00:00
00:00
00:01
Transcript
1/0
They're on top of it. I didn't
switch this yet. I wanted to... remind you about the opportunity
to give a testimony via video. We'd like to include a few of
those. And the thing is, is if I don't have it recorded by lunch
tomorrow, then I won't have, we won't be able to do it because
I've got to have time to edit and put it together and get it,
get it produced for Sunday night. So after church tonight, if you
would like to record a testimony, something for Pastor Derek, Miss
Christina, the kids, a little message, Maybe Ms. Renshaw wants
to record a message. That would be a real surprise
to them, I'm sure. What's she on there for? But
we could get that recorded. Obviously, you'll have opportunities
Sunday night in church to give it publicly and before everybody. But if you would like to get
it out of the way or do it when there's less of a crowd watching,
although some people don't like cameras, I understand. So we
can try and do that after church tonight or in the morning. But
after lunch tomorrow, we won't be able to do any more of those.
Just so you know. Would you turn your Bibles tonight
to the book of 1st John, all the way down the end of the New
Testament. 1st, 2nd, 3rd John, Jude and
Revelation. The book of 1st John. We're going to begin a Bible
study. I told you that we were going to, once we completed the
how-to's, I felt like we were kind of at the end of that. And
so the next time we come together, we will begin to just do a Bible
study. And I asked, would anybody have
a particular Bible chapter or book that they really enjoy or
that they would like to see studied out? This was the only one that
anybody asked about. You know, this was one that somebody
said, hey, I've always enjoyed this book and would love to hear
you teach through the book of 1st, 2nd and 3rd John. And so
these are some fun passages of scripture. These are very powerful
truths and looking forward to just kind of going verse by verse.
Pastor Derek today said, Are you going to try and do it one
chapter a week and you haven't done in eight weeks? I said,
oh, no, there's too much stuff in here to try and do one chapter
a week. I said, I don't know. We'll kind of just go verse by
verse and see what we get done. I don't have a time frame or
agenda at this point to try and accomplish it. But just by way
of introduction tonight is what we're going to try and basically
this evening just kind of introduce the study and dive into it a
little bit, kind of bring our hearts and minds this direction.
And I would encourage you over the next few weeks as we're studying
these, you know, we're in the book of 1 John right now. Then
we'll get to 2nd John and 3rd John. But as we do that, I would
encourage you, as much as your schedule will allow you to, read
through this book. And just get it in your heart
and mind. You know, repetition is the key to learning. And often,
we say you get the most out of that which you put the most in.
And so I think if you, I don't want to mess up your reading
schedule for your devotion and your quiet time. And if you're
on a schedule and want to read through the Bible in a year and
that kind of stuff, I don't want to mess that up. But if you have
a time that you're just going to be reading some or you say,
well, I'm going to read for a few minutes. then I would include
this, try and read through these, get it in your heart and mind
over the next coming weeks, and it'll be a blessing to you. By
way of introduction, let's just read the first four verses of
1 John tonight, and we're gonna look at a few of these thoughts
here, and as we introduce this book and these epistles to you.
He says here, that which is from the beginning, which we have
heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked
upon and our hands have held of the word of life. For the
life was manifested and we have seen it and bear witness and
show unto you the eternal life, which was with the father and
was manifested unto us. That which we have seen and heard
declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with
us. And truly our fellowship is with
the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. And these things
write we unto you, that your joy may be full. I'm going to
ask the Lord to walk through this with us here as we begin
with a word of prayer. Lord, I come to you tonight and
Lord, we're grateful for the opportunity this evening that's
ours to have in our hands a copy of the Word of God. We get to
study and work through a passage of scripture together, we get
to ask questions and we get to spend as much time in the word
of God as we would like to. Lord, we, I think sometimes forget
how blessed we are to have a copy of your word. Much of the world
would long to have a copy of the word of God in their language.
Some places that have it aren't free to study it. because of
the persecution that's prevalent. Lord, we don't want to take for
granted. We don't want to just think,
oh, here's another time of looking at Scripture. But God, we're
truly blessed. to be able to study your word.
And I pray God tonight that you would bring these thoughts to
our hearts and minds and allow us to truly value the truths
that are shared through the scripture this evening. And this study,
as we go verse by verse through these writings of John, Lord,
I pray that you would use them in our hearts and strengthen
us as believers and challenge us. And we'll ask this in Jesus'
name, amen. Well, although these are very
small books in the grand scheme of things, they're very powerful
truths that are for us as believers today. I would like to begin
this evening and look at the author, the writer, just to remind
you of who he is. And I think this is pretty well
known. Don't need to spend a lot of
time here, but I want you to know that it is not John the
Baptist, the forerunner of Jesus Christ. It's not the son of Zachariah
and Elizabeth. That's not who the author is.
This is John the Apostle. This is John, the youngest son
of Zebedee and Salome. It is the youngest son of them.
This is the younger brother of James. We know that because he
was called by Christ, that he was a fisherman before he became
a fisher of men. And I want you to know that I
have seen it in the years of time of ministry that often God
will find somebody that's busy, somebody that's serving, somebody
that's active, somebody that's doing something, and call them
to do more. That's just the way God works.
He's not, very rarely do you find God, and I'm not saying
it never happens, because I've seen God take somebody from the
world that was lost and undone, and right away, God calls them,
God saves them, God calls them, God anoints them, and they are
off and running. And I've seen that happen, but
more often than not, God takes somebody that is serving, that's
active, that's participating, that's doing what they know they're
supposed to do today, and calls them to further service. I think
about this man, John, his personality, what he was like as we read these
passages of scripture, the book of John, and these officials,
1st, 2nd, and 3rd John, and I think that I'm a little bit more like
John than I would be like some of the other apostles. I think
about Peter. You know, Peter was the first
one to speak up. Peter was the first one to jump
into the fray. That's not really me. I'm more
kind of, I sit back and I don't know, it's just not my personality.
I'm not gonna be the one that's gonna jump up first. I'm not
gonna be the one that's gonna speak up and I'm not gonna raise
my voice and make it heard over everybody else. I have a tendency
to sit in the back and kind of be quiet. I think as you read
John, you see the depth of the thought that he shares. And you can see he's very contemplative. He's put a lot of thought and
insight into the truths that he's sharing and the depth of
his love and the passion that he has for Christ comes through
in his writings. And that's exciting that we're
gonna get to study and see these passions as we look here at 1st,
2nd, and 3rd John. But of course, he is also the
author of the Gospel of John. And he's also the author of one
other book in our New Testament, which is what? Revelation. That book of Revelation, Werner
Wiersbe takes these three different areas of John's writings and
kind of gives some, I don't know if you'd call them kind of focuses
of each of these writings. And it's kind of neat to see,
Wiersbe said that the gospel of John emphasizes salvation,
where the epistle of John, these first, second, third John, emphasizes
sanctification. And the revelation of John emphasizes
glorification. And when you think about those
different passages of scripture, this is very true. He says that
the gospel of John is a look at past history. The epistle
of John is a look at your present experience. And the revelation
of John is a look at our future hope. God has used one man to
give us a lot of truth. He said that the gospel of John
looks at Christ who died for us. The epistles of John looks
at Christ who lives for us. And the revelation of John looks
at Christ who's coming for us, amen? We could just have an invitation
right now. I mean, he goes on, he says that the gospel of John
is the word that was made flesh and dwelt among us. The epistle
of John is the word made real in the heart of the believer.
