Fundamentals of the Abundant Life in Jesus - 1st John - The Fundamental of Killing Sin!

OPENING PRAYER

GREET AND INTRO

Good morning everyone!! Good morning on everyone worshiping this morning through live stream.

If I have not had a chance to meet you either in person or through live stream;  My name is Scott and I am a follower of Jesus and have the privilege of serving Him as the Lead Pastor among the people of Stonewater Fellowship. 

LETS GRAB OUR BIBLES

either electronic version or the actual book kind -

Open it to 1st John Chapter 3 as we will look at vs 1 through 10 this morning as we continue walking together through one of the New Testament letters written by one of the, if not the very best friend of Jesus in our fall series learning the fundamentals of the Abundant life that Jesus came to give us.

PRAYER OVER SERIES

My prayers over this series is that we would all grown in - Practice well and enjoy a deeper relationship with Jesus as we live out the fundamentals.

The Fundamental of Joy -

Fundamental of True fellowship with the Father and Each other through Jesus.

Fundamental of Salvation in Obedience to Jesus

The Fundamental of Growing and Multiplying in our eternal purpose.

The Fundamental of Truth, overcoming ad abiding

Last week the Fundamentals of the Spirit

PRAYER OVER MESSAGE

This week I pray that we would come to a deeper understanding of how much God loves us and our calling and mandate to kill sin in our own lives and what that means and the only way we can see victory through Jesus.

TRUTH

1 John 3:1–10 NASB95

1 See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. 2 Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. 3 And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. 4 Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness. 5 You know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin. 6 No one who abides in Him sins; no one who sins has seen Him or knows Him. 7 Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous; 8 the one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. 10 By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother.

ENGAGEMENT

have you ever been in a conversation and you said something and the person you are talking to suddenly turned and said in some sort of weird way “ are you serious?”

Ya know when someone asks that question when you in conversation it is an interesting time of relationship - Becasue you never know what direction they are coming from?

When someone asks you “are you serious? They may be asking becasue they dont believe you.

They may be asking because they cant understand or dont agree with that point of view?

THey may be asking becasue they think your joking and what you have said is suprisinng to them.

They may actually be asking becasue you have shared a point of view that they have considered or not considered and dicided that that point of view was invalid and they are in shock that you take that point of view becasue they think it isnt a valid point of view -

SO what happens to many of us is we begin to not be too serious about many things -

Ask your self - What am i serious about? I think most of us can narrow that list to a few things? and those few things are personal things that I stay with in my self -

THose might be thng like - I am serious about my family? I am seroious about by garden or my home or my work or m money and investements - Im serious about my relationship with God and my wife or husband.

And all in all I keep my opinions about all of those things too my self becasue I dont want the conflict or ridicule from others about that -

and Many times what happens is the things we are serious about lessens and narrows becasue of potential conflict

I mean all of us have heard the wise statement - What are the two things you never talk about at a dinner party -

Politics and religion - The two things that people can take seriously that is out side of their direct life but in reality effects the lifes of others.

SO our seriousness becomes silent and not self refective.

TENSION -

When we take our silent seriousness into our relationship with God what happens is we also take the question of “are you serious?” into that relationship as well. What hapens is when we run across someting in the text that tells us of His point of view what happens is that we either step into it and like the fact that He takes it seriously - - Or we look at it as something that we have an option to take seriously - or the worst posible thing is we take it seiously for others and not seriously for oursleves. and we become Outward focused instead of Inwardly focused -

BACKGROUND

As we open up chapter three it is important to look back at the first two chapters and think through the subjets that John has alread opend and is then beginning to unpacka nd unwrap in this chapter and more -

In each chapter He touches on the great love of God shown to us theough Jesus as the Light of the World, as our pathway to fellowship, as our advocate for forgiveness and reconcilliation to God - our means of Love not only of god but our love for Other people and for eachother. and the means of the promise fof eternal life ot be fulfilled -

Adn in all of that there is a under current of Joy that come through

THen we get to chapter 3 and it takes a deeper spiral turn into two great things - ONE The Love of God and Two the practice of Sin.

