A Changed Life.

Introduction:

As we continue with our worship of the Lord this morning, and we come to the preaching of His Word, I want to invite you to open up with me to 1 John 2:1-14 this morning as we study the Word of God together.

Don’t lose sight of what we are doing. We can become so familiar with the Bible that we lose sight of what it actually is. This is the WORD of GOD. This is God speaking to you.

Listen to His Word...

My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world. 3 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, 5 but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: 6 whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. 7 Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. 8 At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. 9 Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. 10 Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. 11 But whoever 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. 12 I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven for his name’s sake. 13 I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, children, because you know the Father. 14 I write to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one ( 1 Jn 2:1–14.)

As we think about this word this morning, let us go to the Lord in prayer as we seek to know Him and Love Him through the Word.

Let’s Pray Together.

I need all of the kids to come up front with me real quick. Teens and young people....if anyone else wants to join in that is fine too. We are going to play a little game real quick here at the beginning before we dive into the text. We are going to play Simon Says. Now, before we get started, does everyone know the rules of the game?

(Play Quick Game of Simon Says)

I love that game. It is the only time in my life where everyone pays attenion to the words that I am saying. I am sure that the guy who developed that game was only trying to get his kids to their household chores!

But, as we think about this simple game, the Christian life is sorta like this isn’t it? I don’t mean that the Christian life is a game. I don’t mean that the Christian life should not be taken serioulsy, but I mean when we step back and think about how we should be responding to God and His Word, we should be responding as Children.

Jesus said, “My sheep known me and they hear my voice.” The goal of the Christian life is not to go out and do our own thing, but rather we should be strving to hear what the Savior is saying to us and we should be striving toward obedince to that end.

This is what John is getting at here in this section this morning....really that is what the whole letter kinda revolves around.

John is wanting to show the early church what it means to actually follow Jesus because they were starting to face some real problems. They were starting to have people come into the church who claimed to be followers of Christ, but their lives and beliefs did not match up with what had been taught.

So, John is writing this letter to the church so that they can know who is actually following Christ, and who is not. He is giving them test by which they can truly understand who is follow Jesus and who is not.

The point I am wanting us to see is this….Follow Jesus Means a Changed Life.

That is going to be John’s argument here, or the test that he is going to give the early church. How can we tell if someone is really following Jesus? Those that follow Him should be like him.

That sounds like a pretty hard tasks, doesn’t it? I mean, we are to be like Jesus? I don’t know about you, but I know that I fall well short of that measure.

This is where I think that the Bible speaks so clearly to us…. God knows that all of us do not measure up. He knows that already. If we could have saved ourselves, Jesus would have had to need to come. But that is not the case….as John makes very clear.

Look at verses 1-2 with me…look at where John Starts this chapter.

My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world (1 Jn 2:1–2.)

“My Little Children” He speaks to them with words of affection. These are not just people whom he has no connection with….these are people that he dearly loves and cares for. These are people with whom John is close to…these are not his actual Children in the sense in which we think of. These are his spiritual Children. These are people with whom John has shared the Gospel with and with whom he has walked with.

John is using language to show how much he cares for them. I can almost picture a father getting down on his knee to speak to his child…. that is what John is doing here. And he says to them…. those who are still growing in the faith…those for whom he cares….those whom he is helping raise up in the faith… “ I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.” That is the goal of John’s writing. Make a note of it too, that this is his second purpose statement for his writing. He said back in Chapter 1 that he was writing “so that our joy may be complete.”But here, John is telling them that his goal is for them not to SIN. What a Goal! He is writing to these believers because he wants them not to sin. He wants them to pursue holiness…. John is wanting them to walk as Christ walked.

Think if we made this our goal everyday, every moment… every second….our goal is not to sin. We are going to do everything in our power to fight against this draw inside of us to do wrong and we are going to do right. This is the opposite side of the spectrum when it comes to pursuing holiness. We talked about Spiritual Disciplines as part of our growth…John is talking about moral actions. This is the goal….this should be our Goal… This should be your goal…NOT TO SIN. The writer of Hebrews tells us “ To stive for Holiness....”

