Amen. Well, it is a joy to be here with you all this Lord's Day morning. Please rise as we hear God speak in and by his holy word. From the first epistle of John, chapter 2, first epistle of John, chapter 2, verses 3 to 6. Now by this we know that we know him if we keep his commandments. He who says, I know him, and does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps his word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in him. He who says he abides in him ought himself also so to walk just as he walked. Congregation, this is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Amen. You may be seated. Well, there is a classic movie, you probably have seen it or heard of it, a classic musical called Fiddler on the Roof. It's an excellent musical. And there is a famous scene in which the main character, Tevye, asks his wife of many years, Golda, do you love me? And you can hear the tune probably in your mind if you've seen it. And she responds, for 25 years I've washed your clothes, cooked your meals, cleaned your whole house, given you children, milked your cow. After 25 years, why talk of love right now? Well, this does not satisfy Tevye. He asks again, Golda, do you love me? And she replies, I'm your wife. And Tevye responds, I know, but do you love me? This amazing scene captures a remarkable tension. How else would Golda ordinarily express her love to Tevye, but by doing all of the things she has done for her husband? Indeed, if that is not love, I don't know what is. And yet, such acts of love, considered strictly as acts, are not enough to satisfy Tevye's question. A slave or, sadly, a mistress could do these things just as well. The classic song touches the nerve of our passage this morning. The Apostle John returns again to the theme of Christian assurance, but he does not return again simply to repeat himself like a broken record. He returns again to the theme in the way you drive to different points along the south rim of the Grand Canyon to see and then to show more of the true faith and what it means to believe in Jesus. What we are to learn this morning is that while true knowledge of Christ always reveals itself in obedience to the commandments of God, such obedience is and must be the growing and maturing fruit of love to God, or it is not what it might appear to be. In short, you may know that you know Christ by your love-born, love-begotten obedience to the commandments of Christ. God willing, we will expound this teaching under three headings. First, we will consider the possibility of Christian assurance, the distinct, the real possibility of Christian assurance. Second, we will consider the necessity of obedience to Christ the Lord. And third, the only source and spring of such obedience, namely love, a growing and maturing love to God. As stated above, John returns to the theme of Christian assurance, and what he says may sound like repetition. Indeed, much in the beloved apostle's epistle sounds like repetition. If you've read it, you remember that, I'm sure. And yet it is not bare repetition. It never is bare repetition. When the Bible repeats itself, we're always to see something deeper or more into the truth that we have been enlightened by the Holy Spirit to see. He returns to the theme to further expand it and to introduce us to another vital theme of his epistle, a theme that is also vital to his gospel. This is the theme of love. In 1 John 1, verse 5, we heard John declare the unapproachable brilliance of the absolute moral perfection of the holy God. God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. There is one other place in 1 John in which the apostle by the Holy Spirit tells us what God is, and this is in 1 John 4, verse 8. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. Our purpose here is not to expound upon this momentous phrase, but only to show that the introduction of the theme of love, truly the love of God is perfected in him, is not random. Nothing is random in nature. Nothing, absolutely nothing, is random in Scripture. John is going somewhere, and when it comes to the doctrine of assurance, the doctrine of God as light, and the necessity of our walking in the light, as he is in the light, is essentially and organically related to the teaching of the doctrine of God as love, and the necessity, therefore, of walking in love. Love to God, love to Christ, love to one another, our brothers and our sisters in the Church. With this in mind, let us jump into the passage. What do we read in verses 3 and then in verse 5? We read, now by this we know that we know him. This is again repeated in verse 5. By this we know that we are in him. In previous lessons, we have said that one of the purposes of 1 John is that we, as believers, would know with certainty that we have eternal life through faith in the Son of God, Jesus Christ. He does not tell us this to produce anxiety. He tells us this to grant assurance. And this is what John is doing in verses 5 and 3. Listen to what he says. By, or literally in this, by this we know that we know Him. Also, by this we know that we are in Him. Here is the point. This blessed saving knowledge of Christ, This blessed residence in the sun is capable of being known. It's capable of being known by yourself, and I would assume also by others as well, to some degree. This is capable of being known. By this we know that we know Him. God did not send His only begotten Son into the world to save sinners from their sin, but then to leave them dangling in miserable suspense as to whether they are or will be saved. He came to save his people from their sins and to give them the knowledge of that salvation that they might know that they know that they are in him who is true. Assurance of salvation is not only possible, however, it is