Untitled Sermon (32)

We are going to begin a series on 1 John. John tells us his purpose for writing this little book at the end…he says, “I’ve written these things so that you may know that you have eternal life.”

What I think you just heard him say is, I’ve written this so that you can know if you will go to heaven when you die. But that’s not exactly what John is saying—sure that’s a part of it. But eternal life is so much more.

Salvation, eternal life, is more than believing the right things. It’s not passing a doctrine test—though that certainly plays a part. It’s about being with Jesus…eternal life is to be united and connected with Jesus, to be following along the Jesus way…It’s a radical transformation.

And so John is saying—I write this so that you can know you’re in on that. I want you to know that you possess this…that Jesus has transformed you.

But why?

Those to whom John is writing were living in a time very similar to our own. No, they didn’t have deep fakes. They didn’t have social media to spread lies at lightning speed. But they still had falsehood being spread.

We have this same thing happening in our day. Many rival claims. How do you know who you can trust? Who is intentionally lying? Who is deceived? Who knows the truth, loves the truth, and is telling the truth?

Now the stakes aren’t very high if we’re talking about people making football predictions. Or even arguing on the postgame show. What we’re talking about here is eternal life—are you connected to Jesus, do you have eternal life. Are you living for what really matters. Those questions have forever consequences.

And so we’re left, just like John’s audience, wondering…who can we trust? How do we know if these guys are telling the truth…how do we know if the disciples are telling the truth? How can you know...

Listen in as John gives them a bit of an answer…or at least makes a plea for why they ought to trust him, instead of the false teachers:

1 John 1:1–4 ESV

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.

Sermon Introduction:

John is saying—who do you trust more. A guy who has been there with Jesus, who walked with Him, who knew His sleep schedule, or people who are just now coming into this thing?

The answer is obvious. You ought to trust those who have been with Him.

But we don’t really have that same advantage today, do we? I can’t say—trust me, I used to walk on those dusty trails with Jesus. I saw with my own eyes Him healing a leper.

So, what do we do with that? How do we apply John in our day.

In this series our goal will be the same one that John had some 2,000 years ago. It’s the same goal the Spirit has for this little letter. It’s two-fold.

Throughout the history of the Church one thing has been true. There have always been those who profess Christ but are not really Christians. Just as Jesus simply said, “many will say to me on that day Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles? And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness”.

This statement is terrifying but it is true, many who profess to be Christians, and many who might even be confident that they have eternal life are actually NOT. They’ve maybe prayed a prayer, went to church, believe a set of facts, but they haven’t had heart transformation. You don’t know Jesus.

Goal #1 then…expose to our own hearts whether our profession of Christ is real or not.

The other goal isn’t for those who are falsely confident. It’s for those who are falsely insecure. This might even be the dominant goal for John. He wants to encourage us…

You know how to get hit in the face with a baseball? Be scared of getting hit in the face with a baseball. If you don’t have confidence that you’re going to catch the ball…you’re going to be timid. And when you’re timid you get hit in the face…you don’t put the glove where you need to. You try to avoid the ball....the first rule of playing shortstop is to play the ball, don’t let the ball play you.

Well, spiritually speaking when we really aren’t totally sure…when we say things like, “I sure hope I’m saved…I sure hope I’m gonna make it…” we’re setting ourselves up to get hit in the face.

While John’s audience is wrestling with—who do we believe, what do we believe, are we really saved—do we really have eternal life, are these guys correct, do we need to do something more…while they are asking those questions they aren’t in a position to really be thriving and flourishing in the kingdom. And John doesn’t want that for them…he wants that question to be settled.

But before we can do any of that we have to answer a fundamental question first…at that is what we see in these four verses…can we trust John? Can you trust the messenger? Who is this guy? How does he know?

I. The credibility of the message

Picture this setting. A world where people don’t believe in absolute truth, where even Christians are relativists, where theologians are uncertain about Jesus, where new spiritualities are proliferating, where the idea that there is only one way of salvation is considered outmoded, backwards, narrow, ignorant. What world are we describing?

