Sermon Tone Analysis

Tim and Nancy

Pam and Tom

Praise Everyone home for Christmas

Tammy’s Parents

Dennis’ Uncle -Walter Woosley… lost his wife after 64 years

Jerry Covey - Passed away.... right before Christmas

Alicia - Haiti in general

So verse 1

This is all about adoption.

We are now Children of God… and John cannot wrap his mind around it…

All of this is to say in these first few words we should understand that it is perplexing to John that love itself would love us… but God, and he starts to call him the Father he, to demonstrate that he he is OUR father and we are HIS children.... understand how crazy a thought this is.... but all of a sudden our enemy calls himself his children....

Imagine it this way.... Imagine you are a prince, and your father and his father before him has an enemy… and we have spent our whole lives fighting back and forth, hating… its brewed in you from day one… you hate that person… like the louisville cardinals in my house… but more violent… more vitriol… and you have spent your whole life hating them… and then all of a sudden the king says, I want you to be my son.... and he loves you.... and he desires you, and he wants whats best for you.... you destroyed everything he ever tried to do… and all of a sudden he is calling you his son… he has adopted you in… he has given you a piece of the inheritance… and it doesnt make any sense.... and this is the wonder that John is seeing....and this king has always had more… and now he wants something to do with ME

The world = kosmos and remember that is the people that do not know God… the people that are against him, because remember, you cannot be neutral when it comes to God… you are either for him or you are against him… and those against him are the world… and he is saying of course the world doesn’t recognize us… in the same way that the world hated Jesus it hates us…

I have heard people say.... if you aren’t hated by the world maybe you are a part of them… do you agree?

Application: Whenever you are tempted to complain or get upset about your circumstances remember how God has loved you.

Count your blessings one by one and soon you will not feel like complaining anymore.

2. To become children of God, we also give up something.

What?

We give up our popularity in the world.

This verse says that the world doesn’t know us if we belong to God.

When Jesus came, did people accept Him? Did people understand Him? No.

They thought He had a demon (Matthew 11:18, 9:34).

Some thought He was Elijah and others John the Baptist.

(Matthew 16:13-14).

They thought He was crazy when He said they must eat his body like bread (John 6:50-53).

Jesus Himself said they didn’t know where He came from or was going (John 8:14).

If the world didn’t accept Jesus, who did so many miracles and taught so authoritatively, do you think they will understand or accept believers?

No.

They will reject us too.

What are some of the reasons why they won’t like us?

They won’t like us because we point out their sin (John 3:20).

They won’t understand us because they don’t see like we do.

Basically they think we are crazy, fools, nuts, dreamers.

Knowing this, we have a choice.

We can be popular with God or popular with the world.

It is generally incompatible to be popular with both.

Who would you rather please?

Pleasing God is far better since He has power over our soul.

So the next time a friend or relative thinks you are crazy or weird because of your belief in Christ, take it as a compliment.

3. John says it hasn’t appeared yet what we will be.

I think he means that the exact nature of our life in heaven is unknown.

When I share the gospel I often get many questions about what heaven will be like and what we will do there.

While the Bible does mention a little bit about it, for the most part it is a mystery.

God has not chosen to reveal it to us.

I am convinced it will not be like what you see in the movies (ie: floating around in the clouds playing a harp: BORING!)

What exactly we will be doing is not the critical issue.

The more critical issue is what we will be like, how our nature will be changed.

John says that we will be like Him.

This means that we will be sinless (Revelation 21:4).

And we will see Christ which is the best part about heaven.

It is not the golden streets, or pearly gates.

It is not the ability to fly or lack thereof.

The best part about heaven is being with Christ, just like Paul said absent from the body, present with the Lord.

Heaven without God is not paradise at all.

The perfect relationship between people and God will finally be restored after it was broken by Adam and Eve’s sin at the fall.

We will have a perfect relationship with Christ because there will be no more sin to separate us.

I. Our relationship with God (1-3)

Discussion Questions

How great a love did the Father bestow on us?

Give examples in Scripture of how God loved believers.

In what ways has God shown love to you (go around the table one by one 2-3 times)?

Is every person in the world a child of God?How can we become children of God?

What are the basics of the father/child relationship?

What does it mean that the world does not know us?

How do you feel when people around you think you are weird or a nut because of your belief in God?

What does John mean that we don’t know what we will be?

What do you know about what your life will be like when Jesus returns?What effect does this hope have on our present lives?

Cross-References

Galatians 3:26 – So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.

Matthew 5:9 – Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

Romans 8:16-17 – The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.

Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

John 1:12 – Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.

Hebrews 12:3-11 – A father has authority to discipline his children.

Luke 11:9-13 – Parable of the good father.

John 15:18 – If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first.

1 Peter 4:3-5 – For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry.

They are surprised that you do not join them in their reckless, wild living, and they heap abuse on you.

But they will have to give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.

1 Corinthians 2:15-16 – The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?”

But we have the mind of Christ.

II.

Habitual sin and a relationship with God are incompatible (4-10)

Discussion Questions

What is lawlessness?

What is the main point of this passage?

What reasons are given for why practicing sin is incompatible with a relationship to God?

Why did Jesus come?

(5)

Does verse 6 mean that a believer will never sin?What kind of person might try to “deceive” people into thinking that sinning is OK or perhaps even good?

Did you ever try to tell yourself that some kind of sin is acceptable?What should our view of sin be?

What other reason is given for why Jesus came?

(8)How can we tell believers and unbelievers apart?

Cross-References

Romans 6:1,2,8,11,12,13 – We are dead to sin.

Galatians 5:22-23 – But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Against such things there is no law.

Ephesians 4:22-24 – You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

1 Peter 2:24 – “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness;“by his wounds you have been healed.”

Ephesians 5:25-27 – Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

John 8:44 – You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires.