For joining us, we've been studying through the epistle of 1 John, same author as the gospel of John, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, same author as the book of Revelation. But we've begun looking at considering studying his epistles, and we're in the first of his three epistles. This morning, I'd like to ask you to find your way in the Bible, your Bible, to chapter 2 of 1 John, 1 John chapter 2. And I'd like us to read together. Let me read, and you follow along. For joining us, we've been so John, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, same author as the book of Revelation. But we've begun looking at considering studying his epistles, and we're in the first of his three epistles. This morning, I'd like to ask you to find your way in the Bible, your Bible, to chapter 2 of 1 John, 1 John chapter 2. And I'd like us to read together, let me read, and you follow along, a rather long passage, longer than is typical, but I think there is a sense in which we need to deal with this entire segment of John's first epistle together in one treatment this morning. So 1 John 2, beginning in verse 3. John writes, By this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. The one who says, I have come to know him and does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him. But whatever keeps his word in him, the love of God has truly been perfected. By this, we know that we are in him. The one who says he abides in him ought himself to walk in the same manner as he walked. Beloved, I am not writing a new commandment to you, but an old commandment, which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you have heard. On the other hand, I am writing a new commandment to you, which is true in him and is in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. The one who says he is in the light and yet hates his brother is in the darkness until now. The one who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness, and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes. I am writing, John says, you little children, because your sins have been forgiven you for his namesake. I am writing to you, fathers, because you know Him who has been from the beginning. I am writing you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I have written to you, children, because you know the Father. I have written to you, fathers, because you know Him who has been from the beginning. I have written to you, young men, because you are strong and the Word of God abides in you and you have overcome the evil one. Do not love the world. nor to things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world. The world is passing away, and also its lusts. But the one who does the will of God lives forever." Children, it is the last hour. And just as you heard that Antichrist is coming, even many Antichrists have appeared. From this we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were really not of us. For if they had been of us, they would have remained with us. But they went out. so that it would be shown that they were not of us. But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know, for I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar? But the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ. This is the anti-Christ, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father. The one who confesses the Son has the Father. As for you, let that abide in you which you have heard from the beginning. If what you have heard from the beginning abides in you, so also will abide in the Son and in the Father. This is the promise which He Himself made to us, eternal life. These things I have written you concerning those who are trying to deceive you. As for you, the anointing which you receive from him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you, but as his anointing teaches you about all things and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in him. Let's pray. Father, we pray now that you would teach us from your word. It's a very important passage. John is saying, be careful. And here is the anointed apostle of God, the one whom Jesus loved, speaking not only to the churches of his time and day, but to us. We pray, Lord, that you would teach us to heed and to understand the great implications of John's warning to us this morning. Because, Lord, it is so clear that the dangers that the church faced then are not only operative today, but they have been amplified, magnified in untold ways. We pray, Lord, that you would teach us, and we ask these things in Jesus' name, amen. John, as we've been saying all along, is writing to a group of churches in what is now modern-day Turkey. At that time, it was referred to by historians and so forth as Asia Minor. You may even remember that phrase in sort of geography, ancient geography from high school or whatever. Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey. And he's writing to this group of churches that are united in their experience of fighting off the grave implications of this heresy, this false teaching that has come upon them. And we identified that teaching with the word Gnosticism. Now to be honest with you, Gnosticism as a full-blown idea or concept really wasn't developed until maybe the second century. where you find all kinds of Christians refuting Gnosticism. Irenaeus wrote five massive volumes called Against Heresy and so forth. All these Christian apologists, those who were defending the truth, addressing this great danger of Gnosticism that was imposing its beliefs upon Orthodox Christian truth and it was dividing and confusing the church. It was an incredible, incredible danger, Gnosticism. Now what John is facing and dealing with is the Gnostic threat that is facing the churches in Asia Minor. We call this proto, which means beginning, proto-Gnosticism. So this is sort of like the first wave of Gnostic ideas that the church is facing. It's not a fully developed system at this point in history, but it has certainly got tentacles and it is attacking the church. So we need to remember a principle. If Satan attacks a church, He attacks Christians. And he attacks the church from without and from within. And so here's the church being persecuted from without, but it's also being attacked from within as false shepherds and false teachers have crept into the church, look good, smiling, nice guy. And yet he is full of dead man's bones, and he's introducing error to the truth. That's what John's facing. And so from a distance, on a cell phone, he writes a letter, says to his children, little children. Do you notice that? Little children. Be very, very careful. We talked about Gnosticism, the whole idea of Gnosticism. The word Gnosticism comes from the Greek word gnosis, which means to know. The idea of secret knowledge, hidden knowledge. And this hidden knowledge kind of gives you the means by which salvation is achieved as you come to understand things. Or here's the key word, as you are enlightened by the secret knowledge you gain for yourself. Salvation. Salvation is for the Gnostic really the discovery that you have within you the ability to become God or a God. And this has reached epidemic proportion in spirituality in our modern culture. The Gnostics had a weird god. He was a divine principle who spun off emanations. Every emanation he spun off became less light, more darkness, until he spun off the last of them, which was Sophia Wisdom. And you have this Aeon, a spinoff called Christ, the Christ Aeon, and you have the last spinoff which is called Sophia or Wisdom. And of course, like the Romans and like the Greeks, the Gnostics wanted to apply to these gods all sorts of human, the underside, the dirty belly of humanity. So you have them committing adultery, these aeons, and they give birth to this thing that's called the Demiurge, and the Demiurge is actually what the writers of the Old Testament describe as God. As a Christian, that ought to make you cringe. That ought to make you just want to rip your cloak and throw ashes, because it was so, so extremely blasphemous to Orthodox Christianity. And yet it was being embraced as the truth. And the Gnostics were looking at Christians and saying, you guys are just simple-minded, untaught, unenlightened people. Once you know the truth, you'll be like us. Yeah, they're still saying that. Somebody just said that, right? Yeah, take a religion class in one of our major Ivy League institutions and go in there with your Orthodox Christian views and see what they say. Nothing's changed. I would like to give you kind of a context. Remember, this is all one big story. If you'll keep your marker in 1 John 2, look with me further into the Old Testament to the book of Revelation, written by the same author. Revelation, here it is, chapter 2. So from 1 John 2, chapter 2, we want to move forward to Revelation chapter 2. Here is John, the same man, listen, writing to the same people. Another, be careful from a distance. Only in Revelation chapter 2 we have a unique picture in which this is not just John's heart saying be careful, but in the case of the book of Revelation, John is employed by Christ, he is commissioned by Christ to send them a message. You'll notice in Revelation chapter 1 for a minute, John has a vision. In the vision, verses 12 and following, Revelation 1, 12 and following, is Jesus Christ. And he is pictured, as it were, standing or walking amongst seven lampstands. Now, what we find out is, here's Jesus. He's referred to in verse 13 as one like the Son of Man, clothed with a robe, reaching his feet, girded across his chest with a golden sash, his hair as white as wool. Here's the glorified Savior. This is Christ after the resurrection after the after the ascension glorified at the right hand of God and he is walking among seven golden lampstands which are his churches their churches and so what we have here is we have really a picture of Jesus looking at the condition of his church. He's walking amongst these lampstands and he's observing them. This is, so to speak, the church under the looking glass. He is observing the condition of these churches, observing the condition of these Christians. And he writes, or rather he commissions John to write, Seven