And the revelation of John is the word in us. Very powerful truths that this
one author God used to share. We know that this author, he
was part of the inner circle. Who were the other two members
of the inner circle, just to get some engagement here? James
and? Peter, Peter, John's one of them,
yeah. So you have Peter, James, and
John in a sailboat. So you have the inner circle,
these that for one reason or another were always seem to be
right next to Christ. They were drawn with him and
were close to him and desired to be there and they often found
themselves right next to Christ and walking with him and talking
with him and in prayer with him. They wanted to be with Christ
every chance they could get. He was called by Christ the beloved
disciple, the beloved disciple. Four times in John, he identifies
himself, of course, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit,
as that disciple whom Jesus loved. I have those passages written
down here, but four times, that disciple whom Jesus loved. What
an amazing thing to consider and think about that Jesus, God,
recognized this about John. Out of the 12, he said that disciple
whom Jesus loved, Jesus loved him. Actually, John, in its original
language, means whom Jehovah loves, whom Jehovah loves. This John we know sat next to
Christ at the Last Supper. There's many other things that
we could see about him and his desire to be with Christ, but
we see his character. He was very ambitious. In Mark
chapter 10, verse 35 and 37, And James and John, the sons
of Zebedee, came unto him saying, Master, we would that thou shouldest
do for us whatsoever we shall desire. And he said unto them,
what would ye that I should do for you? Then said unto him,
grant unto us that we may sit, one on thy right hand and the
other on thy left hand. Now, the disciples here often,
and I've heard it preached many times, and I'm sure you have
as well, are given a bad rap for asking this question, right?
You've heard that preached? How many of you have heard that?
Like, what in the world? They just want to be lifted up.
They just want to have the position of prominence. But you also could
look at it from the aspect that they just wanted to be close
to the master. They just wanted to be at his
feet. They just wanted to be closest
to him. Of all the places that we could
be, God, we wanna be right next to you. That's where we wanna
be, and I would say that's a pretty high ambition. He was pretty
ambitious. Out of all those people that
are gonna be in heaven, Lord, boy, we would love to be right
next to you. Pretty ambitious goal and desire
to just desire to be right next to Christ. In Mark chapter three,
verse number 17, and James, the son of Zebedee, and John, the
brother of James, and he surnamed them Berjones, which is the sons
of thunder. Again, looking at the idea of
his ambition, his energy, this word means commotion. The son of thunder means thunderings. John was passionate about getting
the gospel out. He was passionate about sharing
the truth of the love of Jesus Christ with the world around
him. His passion was driven by the
compassion that he had in his heart, a compassion like Christ
had. In John chapter 19 verse 26 and
27, he says, when Jesus therefore saw his mother and the disciples
standing by whom he loved, He saith unto his mother, Woman,
behold thy son. Then he saith to the disciple,
Behold thy mother. And from that hour, that disciple
took her into his own home. From that hour, Christ looked
down at him and said, Hey, notice her. And from that moment, he
said, I'll take care of her. I'm gonna bring her into my home.
I'm gonna care for her. The compassion that he had when
he was pointed by Christ towards his mother. The heartbeat of
John can be seen in all of these writings. The love, the love
he had for God. But what he says is that the
love that I have for God is a love that's available to everyone.
It should be a part of every believer's life. He describes
and he talks about the fellowship that he enjoyed, and if any of
the disciples enjoyed a close fellowship with a master, it
was John. But he says, this fellowship that I have with Christ, it is
available to you all. We can all enjoy this kind of
fellowship. So we see this, the author, John,
and then we see tonight the album The book here, 1 John, J. Vernon McGee gives us an outline. He broke the 1 John up like this. He said, God is light. That is
seen in chapter one through chapter two and verse number two. God
is love is seen in chapter two, verse number three through chapter
four and verse number 21. and God is life, chapter five,
verses one through 21. So you could break up the book
of 1 John in those three categories as J. Vernon McGee did, God is
light, God is love, and God is life. Ryan Worsby breaks it up
like this. He says in chapters one and two,
you have the test for fellowship. A true test of fellowship. Do
you truly have fellowship with the Father? And then he says,
but fellowship is only possible through sonship. And chapters
three, four, and five deal with sonship. Are you really a son
of God? Because only through being a
son of God can you have true fellowship with the Father. He said that 1 John is built
around the repetition of the three main themes. The three
main themes in these books is light versus darkness, love versus
hatred, and truth versus error. Now, if you just took those couple
of outlines, those couple of thoughts, J. Vernon McGee's thoughts
on light, love, and life, We're in Wirzbe's thoughts on the fact
that we're dealing with fellowship and sonship, contrasted between
light and darkness, love and hatred, truth and error. And
then as you hopefully in the next few weeks begin to read
through this, look for those things, look for those contrasts,
look where he's talking about light and contrast it with darkness. Look where he is talking there
about love and it's contrasted with hatred and truth as it's
contrasted with error. and you'll be doing your own
Bible study just one verse at a time as you see those truths
come out as you're reading it. There's some outlines there,
then what was the occasion for writing this book? Now we are
gonna jump around a little bit in 1 John here as we see the
five purposes for writing this book. So first of all, we see
the first purpose in 1 John 1 and verse number three. Why don't
you look at 1 John 1 and verse number three and tell me why
he wrote the book. See if you can come up with the,
it's right in the verse there. What was the purpose? That ye may have fellowship.
Yes, that's what he says. So he's writing this book. He
says, here, first of all, I'm writing this to you that you
might have fellowship. If there's anybody that had a
close walk with the master, if there's anybody that had fellowship
with Christ, it was John. And he says, hey, I'm writing
this down so you too can have some fellowship with the master.
You can know that kind of joy. Biblical fellowship is rooted
in a right relationship with the father. Then I want you to
see in verse number four, he gives us the second reason, so
you look at it and you tell me what is the second reason. That
your joy may be full. You know, beloved, joy is a result
of right fellowship. Joy is a result of right fellowship
with the Father and right fellowship with fellow believers brings
joy to the Christian life. The Christian life should be
typified by joy. We ought to have joy in our heart.
We ought to have joy unspeakable and full of glory. It ought to
be part of the Christian's life. Oh, I know we face challenges.
I know we have burdens, but there ought to be something that dwells
down in the heart of a believer that we just have the joy of
the Lord. Amen. So we ought to have. And he says,
hey, I'm writing this down so that your joy may be full. But you take it all in context
and you see that we're dealing with A, joy's only full when
you have a right fellowship. Beloved, when one's joy is not
full, there's a problem. There's a problem. You could take those contrasts
that we mentioned earlier and find out what's in your life
that's blocking the joy, light versus darkness. Love versus
hatred, truth versus error. What is there in your life that's
stopping or blocking the joy? Because our joy is to be full. Then I want you to see in chapter
two in verse number one, we see another direct reason given for
why he wrote this for us. You look at it and tell me what
it is. That you sin not. Well, that's a pretty tall order,
that you sin not. I mean, he says, my little children,
these things write I unto you that ye sin not. And if any man
sin, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the
righteousness. Hey, he says, the goal is that
we would sin not. But if you sin, remember you
got a father. Remember you got an advocate,
one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus who
goes before the Father for you, carries your transgression when
you come to him and ask him forgiveness. He is faithful and just to forgive
us of our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But
he says the goal is that you sin not. So we wanna try and
sin less and less, amen? I had a conversation not too
many months ago with somebody in the foyer here about sinless
perfection. and they were of the mind that you could be sinless. And I said, man, you're better
than me. I said, I can't, I just can't. I mean, I think about
as good as I might try and be, and I'm still a sinner, and I
don't know. I mean, I think, you know, his
question, he says, well, what do you do with the pastures that
says be perfect? I said, well, the Bible, when
it's talking about perfect, the idea is being complete, the idea
is being mature. and that you work towards sinning
less and less. But until we get to heaven, I
don't think anybody's ever gonna be perfect. Only Jesus Christ
is the only one that lived a perfect, sinless life, amen? But we ought
to be striving to sin less and less. We learn in these passages
about the penalty of sin and that the power that sin has,
but that we've been freed from it through Jesus Christ. And
then I want you to see, look in chapter five, you guys recognize
this one. Chapter five, verse number 13. This verse, many of
you could quote it, you don't have to turn there. So what is
another reason why he tells us here that he wrote this book? that ye may know. You're in the
right verse, but that ye may know. So he wrote it, again,
that word that is there in each of these verses. He says, hey,
I wrote this down so you could know that you have eternal life. so that you could know Jesus
is your Lord and Savior. And I tell people when I'm dealing
with somebody for salvation, I says, hey, you know, GPS has
ruined my illustration. But I used to say, you know,
pre-GPS days that, hey, Rand McNally could write in the front
of his map book that I wrote this down so you could know how
to get to Texas. I always use Texas because that's
where I live. I don't know, when you're talking, whatever's in