UNPACKING -

Lets unpack our Text

VS1 John begins this section of the letter with the encouragement of God’s love - “See how great a love God has Bestowed on us”

There are times when our language does not communicate the fullness of what the scriptures say - John Says See how great - How Great - in the original language of the New testament it can be spoken in english “See what an incredible quality of Love the father had bestowed to us - This indicates to us the Highest quality and the highes possible depth of Love in a complete and never ending way -

Behold, see look at, give your attention to - What a great and incredible quality of love the Father had given, bestowed, shown towards, to us -

WHat is that Great LOVE - and how does that Great love transact in our life and in our current state? How did God show us this great and highest qualitty of Love -

Back half of vs one says “that we would be called Children of God and such we are. NAmed by someone else - Called children of God by WHO?

Being called come with the connnotation that we are permitted to be called Children of God

Let us not ever forget that God calls us His Children - Every person who has been saved by Grace through faith coming to the point of repentant surrender to Jesus, Regenerated by the Holy Spirit - God calls His Children -

It is God who labels us His Children - Not anyone else - Not Us not the Pastor - Not our theologym not our knowledge - Nothing can calls us His children except Him and when that happens we are made new.

the last of vs 1 - The world does not know us- Wehn John uses the world in this context what He is refering to are people - People who are concerned with just what is happening here on earth - People who are focused only on the temporal things and not the eternal things of God

They do not recognize us - They do not know us - THey are not familyre with us and the way we think and the way we believe and the way we are captivated by the thouight and purpoises of God -

VS 2 John then Makes a statement of Fact about himself and his audiance - “We ARE children of God -

Being called come with the connnotation that we are permitted to be called Children of God ohn is saying is that it is unknown to us what We will look like and what we will act like and what we will think like and be focused one what our total being will look like and be like when God is done transforming us -

Then John says “BUt here is what we know to be true - When Jesus comes back - We will be like Him, We will be conformed into His image - We will be Like Him - our Transformation through the sanctification prcess will be complete and we will be like Jesus in every way - WHY - Becasue we will see Jesus in totality -

Right now brothers and sisters in Jesus we see dimly - We see partiality - WE See jesus like under a light that is dimmly lit -

But when He comes again and He comes in all His Glory - THere will be no darkenss at all and we will see Him in His fullness and we will be nstantly transformed and accelerated into His likeness.

VS 3 Hon then make an interesting trun and brings bak into the spirial of this letter another subject that He has touched on in both of the previous Two Chapters -

SIN -

John Says “Every person who has their Hope fixed on Jesus - John Says “purifies Himself” just as Jesus is Pure -

So How do we deal with this - Idea of “Purifying One Self”

AS we begin to unravel this we must first understand what John is saying here with the word “purify” This is a word that is used in the context of Ceremonial Purification.

In the Old Textament and in Jewish Tradition there was this process of pruification - The Elders of the Church asked Paul to undergo purification back in acts Chapter 21 and a discription of Jewish Purification in Johns Gospel - Chapter 11 -

In this use of Purify John is not talking about the Ritusl of Jewish Purification - but rather a process of purification - Purifying over time -

When we do this we each and every day - have Jesus remove tose things in our life that are not like Him and we are FIXED on Jesus.

Purifying oursleves is living in a state of continual repentance - Turning more and ore to Jesus with Every passing Day.

VS 4 John then begins a series of Statements Uncovering how this all workd together -

VS 4 - Foundational Statement - Everyone who Practices Sin - Practices Lawlessness -

SO this does not get taken to a place it is not meant to Go and wold end up in an unbilical view point - We need to understand “practices” we all know what Sin is - It is where we miss the mark - Where we fail to live to the moral and highe moral standing of God - We all miss the mark and we all will

and we need to understand Lawlessness - -

How ever - What does John mean when he uses the word “practices” The word has such a broader meaning thatn Just Sinning -

It means to abide in Sin - To agree with Sin - To band together with Sin - To COmmit with Sin - To continue in Sin -

And John the Equates Sin to Lawlessness - Lawlessness is best discribes as Breaking or Violating God’s Law by Trangression or neglect and doing so unrestrained and unregulated by the Law of God -

VS 5 John then reminds them of what they already know that Jesus came to do away with sin - and in Jesus there is no sin at all -

Meaning that Jesus actions Here on earth were prefelicly restrained and perfectly regulated by the Father - This is why Jesus is the one who knew no sin and yet became sin for us that we might be the righeousness of God -

VS 6 is the KEY - John Says that no one who abides in Jesus sins - Remember Two things - What Practice means and that John is Equating SIn with Lawlwssness - Unhindered and Unrestrained violation of God’s Law -

NO ONE who Abides in Jesus can Agree wtih, Abind in - commit to - continue in Trainsgressing the Law of God unrestrained and Unhindered by God’s Law and Spirit.