letters to these seven lampstands are seven churches. They are from the very same area to whom John writes the epistles of 1st, 2nd, 3rd John. They're in Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey. They're listed, by the way, all seven of them in one verse. If you look at chapter 1, verse 11, here are seven Turkey churches. Not turkey churches, but churches of Turkey. That was my Thanksgiving preparation. You'll notice the names of them. You have the Turkish Church of Ephesus, verse 11, and Smyrna and Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and of course Laodicea. These are Asia Minor churches. John became particularly associated with the Church of Ephesus. He was probably the teaching pastor there, taught regularly, preached there, until he was deported to the island of Patmos for proclaiming the gospel in Ephesus. And so he is commissioned by Christ to write these seven letters. But I want you to see these seven letters. The first one begins in verse 1 of chapter 2, and it's to the first church, the church of Ephesus. It says, to the angel. The word there is angelos. It literally means the messenger. John's not writing to angels. He's probably writing to the pastor who is now preaching there. To the messenger of the church of Ephesus write. And I want you to notice the middle of verse 2. John says he's commending them, or Christ is commending them literally through John, that they cannot, notice the middle of verse two, cannot tolerate evil men, but rather that this church puts these people to the test, these people who call themselves apostles and are not, and finds them to be false. You get the picture? Here's a diligent church. A diligent church just doesn't embrace every Tom, Dick, and Harry that walks into church with a message. They're tested. They're tried against Scripture. And if they're false, they're proven to be false and they're cast out. They're not embraced by this church. And Jesus commends Ephesus for doing that. You'll notice verse 6, it says, Yet you do have this, that you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans. Now this is interesting. We know from history that Nicholas was one of three of the major Gnostic teachers in the first century. And so here's the Church of Ephesus that is hating the deeds of one of the major Gnostic teachers of that time. The second church is in verse eight, the church of Smyrna. This is a persecuted church. Everything that John says to this church, verses eight through 11, has to do with hanging in there because they're being persecuted by the Jews in that area for their Christianity. Let me go on to the third church, that's the church of Pergamum. You'll notice verse 12, to the angel or to the pastor of the church of Pergamum, write, and I'll have you notice verse 14, Jesus says to this church, I have a few things against you because you have some there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who kept teaching Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel. Now, if you look at me just for a minute, can I tell you what the doctrine of Balaam is? In the Old Testament, you have Israel, a group of people that God has called to himself, and they are to be separate from all other people. They're not to be of the world, they're to be his people. And you have this other tribe called the Moabites, and they have this king who's threatened by Israel. And so the king of Moab hires this half-witted, half-hearted prophet to go on his behalf to curse the people of God. And of course, You'll remember the story that the prophet goes and he's riding a donkey and the donkey God keeps sending off the way and finally this false prophet and the donkey end up having a conversation together and all that kind of stuff. This is a ludicrous scene. But finally, the false prophet goes back and says to the king of Moab, he says, listen, I can't find a way to curse the people of God. God prevents me from being able to do that. But I do have an idea. I do have an idea. Here's the idea. Oh, Mr. King of Moab, why don't you take your most beautiful Moabite daughters and send them over to Israel? and allow them to marry into Israel and import all your pagan ideas and concepts and so forth. Why don't you use the daughters of Moab to enjoin the people of God with the world around them? What's Jesus say? Jesus says this, he says to the church of Pergamum, I have this against you. Excuse me, I have a few things against you. Verse 14, Revelation 2, that you have some there who hold to the teaching of Balaam. You also notice verse 15, you also have some there who are also holding to the teaching of the Nicolaitans, another Gnostic teacher. Church number four, it's in verse 18, it's the church of Thyatira. Thyatira is a church that's supposed to love Jesus and all of that. But verse 20 says that you have this woman there and you tolerate her. And Jesus refers to her as Jezebel, which is a loaded name from the Old Testament. A moral woman, a moral queen in the Old Testament. And what is she doing? She's leading my bond servants, verse 20, Jesus said, astray. And she's encouraging them to commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. In other words, you have this pagan person, this woman in this church, probably Jezebel is not her real name, but one that Jesus used because it's so loaded with import. And he's saying, listen, and she's tolerated by the church, and the bottom line is that she's influencing the people of God to act in a way that's not in keeping with following Jesus. Big danger. Verse one of chapter three. The fifth church, the church of Sardis. Another church, Asia Minor. What does Jesus say through John to this church? Same thing that John will say to us this morning. Notice verse 3, he says to them, he begs them, be careful, how? He says, remember, please remember what you have received and heard and do what with it? Keep it. Repent where you haven't kept. The sixth church is the Church of Philadelphia. It's in chapter three, begins in verse seven through verse 13. This is the most faithful of the seven churches. They're faithful because at the end of verse eight, you'll notice, they have kept my word, Jesus said, and they have not denied my name. Verse 10, Jesus commends this church, says, you have kept my word, the word of perseverance. In other words, they have kept it under the greatest kind of threats, the greatest kind of dangers. Here's this church that's being attacked from within, without, and they are a faithful church. And then of course the final church, this is the church of Laodicea, begins in verse 14 of chapter three. Same area, same group. And this is the apostate church. This is the church that has turned its back on the truth, turned its back on orthodoxy. And Jesus says in verse 15, I know your deeds, that you're neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold and hot. But because you are what? Lukewarm. Neither hot nor cold. Jesus said, I'm gonna spit you, spew you, vomit you out of my mouth. You say, I'm rich, here's their engagement in the world. You say, I'm rich, I'm wealthy, I have need of nothing. Jesus says, you don't know the reality that you are in fact wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked, so forth and so on. So you have this idea of rejection. Can you imagine Jesus saying, I'm gonna spew you out of my mouth? Can you imagine Jesus casting somebody away from him? Somebody who claims to be associated with his church being cast from the camp, so to speak. It's a powerful, powerful picture. You can go back to 1 John. So here we have this epistle where this danger that later is sort of amplified in John's treatment of the seven churches has really begun to be addressed by the apostle. And you know, here's the influence. You have these Gnostic people and tendencies and belief systems attacking the church and you have all these things taking place and people aren't acting like Christians, they're not following Jesus because of these false teachers' influences and so forth. So that's the nature of this epistle. Be careful. Be careful. Do you know that there are statistics done by surveyors that tell us they survey the church in a modern-day America and they say, you know, people who profess to be Christians today are really no different. Their lives are no different. Their marriages are no different. Their values are no different. Their beliefs are no different than those who claim to be atheists, for instance. How can that be? Has heresy crept into the church? Well, John has three points that he wants to contrast genuine Christianity from deceived Christianity in this section. That's why we read the entire thing. John has three contrasts, and if you're taking note, they're these. John wants to compare, first of all, number one, the sayers, the sayers from the doers, from the doers. He secondly wants to compare or contrast those who love the world from those who love the Father. And thirdly, he wants to contrast the person who confesses the truth from the person who denies the truth. So the three contrasts are the sayer versus the doer, the lover of the world versus the lover of the Father, and the confessor versus the denier. Sayer, doer, lover of the world, lover of God, confessor, and denier. You'll notice in the text that actually this outline isn't something I made up. It's really pretty evident in the text. You'll notice we're talking about sayers and doers. You wanna see something interesting, just look at your text. Remember, we're in 1 John chapter two, and I draw your attention to several verses. Notice, for instance, verse four. The one who says, I have come to know him. Here's the sayer. And John is going to expose that doing is more a greater indicator of reality than what one says. So verse four, the one who says. Verse six, the one who says. Verse nine, the one who says. Here's sayers, sayers. Sayers versus doers. This idea is set in contrast many times to the New Testament. Listen to this just if you would, and you can look it up later, write it down. Remember James? James chapter 1 verse 22, James says this, Prove yourself, what? Doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. So, you can say, I go to church, I listen to great sound