your mind, I could pick any spot. One time I was witnessing somebody
and they said, well, I already know how to get to Texas. I said,
well, that's not really the point. I said, let's pick somewhere
you don't know how to get to. The idea is that the book was
written so you could know and that's what God did here. He
gave this to us and had John pin this. Why? So that you could
know that you have eternal life, amen? You know what's amazing, beloved,
is that men today do not like men that know, or women, that
know the truth. They don't like it. Anybody will
hear you, they'll listen to you, as long as what you're presenting
is only an option. Sadly, much of the preaching
from the pulpits today is even being presented in an apologetic
manner in the idea that here is something for you to consider
or think about as a possibility. What I'm saying is you just say
today that Jesus is the only way. He is the truth and the
life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. People don't like the unchanging truth. Here is
the truth. This is what the Bible says.
This is the line. This is what God stated as the
fact. But people don't like that today.
You know why? Because as long as you just present
it as an option, that leaves room for them to think and believe
whatever they want in their mind. Whatever they want to think of.
Whatever idea that they have. But see, when you present it
as the truth of the word of God, as an unchanging biblical principle,
then what we think has to change, right? And people don't like
that. But he says, here, I wrote this
down so you could know. I mean, I've stood at the door
and stood at the truck stop and stood on the ski slope and talking
to people about Jesus Christ. And I've had him tell me, you
can't know that. You can't know. Nobody can know.
I said, well, God said you can know. God said you can know it. And I know as much as I know
I'm standing on a carpet and a platform right here that I'm
on my way to heaven. I know that beyond a shadow of
a doubt without any question. Why? Not because of anything
that I've done, anything I've achieved, anything I've received,
but because of what Jesus Christ did for me. I haven't earned
any of it, but I know it to be true because of the promise of
the word of God. Yeah. Then I want you to see the fifth
one, the last one. Look in chapter two and verse
number 26. I put this one last because it's a little bit longer
thought, even though we're backing up in the order of the book here.
This one's maybe not as straightforward, but he says here, these things
have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you. So what
we're dealing with here is that there was some false doctrine,
there was some seducing spirits, there was some ideas entering
the church, coming into the believers there that were not correct.
And he says, hey, I'm writing this to try and correct something
that has grabbed a hold of your attention, something that has
seduced you, something that has somehow captured your heart and
your imagination, and it's pulling you away from the truth of Jesus
Christ. and who he is. It's amazing. First of all, the
truth that they lost was the splendor of the word had faded. You see, this was written somewhere
around 180, give or take a few years. If you have a study Bible,
it probably gives you a date there somewhere close to that.
And so 100 years had passed. We're talking about second and
maybe in some situations even third generation Christians.
People that had been in the church for a while. People that grew
up and this is all they ever knew. And can I tell you that
the thrill, the excitement, the joy of knowing Jesus Christ was
fading. It was waning. The splendor of the Word had
faded. The excitement of the privilege
of reading the Word of God, and as I pondered this today and
thought about it, and this is where, even in my opening prayer,
because today the Lord just reminded me of the joy that we have to
be able to study the Word of God. But we have it all the time,
and we put it under our arm, and we carry it in our house,
and we've got copies everywhere, and we've got them on our phones
and our devices, and it's here all the time. And so we take
completely for granted that we get the joy and the privilege
of studying the very Word of God. It's lost its splendor. It's lost its joy. Oh, we're
doing another Bible study, okay. Much like any other service.
