Hi Everyone

Here’s this month’s Gone Fishin’ Newsletter.

Every month a team from our fellowship at Calvary Wellington heads out to our regular fishing holes – the Naenae Market and Hillary Court shops, or the Hutt Riverbank Fruit and Vege Market. There we share the Gospel to those in our immediate community. 

Once a month I publish a simple newsletter that is distributed to the fellowship (or for anyone else who stumbles across this website), as a way of encouragement, and as a tool to equip us to be better evangelists.

You can read last years’ Schoolies report here.

Enjoy!

Gone Fishin’ Monthly Newsletter – February 2025

“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,
but in order that the world might be saved through Him.”
(John 3:17).

Hi Everyone

Welcome to the first newsletter for 2025. Actually, it’s the first since last September! My apologies for that, but it seems a lot happens in a short amount of time sometimes, and before I knew it, I was way behind with my reports. We did do outreaches in November and the big one in December. Lord willing, I will try to get more consistent with the reports and newsletters going forward.

As you reflect back on your last year – did you made the best of the opportunities of your time to share the Gospel? We can always do better (myself included!). But the good news is, we have a God that forgives and does not hold us accountable for our shortcomings. So, just like everything else in life, we put it behind us, learn the lessons from it, and with God’s help, plan to improve going forward!

You can read last years’ Schoolies report here.

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Everybody knows John 3:16, even many in the world can recite it word for word. Alongside Psalm 23, it’s the most famous verse in the Bible.

But could you quote the next verse, John 3:17?
I’m guessing that a few could, but most of you probably couldn’t. I know I wouldn’t have been able to. And that’s the dilemma with verses in the Bible; they are a fantastic tool to help commit to memory God’s truth, but they can also be a hindrance in that we can gloss over context and miss other gems.

We know this is true for John 3:17, as the verse begins with the word “for”. This is a dead giveaway that Jesus was clarifying an earlier point. So, we need to dive deeper into John 3 to find the context.

John 3 begins with a Pharisee named Nicodemus coming to Jesus by night to talk with Him. He affirms that Jesus is from God (v1-3).
Jesus states to Nicodemus that he must be born again. This begins much discussion, and Jesus affirms that it is a spiritual birth that must take place, not a physical one (v4-9).
Jesus chastises the Pharisee for being a spiritual teacher, yet not seeing that it is being fulfilled in front of his eyes through Jesus Himself (v10-14).
Then He segues to the reason why He came, stating He must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in Him will have eternal life. Here Jesus is prophesying of His crucifixion (v15).

Then we run into the first “for” verses:
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (v16).
Before we added context, all we had was this verse stating to just believe in the Son. Although this is true, it does not accurately reflect the driving force behind why we should believe in Him. Many unbelievers I talk to can quote this verse, but it does not drive them to their knees, because they don’t know that they need regeneration and be born again and have their sins crucified. To leave this important fact out could produce a false convert. Anyone can read a history book and confidently believe that Jesus died on a cross. That doesn’t make one a true believer. Even the devil believes in Jesus, but it will not do him any good because he will never be born again!

Then our verse for today:
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.”
Another “for” verse, meaning this is not another stand-alone statement. So, again we read it considering the previous verses. Let’s follow the breadcrumbs from what we already know:

I must be born again spiritually,
Jesus must be crucified; I must believe Him taking my sins on the cross for this to happen,
If I do believe this, I am saved and born again and have eternal life,
If I do not believe this, I am not saved or born again and will perish.

Doesn’t this paint a completely different picture of Jesus? He is the only one who can save us from perishing. He didn’t come to condemn us, He came to save us from condemnation.

Many paint God out to be a cosmic bully: Follow all My rules perfectly or I will smash you.
The reality is totally different: You can try and follow all My rules, but you will fail. This means that you will perish in hell. Therefore, you need someone who can take your hell punishment on your behalf. My Son Jesus offers to do this for you through His death on the cross, where I crushed Him with your sin. Believe in Jesus doing this for you and you will be born again and not perish.

So now can you see that adding context to these verses make the story richer? This is the beauty of God’s word when we read and apply it properly.
It was necessary for Nicodemus to come and ask all these questions of Jesus, so that he (and us) could hear the Gospel; being that Jesus Himself must be lifted up on a cross and be crucified in our place, in order for sinners like Nicodemus, like you, and like me, to trust in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins – to be born again, and to be saved. It is in hearing these words we become children of God. This is the message we trust, and it is the message we must tell others!

Never stop bringing to mind your favourite verses. But do yourself a favour – read them in context to the verses and chapters around them. If you do this, one of two things will happen:
you will see that you got the meaning of the verse completely wrong, requiring repentance and a change of your thoughts and behaviour, or;
you will see that the meaning of the verse is a lot richer than you thought, having much deeper implications than you gave it credit for.

Either way, you will give glory to God for the perfection of His Word to us!

I’ll see you at my place on Saturday at 10am for prayer before heading down to the Naenae shops. This will be our first time down there since the pool has re-opened, so hopefully that will mean there will be more people about!

Blessings,

Craig.

Witnessing Tip: The Bible shows us the way!

If you want to see the the law/gospel model working at it’s best,
Read how the Master does it in John 4!