Today, of course—right? True, but I really had in mind John’s day. You may be asking yourself, “Can the gospel work in that kind of environment where no one believes, or few believe in absolute truth, where Christians are relativists, where even Christian theologians are uncertain about Jesus, where new spiritualities are proliferating, where the idea of one way of salvation is viewed as outmoded. Can the Christian proclamation work in that kind of environment?

How can we have confidence in the reliability of the Gospel in this type of environment? Just do a YouTube search for “Who is Jesus” or “Can I Believe the Bible”? And you’ll get quite a few different answers.

How do I know which message is true? Is it which one sounds the best? Usually, we’ll pick the one that sounds the most familiar. But John wants us to look elsewhere.

Look at the reliability of the witness.

If you do not believe that John is a reliable witness, then his words mean nothing. If John is not giving us the words of God Himself then his message might be worthwhile to study as Christian literature but it is powerless to change our lives. So, whether we believe John or not is huge.

Listen to what John is saying here...

That which was from the beginning…(He’s making a claim about Jesus here…the eternal never created God…this unknowable, untouchable, immovable, wholly other God....)

well...

we heard him.

we saw Him with our own eyes

we gazed upon Him. We studied Him for years…we touched him with our hands.

I hugged Jesus. That’s what John is saying. I know what his breath smelled like.

--

I think this might be a helpful illustration. I have a group of friends in the SBC—one of them is involved in immigration reform. Hot button issue. He gets quite a bit of heat. I know the guy…like personally, eat supper with him, know his heart, know things he struggles with, know the things he is passionate about, know what he believes, I know him well.

Well sometimes because he’s doing thing that hit political hot button items…people will slander him. Call him all sorts of things. Now if I was on the outside, if I didn’t know him, well I might believe some of their accusations. But I know the guy.

Now if I write something about him. And talk about him and his position, etc. Who would you believe the most? The guy who doesn’t know him at all or me, the guy who eats with him, who talks with him on a weekly basis?

That’s what John is saying here. Who are you going to believe. Us, the disciples who were with Jesus, who saw the empty tomb with our own eyes, who hugged him, who laughed with him, who at the Last Supper with him....or these cats who didn’t even know him?

John’s message is reliable. If you don’t believe John’s message it isn’t because he is an unreliable witness…no it’s because we don’t want to believe his message.

things

It is not because we lack reliability that we would not believe what John is saying to us. It is because we know that to believe what the Bible says we will have to change. If we do not believe John’s message it is because we know that if we come to the light our deeds will be exposed. As it says in John’s Gospel, “Every one who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed”. To believe what John says we must be broken. We must allow the blackness of our souls be exposed to the light of God’s holiness. And that is difficult, that is why we so often try to discredit the messenger. If we can discredit the messenger then we can discredit his message.

This man actually knew Jesus, and he was taught by Jesus Himself. It is funny that today we believe people who are thousands of years removed from the person of Christ over a person who saw him, touched him, and heard him. We can trust what John is saying to us. We have his testimony about Jesus right here.

We can trust God’s Word. If you need truth, if you need something to anchor your life on, then anchor it in the Word of God. In a shifting world, where nobody knows or cares about truth, God’s Word is the rock that will hold.

II. The content of the message[1]

The first thing for us to see was the reliability of the message. Now we will look briefly at what John’s message is; the content of John’s message. John Piper outlines 5 things that summarize the content of John’s message.

1. That Christ, who is our life, has eternally existed with the Father. Simply put one part of John’s message is that Jesus Christ has existed from all eternity with the Father. That means that Jesus is God, and has been God forever. We get this from the very first statement “what was from the beginning”. Not only Christ Himself in the Person but also the Message which he brings has been from the beginning. Which is another way of saying that Jesus Christ and His Word has always existed.

2. The second thing we must see is that Christ, our life, was made flesh. We get this point from the beginning of verse 2. John wants us to know that this eternal God became a real flesh bearing, heart-beating, breathing human being. Jesus Christ breathed the same air that we do today.

This will come up later—but something the false teachers were denying was the humanity of Jesus. What we see here in these first two points is that Jesus…somehow…is fully God and fully man.