But what a privilege is ours to get into the Scriptures to
see God's Word and to see how they apply to our lives. We can't
let the splendor fade. It's got to be precious to us.
It's got to be something that's real and powerful. This Word
of God changes lives. We, you know, we love to sing
and I enjoy songs, but the priority at Hunt Valley Baptist Church
is not on the singing. It's on the preaching of the
Word, the Word of God. That's why, beloved, soup kitchens
don't change the world. We need somebody to feed the
poor, but that's not the message of the book. We need preaching,
the preaching of the Word of God that changes lives. The splendor was being lost.
William Barclay described it as a great falling away. He says,
in the first days of Christianity, there was glory and there was
a splendor, but now Christianity had become a thing of habit and
tradition and half-hearted nominal faith. I remind you that Christ told
us that this would happen. He said in Matthew 24, 12, and
because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. Beloved, if we're not careful,
if you don't guard against it, the splendor is going to fade. The joy of the transforming power
of the word of God in your heart and life is going to fade. I
have seen people come in through the back doors of the church,
really just a product of the world. They came through the
doors and didn't know anything about the Bible, and God saved
their soul, and they followed the Lord and believers' baptism,
and their life was transformed, and their family was changed,
and their marriage was restored, and their home began to grow
and prosper under the blessing of God and His provision, and
they're changed, and they come into church, and all of a sudden,
they start looking a little bit more like a Christian and a lot
less like the world. And then they get into the Word
of God and they begin growing and they begin sharing truth
with other people and being used to be a witness. And they say,
hey, how can I help out at church? And they begin to serve at church.
And then they come. And one day we say, boy, would
you be willing to serve as an usher? Oh, what? Oh, me, an usher? Oh, I couldn't usher a church.
I'm not worthy to usher a church. I don't deserve such a high calling
as that. Why would you ask me? And I say,
you're saved on your way to heaven. You love Jesus, amen? And they
say, yeah. And I say, well, wonderful. You're
faithful to God's house. You're here. You're part of the
church family. We would love to have you as part of the usher
team. And oh, they're so humbled by the privilege of serving to
usher. Then they get to participate in some other ministries. But
given enough time, All that's old hat. All that is just normal life.
There is no joy anymore. There is no thrill anymore. There
is no splendor anymore. It's all gone. It's a duty. I wish I didn't have to serve
tonight. Really just wanna sit tonight. Don't feel like doing
this or doing that. The splendor fades, Christian.
if we don't guard against it. Can I ask you, have you lost
the wonder of it all? Not only had the splendor faded,
but I want you to know that the seduction of the world had found
its way into the church. The seduction of the world, and
we're gonna get into these passages and see these things as we walk
through in the coming weeks, but I want you to know there
was no implication in the book here of persecution. there was
a problem adopting the philosophies of men. One commentator wrote
this. He said, the trouble which was
faced by John in 1 John, that he seeks to combat did not come
from men out trying to destroy the Christian faith, but from
men who thought they were improving it. It came from men whose aim
was to make Christianity intellectually respectable. You see, they were
adopting the philosophies of men. To put that paragraph in
modern terms, what you see churches, pastors, and ministries doing
today, they're trying to make the church culturally relevant.
That is the catchphrase today. Are you culturally relevant?
They're basically saying any old-fashioned church is of no
value today because you're not culturally relevant. This is
exactly what John was battling way back then. He says, oh, they
were trying to make Christianity intellectually respectable. Now
you know from our study, I think it was the book of Galatians,
but the idea of Gnosticism, the philosophy that was there and
that Greek influence and how they loved philosophy, how they
loved the intellectual aspects of life and contemplating and
valued deep thought, rich thought. And so they were taking the simplicity
of the gospel in Jesus Christ and trying to make it culturally
relevant by leaning towards Gnosticism. Now Gnosticism is a belief that
only the spirit is good. That all matter, all matter like
this pulpit is evil. Our physical bodies are evil.
Everything in this world is evil and only the spirit is good.