expressly, verbatim, willed by God through the mouth of his holy apostle. By this we know. The Westminster Confession of Faith summarizing scriptural teaching on this point says, in chapter 18, verse 1, article 1, such as truly believe in the Lord Jesus may in this life certainly be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace. State of grace is just a 17th century technical dogmatic term for what? Knowing God. Being in the sun. Having eternal life. That's what they're saying. We may know that we know him. It is not only a possibility, though, the confession goes on to say that it is the duty of everyone to make their calling and election certain. We also see this implied in our passage. Now, by this we know that we know him. God gives us a way to know because he is love. He loves his people and intends that every one of his children know the Father's love in the Son. It is not to produce anxiety. This teaching is designed, it's calculated to produce peace and joy and superabounding thankfulness to God. This is why It exists. Now, there are two lessons here for the Church. First, we should reject as wrong and unbiblical any teaching which denies believers the possibility of knowing the assurance of their being in Christ. There are a number of Christian traditions which sadly, grievously do this. But second, we should beware of affirming the possibility of assurance on paper or in the catechism, but in other ways regarding it as the privileged possession of a small elite group of Christians. R.C. Sproul's got it. Well, of course. Not me, though. It is not the possession of a small elite group of believers. It is the possession of all believers. It's intended for all. What does John say? By this we know. Who's the we? He's not talking about only the apostles. Of course. He's talking about the whole church. By this we know. So how do we know? Well, he tells us. Rather, God tells us. If we keep his commandments. He who says, I know him, and does not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. Have you ever wondered at how simply and directly the Holy Spirit speaks in and by the Word of God? There are portions of scripture which are not so simple. As Peter reminds us, some things are hard to understand. Yet in other places, such as we have here, our Lord opens his mind to us in such simple, clear, and unambiguous language that a small child can understand. It's so simple, it's hard. Dad, how do I know I really know God? You do what he tells you to do. How do I know I love Jesus? You do what he tells you to do. The verb keep, meaning guard or observe. By the way, just as a side note, this is not a kind of a one-off thing. If you're guarding something, what are you doing? You're fixed on it. You're looking at it. You don't dare take your eyes off of it. This is not a one-time thing. The word keep and the noun commandments have a long and rich history in the Old Testament as being connected with the revealed law of God and specifically the Ten Commandments. John is speaking in deeply covenantal legal language if we keep his commandments. This association is present in the New Testament as well. How does Jesus respond when the rich young ruler asks him, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And how does Jesus respond? Keep the commandments. It's the same words. Keep the commandments. Thou shalt do no murder. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Honor thy father and thy mother, and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. He gives him the second table of the law. Those who know God, those who truly know God, love and do what he wills. And his will is perfectly summarized in the Ten Commandments. Those who do not love God's law and are not seeking by grace through faith to frame their attitudes and speaking and actions according to its holy precepts, those who reject it and choose instead to live in sin, regardless of what they say, do not actually know God and will not inherit eternal life. The author of the Hebrews, the holiness without which no man will see the Lord. We must love and keep the commandments. But dawn does not stop here. He says something else expounding upon what it actually meant and what it always means to keep the Ten Commandments. Keeping the commandments, you notice in our passage, is paralleled with keeping his, that is Jesus Christ's, word. John is not defining obedience along the lines of some civic Judeo-Christian order. I'll let the Muslims come in, too. We'll call it Abrahamic. Then everyone will be happy. He's not defining the law according to some secular dream of a Judeo-Christian Abrahamic world order. This is not what he means. The eternal Son of God, Jesus Christ, was and is and ever shall be, as Paul tells us, the end of the law. The end of the law, purpose, the end of the lawful righteousness to everyone who believes. Jesus is central to the law. This is why Muslims do not even keep the first commandment, because they do not know or worship the true God. What does the first commandment command us to do? It's to worship the true God. And they do not do that because they reject his only begotten Son. And if you reject the Son, you do not have the Father. 