up singing it. Would you take God's Word this morning, please, and open to the book of 1 John. And I want you to, we're going to be looking at several verses here this morning, but to read 1 John, I want to just read chapter 5, and we'll read a few verses out of chapter 5 of 1 John. Would you stand for the reading of God's Word today? Stand for the reading of God's Word, 1 John chapter 5, verse 1. Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. And everyone that loveth him that begot, loveth him also that is begotten of him. And by this know we love the children of God, and we love God and keep his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments, and his commandments are not grievous. For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world, and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Thank you so very much, you may be seated. Would you pray with me today? Father, thank you for the privilege we have of coming together to study the scripture. Lord, please open our eyes that we might behold beautiful things, wonderful things out of your word. Speak to hearts, strengthen the faith of those who are here, save souls for your glory. And we pray in Jesus' name, amen. So I want to just begin a series through the epistles of John, several reasons for this. You know, when we had our Q&A a few weeks ago, there were a lot of questions that came up about assurance of salvation. And I was honestly kind of surprised at so many of the questions regarding this area of assurance. And so I thought it'd be good to just speak on it from the epistles of John. And the other thing is I have a book that's coming hot off the press, it's a commercial here, I guess you could say, that should be in print in a few weeks, I'm assuming. The publisher contacted me again just Friday and said, hey, everything's going forward. And this is, again, just designed to help believers with this one area of assurance. So what I want to do is just kind of talk about this and really give you an overview of First John here today. Well, Fredo Gárez lived a life of an illegal immigrant for about 35 years. Year after year, he eked out a living, crossing the border from Mexico into the United States, trying to find work. Some days he would find work, some days he wouldn't. But regardless, he was constantly looking over his shoulder. And on a few of those occasions when he was trying to get into the US, he was caught and he was bused back to Mexico. Undeterred, he would go back. He would swim across the Rio Grande back into the US. And this process perhaps would have continued for a longer time had not have been for an amazing discovery. One day, Wilfredo worked up the courage to go to a immigration lawyer's office, and there at that office, he had an amazing discovery. He found out, incredibly, that his father was born in Texas, and spent time working there. That meant that Wilfredo Garez was a U.S. citizen. And that changed things for him. He now had the certification of being a citizen of the U.S. And that meant that he didn't have to live in guilt or fear anymore. He didn't have to sneak across the border. He could walk through the main gate. That all changed because of this documentation. Now, what a birth certificate is to a citizen, 1 John is to a believer. 1 John was written because there were some believers who were doubting their salvation. They were doubting that they were citizens of the kingdom of God. And why is this? Well, because there were some false teachers that had crept into the church that basically told them that they were not legitimate children of God. They told them that they were illegal. And these false teachers were sowing all kinds of seeds of doubt, which led to disillusionment, which led to despair. And so John is writing this letter to give a genuine assurance of salvation to all those people that were doubting. That's why the key expression that we see in 1 John over and over again is the expression, we know, we know, we know. We see that 25 times in 1 John. Over and over again, John says, I want you to know. Martin Lloyd-Jones said this, he said, assurance is not essential to salvation, but it is essential to the joy of salvation. You see, you can be saved and not have that assurance. But on the other hand, you can have assurance and not be saved. There's a lot of people in that condition, they believe that they're saved, they don't doubt it, but yet they don't have the real deal, the real thing. But the best position to be in is to be saved and to have a true biblical assurance of salvation. And that's John's goal, and obviously that's my goal as well, that you have a clear biblical understanding of the assurance of salvation. So John was seeking to bring healing and clarity to people who were broken, who were confused, and assurance was necessary. And that's why this letter is so important. It's why it's important even today, because there's so much confusion on this issue of assurance. There's confusing theologies that are out there today, many ideas that cause confusion among believers, and so we need this message here today. So I want to, again, just kind of give you an overview and talk to you about the central ideas that John gives us. First of all, let me talk to you about the author. We know that John is the author. There are some who have doubted this. This is the same John who wrote the book of Revelation, who also wrote the Gospel of John. The reason some scholars doubt it is because his name is nowhere given in the book as being the author. Well, his name may not be on the book, but his fingerprints are all