Lesson 8
On the handout you’ll see a quick review of what we’ve
done in the first 4 verses of the epistle. The top part of the thing
gives you 1 John 1:1-4 and 1 John 1:5- 2:11. Those are the two
sections. What we’re trying to do here is follow the research that has
approached this epistle that has been so hard historically to outline.
This has been one of the hardest epistles over the years for people to kind of
get the argument because John doesn’t appear to have an argument. So the
work that Zane Hodges did at Dallas Seminary where he pointed out that these
epistles were read. They were written to be read to illiterates. So if we
follow a rhetorical outline, how did…when letters were written to be read, how
were they structured? The structure was that there would be an extensive
prologue or preamble. So what we’ve done from 1:1 down to 2:11 appears to
be the introduction. This appears to be the set up for John’s
argument.
But before he gets to the argument, he’s going to have
this preamble. So it’s important that we kind of quickly go over
that. The approach that I’m using here is with a kind of framework.
I handed those pamphlets out the last time, the last time we met. The
framework approach would go – here’s how it works. You basically
look at the text of Scripture as a description of historic reality. This is not
some literary figment of an author’s imagination. We’re talking about
real history here. I emphasize real history because the problem is all of
us - very few of you have been trained in Christian school or have been brought
up in home school where you’ve had a biblically based curriculum. The
result of that kind of education that you’ve been exposed to treats the Bible
as a religious storybook and treats history as something other than the
Scriptures. We have to bridge that. The Scriptures are as much
historical as any other piece of work that’s studied as history. So
that’s the first layer.
The second layer is that if God has done these works
in history, God has not left us to guess how to interpret those works; but He
has also verbally revealed Himself so we can see how to interpret those
words. So we can say that history is God’s show and tell. God shows
us with His acts, then He tells us how to think about those acts.
If He didn’t tell us how to think about the acts then we could not correctly
interpret those actions, those things that have happened in history.
Then in the framework approach we go to a third
level. That is once we’ve done that then we say, “Okay to respect the
authority of Scripture we use the ideas of Scripture (the content of Scripture)
to repent - that is to change our thinking about every area of life. So
in thinking we always think about we always remember 2 Timothy 3.
NKJ 2 Timothy 3:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,
NKJ 2 Timothy 3:17 that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good
work.
So the Scriptures have a sufficiency about them.
We have to hold to that because there’s a tendency even increasingly in
evangelical circles that the Scriptures may be necessary; but they’re not
sufficient.
“You have to supplement the Scriptures with something
else.”
So pastors therefore instead of using Scriptures to
council have to resort to secular psychological processes to counsel. The
Scriptures are sufficient.
Then we said in the first 4 verses. This would
be we call the prologue to the epistle. The emphasis in verse 1 is that
John has heard; he has looked upon; he has seen with his eyes; his hands have
handled concerning the LOGOS of life.
We are looking here - this is a little diagram that
I’ve done I show when I teach the framework proper. That is the response to the
virgin birth or the incarnation is predetermined by your presuppositions of
God, man and nature. You can’t properly interpret the virgin birth or the
incarnation if you don’t hold to the fact that there is a Creator-creature
distinction that God is at sovereign work in history and that He can because He
designed man in His image He can therefore incarnate Himself in man. If
the creation account isn’t true; then the incarnation can’t also be true.
So you have to go – both hold together. This marks the difference
between the biblical God and pagan the gods. In paganism, the gods show
up in zoomorphic forms. YHWH God of the Bible never shows up in
zoomorphic forms. His metaphors are animals, but He never
incarnates Himself in an animal.
So then we have the next one. We have the life
of Christ. The life of Christ is a revelation over many years. Men
like John spent years with Jesus. They learned at least that 3-year
period, they learned a lot about revelation; but it can’t be revelation if you
don’t come to that with a biblical worldview because the basic secular
worldview is there is no such thing as divine revelation. What we’re reading
in the Scriptures is just Jewish autobiography. But if we hold to the
fact that God has created the universe He has created us in His image; He spoke
the universe into existence and therefore He can speak to us. So all
that’s very important.
Then it says here. It talks about verse 2.
That’s so critical because here’s the first time John develops the word life,
l-i-f-e. He says:
NKJ 1 John 1:2 the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear
witness, and declare to you that eternal life
Then he concludes. This is the first time he
uses the term “eternal life.” Since this is the first time in the epistle you
need to look carefully at the context. He said:
which was with the Father and was
manifested to us --
We made the point then and this is so important
biblically is that the God of Scripture is a personal God. He can’t be a
personal God if He’s a solitary being. Allah is a solitary being. A
solitary being is alone. A person can’t fully be a person alone. He
has to have a social dimension. That’s why the trinity is so critical.