1 John 2, 23. If they kept his commandments, they would believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Likewise, unbelieving Jews do not keep the commandments, despite an outward or civic appearance. because they are living in rebellion against the Messiah. You can't keep the commandments and rebel against the Messiah of Adonai. They're rebelling against their own Messiah. They can't keep the commandments. If they truly kept the commandments, they would obey the Lord. They would kiss the sun. and receive him as he is, their appointed Lord and Savior. What did Peter preach on Pentecost? Now, by God's grace alone, and hear me, it is by God's grace alone that we are not Muslims or unbelieving Jews. By God's grace, we are Christians. But the apostle's question remains. As we read in our readings this morning, do you keep Do I keep the commandments? You wear his name. Do you walk even as he walked? He says, he who says, I know him. I raised my hand. I went forward 20 years ago at an altar call. Do you keep his commandments? The one you pledged to serve? Do you walk even as he walked? Man, when I was younger, I did some radical things for Christ, probably more than anyone in this room. Great. Are you walking in his commandments now? How about the simple commandments, like honoring your mother or father? Are you doing that? He who says, I know him, I've gone to seminary. I've read all of Calvin and Francis Turretin and corrected them. That's wonderful. Do you love the God that Calvin and Francis Turretin were writing about? Do you obey his commandments, the God whom they served? And that's kind of low-hanging fruit. I'm here every Sunday. I'm on the membership rolls. I know him. I participate in the life of the church. I'm a covenant member. By the way, praise God for that. You should be here every Sunday. Would that all of Apache Junction were here every Sunday. Would that all of this city woke up on Sunday morning and said, it's the Lord's day, let's go to church. And we believe that can happen. Would that all the world streamed to the house of God with joy, but is your mere physical presence, is the mere physical presence. the church. Is that sufficient? The same question, do you keep his commandments? All of these things, apart from what the Apostle John says here, all of these things, some of them are not commanded. We're not commanded to sign a card. Some of them are commanded. Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together. But all of these things apart from what the Apostle John describes here, he who says, I know him and does not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. As John puts it in another way in chapter 3, verse 10, in this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil. Whosoever doth not righteousness is not of God. Now John is not teaching sinless perfectionism. We've covered that a number of times in our lessons. Keeping his commandments includes the regular confession of sin and walking in new obedience. He's not teaching sinless perfection. It is inclusive of ongoing repentance. And by the way, sometimes this repentance is deep and painful. It's as painful as David's repentance in Psalm 51. It's as deep and as grievous as Peter's repentance after denying the Lord. The keeping of the commandments does not exclude sin, confession, repentance, and new obedience. It's inclusive of these things. He is describing, as we said before, first, the determination of one's heart, the desire of the heart. Do you desire to keep the commandments of God? But secondly, the ongoing and habitual pattern of one's life. By your fruit, by their fruit, you will know them. This teaching is not obscure or oppressive. It is illuminating and liberating. It frees us from the unbiblical and therefore unreliable tests of assurance devised by men. John is not leading us into the labyrinthine maze to be devoured there by our own remaining corruption. So many people think of assurance like this, it's just a maze, and once you get in, one's gonna die. He's not leading us into the maze, he's leading us out of the maze and onto the sunlit, discernible path of obedience to God, trodden by Christ who went before us. purchased by his blood, which he shed on the cross, and then empowered by his Spirit that he has sent to dwell in your hearts. Well, this brings us to our next point. In verse 5, which is the heart of our passage, the Apostle John reveals something deeper, not only about what it means to know God, but about what it means to obey Christ. But whoever keeps his word, he says, truly the love of God is perfected in him. There is an unbreakable bond between knowledge, love, and obedience in the heart and life of a believer. These are not separate things. They are distinct, but they are never separated. This is one organic whole. I want to focus your attention on the phrase, love of God. Now, the question many like to ask at this point is, does the love of God refer primarily to God's love for the believer, or does it refer to the believer's love for God? Do you understand the question? But whoever keeps his word truly the love of God, well, whose love? the love of God, God's love for and in the believer, or the believer's love for God. Now, this does not have to be an either-or. And personally, I think John is intentionally layering these meanings. I have usually read it, typically read it, as God's love for and at work in the believer. And this is true. This is what the Bible teaches, Philippians 2.13, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to do for his good pleasure. If you're walking in the light, it's because you were brought into the light. You were made a son of light, and you are empowered by the Holy Spirit to walk in the light. It is God who works in you, first at regeneration. It is God who works in you always, moment by moment, day by day, week by week, gradually, to sanctify you, to make you more and more like Jesus. And this is a perfectly good interpretation. But after reading a couple standard commentaries, Calvin, Matthew, Henry, I was impressed by their reasoning that John has primarily in mind the believer's love to God. He's teaching us something about the obedience of the believer, the relationship between that obedience and love to God. What is the apostle saying? He's saying that love to God is the living principle in the heart of a believer, productive of obedience