over it. For example, when John wrote the gospel of John, we find a purpose statement in the gospel of John, John chapter 20 verse 31, but these things are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life through his name. So John wrote that gospel and he tells us exactly why, so that you will believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that you'll believe on him and that you'll have eternal life. So it has an evangelistic purpose. It reveals Jesus as the Son of God. But what is characteristic of John are these purpose statements. He likes to say, these things have we written, or I wrote unto you, or I've written unto you. These are characteristic of John and his writings. Look at 1 John 1, look at verse number 4. And these things write we unto you that your joy may be full. John is writing to give back the joy that was stolen by these false teachers that took away their assurance of salvation. Look at chapter 2 and look at verse number 26. It says, these things have I written on you concerning them that seduce you. Again, he's writing to help them overcome some of the false doctrines that they have been given that has been seducing them away from the true gospel. Look at 1 John chapter 5, look down at verse number 13, 1 John 5, 13. These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. and that you may believe on the name of the Son of God. So we see these purpose statements that help us to understand that John is the writer here of this. We also see the personality of John. John is the brother of James. In the Gospels, they were called sons of thunder. The reason for that is because of their passion. They had a lot of passion. If you read 1 John, you see a lot of passion coming through what he writes. He calls himself the apostle of love, or he calls himself actually the one whom Jesus loved. Others called him the apostle of love because of that. It's an interesting way to identify yourself. I'm the apostle that Jesus loved. What if I said, you know, this is Reverend John Gorman, this is Reverend David Wagner, this is Reverend Aaron Finley, but me, I'm the one that Jesus loves. You say, man, you're on an ego trip. Oh, John wasn't on an ego trip. I think he was just amazed at the love of Christ. He never got over that. It's like the song that we love, His Grace Still Amazes Me. And John was just constantly amazed at the love and the grace of the Lord. And he emphasizes love. But also there's the witness of the early church. Early church fathers verify that John is the writer of this letter. One is a man by the name of Polycarp, another Papias. Both of these were men who were discipled by John. They're quoted by Irenaeus. And John lived in Ephesus toward the end of his life. In fact, he lived the rest of his life there in Ephesus, there in Asia Minor. And he pastored a church there, and he was, as one writer said, a living and an abiding voice, an elderly man who knew Jesus, who saw Jesus, who had a great impact in his life at that stage in that area. But then the audience, who is he writing to? When he says, these things are written unto you, who's the you there that he's talking about? And this book is unique from other New Testament books in that it's not addressed to any individual, it's not addressed to a church, there's no name on it, no people really mentioned in it. But this is more like a document, like it might be a sermon manuscript, you could say. And I believe it was a sermon that John gave to his church there in Ephesus, but was also intended to be shared with the surrounding area churches as well. And so I think that's the reason for the unique form of this letter. And it's also intensely personal. He calls them my little children or my beloved. When John wrote this, this was between 80, 85 or 95. So you have to remember at this time, he's a very old man. He's an elderly man. He had outlived all the other apostles. So kind of picture an old gray-headed man in his 90s who sits down with a quill and parchment, and he writes this letter. Again, he's the last remaining of the apostles. He is someone that the people kind of have great reverence for because again here is a man that saw Jesus that was one of the 12 apostles and so here he is in this letter he's hammering out the basics of the gospel for a community of believers what's what's the aim of this letter why is he writing this again false teaching teachers and teaching had come into the church And they were basically saying that they were giving a new and improved form of Christianity. That they were offering special knowledge that no one else had. And this kind of caused an elitism among some of the believers there with this new, improved doctrine and theology, and it caused some to just leave the church. This new group just left the church and left this old community of believers kind of confused and broken. Look at 1 John chapter 2, for example. Look at verse number 18, what John says to them. Little children, it is the last time. And as you have heard, the Antichrist shall come. Even now there are many Antichrists whereby we know it is the last time. Verse 19, they went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that it might be made manifest that they were not all of us. And so, again, this new teaching that was presented as an advance on anything Christianity ever taught caused these believers to go out and start something new and left a community of believers bewildered and perplexed. And this became very confusing. And so John is writing to clear up the confusion. to kind of mend up the nets, you could say, the gospel