Please turn in your Bibles to 1st John chapter 1. 1st John chapter 1. By God's grace, we are beginning a brand new series today through what are called the epistles or the letters of John, 1st, 2nd, 3rd John, toward the end of the New Testament. This is going to be an unusually long introduction since it's a new series, a new group of three short New Testament books with a different author. I don't think, I'm quite sure I haven't done a series to any of John's writings yet. So we've done plenty of others. We've done Moses, Paul, Matthew, Daniel, various ones like that. We haven't gotten to the Apostle John yet, and we need to. Let's talk about the Apostle John and his epistles, as they're called. In this introduction, I'm going to extensively reference and quote a very good book that would be probably pretty accessible, pretty user-friendly, if you wanted to check it out yourself sometime. It's called John, Beloved Disciple, A Survey of His Theology. But it's not a huge tome. It's, you know, pretty normal size, pretty, as I said, user-friendly for the average person in church. I believe it's now with the Lord, but it's by the old Presbyterian systematic theologian, Robert Raymond. And he wrote an excellent book on John. He says, first of all, about these letters, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John, he says about who wrote them, Tradition has uniformly ascribed both the Gospel and these letters, Gospel of John, and these letters presently under consideration to the Apostle John. Polycarp, Papias, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, and Origen. In fact, all of the fathers, Greek and Latin. The fathers just means the really old Christian writers from the first few centuries. All the fathers, Greek and Latin, except 1 John as from the Apostle John. And the Muratorian canon included it as a letter of John. Accordingly, Eusebius, he was one of the first church historians who wrote a big church history. Eusebius classified 1 John among the acknowledged books of the New Testament that everyone agreed on from the beginning. He says, I know of no current evidence which would warrant our giving up this tradition. Indeed, the vast majority of scholars today affirm common authorship for the Gospel and 1 John. That is, there is really no argument anywhere. The guy who wrote the Gospel of John, as we call it, is the guy who wrote 1 John. And that's the Apostle John. John, the son of Zebedee, one of the twelve, who walked with Jesus, lived with Jesus for about three years or a little over. It's the Apostle John. And we have evidence going all the way back to the beginning that that's just the case. I don't think we need to really debate that. So in light of that, Remember, remember from scripture. And again, I'm going to quote a lot from Raymond, but remember from scripture, who John was, I want to talk about him personally, before we talk about what he wrote. John, which comes from a Hebrew name we might say in English, Jehohanan, but that's not how they would say it. It means the Lord, Yahweh is gracious. That's his name. He was the son of Zebedee and perhaps of Salome, Salome, you can say it either way. It seems as we piece the gospel records together, his mother was probably Salome, who was in turn perhaps the sister of Jesus, Mother Mary. There's good reason to think that as you compare the gospel accounts. Traditionally thought, it's traditionally thought, and I think it's almost certain, John refers to himself in his gospel as the disciple whom Jesus loved. I don't think, as I was thinking more about that this week and reading about it, I don't think that's actually John saying, oh, I was Jesus' favorite, the disciple whom Jesus loved. Actually, I think he's very humble by the fact that Jesus loved him and that Jesus brought him in so close to himself. It's not in distinction from all the others that Jesus didn't love as much. But John has this special awe at the fact that Jesus loved him and called him to be his own. Anyway, John refers to himself in his gospel as the disciple whom Jesus loved, author of the fourth gospel, the three New Testament letters that bear his name, and the revelation. So Raven says, if those perhapses are in fact so, then John was Jesus' cousin, probably around 10 years Jesus junior. He apparently grew up in Galilee. Again, this is all piecing together scripture. He's a, he was a son of parents in comfortable circumstances, his father having hired servants and his mother being part of that group of women who followed Jesus and supported him with their means. So John was from a family of means. Um, his mother was one of the women who purchased spices to bury Jesus and who were the last at the cross and the first at the open tomb. John was a partner with his brother James along with the brothers Andrew and Peter in the fishing trade. And he is probably the unnamed disciple of John the Baptist referred to in John chapter 1. He remembered the very hour of this disciple's interview with Jesus. And if so, he went with Jesus to Galilee in John chapter 2, witnessed Jesus' first miracle at Cana. He was with Jesus during his early Judean ministry down south. Later, along with his three partners, he quit the fishing trade altogether to follow Jesus. He's listed in either the third or fourth position in the lists of the 12 apostles. He's toward the top. He was a member of the inner circle of the 12, meaning Peter, James, and John. If there were three guys out of all the rest that got to go with Jesus privately to some special happening, some special event, it was them. In addition, as Raymond says, to Jesus' many public works, he witnessed the great private events of the raising of Jairus' daughter, Jesus' transfiguration. It was also those three that Jesus took to pray with him in Gethsemane. Jesus gave John and James that surname or nickname, Boanerges, sons of thunder. which really