preaching, we're under the exposition of the word, I've got to be a good spiritual shape. James says, baloney. Baloney. Prove yourselves doers of the word and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. James says in chapter one, verse 23, for if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror and immediately he forgets what kind of person he is. And so we come to God's word and God's word wants to accomplish two things in our life. First of all, it is a portrait of God. We come to see God, but it is also a mirror of ourselves. And we go, ah, and then we go, ouch. Oh, ouch, let's all do that together, right? Oh, ouch. If we're not a doer, then we look at the ouch and we say, yeah, but who cares? God's not concerned. God's really not trying to change me, conform me, confront me. And John would say, you're deceived, you're deceived. Jesus said it this way, the Sermon on the Mount, chapter seven of Matthew. He says, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father, saying and doing. Jesus said that you will know a tree by the fruit it bears doing. One of my favorite parables of all time, Jesus used two buildings. Two buildings that from the outside look identical. Can't tell the difference. The difference is the foundation. Everyone who hears these words of mine and acts on them, that's the doer, may be compared to a wise man who builds his house upon the rock. The floods come, the winds blow, storms that stale the house, and by the way, you know what those represent? That represents the judgment. This is not about enduring the hard, difficult times of life. Jesus is talking about heaven and hell. So you've built this house, it's called your life, and your house is going to reach that point in history when it has to stand the discerning, all-seeing, all-knowing, discretionary judgment of God. Will it stand when the winds blow and the floods come? Will the house stand Jesus says, the only way to stand is if it's been founded on the rock. And what is the rock? Everybody's going to say, Jesus is the rock. But that's not what John says. Jesus says that the rock is hearing and obeying the word of God. That's the rock. Likewise, Jesus says, a foolish man is he who hears the word and does not act upon it and builds his house upon sand. The house built on sand looks just like the house built on rock. It's appointed the same. It's in the same neighborhood. The same storm attacks both of them. neighbor. The difference is foundation. The one built on sand faces the storm of eternal testing by God and it falls. And great, Jesus says, great is its fall. because it was not built upon the rock. What is the rock? Jesus, no. It is hearing and obeying the word of God. It's amazing. The word in Greek for rock is petra, or petra, and the word for sand in Greek is the word aman. And one of the fascinating things, if we could go like, and we could all be in southern Israel down towards the Jordan, I could take you to the city of Petra, named after rock, and it's all there. In fact, the first movie, Indiana Jones, and the arc of the cut was filmed in the city of Petra. There's a temple and buildings and pillars. It's old, very old. Then I could also take you to the city of Amman, which means sand. You know what's there? Just a big pile of what? Nothing standing. And great was its fall. Great was its fall. In fact, they call it Tell, which means a mound of sand. Tell Amman. Just a mound of sand. So John is saying, listen, your life, your life as a Christian needs to be verified by your obedience to that which you hear. John says that obedience is really the key to unlocking the truth of one's identity. Obedience to God, obedience to God's word, obedience to God's law. I need to say this and listen very carefully. It is important to understand that obedience is never declared or demonstrated to be the means of salvation. We're not saved by obeying God's word. Obedience is never declared or demonstrated to aid us towards salvation or to contribute to our salvation. It is never declared nor demonstrated to be an agency of salvation, but it is always, without reservation, obedience is always declared and demonstrated to be evidence of salvation. Not means, not an aid, not a contribution, not an agency. but the evidence of salvation. If we embrace Jesus Christ as Lord, Romans 10, he who confesses me as Lord shall be saved, Jesus would say this, why do you call me Lord and do not what I say? And so truly making Jesus the Lord of your life means that there is this conscious, volitional commitment to obey the one that you've just crowned as Lord of your life. If you will, look at verse three for a minute. He says, John writes this, by this we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments. Think about this verse. So, somebody asks you, you're in this deep spiritual conversation with your best friend, maybe your wife, your husband, your best buddy, college buddy, your girlfriend, your boyfriend, and they say, you're a Christian, I'm a Christian, how do you know you're a Christian? Well, how do I know I'm a Christian? Look here, my Bible, I signed it. Does that