Without the trinity you’re going to have a very hard time holding to a personal
god because the question you have to answer if you hold to a solitary god
(solitary being) is then you have to hold - where is the object for Him to
exercise love? There isn’t any object outside a solitary being. That’s
why Allah’s attributes do not include love. Muslim theology does not have
of a love attribute of Allah. It’s consistent. It’s self-consistent.
Love means you love somebody, not yourself. You love something external
to yourself. So this is why we keep going over the trinity. You’ll see that
John does that immediately in the section we are going to deal with this
morning. John starts with the trinity.
Then the third thing we said that comes out of the
prologue is that he says:
NKJ 1 John 1:3 that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may
have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with
His Son Jesus Christ.
This argues for the authority of Scripture. You
can’t come to know God outside of revelation; and you can’t get to the
revelation apart from the apostolic canonical writings. So much for the
other thing that is invading evangelical circles is contemplative prayer - a
lot of the Buddhist techniques, light candles, smell incense and contemplate
your naval. This is supposed to have fellowship with God. That’s not
fellowship with God. That’s nothing more than Buddhism coming over with a
Christian vocabulary.
(Question)
When we get into chapters 4 or 5 we’ll get into the
life and the blood is the question; but John also develops that explicitly
here. So let me take that in context. The life that John is talking
about, and this is a powerful idea. Real life, real eternal life preexisted
matter. Therefore life in its highest form is not material. Life in
its highest form was that which described the internal relationship between
Father, Son and Holy Spirit. That is eternal life. Somehow we share
that when we are born again that we have Christ. That’s what he
says.
with the Father and with His Son
Jesus Christ.
…but has now been manifested in us. In other
words it’s something internal to the trinity that has now been revealed.
So we have then go to the next chunk of Scripture
which we’ll try to get done today is from 1:5 to 2:22. You’ll see in your
handout that it’s part of the larger context from 2:11 and that is daily
interaction with the triune God. I’ve labeled it that was because there
is a progression that occurs in the text here. John starts with our
relationship with the Father then he moves to our relationship with the
Son. Then he moves to our relationship with each other; but doesn’t call
it our relationship with the Holy Spirit right away. So we want to start
that sweep starting in 1:5 moving to 2:11.
Today we’ll just do the section where he’s dealing
with the Father. Watch the difference. This is kind of
interesting. Watch the difference in how he describes God from the
standpoint of God the Father when he switches to describing God as God the
Son. There’s a shift in his imagery. There’s a shift in his
attention.
We start with verse 5 and right and right here we have
an idea approaching it from the framework we’re looking for ideas, doctrines of
the Scriptures We’re not just confining it to a religious ghetto we’re using
the ideas of Scripture to develop a critique all ideas in every area of
life. So watch what happens when we get to verse 5.
NKJ 1 John 1:5 This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you,
Notice he no longer uses the verb to see. Now
it’s only the verb to hear. The reason is that the image here has
switched from the historic incarnation to the message that Jesus taught.
that God is light and in Him is no
darkness at all.
The Greek is emphatic here. We literally
translate it “in Him there is light and no darkness, no none at all.”
(Question)
Possibly.
(Question)
The question is - is he writing to an audience that
would include the gentile pagan idea that light and darkness go together.
The diagram will show that in a little bit here. But that’s always the
feature of paganism. Think about it. If you were an unbeliever, do you
believe in the fall? Do unbelievers believe in the fall? No.
Do unbelievers believe in a final judgment that separates good and evil?
Do unbelievers believe that? If you don’t believe in the fall and you
don’t believe in the final judgment, what is your view of good and evil?
They have to coexist forever. There never was a time without evil and
there will never be a time in the future without evil. So on an
unbelieving basis, you can’t bracket evil. God does. So here God
Himself has no darkness whatsoever. This is a radical idea – a
tremendously radical idea. There is no evil at all. This
immediately sets us up for problem with our culture in the postmodern era,
particularly in the postmodern in which you and I now live.
If you go to the next slide… Try the next
slide. Here we go. Relativism - everyone is enraptured with this
idea. So let me show you two slides. The first slide is the
justification for relativism. What is relativism? Everything is
whatever you think it is.
“That’s evil for you; but that’s not evil for
me.”
In other words it’s relative to whom you are talking
to. It’s all over the place out there. So we look at this.