meant they were tumultuous fellows. They had overzealous temperaments, as Raymond says. That came out various times. They had this ardent zeal for Jesus revealed in their readiness to rebuke the man casting out demons because he's not following with us. He's not part of our group of 12. He's casting out demons in your name. We tried to tell him to stop. Like Elijah, in their minds, like Elijah, they volunteered to call down fire from heaven on those Samaritan villages that wouldn't receive Jesus because he was on his way to Jerusalem. These sons of thunder also rashly got their mother in on their scheme to ask Jesus if they could have the most honored seats in his kingdom on his right and left hand. At the last Passover supper, Raymond says, John occupied a privileged place next to Jesus. Judas Iscariot probably reclining on Jesus' other side. They would recline at table. And so John was, as he puts it, in Jesus' bosom. He was right up against Jesus' chest and how they would be seated, not seated, reclining at table at the last supper. So John was right there beside Jesus. So much so that he could, as he records, he could sort of mutter, whisper to Jesus, who is it that's gonna betray you? Jesus says, the guy I'm gonna give this piece of bread to. That's how close he was to Jesus. At Jesus' trial, John gained access to the court of the high priest because it says he was known to the high priest's family, John chapter 18. Apparently he witnessed Jesus' trial. It seems like he alone of all the disciples witnessed the crucifixion of Jesus. And then since he was there, Jesus assigned him the responsibility of caring for Mary, his mother, who was perhaps John's aunt. Seems that John was with Peter throughout the dark days of Jesus being in the grave. John and Peter were the first two of the 12 to get to the empty tomb. John was the first one to see it. Um, he makes a note that he, he outraced Peter to the tomb, but by his own testimony, when John looked into the empty tomb that Sunday morning, he saw the empty grave clothes. And though he says he didn't yet understand the scriptures that this had to happen, he saw and believed. Raymond also says John was present for several of Jesus' post-resurrection appearances. After his resurrection, he was present at Jesus' ascension. John was with the church on the day of Pentecost and received the promise of the Spirit at that time. He was with Peter when Peter healed the lame man at the temple gate called Beautiful, Acts chapter 3. He was arrested with Peter, and with Peter he defended their proclamation of Jesus' resurrection before the people. Later, when Philip took the gospel to Samaria, to the Samaritans, the Jerusalem church sent Peter and John to check it out. And it says, humorously enough, on their way back from that mission, they preached to many more Samaritans in their villages. That's funny because of John's early attitude, wanting to call down fire on the Samaritans. And Paul in Galatians two, then he talks about those who were pillars as he puts it pillars in the Jerusalem church. John is one of those he lists along with Peter and James, the Lord's brother. And then after Acts chapter eight, uh, John disappears from Luke's writings. He's not mentioned again in scripture except in his own writings. Many years later, Revelation 1-9, we find out that John is exiled to the island of Patmos, as he says, because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. And that's where he received the visions we call the apocalypse, the revelation of Christ. Then we have to rely on tradition for the rest, but it's pretty certain, pretty strong evidence from way back, what was happening in general with John. Around the time or a little before, Jerusalem fell to the Romans AD 70 it seems that John and some say John took Mary Jesus mother with him that she was still alive then but John seems to have moved up to the area of Asia Minor to the area of Ephesus Where the Apostle Paul and Timothy and those men had been ministering But it's very certain from what we know that John seems to have ministered in his old age in the area of Ephesus and that whole Roman province of Asia modern-day Turkey that's where he seems to have written probably first the Gospel of John then these letters so I won't go get into the weeds talking about all how we know all that of course but it does seem that he had a wide ministry and a long ministry there And people, of course, would come to Ephesus just to hear John's stories about Jesus. Wouldn't you? Wouldn't you pay almost any plane ticket in today's terms to get there? And John knew him. What a wonderful thing that must have been. Of course, it's really funny then that even with John himself on site there, you had heresies popping up right there and people saying, well, I know better about what Jesus was really here to do. Um, there's one story. It's a story. I'm not going to say it. It's absolutely correct. But there's an early story from, okay. A guy who was discipled by a guy, discipled by John. Irenaeus learned from Polycarp, who learned from John. But Irenaeus says, Polycarp used to tell this story about when the Apostle John and some others were going into the public bathhouse in Ephesus. So the men would have their own bathhouse, and it would be a public gathering place. John was told that the, well it was before the real Gnostics, but he was kind of like an early Gnostic heretic named Serentis. John was told that this guy Serentis was inside the bathhouse. And John said, let's get out of here, lest the roof fall down on us, because Serentis, the enemy of the truth, is inside. He wanted nothing to do with this guy. So John seems to have finished out his days in the area of Ephesus. He was exiled, as scripture says, to the island of Patmos, probably during the reign of Domitian. During that brief persecution, Patmos was a little island, probably a penal