I think so often we can hear these words and start to throw up a red flag and start to scream.. Legalist!!! That is not what I am saying. I am not saying strive not to sin so that God loves you more.... No I am saying, if Jesus has made you NEW walk in that NEWNESS of LIFE and relize that you are in a war. You have an enemy who is after you. He wants to destroy you Christ has given you the Holy Spirit so that you can walk in the newness of Life, so walk.

But, here is the beauty, right. WE all know that we are going to mess up. WE all know that we are going to fail. We all know that there is going to come some point in our day were we mess up… were we SIN. It doesn’t matter if we tell a lie to cover our own backsides, if we break the speed limit, if we know that we should do something but don’t …. we are going to sin. John is not talking about Christians being sinless…. However, You and I, as we walk with Christ, should see a change in our lives.

And when we do sin, its gonna happen, “we have an Advocate with the Father- Jesus Christ the Righteous One.”  When we Sin against God… we Have one who stands in the court for us and pleads our case for us, so we don’t have to. That is what an Advocate it. Advocate is "one who pleads another's cause before a judge, a pleader, counsel for defense, legal assistant.”

Jesus is that for US.  He stands before the Father for us and intercedes on our behalf. We see this all throughout the New Testament. 34 Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is the One who died, but even more, has been raised; He also is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us. (Rom 8:34 CSB)

5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and humanity, Christ Jesus, Himself human, 6 who gave Himself-- a ransom for all, a testimony at the proper time. (1Ti 2:5-6 CSB)

24 But because He remains forever, He holds His priesthood permanently.25 Therefore, He is always able to save those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to intercede for them. 26 For this is the kind of high priest we need: holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. (Heb 7:24-26 CSB)

Who could ask for anything better than this!!! God calls us not to sin….to strive against sin in our lives….But when we do sin…..we are able to RUN to Jesus who is before the Father praying for us…making a case for us…covering our Sins. He is able to say…. I already paid the penalty for that SIN. That is paid for.

Look at how Jesus is described here… Jesus the Righteous One…. A better translation would be Jesus the Righteous. It is a Title.  It describes him. It is like “Alexander the Great” or “Peter the Magnificent” if you are familiar with C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia Series. It is telling you what Jesus is like. To call Jesus the Righteous means that He is the one who has never done anything wrong…He is one who has always done what is right…He lived life the way that it was supposed to me be lived.

And yet, when you look down at verse 2, this Righteous One…our Advocate…. Is also our Atoning Sacrifice.  Jesus, the one who never did anything wrong, died in our place taking on the full wrath of God and made it possible for us to be brought back into a right relationship with the Father.

We do not have to face the wrath of God because Jesus has already done it for us. This is the beauity of the Gospel. When you sin, you get to run to Jesus as your Advocate. You do not have to perform penice for your sins. You don’t have to go around beating yourself up so that God will forgive you. NO! Jesus is the propitiation for our sins.... meaning He is the one who has satified the punishment for us.

But it isn’t just limited to us…. Jesus died for the sins of the whole WORLD. When you start thinking about this, and people have done this in our time, it can appear that John just said that EVERYONE is going to go to heaven. That is NOT what John is saying in this passage AT ALL.

When John says that Jesus died for the sins of the Whole world, what he means is that Jesus’ death is enough for everyone. That there is no one excluded from His saving grace. Jesus’s death can cover the sin of everyone, from the little child who has grown up in a Christian home…. Basically, born at the alter who has been raised by godly parents who is trying to do what is right….to the most horrific murder in all of History. No one is excluded from His saving Grace. No one in this room or outside of this room is outside of the saving grace of God. There is nothing that you have done that Jesus would look at you and be like… NAH. That’s even too much for me. Jesus death is enough for everyone…. Jesus died for everyone…. Anyone…Anyone who would come to Him, repent of their sins, and place their faith and trust in Him, He will forgive them and give them new life.

We have to see this. There is nothing that we can do that isn’t or hasn’t been covered by the blood of Jesus. He loves us and forgives us. But that also means, we need to see that this is true for everyone. This is true for your neighbor whom you think is beyond God’s reach. It is for those class members who right now seem to be against the things of God. It for those political leaders who seem crazy to us. Christ’s death is even enough for them, and they need to hear this good news.  We can’t write anyone off… Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sins and for the sins of the world.

