What does it mean to believe?

No one has gone up to heaven except the Son of Man, who came down from there (v. 13). Sin caused God to punish the Israelites with fiery serpents that bit the people so that many died (Num. 21:4-9). God provided a remedy by commanding Moses to make a brass serpent, so that when any stricken person looked to this serpent, he would be healed. Likewise, our salvation happens when we look up to Jesus, believing He will save us. God has provided this way for us to be healed of sin’s deadly bite. (vv. 14-15). If we don’t know Christ, we make choices as though this life is all that we have, when in reality, this life is just the introduction to eternity. To believe in Christ is more that intellectual agreement that Jesus is God (v. 16). It means to put our trust and confidence in Him that He alone can save us. It is to put Christ in charge of our present plans and eternal destiny. Believing is both trusting in His words as reliable, and relying on Him for the power to change.

God did not send His Son into the world to condemn its people. He sent Him to save them (v. 17)! No one who has faith in God’s Son will be condemned. But everyone who doesn’t have faith in Him has already been condemned for not having faith in God’s only Son (v. 18). Sinful men love darkness rather than light because the closer they get to the light the more their sins are exposed (vv. 19-21). Just as natural light shows up what is otherwise unseen, so Christ, the Light, exposes people’s evil deeds. It is not the intellectual problems but spiritual blindness that keeps people from Christ.