colony, out of the Aegean Sea, just off the coast of where Ephesus is. So same area of the world. Once Domitian died, pretty soon after that, John, it seems, went back to Ephesus and died there during the reign of Trajan. Had a great ministry there. So that's a short biography of John, who he was as a man. And some people might kind of overdo it and represent John as having been this fiery guy in his youth, son of thunder. And then he calmed down, as he should have. Well, he grew in wisdom, that's certain. and in proper love for the Lord and how that should look in his life. Yes, he's known as the Apostle of Love, as he speaks of Christian love so much in his writings. But you'll see he's still fiery in 1 John. He just now knows the proper time and the proper way to be zealous for the truth and out of love for his Savior. But the fire's not gone. In fact, he is, people talk about his dualism as they call it, either, or it's either this or that. He makes everything very plain. You're either a child of God or a child of the devil. That's his words. First John. You're either, it's either the spirit of Christ or the spirit of antichrist. Either or no middle ground here with John, as he declares his savior. And as he says what that means for us. Well, as Robert Raymond says, lastly, John wrote his gospel, the gospel of John, to arouse faith, to encourage it to be born and to be strengthened. But he wrote 1 John to establish faith's certainty. You can look at that two different ways. The certainty of the Christian faith, the facts about who Jesus really is and what that really means. The certainty of that, factually, but also we can establish with certainty that our Christian faith, that we are really part of the Christian faith, that we really belong to the true God and his son, Jesus Christ. In fact, John gives what some people have called tests of true Christian faith. This will show, this will be evidence over time in your life, whether you really know Jesus or you don't. That comes out a lot in 1 John. Well, let's look at the first four verses then. First four verses of 1 John 1. And I think you'll see even more why I went to all that trouble to talk about John's life and all the things we know from the Gospels, especially about his life with Jesus of Nazareth on the ground. from the very beginning of Jesus' ministry all the way to the end. That's important for what he says here. It can help you understand what he's saying here right away. Verse one of chapter one. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, And the wording there is not just like an accidental brush up against with your hand, but they felt him concerning the word of life. The life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the father and was made manifest to us. that which we have seen and heard. We proclaim also to you so that you too may have fellowship with us. And indeed our fellowship is with the father and with his son, Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things that our joy or some manuscripts say that your joy may be complete. That our joy may be complete. What's the big idea? One of the biggest ideas in all of scripture, really. The eternal word of life came in the flesh to be proclaimed and known. The eternal word of life came in the flesh to be proclaimed and known. So let's unfold John's message a bit. Starting in verse one, it shouldn't take us long to work through this, but verse one, He talks about a first-hand encounter with the eternal word incarnate, meaning in the flesh. His first-hand encounter. And he speaks, there's debate. Why does he say we and us here? And then later on in this same epistle, he just talks about I and me as I'm writing this to you. Why is he talking in the plural about we and us? And this is what we saw and heard and felt and touched. Well, There's some who have reasons to think this is just special wording, just talking about him, but a special kind of way back then of giving an eyewitness testimony very solemnly. But you could also see this as, and many do, as John subtly speaking as if, and I'm not the only one, He was one of the apostles, one of the specially chosen eyewitnesses of the Lord Jesus, who was sent out to the nations to declare what they had personally seen and heard and touched. They were perfect eyewitnesses to give their testimony. And I'm not talking about It's fine. We talk this way. I'm not talking about how Christians kind of have their lingo. I gave my testimony, my story of how God worked in my life. I'm using testimony like you'd use it in court. Someone goes to the witness stand and they solemnly testify to the truth that they know firsthand. That's what he's talking about here when he's talking about how he's testifying to us of the facts. He had a firsthand encounter and not just him. The apostles had a firsthand encounter and not just for a moment or a brief day over a long period of time. Firsthand encounter with the eternal word now in the flesh, now incarnate, now made flesh. Why does John though say that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which was instead of instead of he who was from the beginning, whom we heard, et cetera. That's called, in Greek, using the neuter instead of the masculine. And Greek doesn't work all the same way as English does, so that's part of why this is, I think. One commentator says, this use of the neuter avoids the confusion in Greek of thinking he is referring exclusively to life, which is a feminine noun in Greek, or The word which is a masculine noun in Greek, but the neuter pronoun focuses the reader on Jesus as both the word and the life as you'll say So it communicates John's comprehensive view of Christ. So that's Greek stuff. You don't totally get that That's fine but he says further his use of heard saw with our eyes beheld and handled points his readers to the person of Christ and His reference to the word of