nets. Watchman Nee had an interesting approach when he wrote a book called What Shall These Men Do? And in that book, he suggests that the ministries of John and Peter and Paul can be characterized by how they were called when the Lord found them. For example, when Jesus called Peter, Peter was a fisherman. He had just thrown a net into the water. And Jesus called him to be what? A fisher of men. And so that was what Peter's ministry was. That was the characteristics of his ministry. He was always initiating new programs. To him was given the keys of the kingdom. On the day of Pentecost, he threw out the gospel net, and 3,000 fish were brought in. And so he was the gospel fisherman, you could say. Paul, when God called him, he was a tent maker. So he was building things, and Paul became the wise master builder who knew how to go in and to build a church. But then, what about John? Well, when John was called, he was mending the nets, and so John is a mender. His written ministry comes in after the church has been in existence for a while, but apostasy and false doctrine began to creep into the church, and John's calling then is to mend the nets doctrinally. to bring them back to the beginning, to go back to the original foundations of the gospel and what is taught in the gospel. He calls people back to truth. And so that's what John's whole purpose here is, is to mend the doctrinal nets that have been broken and to bring them back to the beginning of the gospel, but also the arrangement. What about the arrangement of this book? Well, mentioned this a little bit last week, but the arrangement of the first John is It's not linear like you would find in the Apostle Paul Paul's very logical. He's very line upon line straightforward John is more circular in the way that he lays out this book. He basically, in five chapters, is going to give three major themes that he's going to come back to again and again. He's going to cycle back, and actually you could say that 1 John has three cycles in it. He cycles back these three doctrines and he revolves them around three times. Each time he gives a little bit more knowledge and understanding and insight about that one theme. One scholar likened the arrangement of 1 John to like a spiral staircase that gets wider and wider the higher you climb in it. And that's the sense in which John is writing us here. And there are three themes that he goes over, again, are truth, truth about Jesus Christ, righteousness, we living out righteousness in our life. If we truly know Jesus, we're gonna live out a righteous life, and then love. If we truly know Jesus, we are going to love the brethren. So these are the three pillars that form the foundation of truth that John emphasizes again and again and again. And why does he do that? This is called a Greco-Roman amplification technique, where it's just really repeating again and again the same major ideas. And we know, if you've been teaching at any group or anyone, you know that repetition is the key to learning, right? Go over it again and again and again. And this is what John does. He's hammering the same nail into the wood over again and again. Now, why does he mention these three particular themes in 1 John? Well, because the false teachers were propagating a threefold error. And here's part of it. It was doctrinal error concerning the person of Jesus Christ. They were teaching lies about Christ. They denied that Christ was the son of God. They denied his divine sonship. They denied that he had come into the flesh, that he was a man, that he only appeared to be a man. He wasn't really a man. They denied that he was God in the flesh. And so, look at John Wright, just look at a few verses with me, and we'll be flipping around a few verses here, but look at chapter two, look at verse 22. Notice what it says. Who is a liar? But he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ. He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son. That's another thing they taught. You can get to the Father without the Son. You don't need the Son. Verse 23, whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father. Look in chapter four, look in verse number 15. Notice what it says. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. So there, John is, again, emphasizing that you must believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that he has come in the flesh. If you don't believe that, then you're a liar. And so, John, over and over again, will focus on Christ. And who is he? His person, his work. That is so foundational. But another part of the error was ethical or moral. These false teachers believed that there was no such thing as sin. There was only enlightenment, getting knowledge. And then another part of the error was relational. They didn't really love others. They became elitist in their attitude. They were hostile. They were intolerant of those who were not as initiated as they were to see these spiritual truths. So they'd look down on the lesser brethren. They were not walking in love. So John wants to correct all this. So that's why he hammers out these three cords, I like to call them, the threefold cords of assurance, or God's threefold cord. So first of all, let's focus on that doctrinal cord of truth. John emphasizes over and over again, truth about who Jesus is. That's so important, especially even today because everybody has a different version of Jesus. Everybody has their own Jesus. There's a Mormon Jesus, there is a Jehovah Witness Jesus, there is the Jesus that people create in their own mind, and that's the Jesus they worship. The