Ethical judgments merely express an individual’s emotions or attitudes toward
an action or object. The arguments for it and you see it all through the
media, all through the culture today – TV, commentators - circumstances
in generational experience differ from person to person. Well, is that
true? Yes. Because generations differ does that mean standards of
right and wrong differ? Because generations differ, do two and two now
equal 5.3? If there are such a things as truth and standards, that is
illegimate. I don’t care whether circumstances in generations experience differ.
That is irrelevant to an ethical judgment - period. But this is part of
the culture. People disagree and say ethics come out - each generation
has it’s own views. Well, each generation does have its own views; but
that doesn’t change the standard if there is a standard.
Then the second argument is one that is very much in
vogue today is it’s intolerant to impose one’s
view on others. Notice I’ve italicized one’s. Articulating a
biblical frame of reference if God is light and in Him is no darkness at all,
is that one’s view? Let’s think about this. This comes up in
conversations all the time. This goes on over and over and over today -
that it’s intolerant to impose your views on others? What is going to be
your answer if somebody says that to you? It’s not one’s view is
it? That’s the whole point. In other words, this begs the whole
question doesn’t it? If you’re saying you’re imposing one’s view that
assumes the view comes out of subjective man. But that’s the whole
question at stake. Does it come out of man or is it derived from God in whom
there is no darkness? That’s the point of the discussions. So
saying that, “I don’t want to impose my view on others,” that begs the
question. This is not one’s view is it?
Take another analogy. Because your math teacher
in school taught you that two plus two is four - was he imposing his views on
you? Why is that not a case of him imposing his views on you? Because two
plus two is four is universal. So these are two very common things.
If you listen to the media, observe this. I’ll show you why in just a
moment. Observe and be sensitive to this kind of thinking.
Now let’s go to the next slide. Here are the
problems. There are at least 3 problems – 3 major problems with
relativism. All of this comes out of the fact in John in verse 5 is
saying:
NKJ 1 John 1:5 …in Him is no darkness at all.
John in 1:5 is making God’s character the standard of
right and wrong. So it’s not….the standard isn’t derived from Joe three
doors down articulating his view of what is right or wrong.. It doesn’t
emanate either from you or from me. This emanates from God’s
character. So the problem here is that if it’s really true that whatever
is right or wrong is how you feel about it versus what you feel about it versus
what you feel about it - if that’s the case, none of our feelings have anything
to do objectively with the act.
Let’s say we’ve seen a murder here. Maybe we’re
at the LA airport two days ago. We see a TSA agent shot on the
floor. We look at the TSA agent and, “I think that’s evil.”
Somebody else says, “Well, I don’t think so. You
got it coming.”
Well now, have those two views said anything about
this? What have those two views said about? What people thought
about it. So you haven’t articulated a thing about objective evil. All
you’ve given is a plopped out your opinion, which is fine. You have a
right to do that. I have a right to do that. But plopping out an
opinion isn’t talking about that. It’s talking about our opinion.
So that means that on a relativistic basis ethical judgments…and by the way in
speech how do you recognize an ethical judgment is being made? What
do you look for in a sentence? Should or ought – those are the
signals when you’re listening. When you hear should, ought - bingo,
ethical judgment’s being made. That’s when the wheels ought to start
turning.
“Gee, I wonder what standard they’re using here if
we’re interested in talking about the Lord.”
I’ll get the question in just a minute.
It is self-refuting. Why is it self-refuting?
Because, no one can live that way. If the cash turns out to be
counterfeit you give to a drug dealer, does the drug dealer say to himself,
“Well I think it’s wrong?” Or, does he really believe it’s wrong? He believes
it’s wrong. A relativist can never consistently live with his own
relativism. When you short-circuit him or her, boy all of a sudden now
they’re not talking about their opinion. They’re talking about you were wrong
– objectively wrong.
“You cheated me.”
“O gee, I cheated you. I thought you just felt
that you were cheated.”
“No, I was really cheated.”
“Ah! Okay!”
Yes
(Question)
They become a standard. The problem is they’re
not infinite. A finite god has a problem. He’s okay until he meets
another finite god. You have two finite gods on the same conversation,
you have a little problem. So that’s what happens when you get
relativists.