cut it? How do I know I'm a Christian? Well, you know, I was baptized once, sprinkled once, or I walked the aisle once. I was at summer camp and we all burned a stick together. How do I know? How do I know I'm really Christ? And John would say this, and it sort of has a sting to it, doesn't it? By this we know. That is, how does my salvation really find protection from self-deception? How can I know that I have assurance, genuine, legitimate assurance of my salvation? John says, look at the fruit of your life. By this we know that we have come to know Him. if we keep His commandments. If somebody is living in dynamic disobedience to God's Word, God's will, the words of Christ, and so forth, and they say, yeah, I know, but I'm a sinner, but I do know Jesus is my Savior, John is essentially saying, you know what you can say to that person? Baloney. Baloney. There is evidential truth to this. You know, this is the whole doctrine of lordship salvation. That coming to Christ isn't just saving yourself from torment, it is the surrender of one's life to Christ. He is my God and my king. What does Jesus say to Peter? Don't worry about what happens to him, you follow me. And Jesus would say that to all of us. You follow me, it's about lordship salvation. John says we know that we've come to know him if we keep his commandments. So not only is obedience the key to keeping us from self-deception, but it's also the key to keeping us from being deceived by others. You'll notice in verse 4 he applies the same principle not only to us as believers, but to our ability to identify those who are legitimately Christ. Verse 4, the one who says, that's the false teacher, I have come to know him and does not keep his commandments is what? And the truth, even though they claim this great enlightenment is not in him. So you see these people that we've all become familiar with over, if you've lived long enough, several decades and you've been a Christian, been aware of the spiritual culture of our land and of our times, all these people who claim to know him and make money in his name and all that, and then suddenly their whole life is exposed and it's all just a bunch of hooey and immorality and that's the way they live and that's what they're all about. John says they're liars. They're liars. Does that mean we live impeccable lives, perfect lives? No, we stumble and fall. It's a lot of scars. But you know what? Every true Christian orders his life, desires his life to be a pleasing aroma unto Christ. John is identifying the Gnostic heretics as liars. How can they be identified? They don't obey the law. They're not committed to obeying Christ. Be not deceived. And of course, The issue of obedience. Where does obedience lead? And this is an important point. Because I have met legalists, religion legalists, who see obedience as something completely different than what the scriptures describe it as being. Where does obedience to the law lead? Ready? It leads to being like Jesus. If your obedience isn't making you more like Jesus, then your obedience is misplaced and misunderstood. You'll notice in this text, verse six, here's another, the one who says that he abides in him ought himself, here it is, to walk in the same manner as he walked. Jesus obeyed the law perfectly. If you want to see what perfect human obedience to the law looks like, look at Christ. Look at Christ. Was he rigid? Was he hard? Was he judgmental? Was he self-righteous? Was he argumentative? You want to see what obedience looks like? It looks like Jesus. Jesus is the goal of my obedience to God's law. This is really powerful. Jesus is the goal of obedience, and John says that this kind of obedience is the evidence of genuine salvation. And I want you to see this. He says in verse 7, and when I say all this, John says, I'm not telling you something new. I'm not writing a new commandment to you. But I am declaring the old commandment, the commandment that you have had from the very beginning." What does he mean by that? That conformity to the image of God isn't something new. It's from the beginning. From the beginning of what? Oh, it's from the beginning of our Lord's ministry. No. When he says beginning, he means beginning. The objective of salvation is that through Christ, God's desire is to restore in you and I that which was at the very beginning. What was at the very beginning? When God created man and God created Eve, a woman, He created them in His own what? Image and likeness. That was lost. That was lost by the entrance of sin. There are things in me at almost 52 years age that I look at and I say, man, that is about as un-Christlike as it can possibly be. You ever feel that way? But I know, I know that God has given me his word and God has given me his Holy Spirit and God is patient and he is molding and mending me and the objective is to help me to obey his law so that he can and will, through Christ, restore in me the image of God. The Gnostics would say, you are God. God would say, no, you're not me, but you are an image of me. God is through Christ and through his word, refashioning, restoring the image