only problem is that's not the Jesus of Scripture. It's not the Jesus of the Bible. You don't get a right to make your own Jesus and then call it worship. You don't get the right to do that. That's what this false group of teachers, false teachers, did. They called themselves, by the way, Gnostics, from the Greek word gnosis, which means knowledge. They believed it came through knowledge, through enlightenment. The problem with man was not sin. The problem with man was ignorance. The problem with man was blindness. What man needed was light. You had to get light. And so they needed true enlightenment. So they taught that salvation came through knowledge. And by the way, how do we know what they teach? In 1945, there was a farmer in Egypt named Muhammad Ali, not the boxer. And he was trying to fertilize his crops, and so he was digging for soil to do that, and he found some red earthware jars near a place called Nag Hammadi, Egypt. And in those jars, he found 13 leather-bound codices or books that were dated around 350 AD. And so this was a big discovery according to some because they presented a version of the Gospels and Jesus that was very different from what the Bible says about Jesus. And this is called the Nag Hammadi Library. We were talking about during our conference, legacy conference, about canonicity. How do we know the 66 books of the Bible are the canon of scripture? And one of the rules is they have to teach apostolic doctrine. There have been these liberals out there that say, oh, you need to add these books to the Bible. No, these are heretical books because they teach a heretical version of Jesus. These are Gnostic Gospels. And what do they teach about God? Well, they teach that God, the highest God, the supreme God, is not the God that created the world that we see today. Out of this highest God, there emanated lesser gods, or called demiurges, or semi-gods. So out of the highest God, there emanated lesser gods on down a chain, and somewhere down that chain, there was a God that created the heaven and the earth that we know today. But he did a bad job. It was a botched job, they said. And the reason for that is because he took the material world and mixed it together with the spiritual world. And that was a botched job of creation because according to their idea, all spirit, all spiritual things are good, all matter and material things are evil. So he mixed together good and evil. And he messed up creation in doing that, like an inept jeweler would put together pure gold and junk metal. That's what he did. And so this lesser God is to be disobeyed. This lesser God is blocking us from ascending to the highest form, the highest God. So we need to disobey his commandments. We need to get around him. We need to work around him. And the way that you have knowledge, the way you ascend into perfection is through knowledge. You have to have knowledge. You have to know the names of these emanations. You have to ascend up this ladder through special knowledge. Enlightenment, spiritual enlightenment and perfection is gained by this knowledge. And by the way, we have to go around or go through this lesser God that messed up creation. So therefore, his commandments are not really something that we need to even worry about. and there's no such thing as sin, all you're trying to do is get knowledge. You're trying to gain knowledge. So what did they teach about Jesus? Well, Jesus was one of these lesser emanations. He wasn't God. He wasn't a son of God. He didn't even really have a body. He only appeared to have a body. And when he came, he came to bring enlightenment. He came to bring wisdom. So what is this? new heresy attack. It attacks the incarnation, the fact that God became a man and the virgin born son of God. It attacks the crucifixion because since he didn't have a body, he only appeared to have a body, he never really ever suffered for sin. In fact, there was one Gnostic writing that said this, I did not die in reality, this is supposed to be Jesus talking here, one of the Gnostic Gospels. I didn't die in reality, but in appearance. It was another who drank the gall and vinegar, it was not I. They struck me with a reed, but it was another. I was rejoicing in the height overall, and I was laughing at their ignorance. Supposedly the words of Jesus only appeared And it also attacks the resurrection. Because since all matter is evil and he didn't have a body, there was really no resurrection. Now another, just in fairness, there's another form of Gnosticism that says that, yeah, the spirit of Christ came upon him, that was the spirit of God that came upon him at his baptism and it left just before his crucifixion. That's another version of Gnosticism, just to be fair, whichever false teacher you listen to. But this is what was attacking Christianity and attacking the church there. And so John is writing this set the record straight. John says, look, let's go back to the beginning. Let's go to the beginning of the gospel. Look at 1 John 1, look at verse 1. That was just from the beginning. The beginning he's talking about here is the beginning of the gospel message, which we have heard. which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, our hands have handled of the word of life. Again, John was an eyewitness of the earthly ministry of Christ, and he gives his eyewitness account in these first few verses as one of the last surviving eyewitness of Christ. The people he was writing to were really one generation removed from those who lived during Christ's earthly ministry. And what does John say? We have heard. I heard