Now let’s look at the third level. Watch the
third problem. It’s even more serious. Not only is it self-refuting, but
it leads to totalitarian politics. Why does relativism lead to
totalitarianism? Think about it. If everyone is for himself,
what kind of a society does that create? Chaos People will not
tolerate chaos. They will prefer total loss of their freedom in order to
have order. This is how dictators rise. This is how totalitarian
states arise. They always arise when you have moral relativistic anarchy
going. This is why we’ve learned something – haven’t we – in
the Middle East. Dictators are necessary in a society that thinks that
way. You can’t knock off a dictator and then you… “Gee we have a mess
here.”
Right, because guess who was holding it
together. The dictator. Dictators are necessary if you are going to
have a misbehaving society - period. You can’t have it any other way.
(Question)
Okay, what Nate’s bringing up…
(Question)
What Nate’s getting at is people are shy about overtly
saying good and should. The problem is what we are having is semantic
manipulation. There are rhetorical tools that we use. Historically
this happened with the Greeks. This is why you can learn from history.
These aren’t new ideas. This is not something that came out in the
2000’s. In the ancient world when philosophy began to fall apart at
a certain period of time there arose a group called the Sophists. The Sophists
believed in relativistic truth. What Sophist teachers did for their
students was teach them rhetoric. That’s where the word rhetoric came
from. They taught their students how to manipulate words to get
results. It did not matter what the salesman was selling. It
did not matter the value, the absolute value, of what was being sold.
What mattered was whether you made the sale. That was the origin of
rhetorical manipulation. The society is loaded with it. The whole
homosexual agenda since 1987 when the homosexual strategist wrote a book on how
to do it – a 6-point strategy and they’ve executed the 6-point strategy
perfectly. They used manipulative logic. In other words use words like
fair without defining them. Use words like discriminate without defining
them. Use words like equal without defining them.
If you don’t define it, people don’t notice what you’re doing with the
word. This is called rhetoric. It is slippery, slimy conversation
and it really requires attention to focus energy to decode this manipulation
that goes on. It makes real conversation very, very difficult. This is
why it is becoming increasingly hard to share the gospel of Christ. This
is a very, very difficult mission field here because of the rhetorical
manipulation that goes on with words - the use of love, tolerance…. Think
about the word tolerance for a moment. Do you tolerate? Is
tolerance necessary if there are no differences? If everyone is the same is
tolerance necessary? The very fact that we’re talking about
tolerance admits that what exists? Differences. But then they
want to eliminate the differences. So when they use the words “you’re
intolerant”, what they’re really decoding the word. What they’re saying
is you’re different from me; and I don’t like it. So therefore your
tolerance means that you are intolerant toward these differences.
It’s a complete inversion of the word.
Yes.
(Question)
What Mike’s brining up here and I’m glad you did
because this introduces sanctification. Part of our sanctification is
growing more and more comfortable with our God’s holiness.
We looked at verse 5 today.
NKJ 1 John 1:5 This is the message which we have heard from Him and
declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.
Now think about what we just talked about. That
separates this from all paganism. They’re incompatible. You can’t
harmonize all religions believe the same thing. No, they don’t as a
matter of fact. And if they don’t then at least one of them is
wrong. So here God is with no darkness at all…and here the pagan view is
that good and evil coexist eternally. Those aren’t two of the same
ideas. Those are different, and you have to choose between one or the
other. The problem we have with verse 5 though as Christians is none of
us is as pure as God is. So now what do we do? That’s why John
brings it up. This is God’s nature.
Remember when we talked about the Trinity I said one
of the tri-unities that Dr. Nathan Woods did back in the 30’s was pointing to
human beings. He said there is a nature behind us. There is the
person we see and there’s the personality which is that person’s
influence. In some sort of very finite way there are some analogies
here. When John speaks of the Father he’s not talking about God
incarnate; he’s talking about God the Father and His nature. He says God the
Father is love. He’s going to do that. Here he’s going to say that
God the Father is light. Interestingly, he only says this twice in the
epistle. One is that God is light. The other is that God is
love. Our present world cannot get those two together. Only the
gospel brings those two qualities together. Today we love to say God is
love. But it is very uncomfortable to say God is light in whom is no
darkness at all. Those two truths go together in this
epistle. That creates tension in sanctification.
So let’s look now at something else. Here is a
question that Joel brought up. This is the idea that good and evil are
eternally together. That’s the pagan view. The biblical view is
here. See the difference? You maintain the foundational good of God
from eternity to eternity because in Him is no darkness at all. That’s a
study.
NKJ Hebrews 13:8 Jesus Christ is the same
yesterday, today, and forever.