And when you take that to its nth degree, they would teach
that inside of man, there is a spirit that is good. And our
goal and effort in life is to free or release that spirit.
But man itself is evil because everything is evil. But they
go beyond that and say that the only way you can release that
spirit is through special knowledge. You see, you need special insight.
And that can only be given to you by somebody who's a true
practicing Gnostic. So they're kind of putting boundaries
on what you can do spiritually without them. But there's only
one mediator between God and men. There's nobody here that
has a corner on Jesus Christ. Nobody here that has a corner
on the Spirit of God and His power and His working. Anybody
here can be more spiritual and more powerful with God than anybody
else if we want to follow what the Bible says to get there.
We don't need somebody to impart a measure, you know, I come down
and lay hands on you so that you can have the power of God.
No, you can have the power of God if you follow God. The greater problem with this
whole ritual and this Gnostic movement is that all matter is
evil, and they say God cannot touch evil, so they would deny
that Christ was the Son of God. Because Christ can't touch evil,
man's physical body is evil, all things in earth are evil,
and so therefore he could not have been Christ. Look in chapter two, in verse
number 22. He says there, chapter two, verse
22, he said, who is a liar? But he that denieth that Jesus
is the Christ. He is an antichrist that denieth
the Father and the Son. You see, there was the problem.
The full fruition of this Gnostic belief was that they were denying
that Jesus was the Christ. And he said, who's a liar? Anybody
that tells you that Jesus wasn't the Son of God. And I'll just
tell you today, anybody that tells you that Jesus is not the
Son of God, the Savior sent to save men from their sin, they're
a liar. You need to get back to the Bible.
It doesn't matter how many degrees they have behind their name.
It doesn't matter how puffed up they are in their own knowledge
or how smart. They may be able to argue you
down into the ground, but you don't have to argue. You just
hold this up. You may not even know every single
verse to turn to, or you may not be able to point it to Him
and say, well, this and this and this and this. You don't have
to be able to argue it. You say, I believe the Word of
God, and the Word of God says that he that knoweth the Son
knoweth the Father, because the two are one, and He was Jesus
Christ in the flesh. They're liars. Some would teach
that He was God, but that he actually didn't have a physical
body, that he just looked like a physical being. See, because
he can't be a physical being and still practice Gnosticism,
because everything physical is evil and God can't be a part
of evil, so they would teach the other extremists, oh, well,
it was God, but he was just a spirit that looked like man. But that's
not what the Bible says. He was all God and he was all
man. I read so much stuff on this
idea of Gnostic belief, it's just, it's crazy how far down
this path he goes. They teach that on the cross
when he was dying and going through the pain and suffering to cover
all of our sin, that Jesus wasn't actually there on the cross.
That he was talking to John in a cave somewhere. Now this is
not in the scripture. This is not in the Bible. And
they have actually written down what Jesus said to John about
like basically, don't worry about the guy on the cross and all
that he's going through, because that's not me. I'm here with you. Why? Because he was a spirit. He couldn't be that flesh and
being. But the Bible says he was tempted in all points like
we are. If he wasn't actually a flesh and being, if he didn't
know pain and heartache and suffering, he couldn't be tempted in all
points like we are. So it's a false doctrine, it's
a false teaching that is turning people away from the simplicity
of Jesus Christ and who he was. Taking Gnosticism to its nth
degree, has one of two extremes. First is extreme asceticism. That is, the asceticism is the
self-torture that you believe spirituality is achieved by even
physically hurting yourself. by denying yourself, by crawling
on your knees towards Mecca, or by, you know, just different
ways of, you know, whipping yourself, and that somehow this brings
about spiritualism and spirituality, and the more you do it, the more
spiritual you are. Self-mortification, self-denial,
that's asceticism. The other is self-indulgence. The other extreme, because they
say, well, the body, It really doesn't matter. Everything on
earth, everything physical is already evil anyway. Doesn't make any difference.