As we think about what Jesus has done for us, it brings up an interesting question: how can we know that we know Jesus in this kind of way? John is going to give the answer to us. Look down at verses 3-6 with me. 

3 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, 5 but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: 6 whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked (Jn 2:3-6).

So, how do we know that we have come into a relationships with Christ.... John’s answer is.....

A Changed Life.

Look at the text. He says “This is how we know” twice in these three verses.  He says it in verse 3 and then toward the end of verse 5. We know by how we treat the commands of God. If we keep the commands of Christ, then we can know that we know him. If we are not keeping the commands of God, not prefectly because we have already seen that we are going to sin, but if we are not striving to keep them…then the truth is not in Us.

This is what John is talking about here. A Christian is someone who not only believes in Jesus with their head, but also with their heart and wills. The desire for a Christian is to do what Jesus said to do. To follow His commands. To stay connected to Him. The goal is to be like him. To live like Him. That is what the early church was accused of when they were called Christians. People were saying….these people are some much like that Jesus Christ guy…so they called them Christians, or literally little Christ's’.

Could someone say the same thing about you? Could those closest to you accuse you of being like Jesus? That is a tough question to ask isn’t it? But here is what John is saying to us. Those who have given their hearts to the Lord should have a desire to follow Him in all things..to be like Him.

Those that don’t, John calls them liars, and says that the truth is not in them.  We see this today when we hear people who say that they believe in God, and Jesus, and stuff, but they don’t believe the Bible. When people say that they are following Jesus, but then they disregard clear teaching of the Scriptures…those people don’t know the right Jesus. They are making up a Jesus of their own liking… one made in their image… one who is ok with everything they are ok with and one who doesn’t like the things that they don’t like. That Jesus isn’t a savior at all. He will be of no help to them. That Jesus is neither an advocate, an atoning Sacrifice, nor Righteous. That Jesus will lead people to Hell. But, the Jesus of the Bible, the one who is able to save….not only gives us everlasting life…but He gives us a changed life in there here and now.

You see, Jesus changes us so that we become like Him.

Jesus said the very same things in his earthly ministry. This isn’t something that John is just making up on the fly. John isn’t trying to be a legalist or anything. John isn’t trying to gain power by telling the Church that must do what He says. John is simply reminding them of the teachings of Christ. Those who love Christ keep His commands. Those that are following Christ stay connected to Him by holding onto His word.

How is this seen in the Christian life?

Look down at verse 7-11 with me as John moves on to give them another test by which they can tell if they are Following Christ.

7 Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. 8 At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. 9 Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. 10 Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. 11 But whoever 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 (1 Jn 2:7–11).

Ok, John. Which is it? Is it an old command or is it a new command? You cannot have it both ways, can you? That would not make any sense.

But, yet that is exatly what John is saying here in this text. Here is what is going on. The command that John is talking about is that we are to love our brothers, we see that when we look down at verses 9-11, but it is both an old Command and New Command.

It is an Old Command in the fact that it has its roots in the OT. This is not a new idea or concept.

It the book of Lev. We read this:…love your neighbor as yourself; I am Yahweh. (Lev 19:18 CSB)

When we hear those words, it reminds of what Jesus had even said when asked what the greatest commandment was….what did He say? “ To Love God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength”…. And to what? “Love you Neighbor as yourself.”

This is the Old Testament Law….it is not a New Commandment. This is not something that they were completely unfamiliar with, but yet, John says that he is writing a New Commandment, why?

Jesus, in his ministry, takes this text and he applies it to a completely different group of people and intensify what it really means to love your neighbor. Listen to His Words, 34 "I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you must also love one another.35 By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." (Joh 13:34-35 CSB)

The Command to Love is not NEW. That is Old. That is an OLD command. But the idea of Loving someone else like Jesus has loved US!! That’s completely NEW.

When you think of the depth of Love that Jesus shows to us… the existent that Jesus went through to demonstrate His Love for us… It is mind blowing. He literally gave up EVERYTHING for US. HE Came and Die on  A Cross for US…For US. People who have done nothing but spent our entire lives living in complete rebellion against HIM….HE DIE FOR. That’s love.  He didn’t think of Himself at all. There was no selfish motivation in Him. He wasn’t like…. Man if I do this then…. maybe I will get a bigger house in heaven. NO. He had everything in His possession already, and yet He die.