Immutability. Below it however in the creation
and remember we said before, we said always think of the Creator-creature
distinction. See you can’t get away from it. Here we go again. The
Creator is different from the creation. The creation – He starts
out the creation perfect. Then there’s the fall. Then evil and good
coexist up until the judgment. Then what we have here is eternal
quarantine. So only in the Christian position is evil bracketed.
That’s tremendous.
When Gary went to Honduras he showed that bottom
diagram - didn’t you Gary – to one of the teenage girls. The expression
on her face was what? Hope. A gal living in poverty, living in a
fallen world and Gary shows them that chart and her face lights up with hope
because “I don’t have to live this way forever and ever.” So this is the
hope.
This is why when Paul talks about in his epistles
about dying.
NKJ 1 Thessalonians
4:13 …lest you sorrow as others who have
no hope.
That’s what he means. Death is a threatening
situation. If you don’t have this view; you can’t have hope in this
life. So these are the structures, the powerful truths of Scripture on which we
can build our lives.
I want you see now if you’ll turn in the epistle. I
want to take you on some verse chains to show you how “God is light” is
anchored at several points here and creates tension in how we interpret some of
these texts because we all know that we’re not light in whom there is no
darkness So how do we mix our unsanctified state having fellowship with a God
who is holy. Look how John does this. Look at 2:1. I’m going
to show you. These are listed in your outline. I want you to see
the vocabulary and how he uses this and how this pops up in this
text.
In chapter 2:1:
NKJ 1 John 2:1 My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not
sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ
The what?
the righteous.
There we go. He can be an advocate because He
shares the same nature as the Father.
NKJ 1 John 1:5 …that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.
That’s how He can be an advocate.
But we say our Advocate has perfect fellowship from
all eternity with the Father.
Let’s turn 2:29. This is another example of how
the uses the word.
NKJ 1 John 2:29 If you know that He is righteous,
Conclusion….
you know that everyone who practices
righteousness is born of Him.
So if you see righteousness, the kind of righteousness
compatible with Him, emerging in the behavior of somebody then you know that
person is born again.
In 3:3 he says:
NKJ 1 John 3:3 And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies
himself, just as He is pure.
These are strong statements. You see that’s why
I want to emphasize here verse 5 because as we get into these verses –
what is this?
NKJ 1 John 3:3 And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies
himself, just as He is pure.
Then we have verse 5.
NKJ 1 John 3:5 And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him
there is no sin.
Affirmation again in Him, in Christ is no sin.
So it appears from these texts that John is fighting something. There is
something he is worried about in these Christians to whom he is writing that
somehow they may be seduced you by this Greek belief that matter…you know, you
don’t have to sweat too much.
“Matter is evil anyway so it doesn’t matter how we
live.”
He’s doing something. He doesn’t tell us exactly
what kind of target he’s shooting at here. But he’s shooting at something
because this is the prologue that sets up the argument that’s going to
come.
Let’s look at verse 6 through 7. That’s all
we’re going to get to this morning; but that’s okay. It’s better to
understand what we’re doing than go speedy.
NKJ 1 John 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk
in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.
NKJ 1 John 1:7 But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship
with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all
sin.
Now here we encounter a feature of Johannine literature.
Next slide. John writes antithetically. You see this again and
again in this epistle. Fist there’s a positive statement.
Then there’s a negative statement. Then there’s a positive
statement. Then there’s a negative statement. Then there is a
positive statement. Then a negative statement. This goes on through
the whole epistle. So we have to get used to this. This is how John
expresses himself. So we’re looking here at a verse. First there is the
light, the perfection of God. Then in verse 6 he’s talking about the talk
versus the walk. darkness. Then verse 7, the light or the cleansing
in fellowship. Observe this as you roll through the text. You’ll
see first one side then the other side, one side then the other side.
Keep in mind this epistle was read to congregations. So probably when it
was read so people could hear it, the person reading it would emphasize his
voice on the positive and then maybe in a different tone the next verse would
sound differently because that was the “bad” verse.
So let’s look then “if we walk in the light”…if we say
we have fellowship. This is something John also does.
He contrasts the walk and the talk. Evidently he’s also coping here with
false teachers who have come in and spoken these words. Now what he’s doing is
refuting them by a standard of behavior compatible with a holy God.
So he says:
NKJ 1 John 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk
in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.
Now that introduces us to another noun that John uses
over and over. So if you’ll look at 1:8. This is the word aletheia, the word for truth. And
here’s how he uses it. I mention this because we sometimes think of truth as
just an abstract. It’s not the way John uses truth. This is
how he looks at truth. Every time he uses that word, this is what he’s
thinking of. In 1:8 - notice what he says there. And notice how he
speaks of the relationship of truth. Notice in verse 6 that we just
read.