to Christ's words. Love is the fire. It's the living principle in the heart of a believer, love to God. that is productive of obedience to the Word of Christ. To love God is to obey Him who came from God, even His Son, Jesus Christ. Now, notice this love is not static. It's not inert. It's not a dead thing. This love is alive and growing. It grows and develops and reaches maturity. Presumably it starts small, maybe not, but the point is is that it matures, it grows, and we see this in the verb. The passive verb is perfected, comes from a verb which means to make perfect or to complete or to bring to perfection. It's not something that comes, boom, No, it's like a seed, right? It's like a seed, and it grows, and it has an end. It has a purpose. It's been planted for a reason, it's being tended for a reason, and it's going to produce fruit for a reason. Similarly, the quality of our obedience likewise reflects the quality of our love. Think about a fire, a campfire. The love of a believer may be small, as small as a smoldering wick. But even a smoldering wick emits some light and some heat. There is no fire that does not emit something. Because if it's true fire, there's true emissions. There's heat. There's light. What may at one time be a smoldering wick, maybe that's you this morning, is destined by the grace of God to become an inextinguishable fire that will burn with perfect obedience for eternity. But whoever keeps his word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. Jesus teaches the same thing. John is not making this up. Jesus taught the very same thing in the 14th chapter of the Gospel of John. Listen to what he says. If you love me, keep my commandments. And again, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word. You notice the similar words? It's the same word. He who does not love me does not keep my word. This is how we know. Do we keep his word? Now, what lesson are we to learn from John so joining obedience to Christ with love to God? There's this relationship. They go together. They can never be separated, they can be distinguished, but we can never pull them apart. What are we to learn about this joining of the two? First, we must never separate what God has joined together. Love obeys. It must obey, or it is not actually love. Oh brother, you don't understand. I love Jesus, I do. I love Jesus. I just don't love my wife anymore. And frankly, she doesn't love me. And we've both decided it's probably best if we just leave. But I love Jesus, don't get me wrong. No, no, no, no, no, no, I love Jesus. If you love me, keep my commandments. Stay married as Christ commands. This is how you love God. This is how love expresses itself. Look, I've had a busy week. I'm tired. The kids are a wreck. We don't need to go to church every Sunday. Let's just, look, we can maybe, here's what we'll do. We'll watch it online like three Sundays a month. And, you know, one Sunday a month, that's great. But we don't really need to be there. It's not that important. We can just get the message, you know, we have fellowship with people here. It's not that important. Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together. If you love me, keep my commandments. As we heard last week, you can't eat bread and wine in your home separately. That's contrary to the whole design of the one bread and the one cup. If you love me, keep my commandments. This is how you love God. It is by keeping his commandments. This is how you know you love God. It's by keeping his commandments. I didn't have a real radical conversion experience like this guy, you know. Do you keep his commandments? Well, yes. Well, good. You love God. I don't know if I'm part of the right church. I mean, what if the Orthodox are right and I'm outside of Christ because I'm outside of the Orthodox Church? Or what if the Catholics are right before Second Vatican Council and I'm damned? Do you keep his commandments? If you love me, you will keep my commandments. How does Golda love Tevye? By doing precisely what she's been doing since they got married. But here's the second error, which may be more relevant to us in this room, and it is to assume that obedience, when we think of obedience, it consists of visible or external completion of a covenant checklist. Well, dear, it's our anniversary again. Here's your annual card, bouquet of roses, and an expensive dinner. I'm gonna go hang out with the guys. What wife would be honored by this? True obedience is always and ever from a heart of love and thankfulness. Nope, church. Get dressed. Sit up straight. Do good. Do you love? True obedience is always and ever from a heart of love. But whoever keeps his word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. God is not rightly honored or served by people whose bodies are in the right building, whose lips say the right word, whose mouths taste the right food, but whose hearts are far away from him. whose hearts are dead and cold and who do not have the love of God in them. This is not true obedience. It never was, it never is, it never shall be. What does the author, what does Solomon say in Proverbs 23, 26? My son, give me your heart. and let your eyes observe my ways. There's an order there. My son, give me your heart and let your eyes observe my ways. I'd like to begin to wrap up this lesson by returning to something mentioned above. The question whether love of God primarily refers to our love to him or his love for us. Having explained, I hope, the necessary connection between our obedience and our love, that we keep his commandments and we strive to keep his commandments. This isn't just like, just let it happen. We're striving, we're pressing on, as we heard this morning. Striving to attain that for which Christ is a hold on us. But having explained this