life clearly alludes, it clearly reminds you of the prologue of John's gospel, wherein the word of God is the incarnate word, Jesus. And finally, he says it could be that John intended both Jesus as eternal life, incarnate, and his teachings about eternal life to be in view. That's what Kistamatzeker, another commentator, thinks. Akin says the the message in the person ultimately cannot be separated each explains the other So I'm just kind of clearing the brush out of the way There as we're wondering why is he worded this way not that way? But whatever else John is referring to when he says that which was from the beginning first of all he's talking about the person of Christ and whom then he personally encountered in these ways, whom he heard and saw and touched, right? And it really seems, it really does seem that these people whom John is writing or addressing here, they probably had already read or heard John's gospel. John seems almost intentionally to be talking about some of the same things now, all right? There's good reasons to think that. that which was from the beginning. Well, John uses from the beginning in various ways in his letter here, but I think the closest way to what he's doing here is chapter two of first John. He says, I'm writing to you fathers because you know him who is from the beginning God, right? And what's the beginning there means the beginning of all things. him who was from the beginning. He says it again later on. I write you fathers because you know him who is from the beginning. So similarly here that which was from the beginning, some people think, oh, the beginning of Jesus ministry or the beginning of your Christian experience, all sorts of weird ideas. I think clearly John is, if you compare his writings, especially John is saying, this is something which existed from the beginning of time. that which was from the beginning, that's what we encountered, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon. And so he uses two different words for seeing. We saw with our eyes and we looked upon more of a close examination. We really watched them. We took in what we were seeing. and we have touched with our hands. Joel Beeke here says something really wonderful. He's kind of using the old King James wording but it It's more literal, actually, how John speaks in the Greek. He says, John also touched the Savior. He placed his arm on Christ's arm and leaned his head upon Jesus' bosom. Jesus, who was in the bosom of his father, he's pulling this together from John's writings. Jesus, who was in the bosom of his father, manifested himself to John and the apostles so that they could have a place in the bosom of the eternal Christ. What what is all this that he's talking about that which was from the beginning and then we encountered personally in these hands-on ways these in-person ways Well, it's a little difficult to translate ESV says concerning the Word of Life But it's the Word of Life they encountered And one way you could look at that, again, we're talking Greek grammar, which I don't want to get into too much, but in syntax, but when we translate it, word of life, it could mean something like the word and then renaming it, who is life, the word, who is the life. That's one way to take it concerning the word of life. And remember how John famously in the gospel of John chapter one talks about in the beginning, So I'm talking here that which is from the beginning there. He says in the beginning was the word the long us and the word was with God and the word was God and all things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made and in him was life. He's talking about the same person. The eternal son of God spoken of as the very word of God the Old Testament The Old Testament stressed God's word, which he sends out in creating things in creation, God's word, which also reveals the Lord God and God's word, which brings salvation. And from that, it seems John then said, and that's not just a word or a force. That's a person. That's the very son of God, John chapter one. That's who God's word is. Now let me pause here, talk a little more about something I just barely mentioned earlier. We could be overly certain and go too far about, well, I know exactly everything that was happening when John wrote this, okay? And we always have to be careful about that. Doing historical studies and saying, well, I'm gonna interpret everything through this specialized knowledge from some historian who wrote something about this time period. But it does seem pretty certain, just from reading what John wrote, John is not only just writing to believers about their common faith, but he's writing to them to reassure them in the face of false teaching and those who have been part of the church who then had departed from the church to do their own thing religiously. We do know that much. And it seems certain from what John writes in this letter, he is going to confront those who are denying the incarnation, denying that God was made flesh. The situation, Robert Raymond again says, behind John's first two letters seems rather clearly to be a situation in which certain heretical teachers, possibly Cyrinthus himself or those related to him, we mentioned Cyrinthus, they were on the one hand claiming probably a special illumination by the Spirit that imparted to them the true knowledge of God. And they were, they had this high and solemn sort of piety that claimed immediate communion with God. They probably had slogans like, Oh, I know God, I abide in him. I am in the light. I love him. all this pious-sounding language to say this new teaching I'm introducing is a higher and better form of Christianity than you've ever known, so let me teach you. On the other hand, they were denying the possibility of a real incarnation. So here's where Greek ideas were probably making their way in from the culture around. Maybe some