"...and of the Son...", pt. 5 (05/01/2024) (Undeniable Truth)

1 John 2:22–25 NKJV

22 Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist who denies the Father and the Son. 23 Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father either; he who acknowledges the Son has the Father also. 24 Therefore let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son and in the Father. 25 And this is the promise that He has promised us—eternal life.

In this session, we will understand why it is not only necessary that Jesus is God and that we believe that, but that it is fatal to deny that Jesus is God.

First of all, after we’ve read this passage through once, now let’s think about the context. In this historical context.

St. John, one of the twelve apostles, is likely addressing the heretic named Cerinthus, who was one of the Gnostics. Now, the Gnostics are a very broad heretical group that died only a few centuries after Christ. However, some have been trying to revive it in recent years.

Essentially, the Gnostics were a group of many sects held to a belief system that was very loosely based on Christianity but was completely different. For example, they denied that Jesus was God, as we see in this passage, but they also believed that the physical world was evil and we were supposed to escape from it.

In their view, there was only one problem with their belief system: they had no apostolic authority to back them up. How were they going to convince anyone of their (so-called) truth if not a single apostle of the twelve showed any support for them only a generation or two after they had died? All everyone else saw was a heretical, man-made development.

So this was their solution: to write their own Gospels. And they wrote a lot of them. Some examples are “The Gospel of Thomas”, “The Gospel of Truth”, “The Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles”, “The Acts of John”. All of these were forgeries, and they didn’t hide it very well. These “gospels” or “acts” of the “apostles” were often filled with overdramatic miracles and outlandish claims like

The God of the Old Testament being an evil one named Yaltabaoth who had Jesus crucified because Jesus was destroying Yaltabaoth’s kingdom instead of promoting it

Or Jesus apparently saying this in the “Gospel of Thomas” saying 114 (quote):

“Simon Peter said to them: Let Mary go out from among us, for women are not worthy of the life. Jesus said: Look, I will lead her that I may make her male, in order that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who makes herself male will enter into the kingdom of heaven.”

If you haven’t picked up yet, this is a kind of weird group.

Even so, this attracted many people to leave the Christian faith.

This is why John describes the punishment that will unfortunately befall all those who joined in this heresy. Notice how out of all the heretical beliefs of Cerinthus and the Gnostics, the belief that makes them “antichrist” is denying the Father and the Son. They become liars because they were in the truth before, but then left it. Wherefore St. John writes 3 verses earlier: 1 John 2:19 “19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us.” They are literally antichrists, because they are opposed to Christ. Cerinthus believed that the Christ was something that entered Jesus at His baptism and exited before His crucifixion. This denies the Incarnation and Him being eternal God. If He wasn’t God during His death, then the Atonement is worthless. This is an incoherent form of Christianity, which is why St. John writes that whoever denies the Son denies the Father, too.

Meanwhile, we are blessed. When we acknowledge the Son, we also have the Father.

Just like the author of Hebrews encouraged the Christians, so St. John does to these Christians.

And what is that promise? Eternal life.

This is why we need to hold to this truth, this undeniable truth of Jesus, our God and King.

But many times, we deny it by living a life against His commandments. If we are Christians, this means that we follow all of Jesus’ commandments.

I’ll leave you with that as we leave to Shop, but I need to ask you again and again: never stop following God.

What’s the point of me coming here twice a week during Academics if you don’t use it after. I do this for the benefit of everyone here and once it’s said, I’m released of the burden. But what about you all? Now it’s our turn to live it out.

(pray)45