Jesus teach. He should have some credibility here. He heard Jesus teach, which we have seen with our eyes. John saw Jesus do all those great miracles. He saw it with his eyes, which we have looked upon. That's not a repetition. The word looked upon here, the Greek word, where we get the word theater from, it's the idea of studying. It means to examine thoroughly. John says, look, I knew Jesus. I saw him. I examined his life completely. Thoroughly studied him. And I love this, and our hands have handled. Oh, he was real. He was a real man. Our hands handled him. Remember John, he was the one that leaned on Jesus during the supper. Just leaned back and there was Jesus. They would eat reclining on an elbow. And John says, look, our hands have handled. Him, he was really a man. And he came as a savior to die for sin. Look in chapter two, look in verse one. My little children, these things write unto you that you sin not. If any man sin, we have an advocate with a father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. He came as a savior to die for sin, not so that you can sin all you want to. In the name of gaining knowledge, he wasn't giving enlightenment, he came to take away our sin. He came to deal with our sin. He is the righteous one. And John says, look, you don't lack any special knowledge. Look at 1 John 2, look at verse number 20. But you have an unction from the Holy One and you know all things. You already know what you need to know. Look at verse 24. Let that therefore abide in you which you've heard from the beginning. If that which you heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye shall also continue in the Son and in the Father. And look at verse 26. These things have I written on you concerning them that seduce you. Verse 27, but the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you, but as that same anointing teaches you of all things and is truth and is no lie, even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him. Now, at first glance, it might sound like John is saying, look, you don't need human teachers. You believers don't need human teachers. Well, if that's the case, I'm done here. Is that what he's saying here? No, he's not saying that you don't need human teachers in the sense that Bible teachers, because according to other verses in the Bible, God gives to the church, pastor, teachers. He gives people that have the ability to teach the word. These are God-given roles. So what does John mean when he says you don't need that any man teach you? He's not rejecting godly teachers. He's rejecting false teachers. John is saying, look, you don't need some new voice coming in, trying to give you some new supposed revelation or new theology. You don't need any new deceptive voices. You have already heard the truth. You've been given the gospel. You need to go back to what you heard from the very beginning. You don't need someone to come in and guide you and to give you special new revelation, new enlightenment. You already have someone who teaches you everything. He's called the Holy Spirit. Look again at verse 27. But the anointing which you have received of him abided in you. You already have this anointing. That is the word for the Holy Spirit. You already have the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit illuminates scripture to you. And the Holy Spirit is able to help you to discern between truth and error. You have that anointing. You have that ability because you have the Holy Spirit living in you. And this spirit testifies to the truth. So you don't need to go out chasing progressive revelations or some new truth, supposedly. If it's new, it's not true. If it's true, it's not new. You need to go back to the beginning, to the foundation of doctrine. And then to deny Christ is to deny God, as we've seen before. And so John is saying, look, you need to go back to the person and work of Jesus and who he is. And so over and over again, he'll cycle back to this whole idea of Jesus and what Jesus did, his whole work, all through the book until you get to the end. Look in chapter five, look at verse number 20. how he ends it, and we know that the Son of God is come and has given us an understanding that we might know him, that is true, and that we are in him, that is true, even in his Son, Jesus Christ, that is the true God and eternal life. And then he ends it by saying, little children, keep yourself from what? Idols. Keep yourself from idols. Don't make up your own Jesus. Keep yourself from idols. So there's the doctrinal court of truth. Second court is the moral court of righteousness. And the lesson John seeks to teach us here is that the true believer has a pattern of righteousness in their life. You say that you're a believer, it'll be evident because there'll be a pattern of obedience. There'll be a pattern of righteousness in your life. You'll be warring against sin in your life. A true believer is not perfect. That's not what he's saying. But there will be a pattern of practical righteousness. It's not perfection, it's direction. I'm walking in obedience, that's the pattern of my life. And so John is really distinguishing again between those who say they were believers and left and those who are true believers. He's kind of giving the contrast in this letter. And true believers are characterized by several things. Walking in the light. Again, look in chapter 1, verse 5. This then is the message we heard from him. and declare unto you that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. Verse six, if we say that we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. If we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. And John is using light as a metaphor for righteousness and holiness. Darkness is a metaphor for sin. Walking in darkness means living in sin. You can't walk in darkness and claim to have fellowship with Christ. And again, he's implying what these false teachers have been teaching. There's no such thing as sin. There's only discovery. There's only learning and getting knowledge. And that has the hiss of Satan the serpent in the very beginning in the Garden of Eden who says, you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. Just go ahead and disobey God's command because that'll give you knowledge. And these Gnostics are saying the same thing. There's no sin. There's only enlightenment. And John says, oh no. If you walk, God is light. If you want to have fellowship with him, you have to walk in the light. If you walk in darkness and claim to have fellowship with God, that's a lie. True believers walk in the light. True believers confess their sin, verse eight and nine, chapter one. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves. The truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. A true believer is aware of his sin. He has a new awareness of sin in his life. And so therefore, he is confessing his sins continually. The word confess here, present indicative, active, constantly confessing. You know what a believer's like? It's someone that every day is wrestling against sin, dealing with sin, and confessing their sins. Why? Because there's a new awareness since you've been saved. You know what a unbeliever's like? They say, what sin? I'm a pretty good person. What sin you talking about? A true believer says, I grieve over my sins all the time. and I have to bring it to God in confession, because you've been given a robe of righteousness now, which causes sin to stand out. When I got married, I wore a white tuxedo. I don't know why I did that. But I remember right before the wedding, I got a big black blotch on it. Talk about standing out. You know, thank God there was a lady in the church who helped me, and she brought some spot remover, you know, to it. But if I were in a black tuxedo, you would have never seen that. But now that I had on a white tuxedo, every little stain shows. When you get saved, you get the white robe of righteousness, and so therefore, every sin becomes very real to you. And so what does a true believer do? They confess their sins. They're constantly confessing their sins. They walk in the light, they confess their sins, they keep his commandments, 1 John 2 verse 3, hereby we do know that we know him if we keep his commandments. He that says I know him and keepeth not his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him. A true believer has a heart's desire to keep the commandments of Jesus. You're just gonna wanna obey him. That's gonna be your heart's desire, I just wanna obey. We might not do it perfectly, we're not gonna walk perfectly, but that is the overwhelming desire of our heart, we just wanna obey his commandments, we wanna keep his commandments, and when we don't keep them, we're grieved at that. And so you notice again, I mentioned this last week, John is very antithetical in the way he writes, you're either this or you're that. You either walk in the darkness or you walk in the light. You either obey his commandments and know him, or you don't obey his commandments, therefore you don't know him. You either love the world or you love Christ. You can't do both. It's one or the other, and it's the same here. But then also, what's characteristic of a true believer? Abiding in him. Look at chapter three, look at verse number six. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not, and whosoever sinneth has not seen him, neither known him. Wow, what is this? Well, sin if not means a lifestyle of sin. Again, present indicative, active. You can't live in a lifestyle of sin if you truly know God, know Christ. In other words, you're gonna be struggling against it. You might lapse in this sin, but you're gonna confess it, you're gonna get it right. You don't just live an unbroken pattern of sin as if you've done nothing wrong and everything's okay, You know, that's not the way a believer lives. If that's your lifestyle, what does John say in verse 6? You have not seen him, neither known him. You don't know him. If you just live in this and it doesn't...no conviction, doesn't bother you. That's abiding in Him. You can't abide in Him and live in sin. You can't do that if you're a believer. And then another characteristic is you're overcoming the world. Look in chapter 5, look in verse number 4. For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world, and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. The word overcome is a word that John likes to use a lot. It is Nikeo, where we get the word Nike. It means victory. It's used 28 times in the New Testament, 24 times it's used by John. And John wanted us to know that, look, if you're saved, God will give you victory over the world. You will no longer be drawn in by the lust and the lure of the world. Again, let me be clear here. Can a believer act worldly? Yes, at times, but overall, you will not live according to the way of the world. You have the power and the ability to overcome the lust and the lure of the world. The world is no longer enticing you like it once was. It's like an old girlfriend or boyfriend that you no longer love because you found something better. You found Jesus. So therefore the world does not have its enticement over you like