of the ideas were the idea, for instance, that The material, the physical is evil, and the spiritual is good. So we have to get free over time from the material, the physical, and just be on a spiritual plane. But they were denying the possibility of a real incarnation, the only purpose for which was to deal with original sin and its consequences. They were quite possibly insisting that Jesus began his earthly life as a mere man. and that at his baptism, the heavenly Christ, as they called him, or the son of God, a higher divine power or emanation came upon him, upon this man Jesus, empowering him for service, but departed from him just prior to his crucifixion. If this were indeed the case, then no real incarnation occurred. In some, these teachers were denying not the deity, but the full and true humanity of the Christ. It is likely that this is the view, Raymond says, which John was combating in 1 John 5, 6, when he tells us that Jesus Christ, the son of God, is the one who came through water, that is the event of baptism, and blood, that is the event of crucifixion. We'll get there later in the series. Accordingly, John writes to expose this false teaching by emphasizing the real and true humanity of the son of God. In keeping with what he said in his gospel, the word became flesh. If we don't have a savior who is both God and man, none of this works. It's all off. And indeed, these false teachers who evolved sort of into what we call in the second and third century Gnosticism, they didn't care about the real gospel. They had their own ideas of what it was to get close to God and to be saved. It was about each of us realizing, as many teach today, that, well, we can have, we can realize the Christ principle or whatever in each of us. Jesus was a really good guy who kind of showed us the way, but he didn't die for sins. It's also probable that, as Don Burdick says, another false teaching at the time, very close to that, was docetism, which may have said, well, Christ only appeared to have a physical body. He was more of a phantom, and he only appeared to suffer on the cross. Docetism, from a Greek word to keo, to appear, to seem. It only seemed that way. But, you know, they would say, We know better, don't we? Isn't it disrespectful to Christ to think that he was actually a man? Think of him that lowly. So you have all these, we do know enough to know things like this were swirling around already in that area of Asia Minor where John was ministering. So it doesn't make all the more sense then that he goes to this great length to say, look, we're testifying to you. in the sight of God that we live with this Jesus. We heard him. We saw him. We touched him. The word was made flesh. And you have to know that and believe that to know the one who is the word of God and the life of God. And if you don't know him, you don't know the real Christ. That's what he's doing. So. There's this firsthand encounter with the eternal word incarnate. And then because of that, we can move more rapidly here. There's the eyewitness testimony that we've been talking about. The eyewitness testimony to eternal life incarnate. He then moves from talking about him as the word of God, and as God's word, he tells us everything we need to know about God the Father, John chapter one. But he moves from talking about the word to talking about the life. Christ, the Son of God, who became the man, Jesus of Nazareth, and is now forever Jesus of Nazareth. Christ, the Son of God, is eternal life Himself. He doesn't just have eternal life at His disposal to give you. To know Him is to know eternal life. Eternal life is a person. You need to know him personally. So verse two, the life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it. So because we've seen it, we're giving our eyewitness testimony and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the father and was made manifest to us. just quickly, those Gnostic ideas we talked about, those heretical ideas that were starting to pop up in John's day and took on a life of their own after that, they wouldn't like this, that the life was made manifest for all the world to know about, because they were all about secret knowledge, Gnosis, they're called Gnostics, Gnosis, knowledge. We know what's really going on in the world, the secret knowledge. but only a few who have the secret handshakes, as it were. Only a few can really get in on this deep knowledge of things and of God. That was what they were all about. But John says, the life was made manifest and we've seen it and we testify to it and proclaim to you openly. This is no secret thing for the privileged few. This is for the world to know. The eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. He's following the pattern even in, I'm sorry, I'm mentioning the Greek so much today, but it's just so clear when you look at it that way. In the Greek grammar, he's going back to how he talked in John chapter one, that the word was with God. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God. Here he says, the eternal life, which was with the father. Again, it's talking about the second person of the Trinity, the Son of God, who was with the Father for all eternity past, as we would look at it as humans. And, um, when it says he's with the Father, that Greek wording has the idea of being near or facing someone. So it's, it's not just that he was that there were two people in existence together. people, two persons in existence together, but it's this close face-to-face relationship between Him who is eternal life and the Father. Now turn with me to John chapter 17, Gospel of John chapter 17. This wonderfully just fits in right here. John 17 verses 1 through 5. And again, it really seems John had already written this and these people probably already heard this read before. John's referring back to his apostolic testimony which he has given over many decades