Relationship with God -1

John 3:16... Another new meaning ... how can this be? I've always said that if our minds and spirits were open to God that He could reveal something new about this verse each time we read it. I knew that was true but even more so now as I meditate on relationship with God.
 
--For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16 KJV

Sounds pretty straight forward. I guess other people have preconceived notions and understandings about words just like I do.  But I find it has hindered my understanding of what God is really saying or all he is saying in His word.  Whether it is my limited knowledge of the English language or instilled by years of mainstream religious teaching, it can cause a person to read over many truths that God is trying to show us.


My Conventional understanding:

God Loves us so much that he sent his Son to die on a cross so that we can be forgiven and go to Heaven.

Ok, so I’m a simple thinker…..  But basically this was my understanding of it.  What else would you tell a pre-schooler?  Now the fact that I held that and didn’t search it out more, grow in it or open my mind to the Spirit and hear more from God on it is only a mystery.  Pride???  Thinking I know what you know?  Or laziness…. “I know that and don’t need to think about it”.  Or maybe even the law of humanity put in place by God Himself…. “train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it”…   God knew that if something would be learned as a child, it would be sort of hard coded into us and not questioned so easily.  However, if we are not also taught that God is the ever-revealing one and that we should listen to the Spirit and be led by the spirit we can hold too tightly to a single truth, and not receive ALL that God is saying in it as we mature and are ready for the “meat” of the Word.


A little Meat:

For God so loved the world (whole world.. not just those that accept him) that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever (not just the worthy) believeth in him should not perish,(to incur the loss of true or eternal life; to be delivered up to eternal misery) but have everlasting life (begins on earth, just as soon as one becomes united to Christ by faith, see John 17:3  And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. ---
Life eternal is knowing God and Jesus Christ.  Knowing here means an intimate knowledge of him. 

Now I know the truth and am made free to rest in that God gave his son not only so I could go to heaven, but that I would not perish in this life and the life to come.  So that I will not have sickness, disease, lack, a troubled mind, unbelief, or any misery that Satan may try to bring upon me, now and forever!!  That I might come into a wonderful relationship with my creator on a spiritual level equal to that of Adam & Eve before the fall.  

It is not God's will that any be sick, poor or broken.   amen