And so you can satisfy every desire you want, every desire
you have, you can do that. And it doesn't make any difference
because it's all evil anyway. So they take it to the other
extreme. So this is the seduction of the world that has found its
way into the church that John is dealing with here. We're gonna
see these as we go through these passages. As I wrap this up,
I want you to see the aim tonight. Beloved, whether you're writing
a letter, teaching a class, addressing a crowd, there is an aim. There
is an objective you have. It could be something as simple
as giving some announcements about Sunday night and our farewell
to Pastor Derek and his family. Here's what's gonna happen. You
wanna listen because you need to know what we're gonna do.
It could be something very important, like, you know, I think they
call it muster on a ship. When you're getting ready to
go, they call you together and they say, hey, listen, if the
ship starts going down, this right here is your lifeboat.
This is where you're supposed to go. You know, it's pretty
important that you get that information, but whatever I'm saying, whether
you're writing a letter or whatever, you have something you want to
communicate, and John has an aim, and his aim is seen in the
focus of his message. John's focus we've already seen
is on fellowship. John 1 verse number three, he
says that you may have fellowship with us. And truly our fellowship
is with the father and with his son, Jesus Christ. Beloved, we
should have fellowship with God and with other men. And I tell
you tonight as a challenge to myself and to you, whomever you
might be sitting under, that every message preached should
have as its objective the underlining goal of bringing us into better
fellowship with one another and the Father. That should be the
goal. ultimately an underlining goal
bringing us into better fellowship with one another and better fellowship
with the Father. It should draw us closer to one
another and closer to God. You see, this is the fulfillment
of the law because the law has been brought down to two simple
commandments. I was listening to a message
this last week and it talked about the truth that In the Old
Testament, there's a little over 600 laws that you could see and
view. But God gave the law to his people,
and he broke it down to 10. He said, here's the 10 laws.
But then when Jesus came, he broke it down to two. And he
said, all the law is contained in these two laws. And what are
they? Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all the soul
and the mind. And the second is like unto it, what is it? So you see the importance of
that objective? The underlying objective of every
message should have as a goal to point people to love one another
better and to love God more. And Paul, or I knew I was gonna
do that because there's so much in the New Testament written
by Paul. This is not Paul, John. John
is trying to communicate that to us. Every preacher of the
gospel should have as his goal to lift up Jesus Christ and him
crucified. It is man's sin that sent Christ
to the cross and it's the father that raised him victorious over
sin. And beloved, the result is what
we see in verse number four. You know what, there's a time
for godly sorrow. The Bible says that godly sorrow
does what? Do you know the passage of scripture?
Godly sorrow leadeth thee to repentance. So sometimes when
we preach, there's some pretty pointed, there's some pretty
straightforward addressing of sin. and it might bring about
some sorrow, but the underlining objective
is seen in verse number four, that your joy may be full. Godly sorrow leads us to repentance
and through Jesus Christ and what he did on the cross, we're
brought back into fellowship with the Father and back into
fellowship with one another and our joy is full. That is the
message, the aim, that John has for us. Would you stand to your
feet with your heads bowed and your eyes closed? Lord, as we
have a moment of invitation here, so powerful are the truths of
your word and so, I guess, at hand they are that
many times we take them for granted. But I pray, God, that we would
truly value the message from your word tonight and realize
the importance of the aim of this book to bring us into true
fellowship with the Father and fellowship with one another that
our joy may be full. And Lord, we pray that you would
work as only you can in the hearts of your people, in Jesus' name,
amen. It's a pianist's place. If God
spoke to you, you come. Is your joy full? Do you have
something in your heart or in your life that's hiding or keeping
back the joy? Are you out of fellowship with
the Father? Are you out of fellowship with a brother or sister in Christ?
Do you have something there that needs to be dealt with?
The Epistles of John
Series The Epistles of John
| Sermon ID | 225231345177593 |
| Duration | 46:16 |
| Date | |
| Category | Midweek Service |
| Bible Text | 1 John 1:4 |
| Language | English |
Documents
Add a Comment
Comments
No Comments
© Copyright
2026 SermonAudio.