now. But this records what Jesus himself said the night of his betrayal, before he was betrayed. He said this after the Last Supper. Facing the cross, John 17 verse one. When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, father, the hour has come. Glorify your son that the son may glorify you since you have given him authority over all flesh to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And that makes so much sense, doesn't it? As John is saying, this is the one who is eternal life, who was with the father. Verse three, and this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed, before the world was. This is the eternal life that was with the Father in inexpressible glory before the world existed, before time was a thing. This is the one John's proclaiming to us. Do you see why it's important to listen? And why is John giving this eyewitness testimony to eternal life incarnate? Well, because he desires fellowship with the audience, with his hearers. There's a desired fellowship with the audience. And by the way, I don't want to miss this again. Joel Beakey said something wonderful here. He says, John's passion was proclaiming Jesus Christ as God, man, savior. His great joy was to share with others all that he had heard with his ears, seen with his eyes and handled with his hands. The eternal word of life. Christ was the alpha and omega. The beginning of the end of John's ministry. and it should be of our Christianity too. It shouldn't be Christ was my way into Christianity and then I get more interested in other things about religion. Everything has to connect back to this person who is eternal life. Everything we care about as Christians, which we call ourselves, has to be ultimately about Christ. If it doesn't, it's worthless and it's dangerous. Okay. So there's a desired fellowship with the audience that which we have seen and heard. We proclaim also to you so that you too may have fellowship with us. You don't have to have been there. Like John was there. It's kind of funny. Um, we have, there's a traditional old Christian song. Were you there when they crucified my Lord? Were you there when they laid him in the tomb? Were you there when he rose up from the grave? I have no problem with that song, but really I cheekily want to kind of say, say at each verse, uh, no, I wasn't. Sorry, but it's speaking like one of the apostles might've said, like saying rhetorically, were you there? And can you feel what that was like? You know, but John was there all the same. It's okay that you weren't there. because just by hearing and embracing the message, the truth about Jesus Christ, you can have fellowship. You can be united in this unbreakable bond with those who believe, with the apostles themselves. You have a light, as Peter calls elsewhere, a light precious faith, the same kind of precious faith that an apostle had who was there and sought for himself. And as John says at the end of his gospel, as he quotes, Jesus is saying to Thomas, blessed are those who have not seen and yet believed. So there's this desired fellowship with the audience. John doesn't just throw up his hands and say, I was there. I know the people who were there and we just can't express what that was like to you. So I wish I could communicate it and you could enter into this with us, but I'm sorry. I'm just part of a select few, a very privileged club. I wish people could understand what we understand. No, he says, you can understand this so that you have fellowship with us. By the way, that's why one of the many reasons the Lord commands us to be here Sunday after Sunday, because there's so much to communicate, to enter into that deeper fellowship of knowing the Lord. So as Matthew Henry says in his commentary here, there is a communion or a common participation of privilege and dignity, belonging to all saints from the highest apostle to the lowest believer. And he goes on to say, and indeed, our fellowship is not just to, again, to just be a little, I don't know, to be a little silly. It's not just a human club that we're all so happy to be part of. It's not just a human fellowship, an earthly fellowship. It's a real fellowship with the father and his son. Indeed, our fellowship is with the father and with his son, Jesus Christ. And of course, the Gnostics who would go on to say, well, the Christ spirit was different than the human Jesus. They would hate how he said, God's son, Jesus Christ, they're the same person. Matthew Henry again, see for what end the eternal life was made flesh, that he might advance us to eternal life in communion with the Father and himself. I can't express to you, I'm trying to, but I can't fully express to you that the wonder and the glory that the eternal one, the one in three and three in one, would come into history as one of us, Now, the second person in the Trinity would come into history as one of us to pull us into that eternal communion of eternal life that the Godhead has with each other. To pull us into that fellowship that will never end and that will only become sweeter as the ages roll on. And we, being part of a rebel race against him, that he made and that nonetheless has rebelled against him. And, as we wrap up this message unfolded, this written address, I think he's referring to the whole letter really, this is a written address for completed joy. And it's hard to decide between two different things we find in different old Greek manuscripts. Some have, like we have here in the ESV, we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete, which could fit with what John says even in some of his other letters about, I have no greater joy than when my children walk in the truth, things like that. This would certainly bring joy to the apostle as he writes these things to establish and strengthen his little children in the faith. As Donald Burdick says, if as a result of this epistle, the readers