Two Traits of a True Believer

1 John is written exclusively for Christians. The purpose of the letter is to address Christian fellowship between Christians and between God and the Christian.

When a person is saved, the Bible says that person has been born-again. We are born from above because salvation which produces the new birth comes from God. When a person is born-again, some radical changes take place, and there are some specific traits of those who have been twice born.

Now, we probably do not stress this fact enough.

Being born-again means a new life is produced, a life that is radically different from the life from which you were saved. (1 John 2:4, 6, 9)

Here is what John says about it.

1 John 2:4 “Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him,”

1 John 2:6 “whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.”

1 John 2:9 “Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.”

As you can see, if a person is truly born-again, there are some radical changes that take place. Do you know what John is basically saying? A true believer’s talk will match their walk.

With that being said, what is a true believer? In 1 John 2, John gives us traits of a true believer, and I am going to discuss only two of them because of my propensity to abuse time.

I. A true believer submits to the Lordship of Jesus.

1 John 2:3–4 “And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him,”

To understand this trait, you must understand what admission you made when you were saved.

Romans 10:9–10 “because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.”

Acts 16:31 “And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.””

If you were truly saved, you believed and confessed that Jesus Christ is Lord. That means Lord of everything in your life. At the time of your salvation experience, you admitted Jesus as Lord of your life. You are not saved and later submit to the Lordship of Christ. It is a confession you make the moment you are saved.

If Jesus is Lord, He has the right to expect certain things from you. Look at what Jesus said.

Luke 6:46 ““Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?”

Jesus says, “if I am Lord, why are you not doing what I say?”

What John says matches what Jesus said.

A trait of a believer is following the commandments given by Christ and God’s Word. When a Christian does that, that Christian is submitting to the Lordship of Christ.

This does not mean that a true believer who breaks a commandment loses his or her salvation. To understand what John is saying, you must understand the tools of grammar he is employing.

A. “And by this we know that we have come to know him” (1 John 2:3a)

“We have come to know him” is the present perfect tense. It indicates a past action that is continuing. so we have come to know him indicates that a person confessed the Lordship of Christ and that action is continuing.

When I confessed Jesus Christ as Lord, Christ’s Lordship did not stop with that initial confession and submission. It is supposed to be continuous submission. I should always by my speech and lifestyle show that submission to Jesus Christ.

B. “if we keep his commandments” (1 John 2:3b)

We show submission by keeping his commandments. I know what you are thinking. No one can ever completely keep the commandments. That is why you need an understanding of what keep means.

Keep in this verse carries the meaning of treasuring the commandments of God.

If you have a treasured possession, are you going to “keep” it, or are you going to treat it haphazardly? You are going to keep it. A true believer will keep God’s commandments in the same way.

Keep is also is a term used by ancient sailors before the days of radar and GPS. Ancient sailors would sail by the stars, and stars would be in fixed positions, so the navigator would be told to keep his eye on a particular star. The ship reaching its desired location was dependent upon that navigator keeping the stars.

The same holds true for a true believer. If we want to arrive at our destination, we need to keep our eyes fixed upon God’s Word. When we take our eyes off that Word, we falter.

All of us from time to time lose sight of God’s Word, but a true believer will treasure that Word. A true believer will know when he or she loses focus because the Holy Spirit will convict him or her of sin, a conviction that leads to repentance.

1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

By the way, John is talking about specific confession. He is not saying, “Lord, forgive me of my sins.” He is saying that you know specifically when you sin for two reasons, God’s Word and the Holy Spirit.

When you know that specific sin, you are supposed to confess that specific sin if you want to have fellowship with God and other Christians. Do you see the value of “keeping” God’s commandments.

Look at 1 John 2:4 again as finish this point.

1 John 2:4 “Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him,”

John pulls no punches. He lays all out for us. If a person says he knows Jesus as Lord but does not keep His commandments he is a liar and the truth is not in him. We sugarcoat the Bible sometimes. John is saying without hesitation that a person cannot know Jesus and live in open disobedience to the Word of God. John says the truth is not in a person that does that. Do you remember what Jesus said?

John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Jesus said I am the way, and the truth, and the life, and John says that a person who says he knows Jesus but lives in open defiance does not have the truth.

Dear friend, I am telling you that Lordship produces obedience, and if you are not obedient to God’s Word, if you are not keeping God’s Word, you need to do what the Apostle Paul wrote.

2 Corinthians 13:5 “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”

A true believer submits to the Lordship of Jesus.

II. A true believer seeks the lifestyle of Jesus.

1 John 2:5–6 “but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.”

A true believer will have the same lifestyle as Jesus. (1 John 1:7)

1 John 1:7 “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.”

John is making it tough on a brother, AMEN? He says if we walk in the light, if we live the lifestyle of Jesus, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin. That’s pretty tough. True believers will follow the example set before us by Jesus Christ.