of God that was marred in me. Why? Because it is only the image of God that brings glory to God. John says, this is not new. This has been from the beginning. Then verse eight, he says, but on the other hand, This is kind of new. This is kind of new. He says, on the other hand, I am writing a new commandment to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing when the true light is already shining. So this commandment that if you're really a child of faith and you really love the Lord and you've really trusted in him, that you're going to be committed to obeying his word and obedience leads to Christ's likeness is not new. It's from the beginning, but John says, but it is kind of new. Well, how can that be? And here's the important point. It's new because of its emphasis. In the Old Testament, the law was interpreted by Israel as that which made them distinct from everyone else. Yes? Their laws, their dress, their clothes, their diets, made them distinct. That's how they interpreted the law. The law is to make me different. But in the new covenant, Jesus provided a powerful new emphasis on the purpose of law. It's not to make you different from everybody else. The law is, listen, not to make you different from everybody, the law is to make you love everybody else. It's new, not in that it distinguishes us from everyone else, but it binds us to everyone else. Jesus said, what is the great commandment? How do you fulfill the whole commandment? Love your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus says this, in this you have fulfilled the entire law. The emphasis is different. It doesn't make us distinct. It makes us endearing. This is the law. If you want to know what obedience to the law of God looked like, look at Jesus. What do you see? You see somebody who so loved the world that he gave his life in order to redeem them. You see Jesus lovingly caring for, healing people that were unloved, the outcasts. You see Jesus breaking every barrier. You see the new manifestation, the intent, God's original intent in the law. Look at verse 9 and 10. We're out of time. He says, but the one who says I am in the light and yet hates his brother is in what? The darkness. Don't tell me you're enlightened if you hate your brother. Verse 10, the one who loves his brother is the one who abides in the light. This is the purpose of the law. You know what the Jews did? The Jews took the law and twisted and perverted it in such a way that the law became the grounds of justifying their hatred of everyone else. Can you imagine that? They took God's law, which was to lead them and bind them to loving those people created in the image, and they twisted it in such a way that it became justification for their hatred of other people. Wednesday night we had Elizabeth and Sam Goodwin here. And by the way, there are newsletters here. We've been praying for them, the passing of their little infant daughter, little tiny daughter, Simeon. It was a wonderful time. But Sam and Elizabeth are going over to this part of England where there's only a handful of churches. And, you know, it's like 0.01% of the population. Everybody's a professed atheist in this part of England. And there's only, you know, 250 Christians in this entire population of hundreds of thousands of people. And you know what? They don't ever do anything together. We're 250 Christians, an entire population of professed humanistic atheists, but you know what, we don't do anything. You know why we don't do anything together? Because the way I understand the truth allows me to put my hand out and provide some distance between you and me. Can you imagine? This is only Christians. It's like this is the entire Christian body in this Huge population, we're it, but we don't like each other. John says, are you kidding me? How can that be? You must not be in the light. You can claim to be a Christian until you're blue in the face, but something is bad wrong. Because if you're in the light, verse 10, the one who loves his brother abides in light and there is no cause for stumbling him. In other words, what's stumbling for the law? Listen, love your brother is, as you love yourself and you'll fulfill the law. That's what he's saying. Verse 11, and we'll close and I'll pray. But the one who hates his brother is in darkness, in the darkness, and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes. In other words, hatred in the human heart, in the Christian's heart, blinds him to the reality, or the direction, or the purpose, or the intent for which Christ has saved him. Blindness caused by hatred really ultimately paralyzes the Christian experience. Jesus says, listen, you come to the altar and you remember that you have hatred or something against your brother in your heart. What's Jesus say? Lay down your offering. Forget it. Stop trying to worship. Stop. You go make it right with your brother. When it's right, then you come back and worship me. You can't walk in the light. You can't pretend to be in the light with hatred in your heart towards your brother. Forgiveness is the premier characteristic of the Christian gospel.