come to enjoy an experience of more intimate fellowship with the Father and the Son, and do not allow the fellowship with other believers to be marred or broken by the inroads of false teachers, the author will be overjoyed. So you can look at it that way. Other manuscripts say that your joy, I'm writing these things so your joy may be complete. And certainly that would be true as well because if you know the one who is God's very word and the one who is eternal life, there's no way you can miss the joy if you really know him. Joel Beekie says, since Jesus is the source of all true joy, this joy holds the promise of reaching as high, as wide, as deep as God himself, and lasting just as long. A treasure to be enjoyed in this life and in the life to come. As Robert Murray Machane says so beautifully, believe not, in Jesus that is, and you will have no joy. No joy of this sort, this eternal joy, this deep joy. Believe little, and you will have little joy. Believe much, and you will have much joy. Believe all, and you will have all joy, and your joy shall be full. So I'll quote Robert Raymond again, as he summarizes what these first four verses are about. He says, God has spoken his ultimate word, the word of eternal life in the concrete, visible, palpable, you can touch it, historical reality of his incarnate son. With that word, he has admitted man to fellowship with himself and has placed men into fellowship with one another. How can we not rejoice in that on this Lord's day? And so again, the big idea is that the eternal word of life came in the flesh to be proclaimed and known. Are you willing to speak up about him? And are you willing, do you know him in personal fellowship? Or do you really have nothing in common with the living God and his son? Do you really, are you really an outsider? In fact, an alien and an enemy. God himself calls you to come in, bow the knee, yes, submit yourself to his truth and know him. And be his child, as John goes on to say in this epistle. What manner of love is the Father given to us that we would be called children of God, and such we are. That kind of fellowship. Now the rest of 1 John goes from here to hammer home tests of Christian life and faith under and subject to this historical manifestation and this proclamation. You have to start here. This revelation of the word of life, God's Son who is the Father's eternal word and eternal life, now and forever incarnate. This must be the Christ that you trust, that you know, and that you confess. And this fellowship with the real father in heaven and his real son, Jesus Christ, John's going to say, this fellowship will be evident in the beliefs you confess. It'll be evident in the deeds you do and in the loves, the loves of your heart that you manifest. But for now, I'll just talk in verses one through four again. I have two brief things to say as we apply the message a little more. As we examine ourselves in the light of this message. First, there is an attested and indispensable incarnation to believe. It's been attested. It's been proclaimed to us by those who are eyewitnesses of Christ. And it's indispensable to the Christian faith. You can't have Christianity without it. You have to believe it, this incarnation. Later in 1 John 4, John will say, Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. And every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them. For he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. They are from the world, therefore they speak from the world and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us. And whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. I'll just briefly mention, I don't have much time, briefly mention Donald Burdick wrote this in 1985, and it has only become more relevant to where we are now. He says, application of this passage may be made even more directly to that group of present-day cults, and I would add elements of the occult and the New Age, those present-day cults that are gnostic in character, namely Christian Science, New Thought, the Unity School of Christianity, and the Theosophical Society. Now, you may not have heard those terms exactly, but you've probably run into some of the authors and some of the people. He says, the basic factor that binds these four religious systems together is their view of Christology, doctrine of Christ. All of them separate Christ from the human Jesus. making the former, Christ, to be some kind of divine consciousness that, although latent in all man, it's kind of there somewhere in all of us, was fully developed in the man Jesus. You hear that, that's from the pit of hell. We know this. And John already refuted this. But we'll have plenty more opportunity to go there throughout this series. But the eternal word of life came in the flesh to be proclaimed and known. So you must believe in the incarnation. You don't have anything without that, with God. Second, and lastly, there's an earthly and heavenly fellowship to enjoy. An earthly and heavenly fellowship to enjoy. John Hannah, in his commentary, applied it this way, he said, In a culture that is increasingly self-oriented, John would tell us that we are walking down the road of disappointment and emptiness. The personal desire for significance and self-identity is valid, he says. However, it is not found in the pursuit of self-interest. For believers, contentment and self-worth is found in desiring for others what God has so graciously bestowed upon them. participation first in the life of God and then in the family of God. What he's saying is, if you come to God and get your joy in him, you'll figure out who you are in the grand scheme of things. You'll figure out who you are in yourself, but that's not the important thing. If you seek self-identity and self-worth and all that stuff through self-interest, it needs to be all about me and looking into myself You're doomed. You