Jesus looks at the disciples, and at us, and says to us…. Love each other like I have loved you. That is a big calling.

This is why John says that I am writing both an Old Command and a New Command, both of those are true.

Then John says this is how you know who is truly following Christ. He is going to give a daily life example to what he has been talking about all along.  What does that actually look like to walk as Jesus walked or to live like Jesus? John’s answer is to LOVE

John is saying, if anyone is actually walking with Christ that person will love others. If that person does not love other people….then that person is not walking with Christ. It is that evident.

A person cannot claim to be a follower of Christ and yet Hate his brother or sister. The Word hate means: to hate, pursue with hatred, detest; …feel and express nothing more than interest in, or disregard and indifference to a thing.

It’s not even that you may have awful feeling towards someone…. It could even be not caring one way or the other about a certain person.

I know when we start talking about this text, there is a natural though that comes across our minds. Is John talking about loving our brothers, as in loving other Christians, or does he mean loving everyone?

Let’s be honest…. Sometimes it is easier to love our brothers in Christ than it is to love those outside our walls… I said sometimes because sometimes it is easier to love those outside the walls. We can be difficult people sometimes.

We can’t look at this and be like… “loop whole.” I honestly believe John is talking in the broad sense here. It is not like John, or Jesus, is like…. “Love your brothers in Christ and forget about those other people.” That is not the case.  John is talking about having a love for our neighbors. And who is your neighbor?  Anyone, right? Isn’t that what Jesus taught in the parable in the Good Samaritan?

If we are going to be followers of Christ, then we must walk in Love toward our Neighbors.

John says here, that if that is not the case, then we are walking in darkeness and do not know Christ. Those are hard words to hear.... but how we treat others and live life an show what is actually going on inside of our hearts.

There is one more truth I want us to see from this text, and it is found down in verses 12-14. Look there with me.

12 I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven for his name’s sake. 13 I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, children, because you know the Father. 14 I write to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one (Jn 2:12-14).

What we see here is three levels of Christian Maturity.  I believe that each term that is used, Children, Young Men, and Fathers, does not refer to some guys in the local church or to the kids. I think what John is saying is that there are people in this church who are all on different levels of Spiritual growth.

As we Follow Christ, we should grow into maturity.

We all know that this is true don’t we? Think back to when you first got saved? What was your attitude then? You loved Jesus. You didn’t know a whole lot, but you knew one thing and it was enough… Jesus Loves you and He has forgiven you and is with you. Just knowing that made you walk with a little more pep in your step. It made your day.

John addresses them, like he is going to do each group twice, and he says basically the same thing to them. “ I am writing to you because your sins have been forgiven and you know the father.”  This is basic Christianity 101. When you first get saved….this is what you know and it is good news to you, amen?

Then we see him address the next group, those who are a lot further along in their faith, he addresses the fathers. These are the people who have walked with the Lord through the ups and downs of life. John says that these people have come to know the one who is from the beginning. To know doesn’t just mean some intellectual idea, but it means they have a deep abiding relationship with him.

Lastly, we see him address the young men. These are the ones who have grown in the faith and who understand that they are at war with Satan, and they only way that they have done this is because the Word of God remains in them. It is nothing that they have done on their own. It is only by walking with Christ and obeying His word that they have been able to stand up against Satan and his schemes. That reminds me of Ephesians 6:10-20 when Paul is telling us that we need to put on the whole armor of God.

I think that we have to see the connection here as a progression. How do you go from being a child in the faith to being a father in the faith? How do you mature? I think the answer is seen with the young men. You grow in your faith by abiding in the Word and fighting the war. As you walk with the Lord through these things, and cling to Him, His word becomes precious to you, and you start to matrue in the faith.

As we are looking at these different levels of maturity, where would you place yourself?  All of us who have accepted Christ are on this journey, and we need to ask ourselves, Where Am I Spiritually?

Would John see me as a Child?

Would John see me as one who as matured in the faith?

Would John see me as one who is growing?

Would John see me as one who is walking in the dark?

These are hard questions for us to wrestle with, but they are ones that we have be willing to answer.

Following Jesus Means A Changed Life?

Are You Being Changed?

Let’s pray together.

Conclusion: