Welcome to Unveiled Faces, a Redeemer Presbyterian Church podcast. Please enjoy our feature presentation. Well, good morning. I'm thankful to have this opportunity to deliver the message today. The sermon that I have today is from about four, four and a half years ago, and was the first of a series that I preached on 1 John. But before we begin to dig into the text, we need to go over some of the background on 1 John. And I'll try to keep it short, as I do love history, and could probably spend an hour or so talking about it. But as we read through 1 John, The first thing we might notice is that this letter does not introduce an author or an audience at the beginning. However, the name kind of gives us a little bit of an indication on who was the writer. And based on the evidence, it's overwhelmingly certain that the author is John and the son of Zebedee. And it's one of five books of the Bible that are attributed to John. John was a disciple to Jesus. He is known as the disciple, as John 21, 20 states, whom Jesus loved. John was an important leader in the early Christian church in Jerusalem. Paul considered him to be a pillar of the church in Galatians 2.9. So we're confident in who wrote the letter. However, we're not sure to who the letter was written. The letter would be applicable to all of the early church. And also some of us suggested it might have even been a sermon. Meant to be read out to the people of the church. Now at the time of the writing of this letter, there were many false teachers who were teaching beliefs that were infiltrating the early church, pulling at the sheep in the flock. Heretics were denying the divinity of Christ. They did not believe that Christ was in fact God manifested on earth as man. This leads to why John starts the letter in the way he does. So let's go ahead and start working through this text. Let's look at verse one. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled concerning the word of life. We'll stop there. I want you to take a second and think about our day-to-day lives. Think about some of the interactions that we have with people around us. We hear things from people all the time. You might hear from a co-worker, can you believe what he or she said? One of my kids might tell me, so-and-so did this, or so-and-so said this. In my regular job, I'm dealing with interactions all of the time, and find myself many times a day involved in situations where I'm trying to decide who's telling the truth, who is right, who is wrong, and who has the story straight. As many of you know, my job is teaching homeschoolers, and despite being truly blessed teaching children from Christian families, for some reason, they still have disputes. When these disputes arise, my first question to the children involved is, did you see them do this? Or how about, did anyone else see this? Because they have witnessed the alleged incident, they would be more believable. If someone's being brought to court, the jury's looking for witnesses, eyewitness accounts that can be counted on to figure out who was at fault. A friend or coworker might tell us they heard from this person who heard from this person, and it continues on. Do we immediately believe them, or do we ask around? So if we start with the first part of the verse, which we have heard, we can see this might raise concerns about the accuracy of the information. However, in this situation, the author immediately makes it clear with the next few words, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon, and our hands have handled. Okay, this is sounding like a credible witness. This is not someone who merely heard of the teachings or is passing in rumors and stories about Jesus. This is someone who was there. The author was there. He saw, he looked upon, he touched. This is establishing the authority from which the author John can speak. He was there. We reference the historical context. He's basically saying, guys, I was there. Don't listen to these other people. They weren't. Next he answers with what he was made witness to. In verse two, the life was manifested and we have seen and bear witness and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us. This verse is John's rebuttal to the false teachers of the age. He is stating he has been a witness. He has seen this life made manifest that Christ who is with the Father from the beginning became flesh. He walked the earth and he became our way to eternal life. This is a plea to the people. Hey, wait a minute. I know what is being said out there. I know what others are trying to tell you. But I was a disciple. I was taught, I witnessed the works, the life, the ministry of Jesus Christ. Listen to me. These I have seen and I bear witness. We move into verse three. 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. Okay, so just in case you forgot, John is continuing to remind you that he saw this, he heard this, and now he wants to share this with you. John is once again establishing authority, and now that you are paying attention, you remember I was there, I knew him, this is what you need to know. Why is this so important? Why is it so important that we have fellowship with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ? because he wants the people he is writing to to understand, to, as he does, have salvation through Christ Jesus, so that they can have fellowship together with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ. Don't we feel the same way? Pastor Van Der Dusen just preached about our need to be evangelists, to share the good news, the gospel, so that others can have what we have. We plead for their eyes to be open. We pray for people all the time. Please, Lord, bring them to you. Open their eyes. Let their ears hear. John is pleading for the same. We're called to share. from the Great Commission in Matthew 18, verses 19 and 20. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. Amen. We read in Mark 16, 15. And he said to them, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Psalm 96, three and four. Declare his glory among the nations, his wonders among all peoples, for the Lord is great and greatly to be praised. He is to be feared above all gods. God is clear about what we are supposed to do. We are to share so that others might have fellowship with our Lord as well. Why do we seek fellowship with the Lord? In verse four. And these things we write to you, that your joy may be full. Fellowship with him and one another. This is from the New King James, in the ESV it reads as complete joy. New King James, joy that may be full. John needs to share, and this is why. This is the way to have complete joy. The only way to find perfect joy or complete joy is in Christ, not in yourself. not in your spouse or your family, not in friends, your job, hobbies, government, but perfect, complete fullness of joy is found in Christ. Paul states in Philippians 3.8, Yet indeed, I also count all things lost for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and I count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ. Only in Christ is complete joy, is the fullness of joy found. Everything else fades away and lets us down. I remember as a kid, I loved race cars. And I spent hours and hours and hours building racetracks for my toy cars. But the tracks came down, and I grew up, well, kinda. As a young adult, I poured hours and maybe days, countless days, into video games that are no longer played, no longer exist. These things brought me temporary joy. I did have a good time, but it ended up empty, gone. It was not complete joy, unending joy. A movie, a great book might bring joy for hours, maybe even days or weeks. But eventually that joy fades as well. The only complete joy that we can have is in Christ Jesus. Verse five. 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. Here comes the message that John wants us to hear, he wants us to know. There is no darkness in God. There's no lies, no wickedness, no evil thoughts, no sin. How can darkness exist in light? God is light. The word darkness, if you look it up in the dictionary, means absence of light. If God is light, There can never be darkness where God is. What happens when you shine light into darkness? It disappears. The darkness disappears. And now we need to see verse six and see how it applies to the people. If we say that we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. All right. So God is light. And we are walking in darkness. Can we be having fellowship with God? No. As mentioned in the last verse, God is light and darkness cannot exist where God is. So if we are in fellowship with God, how can we be walking in darkness? If we're fellowshipping with God and God is light, how is it possible to be walking with God when we're in darkness? If God is there, so is the light. This is what was happening at this time in the culture. The people were saying, we know the truth. We are walking with God, we are from God. Yet they were walking in a life of darkness. They were walking in a life of sin. How could those people be correct? How could those false teachers and false prophets be correct if they're walking in a life of darkness? Now, there's one problem. We are all sinners. Every one of us. We're sinners. And we'll go further into detail in a few minutes on this. But just because we are sinners, does this mean we all walk in darkness? No. It does not. To walk, you are continuing. It's a pattern. It's continuous steps. Step, step, step. And now we're walking. We might make a misstep. We might stumble. The question we have to ask is, are you living in a pattern of sin? Are we repeating the same missteps over and over again? Because if we're repeating these steps over and over, now we are walking. Someone who claims to be in fellowship with God cannot be in a pattern of sin. Walking in the same missteps over and over again. If we are living in a pattern of sin, we are continually stumbling. continually taking wrong steps, then we are walking in darkness, and we are not in fellowship with God. We need to be called to repentance, and we need the help of the Lord to pull us out. At the time period John was writing this epistle, there was, as mentioned before, a problem with false teachers. They were preaching heretical beliefs. They dismissed the divinity of Christ, that Christ was God. John will go further into this in later chapters, but one way to dismiss these teachers was to look at the fruit of their life. How could they be in fellowship with the Lord? How could they be speakers for God, preachers of the word, leaders of his people, when they were living in a life of sin, walking in darkness? The light of God could not be present with them. We read in Matthew 7, verses 15 through 20, Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore, by their fruits you will know them. John is calling out these false teachers, these people who are leading the people astray. He's calling them liars who do not practice the truth. Moving to verse seven. 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. How do we walk in the light? I just mentioned before that we all stumble. It would be easy to fall into walking into darkness. How do we avoid this? How do we walk in the light? We can't, or at least not on our own. The only reason we can walk in the light is because of Jesus Christ. The Son of God, he cleansed us from our sins. His death, as the verse states, covers our sin, period. There is no other way. There is no other way but through the sacrifice of Jesus. It's not a choice we make. Okay, I'm now gonna be free from sin. I choose it. We will stumble. It's only by the grace of God, by his mercy. From Romans five, verse nine. Much more than having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. From Ephesians 1, verse 7. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace. We are justified by the blood of Jesus Christ. The sacrifice cleanses us from sin. Moving to verse 8. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. I mentioned earlier that we would talk about sin again, and here we go. Every one of us is a sinner. We have sinned. If you have any doubts, ask around. Ask your parents, your spouse, pretty much anybody that knows you, and they'll help you understand the truth. We are sinners. If we think we're not, then we're not telling the truth. but there is hope in verse nine. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. True forgiveness, it's a gift I'm not sure we will ever be able to fully understand and appreciate. As children, we are taught to say those words which come very painfully sometimes, I'm sorry. And usually, if we're able to forgive each other, we're able to rebuild friendships and relationships. Kids are great at this. You'll be watching them play, and they'll be crying and hurt, and they'll come to you, and so-and-so said this and this, and they'll be crying. You say, say, you're sorry. I'm sorry. Say, you're sorry. I'm sorry. And they're off playing again. Now think about the sins we have committed against God. every single one of us. We confess them as we realize them, as we commit them. We gather together at the church and take a moment to confess them. We reflect on our fallen state and we ask for forgiveness. How amazing is it that God forgives us? If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from unrighteousness. That is so powerful. When my spouse forgives me, I'm thankful. When friends and others that are wrong forgive me, I'm thankful. I know I make mistakes, but for the mistakes that I've made and the sins I've committed against God, He forgives me. God forgives us completely. and cleanses us from all unrighteousness. Psalm 51.5 reads, Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me. Every one of us was born in sin. In darkness, that as we said earlier, is the absence of light. God is light. and we are born in the absence of God, but he forgives us. He cleanses us. He allows us to fellowship with him. Verse 10. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. This verse is clear. We've sinned. But just in case we feel the need to try to explain it away, oh, it's just from this person, we're taking it out of context, and need to affirm it, we can also look to Romans chapter three, verse 21 through 25. But now the righteousness of God, apart from the law, is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and all who believe, for there is no difference, for all have sinned. and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance, God had passed over the sins that were previously committed. If we have not sinned, Would there be a reason for Jesus to be born man, to walk the earth and die for us? No, but he was born man and he did walk the earth and he did die for us so that we may have eternal life through him. Why did he do this? Because we are sinners who have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We have to remember that. We are sinners and we will continue to make mistakes, to fall down, to sin. Our hearts will grieve over some of our decisions, our poor behavior, and our own failures. But the Lord God has covered our sins through the death of Christ Jesus. If we confess, he is faithful to forgive. We have worked through the entirety now of 1 John chapter one. We've heard John's plea to the people. So how do we take this? How do we apply this? How does this affect our day-to-day life? What should we take away from these verses? The first thing I want you to take away is from verse four where it states that John is writing these things so our joy may be full, it will be complete. Our joy is in Christ. And in that joy, we are to be a light to the world. This goes hand-in-hand with evangelism and what Pastor was talking about. And this also spurs opportunity. People should recognize our differences. They should see our joy. We need to make sure that we acknowledge where our joy comes from. It's not that we have a spouse that loves us, a great family, lots of friends, a steady job. Our joy is in Christ and comes from Christ. Take the opportunity to let others know when they ask. We are unique. We will stand out in this world, and people will ask. Think about all the opportunities in life that come up. People will ask us questions because we are different. Questions such as, why don't you do that? Why do you blank? Why are there so many blank? These questions come up. Use them as an opportunity to share our joy. Think about those times when we were so excited as a kid. We anxiously wanted to share every bit of new information we had. We want to share what we got for our birthday or Christmas or what we just saw on an article or on the internet or on a TV show. We want to share what we did over our vacation. Later on, it might be excitement to share about a book that you're reading, a movie, or maybe a sporting event that you watched. Have that same joy and eagerness to share when it comes to our Lord Savior. Remember where our joys comes from and be as eager to share it as well. Matthew 5, 14 through 16. You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do they light a lamp and put it under a blank basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven. Secondly, be humble. You might have been born and blessed and raised in a Christian home. You might know your Bible inside and out, read all the right books, and be blessed with amazing relationships, all wonderful things. And none of that changes the fact that we are sinners. I referenced Romans earlier, all fall short, except that fact, especially when dealing with those who are in sin or are first coming to the Lord. Who knows what their background might have been? Who knows what situations they might have had to go through? Look at the world around us. In the Christian community, many great men, men that were highly esteemed, have had very public failings. Everyone sins. Our Heavenly Father forgives us and has mercy upon us. Can we have the same for our brethren? Ephesians 4.32. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you. Lastly, be encouraged. We fall. but our Father picks us back up. We might stumble, but he will shine the light on our path. Confess, and he will forgive us and allow us to walk in the light. John 8, 12. Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life. believers in our Lord Jesus Christ. As we leave here today, let us follow our Lord and let us walk in the light. Let's pray. This has been a presentation of Redeemer Presbyterian Church. For more resources and information, please stop by our website at visitredeemer.org. All material herewithin, unless otherwise noted. Copyright Redeemer Presbyterian Church. Elk Grove, California. Music furnished by Nathan Clark George. Available at nathanclarkgeorge.com.