That is the testimony of eternal life.

3. The next thing that we must see is that through Christ being made flesh John has fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus.

That word for fellowship is koinonia. A self-sacrificing conformity to a shared vision. Or to say that another non-nerdy way…it means to be connected to Jesus…to be following to Jesus…to be along the path of Jesus, the way of Jesus, to be abiding in Jesus.

John is saying that he has come to share the values of Father and Son. His life purpose is that same as God’s life purpose. He’s been drawn into this.

John is saying…I’m in fellowship with God.

4. The next thing that we must see is that Christ is the basis for John’s fellowship with us.

It almost seems…look at verse 3…that John is saying, our goal here is that you’ll have fellowship with us. Be connected to me and I’ll hook you up with Jesus.

As if John and the other disciples are placing themselves as mediators to Jesus. You want to get to Jesus—well, you’ve got to go through us. That’s not what he is saying.

But he is saying those who have fellowship with John have fellowship with God. Why is that? Because the way that John is connected to God…is through Jesus. It’s the only path. And so if you want to be on the path of eternal life…you’re going to be connected to all the others who are on that path.

If you do not have a fellowship with those who were with Jesus, in God’s Word then you do not have fellowship with Jesus. It is impossible to believe something other than the gospel set forth in God’s Word and still have fellowship with Jesus Christ. So whenever we begin a relationship with Christ, we must not do so through a feeling or emotional experience, or a foundation-less personal decision, but we are accepting the truth that is given to us through God’s Word.

But it’s also true here that the only true Christian fellowship we have is through Christ. It is the basis for our fellowship with one another. It’s why diverse people can get along…we’re connected to each other as we are connected to Christ.

John’s concern is that through this message of the Gospel that believer’s unite. We will learn later that one of the test for knowing whether you are really a Christian or not is by your love for other believers.

5. Lastly, we must see that our fullness of joy comes when others share our delight in fellowship with God.

We get this last point from verse 4 where we see that John’s joy was to be made complete only in the spreading of God’s glory to others. It is a joy and a privilege whenever someone else responds to the gospel. There are few things more enjoyable in life than sharing and spreading the gospel. There is very little that rivals getting to actually be with someone whenever they begin a relationship with Jesus Christ.

To sum up John’s message it is this: Jesus Christ is fully man and fully God. He is the God that existed from eternity and He is the God that became a man. And He is our only way to have fellowship with God and other believers.

III. The concern of the message

As I stated in the beginning the concern of John’s message is that we know that we have eternal life. Are you following Jesus? Are you connected to Him? In union with Him?

Or even to put it in terms we might be a little more familiar with—if you died tonight do you know if you’d spend eternity with God?

Now let me say this as a way of encouragement…if you’re one of those saying, “I sure hope so...” What are you basing your acceptance with God on?

Is it your own personal performance? Whether you’ve had a good quiet time? Or is it based upon being connected to Jesus…walking along the Jesus way…being transformed by Christ.

Is that the desire of your heart to be like Christ? Have you been just completely and utterly transformed where you’re saying…I want to be like Jesus. I want to follow His footsteps. I want to know Him. I want to sit under Him…to learn from Him.

I believe the testimony of John, and Matthew, and Mark, and Luke, and Paul, the OT prophets. They are on the Jesus way…and that’s where I want to be.

Is that your heart? Then you need to be encouraged. This is eternal life. You’re connected to the vine.

But there’s another side to this. And this is what John is also saying here…the only path to eternal life is this transformation of being on the way of Jesus.

Not saying some prayer, or walking an aisle, or getting dunked in water, or making sure to go to church, or reading theology books, or teaching theology, or making sure you vote the right way, or being able to pass a doctrine test....but being transformed in such a way...

Deny himself, Take up your cross and follow me.

I don’t want to abide in the world anymore. I don’t want anything else to be my source of joy, identity, or any of that. I want to be on the Jesus way. He has the words of eternal life, where else can I go?

Do you believe John’s message…that Jesus is the only way and you need to pattern every bit of your life after Him?