NKJ 1 John 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk
in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.
That is an expression we don’t use in our language, is
it? . You don’t hear people saying, “I do the truth.” You think the
truth; I’m impressed with the truth; but we usually don’t say I do the
truth. What does John mean when he says “we practice the truth?” It
sounds to me like it’s a way of living.
Then he says in verse 8 – notice this.
NKJ 1 John 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is
not in us.
That locative thing – he uses the location
preposition. He uses that for abiding in Christ. Now at first
glance you would look at verse 8 and think to yourself, “Gee this person must
be unsaved. There is no truth in him.” But since he’s saying if he
is saying we have no sin, he includes himself here.
He says, “I as an apostle can do this. If I do
this then the truth is not in me.”
Well, what does he mean by “in me?” John looks
at behavior. He looks at the outward thing - what we observe, what we
hear, what we see. The best way of understanding this use of in (the truth is
not in us) is to think that John is
thinking of the personae, the projection of the person, what the person
manifests Him to be. There is nothing in the manifestation. The
truth isn’t in the manifestation. He’s not arguing that the person doesn’t know
the truth; he’s saying the truth isn’t in his appearance.
Look at 2:4 - another example of how he uses this.
NKJ 1 John 2:4 He who says, "I know Him," and does not keep
His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
It’s not in the way this person looks to me from the
outside.
In 2:21 he says:
NKJ 1 John 2:21 I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because
you know it, and that no lie is of the truth.
So he clearly expects his people to know the truth.
He’s going to say later on, “I know that you know the truth, but I want to
point out something.”
There is an inconsistency here with the false
teachers, and you people having known the truth should understand this.
It should be immediately apparent to you that these people are false teachers
because you do know the truth.
Then in 3:18:
NKJ 1 John 3:18 My little children, let us not love in word or in
tongue, but in deed and in truth.
See how he uses it there. That gets back to the
word aletheia as doing the
truth. He’s talking about behavior here.
let us not love in word or in
tongue, but in deed and in truth.
See the word between the walk and the talk. See
here it is again popping up.
Let’s look now at 4:6. He’s talking here
This is a major section on how to spot false doctrine or false teachers. He’s identifying
himself as the apostolic authority.
NKJ 1 John 4:6 We are of God.
This would be totally arrogant to a postmodern
person. Think of this sentence. Watch this sentence and think of
your contemporaries and think how someone well educated in our contemporary
society would look at this and gag. Look at the claim.
He who knows God hears us; he who is
not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit
of error.
What an arrogant statement in today’s culture.
“If you don’t hear me; you’re not of God.”
Now clearly this is a vigorous portrayal of apostolic
authority. This is offensive. But remember what we said. If
God is the creator and we are the creatures and He has revealed Himself through
the Apostle John, why should I be offended if he says this? I’m not
offended if my algebra teacher for correcting my equations am I? Am I
feeling persecuted because the solution to my equation is different? No,
I don’t take that personally. That’s objectively the case.
So finally one more, 5:6. This gets back to the
section. I’m going to eventually come back to Mike’s question about blood
and life.
NKJ 1 John 5:6 This is He who came by water and blood -- Jesus
Christ; not only by water, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who
bears witness, because the Spirit is truth.
Again now we get the third person of the trinity
coming into the case here. We are running out of time today so we only
got down to verse 6. I haven’t finished that yet; but I really think it’s
more important that we get a flavor for this guy than just whipping through
it.
Yes.
(Question)
Mike again bringing up the fact that we all in our
flesh rebel against this sort of thing particularly the places we all rebel in
our flesh is where God’s correcting us. It’s exactly the place
where we’re sloppy, we’re sinful that God works to correct us. That’s the
place we eat. We don’t like that so we kind of back off from that
situation. Be encouraged that God is gracious and God does love us
and takes care of those things.
One concluding question – practical
question. Keep in your mind to ask people that you might be asking to
open a gospel conversation with. This is a diagnostic question that has
to be asked very carefully lest somebody’s defenses go up. So you have to
wait in the conversation for an opportunity to say this in a gracious
way. But here’s the diagnostic question based on 1:5. Do you think that
some things are right and wrong for everyone throughout all of history?
Do you think that some things are right and wrong for everyone throughout all
of history? Why? Whatever answer they give you ask them for
why. You are listening to where they’re coming from as far as an ethical
standard.
(Closing prayer)