before. You have that ability. So what is John establishing here? That a true believer has a pattern, a life of righteousness in their life. That's a basis of assurance that you believe the right thing about Jesus, that you have a pattern of righteousness in your life. And then here's the last thing, and I'll be quick here. The relational court of love. And again, this is the theme that John goes back to again and again. It's love over and over. He'll emphasize loving one another, loving your brother. If you're a true child of God, you're going to love the brethren. You're going to love the church. Why? Because this is because you're your children of God. You're my brother and you're my sister in Christ. And if I love the one who gave me life, I'm gonna love others who he gave life to. There's gonna be this family sense of unity that you have, therefore you will love the church. I've heard people say, well, you know, I love Christ, I just don't love his church. That's incompatible with Christianity. And you think that you're being complimentary to Jesus when you say that? You know, Jesus, I love you, I just don't love your bride. That doesn't work. I love the head, I just don't love the body. Doesn't work. If you love Christ, you're gonna love his people. And that is walking in the light. Again, I'll finish up here. Chapter two, look at verse number 10. He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him. But he that hateth his brother is in the darkness. There's no gray area here. If you love your brother, that means you are in the light. If you don't love your brother, you're not in the light. You're still in darkness. You're walking in darkness. It means you have real life. Look in chapter three, look in verse 14. We know that we have passed from death unto life. How do we know that, John? Because we love the, what, brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. You don't love your brother, you're not in the light. You're not walking in light. You don't have true life. You are abiding in death, not life. And then you have the love of God in you if you are loving your brother. Look in chapter four, look in verse 20, and we'll finish with this. If a man say I love God and hateth his brother, he is a liar. For he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him that he who loveth God loveth his brother also. So you're just going to love God's children, even the ones that are hard to love. You're still going to love them. And so this is the threefold cord that John keeps going back to again and again. The doctrinal cord of truth, the moral cord of righteousness, and the relational cord of love. These are the three things that John uses to say, measure your own life against this. During the first part of the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, there were no safety devices used. 23 men fell to their death. But for the last part of the project, however, a large net, which cost about $100,000, was bought and employed. At least 10 men fell into that net while they were working, but their life was saved. But what's interesting, as a side note, 25% more work was accomplished by the workers. You know why? Because they felt secure. They felt secure. You know what? 1 John is the safety net for the believer. And God wants you walking securely. He wants you knowing that you know Jesus Christ as your Savior. And these three cords are the cords that John uses to repair the net that doctrinal confusion and false doctrine has torn apart. Again, the whole goal, John says, these things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you might know that you have eternal life. Let's bow for prayer today. Father, thank you for the assurance that you give us. Lord, we know that there'll be times when confusion may come in, when there's doubt. But thank you, Father, that it's your desire that we know that we have eternal life, that we're trusting in Christ, Christ alone, that we know who Jesus is. We know he is the son of God who came to save us from our sin. Because he saved us, we now have a desire just to obey him and to walk in righteousness. And we know that even that is something that you give us. That's the seed of righteousness, Lord, that you plant in us. And because now I know Jesus, I love others. I love my brothers, my sisters in Christ, because I love the one who brought them into the family. I love them as well. Father, I pray that you'll strengthen the assurance of those who are yours. And for those who may have a false assurance, I pray you'll strip it away, that the real thing might take place, that they might have a real encounter with Jesus Christ, to repent of their sin and to call upon him as Savior and Lord, and be transformed by the power of the gospel. Father, do your work in every heart and every life. Save souls, strengthen the body of Christ. And with heads bowed and eyes closed, friend, would you just take a moment and just pray right there where you are. Examine your own heart according to what you heard. And do you have a biblical assurance or is it something that you still wrestle with? Ask God to give you that solid certainty of knowing Jesus Christ. Have you been to the cross? Have you trusted Christ and Christ alone as your savior? Do you believe He's the Son of God who took all of your sins upon Himself, who became the propitiation for your sin? He took upon Him the sins of the world, and do you turn to Him for salvation? If not, do it right now. Just pray, God, be merciful to me, a sinner, and save me. Father, use Your Word in every heart for Your glory, we pray in Jesus' name.