The Heart of the Gospel {For God So Loved the World} by A. T. Pierson


Phila	delphia > The Heart of the Gospel {For God So Loved the World} by A. T. Pierson

III. Now let us look at the third pair of words, world and whosoever. It need not be said that those are both universal terms. World is the most universal term that we have in the language. For instance, we sometimes mean by it the whole earth on which we dwell; sometimes the whole human family that dwells on the earth; and sometimes the world-age, or whole period during which the whole family of man occupies the sphere. That is the word that God uses to indicate the objects of His love. But there is always danger of our losing sight of ourselves in a multitude of people. In the great mass individuals are lost, and it becomes to us simply a countless throng. But when God looks at us, he never forgets each individual. Every one of you stands out just as plainly before the Lord as though you were the only man, woman, or child on earth. So God adds here another word, whosoever, that is also universal, but with this difference between the two: world is collectively universal, that is, it takes all men in the mass; whosoever is distributively universal, that is, it takes everyone out of the mass, and holds him up separately before the Lord. If this precious text only said, "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son," one might say, "Oh, He never thought of me. He had a kind of general love to the whole world, but He never thought of me." But when God uses that all-embracing word "whosoever," that must mean you and me; for whatever my name or yours may be, our name is whosoever, is it not? John Newton used to say that it was a great deal better for him that this verse had the word "whosoever" in it than the words John Newton;

Blessed be the Lord! He would not have us forget that He thought of each one of us, and so He said, "whosoever." You notice the same thing in the great commission, "Go ye into all the world" (collectively universal) "and preach the Gospel to every creature" (distributively universal). [Mark 16:15]

Before I leave this pair of words, let me illustrate what a precious term this word whosoever is. It reminds me of the great gates of this Tabernacle, that spring open to let in poor souls that want to hear the Gospel. This word whosoever is the wide gateway to Salvation, and lets in any poor sinner who seeks to find for himself a suffering but reigning Savior.

In the South Seas, in the beginning of the present century, was a man of the name of Hunt, who had gone to preach the Gospel to the inhabitants of Tahiti. The missionaries had labored there for about fourteen or fifteen years, but had not, as yet, a single convert. Desolating wars were then spreading across the island of Tahiti and the neighboring islands. The most awful idolatry, sensuality, ignorance, and brutality, with everything else that was horrible, prevailed; and the Word of God seemed to have made no impression upon those awfully degraded islanders. A translation of the Gospel according to John had just been completed, and Mr. Hunt, before it was printed, read from the manuscript translation, the third chapter; and, as he read on, he reached this sixteenth verse, and, in the Tahitian language, gave those poor idolaters this compact little gospel: "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have Everlasting Life."

A chief stepped out from the rest (Pomare II), and said, "Would you read that again, Mr. Hunt?" Mr. Hunt read it again. "Would you read that once more?" and he read it once more. "Ah!" said the man, "that may be true of you white folks, but it is not true of us down here in these islands. The gods have no such love as that for us." Mr. Hunt stopped in his reading, and he took that one word whosoever, and by it showed that poor chief that God's Gospel message meant him; that it could not mean one man or woman any more than another. Mr. Hunt was expounding this wonderful truth, when Pomare II said, "Well, then, if that is the case, your book shall be my book, and your God shall be my God, and your people shall be my people, and your heaven shall be my home. We, down on the island of Tahiti, never heard of any God that loved us and loved everybody in that way." And that first convert is now the leader of a host, numbering nearly a million, in the South Seas.

Reference has already been made to the fact that this was the great text that Dr. Clough found so blessed among the Telugus. When the great famine came on, in 1877, and the missionaries were trying to distribute relief among the people, Dr. Clough, who was a civil engineer, took a contract to complete the Buckingham Canal, and he got the famishing people to come in gangs of four thousand or five thousand. Then, after the days work was over, he would tell them the simple story of redemption. He had not yet learned the Telugu language sufficiently to make himself well understood in it, but he had done this: he had committed to memory John 3:16 in the Telugu tongue. And when, in talking to his people, he got "stuck," he would fall back on John 3:16. What a blessed thing to be able at least to repeat that! Then he would add other verses, day by day, to his little store of committed texts, until he had a sermon, about half-an-hour long, composed of a string of texts, like precious pearls. I have sometimes thought that I would rather have heard that than many modern sermons. So, once again the great text that God used for bringing souls to Christ was still Luther's little gospel: "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have Everlasting Life."