know, it wasn't that many weeks ago. It was before we moved into the parsonage. I was at a coffee shop, as I sometimes did, to write sermons. I'm a foreigner there. I saw something really interesting in the next table over. A young lady who, she had a number of things there that she was doing. But I recognize one thing she had out, not because I've ever used them, she had tarot cards laid out. And she was using them there in the coffee shop. For those of you, maybe children who don't know, I hope you don't know a lot about that, but it's part of the occult, trying to get secret knowledge from the invisible world, but not from God. But she was using tarot cards, and so I figured out a way. Then she started to pack up. I asked her about them, what she was doing, and we had a good conversation. But it was really heartbreaking to hear her explain. Now, her mom had used these cards as she grew up, and now she's using them. And the cards and her interpretation of them, although there's a lot of interpretation that goes into it, well, the cards showed me these things, so I kind of took that meme The cards and her interpretation of them as if they were mystical communication from the universe somehow. That's how she put it. The universe talking to me. That led her further into self-affirmation, telling her that she was enough. She was nervous. There were some big life changes coming for her. She was thinking about moving across the world to some place. Well, is this all going to work out? Am I on the right path? So she used the cards and then, oh, they're affirming, you need to look deeper into yourself. You need to have more confidence in yourself. And whether or not you use the occult to get there, isn't that what most everyone is saying these days? You need to look deeper into yourself and find what you need there. Self-affirmation. And I just had the quick opportunity to kindly say, you know, none of us is enough. We were made as creatures who need a father in heaven. And we need to look up, not in. But that's what I tell you. The world in this present evil age just continues that lie of the serpent from Eden. It says that we should find deity and thus we should find everything we need in ourselves. But we were made to have a marvelous fellowship, a communion with the one and only true God. He's our maker and redeemer. He's in a, who is in a category entirely distinct from us as his creation. But we were made to have eternal fellowship with God, the father and Christ, his son. And then with a countless host of those who are made in his image and who are now refashioned by his grace into his perfect likeness over time. We're made to have fellowship with God and with those who are finite representatives of His glory and who find all their satisfaction and all their joy, not in themselves, but in Him. And if you don't live for what you're made for, you're headed for trouble and for despair. As John's first epistle will emphasize also, fellowship with God will show in our fellowship with His children. I'll skip some of what I had here for sake of time. But think about, John's gonna challenge us to not just say things that are true, say that things are true about us spiritually, but to prove them by our lifestyle. Think about your fellowship with the people of God. Is it really sweet to you? Is it really a top priority in your life? So I'll skip here to, back to this fellowship with God, with which I'll end. Christians are commanded by the Lord to show their love for Him by loving His people, His church. So if, as you say, you eagerly anticipate eternal communion with God and His people one day, start by seeking out worship and friendship and fellowship with God's people now. But again, as John said, this isn't just us on earth who are in this fellowship. The whole point of the church and of Christian fellowship is eternal fellowship, abiding in mutual closeness with God the Father and Jesus his Son. So that's why I'm ending with John 14, starting in verse 18. Jesus said to his disciples, I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you. Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. And that day you will know that I am my father and you and me and I am you. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. and he who loves me will be loved by my father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him. Judas, not Iscariot, said to him, Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourselves to us and not to the world? Jesus answered him, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. That's the fellowship John's talking about. God coming to make His home with you, His dwelling with you. So is Jesus precious to you? Not the Christ of someone's half-baked imagination, tailor-fit to our small-minded, hard-hearted desires, but Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the Word, the Son of God made flesh who was truly born into our race. He truly lived a perfectly righteous life in our fallen and cursed world. He truly suffered and died under God the Father's wrath in the place of condemned sinners. He truly rose bodily from the dead to inherit eternal life for himself and everyone who trusts in him. And he's the one who's truly coming in the body in great power and glory to judge the living and the dead. Is that historical, living, matchless person precious to you? Do you relish true closeness with Him? Do you dread being distanced from Him, having sin come between you and Him? If not, you're probably miserable being here as He meets with His people. Give up your self-importance and your self-righteousness and your self-sufficiency. Fall at His feet and embrace Him by faith and hold on to Him. Let's pray again. Father, please bless your word to our hearts and turn hearts of stone into hearts of flesh as well that are sensitive to your word and respond in faith. We ask this for Jesus' sake, amen.