This is not addressed in the Text but the Wuestion then remains HOW DOES THIS WORK - The Holy Spirit -

VS 6 is an IF then Statement IF you Abidew you cannot sin - IF you Sin the you do not know Him and you have not seen Him.

VS 7 and 8 John then adds come understanding of our condition as GOd’s children - John Says “make sure that no one deceves you - Inother words - DOnt let anyone tell you something different thatn what I am about to tell you -

IF a person practices - Walk in - Agree with = Abides in - COmmits to COntinues in Righetousness - Just as He is Righteous then they are righeous -

The One who practices Sin is of the Devil - The one who Treangreses God’s law by omition or neglest unrestrained and unhindererd is of the devil - WHy Becasue this is what the devil has done form the beginning.

Jesus came to destry this - He came to destroy the workd of the Devil.

VS 9 NO ONE who is Born of God - practices Sin - No one who is born of GOd agrees with SIn - Reamins or abides with Sin - COntinues in sin 0 COmmits to Sin - Unrestrained and unhindered -

WHY IS THIS - becasue the seed of God the Holy Spirit of God abides in Him and He cannot SIn becasue He is Borrn of GOD -

many many today Say about SIn - I was born this way - More on that in a minute.

VS 10 john then concludes His thougts on the subject for a minute by saying This is how you can tell people who are saved and prople who need Jesus - This is how you can know you are a chld of God or if you need to surrender and repent again -

This is how we know the Children of GOd and the Children that are lost and belong to the devil .

ANYONE _ who does not practice richeousness is not of GOd - NOr is the one who does not love His brither -

NOW if we were to take that last statement as a completely standalone statement we all could get very judgy at tyhis point - and I dont know about you but there is enough judgyness without us adding to the mix AMEN?

But we must remember the fullness of practice and place that in the context of the whole Bible - Anyone who does not Agree with, Abide in , COmmit to, Continue in Riugheousness

NOr the one who does not love His brother -

Here is the interesting thing and If we dont get this we can find ourselves in a paradox that might be unsolvable - Infact if we dont get this we will find the writtings of john in paradox -

But this is what we must understand - Thr Richesouness that we must agree with, THe Richeousness that we must continue in - The Richesousness that we must remain in and commit to and continue in - Is Jesus and His richeousness alone -

APPLICATION -

AS we come to the end of this message - How do we apply this - John is making reference to the fact that Sin and Lawlessness are no compatable with being a jesus follower - SO what do we do becasue all Sin - Everyone of us will sin and Liek John Himselff says - We have an advocat -

But here is the KEY -

John has equated SIn with Lawlessness - Lawlessness being this temperment of constantly and continually breaking God’s law in rebellion and blatant disobedinace Un restrained and Un Hindered by the fact that God has sspoken the law -

SO How do we see the victory over Sin -

Cuz let me share this - If you focus on the SIn your gonna sin more -

But Vs 6 kives us the Key and it is the second time that we have heard John say this -

ABIDE- REMAIN in Jesus. You see the promise is this that If we Remain in Him if we are in constant fellowship with Jesus and Obeying His commands - we will not deliberatly kowingly continually remain in Sin -

Here is a truth - If you struggle with addiction - and you join a 12 step recovery community - Unless those steps are with Jesus you will take them all over again and again -

ABIDE IN JESUS - Stay Daily in fellowship with Him in the word and in prayer - Rely and trust HIm in everything. Commit to obey the commands of Jesus - Repent and Believe, Be baptized and then Baptize Others - Pray, Make Disciples, Love One another, Worship Jesus especially when it difficult , Gather together, sharing in His table with other believers,

This is how you Abide in Jesus - This is how we see victory over Sin happen agains and again and again!

LEts stand and worship the One who set us free!