Wide-Eyed Wonder: Opening the Gift of the Gospel - Part 2 John 3:16

1. Cindy’s Recurring Christmas Dilemma

2. She was actually giving back
what belonged to others.

3. Amy Carmichael
1867 - 1951
One of the best known and
respected missionaries in the first
half of the 20th century.
Gave up her comfort and safety
in order to give comfort and
safety to abused children.

4. “You can always give
without loving. But you
cannot love without giving.”
Amy Ca r m i c h a e l

5. She was actually giving away
what God had given to her.

6. Because God is love,
God loves to give.
James 1:17 Every good gift and every
perfect present comes from heaven; it
comes down from God, the Creator of
the heavenly lights, who does not change
or cause darkness by turning. (GNT)

7. Miroslav Volf
Free of Charge (2006)
“God is essentially a giver
just as God is love…God is
a giver more the way ducks
are quackers than in the
way I’m a biker.”
Explain Volf’s comparison.

8. Because God is love,
God loves to give.
Matthew 7:11 As bad as you are, you
still know how to give good gifts to your
children. But your heavenly Father is
even more ready to give good things
to people who ask. (CEV)

9. God, the Prodigal Giver
Luke 15:29 But he spoke back to his
father, ‘Look, all these years I have
worked for you like a slave, and I have
never disobeyed your orders. What have
you given me? Not even a goat for me to
have a feast with my friends! 30 But this
son of yours wasted all your property on
prostitutes, and when he comes back
home, you kill the prize calf for him!’ 31
‘My son,’ the father answered, ‘you are
always here with me, and everything I
have is yours. (GNT)

10. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that
whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life.”
John 3:16

11. God the Giver

12. God the Giver

13. Our Recurring Christmas Dilemma

14. Whatever we have to give that’s precious
and priceless, God gave it to us first.

15. Because God gave us Jesus, we have been given
the gift of God’s unconditional forgiveness…

16. …of God’s prodigal love

17. …of a radical new way of sharing
this planet with everybody else

18. God doesn’t want us to give these back to him.

19. God wants us to give away his gifts to the world.