connection between that, obedience, and love, I believe it is best to end by showing the connection between our love to God and his prior and all-powerful love for us and in us. Perhaps you are here and you are not a Christian. You have not been baptized. You do not believe in Jesus. The question of assurance is not relevant because you do not have any salvation yet to be assured about. You are outside of Christ. You are without God and without hope in the world. And if that is you this morning, the message for you is repent and believe in Jesus. Believe and be baptized. What does Jesus say in John 3, 16? For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Do you want to have everlasting life? Believe in Jesus and be cleansed. Now to believers, to the church, to us who confess his name, do we keep his commandments? Do we tolerate those who come to us saying they know him, but do not keep his commandments? Do we flirt with them? Are we listening to them? Are we buying into that lie? Do we keep his commandments? Do you walk even as he into whose name you were baptized? Do you walk even as he whose name you confess? Do you keep his commandments? If you do not, if you like the sons of Eli, Think about the sons of Eli from 1 Samuel. Circumcised sons of the high priest. Pretty good. And yet what does it say? They knew not Jehovah. And how was that demonstrated? They despised his worship. You know, despising his worship doesn't mean coming in and disrupting a worship service. That can happen in your heart. They despised the worship of Jehovah, and they slept with the women at the door of the temple, the tabernacle. They knew not Jehovah. If that is you, if you are living in secret sin, unrepentant, then repent, and as the prophet Joel proclaimed to the people of Judah, surrender your heart and not your garments. Save your clothes. Rend your heart. My son, give me your heart. And let your eyes observe my statutes. Repent. Rend your heart and not your garments. And listen to this. Listen to the promise. It's extended. Return to Jehovah, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness, and he relents from doing harm. Return to Jesus, your God. Rend your heart. And you know what? He will give you a new heart, a heart that loves God. and that follows and walks in all of his ways. But if you do keep Christ's commandments as we described, then despite, listen to this, despite the constant assaults of the world, the flesh, and the devil, even despite your own particular sins, which you confess and repent of and forsake, if you walk in the light, if you keep his commandments, if you keep his word, then be assured, you genuinely love God. Despite your imperfections, despite your failures, despite the weaknesses, and the sins that you grieve and repent of. Despite those things, if you are walking in the light, if you are keeping His commandments, be assured, you genuinely love God. You know His Son. You know His Son, and more importantly, He knows you. Depart from me, for I never knew you. Who? You who practice Lawlessness. We're not talking about a sin that you repent of. John has dealt with that. We're talking about those who practice lawlessness. Your love may be, as I said, as small and vulnerable as a smoldering wick, and it's starting to rain. But do not be discouraged, do not despair. Christ does not despise it, the smoldering wick he will not snuff out. Christ does not despise it, why? Because he ignited it by the breath of his Holy Spirit. You think you lit that fire by yourself? You didn't light that fire, he lit it. He said, let there be, and there was light. And that light has shown in your heart to give you the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. He ignited it. And he will bring it to completion. God will bring it to completion at the day of Christ. He will protect it. He will perfect it. Why? And here's where we want to land. Because he loved you first. He loved you first. He didn't look down the corridor of eternity and say, ooh, that person right there, he loves me, I'm gonna love him now. No, he looked down the corridor of history, as Paul tells us in Ephesians chapter one, and he says, I love you. And because I love you, you will love me. And what greater joy, what greater gift could there be than to love God? He loved you first. We love Him, John says, because He first loved us. And how did He love us? Why do you love Him? How did He love us? In this is love. Not that we loved God. We didn't. but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 1 John 4, 10. He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins, that you might, that you may, by the power of His Spirit, be given a heart to love Him. He didn't shed His blood to forgive you of your sins, but to keep you a wicked sinner. He shed his blood to forgive you of your sins, to be the propitiation for your sins, in order that what? The blessing of the new covenant might be yours. I will give them a new heart and they will walk in all of my ways. He did this to give you a new heart, a heart which loves God and does his commandments. You see, those aren't different things. We put them together because the Bible always puts them together. He died for us that we might be forgiven. Why? That we might love him and do his commandments and walk in his ways. So love your wife, love your husband, pray for your children, be patient with them. Love your brother, that brother. Love your sister, that sister in the church. Love one another, even as God has loved you and will always love you in his son. I would like to end with this prayer of confident hope and humble petition offered by David in the 138th Psalm, verse eight. Jehovah will perfect that which concerns me. Your mercy, O Jehovah, endures forever. Do not forsake the works of your hands. Amen.