What was the lifestyle of Jesus?

A. It was a life of honesty.

Are you an honest person? Is your lifestyle marked by integrity? There are no innocent lies because, according to the Bible, who is the father of all lies?

John 8:44 “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”

Every lie ever spoken came from the devil, so if you are a person that lies, are you living the lifestyle of Jesus Christ? While Jesus was on this earth, He was honest with the Father, He was honest with Himself, and He was honest with others, and today, He is being continually honest as He defends you and me before the Father when we sin.

Hebrews 7:25 “Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.”

When He is making intercession for me, do you know what He says to the Father even though my life might not reflect it at the moment? “Father, Jimmy has applied the blood and confessed my Lordship.”

If you can live a lie and not bat an eye, you need to check your salvation. If all lies come from the devil as Jesus said and you continually lie, whose lifestyle are you living, Jesus’ or Satan’s?

B. It was a life of purity. (1 John 3:3)

1 John 3:3 “And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.”

This is a tough one. We are to purify ourselves as He is pure.

Let me ask you a question.

Who lives in a born-again Christian? ___________________.

What does the Holy Spirit do? He reveals Jesus Christ to you. (John 14:26, John 15:26)

John 14:26 “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.”

John 15:26 ““But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.”

If the Holy Spirit bears witness to Jesus Christ and brings to remembrance in your life everything Jesus said, is it possible for you to live a pure life? ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!! If Jesus is Lord.

When we get ready to do something impure, we might would be less inclined to do it if we remembered who we were subjecting to that impurity. AMEN!!!! What do I mean?

1 Corinthians 6:19–20 “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”

Man, that Bible cuts like a sword, does it not? Let me tell you where I personally believe where most Christians fail to live up to the purity of Jesus.

I believe Christians display impurity in the entertainment they enjoy.

We watch TV shows and movies that we know we should not watch. Shows with all kinds of profanity and sexual perversion. It is as if we take Christ and set Him aside when it comes to entertainment. When we do that, is He Lord?

The Holy Spirit has really been convicting me of that lately. Do you know what we need to do? Before watching anything, we need to realize that our bodies are the temple of God, and that we have been bought with a price, and we need to leave that immoral entertainment alone even if it means we never turn on our televisions.

I am telling you Christ would not be watching movies or TV shows with the language of Yellowstone. Christ would not be watching the Walking Dead. Christ would not be watching Superman. Christ would not be watching anything sexually explicit. Guess what? Neither should we.

Do you realize the entertainment you enjoy could be keeping you from walking in the light? It could be keeping you from fellowship with the Father and fellow Christians, and the sad thing about it is that many Christians do not even realize they are sinning by watching the junk they watch.

“Well, Jimmy, if I followed what you are saying, I would not be able to turn on my television. What would I do?”

You are probably right. You would not be able to turn it on, and what you should be doing with that time anyway if Jesus is really Lord is praying, studying God’s Word, and raising your Children in God’s Word.

And I have not even discussed the music industry. Have you listened to any modern country music? It is ridiculous the lifestyle that music genre upholds. Gangster rap and its sexually explicit and violent lyrics are gobbled up by teenagers and young adults of all colors today, and parents do not even monitor it, and the entire time, you are opening your life and your child’s life to the devil.

Ephesians 4:27 “and give no opportunity to the devil.”

A true believer limits the devil’s opportunities and and seeks the lifestyle of Jesus.

C. To have the lifestyle of Christ, one must abide in Christ.

John 15:5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”

Abiding in Christ is the secret. How does a branch abide in a vine? The branch is totally surrendered to the vine.

The branch receives everything it needs from the vine. The branch is not distracted by anything. Let me explain.

Many of us get distracted which keeps us from abiding in Christ. We are distracted by family, recreation, finances, and the world. If we are to live the lifestyle Christ lived, when it comes to our family, we serve Jesus. When it comes to our recreation, we serve Jesus. When it comes to our jobs and finances, we serve Jesus. We abide in Christ.

Philippians 3:13 “Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,”

Matthew 6:24 ““No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”

Jesus says you cannot serve two masters, and Paul says he was not going to be distracted. He was moving forward with Jesus, and dear friend, that must be your attitude if you want to abide in Christ and have the lifestyle of Jesus.

Conclusion: A person that is truly born-again is born to a new life, a life that bears the mark of Jesus. The whole idea of being born-again means that something had to die. That something is your old life. You bury that old life and receive a new life from Jesus, a life that should resemble the life of Jesus, a life that should produce the fruits of the Spirit.

Galatians 5:22–23 “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

If your life is not marked by the traits I described or by the fruits of the Spirit, you need to be saved. You have not been born-again. There is no such thing as a “mean-spirited” Christian. The Bible says you must be born-again. Have you?

John 3:16 ““For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”

John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”