3 John - The Two Paths

Y’all can be seated, and kids you are free to go to your class. We pray that the Lord would be with you as he is with us.

Good morning. Pastor Kyle is traveling on vacation, and we pray that him and his family would have a refreshing and enjoyable time.

It is a wonderful morning to gather together with God’s people. It’s a joy for me to be with you all face to face. John often writes that he wants to see his audience face to face and I am so blessed to be able to do what John wished he could. I get to be here this morning with you in the flesh.

This morning we will be continuing our work in the epistles of John and be looking 3 John. And what is so fascinating about our letter today is that this is a very personal letter. In this letter, John starts off by naming names. John writes about three different men in this letter. Now today we can get nervous about name dropping, we don’t want to offend anyone, or get cancelled, or maybe speak too hastily, but John is willing in this epistle to name drop.

Now if your name is mentioned in a letter written by an apostle, you are probably going to start sweating just a little bit. You’re probably a little nervous about what John is about to say. And John is not about to shy away from rebuking those who are evil. But he is also going to praise those who are faithful. In fact what John is going to do is he is going to compare and contrast two different groups of people. Those who are faithful to following Christ, and those who have turned away from Christ.

And 3 John is first and foremost a letter written to a friend of John. 1st and 2 John were written to a church with harsh warnings but 3 John is written to a friend, Gaius. And this whole letter is an encouragement to Gaius. It is written to praise him for the good that he has been doing and to continue on the path that he is walking.

John wants to praise this friend of his but also call him to remain firm in what he is currently doing. He wants Gaius to stay faithful to the work that he is doing. And John writes to him to encourage but then to warn him of another man, named Diotrephes.

Diotrephes is anti type of Gaius. For everything that Gaius does well, Diotrephes is walking in sin and darkness. Diotrephes is not persevering in the faith, he is not walking according to the teachings of the apostles, he is in fact harming the church.

And John is saying to Gaius don’t depart down the path of Diotrephes. Don’t do what he is doing. Because their are two paths, the path of light and the path of darkness. Those who abide in Christ and those who are anti - Christ.

This is the truth of the Christian life. There are two paths, which will you follow? We see this playing out all throughout our Bibles.

Will you follow the path of Abel or Cain? Abraham or Lot? Jacob or Esau? David or Saul? What about the disciples who denied Jesus, will you be Peter or Judas? In Fact will you follow the Jesus or Adam? Which path are you going down? Are you walking after Christ or are you turning your back on him?

For our passage today, are you walking the path of Gaius or Diotrephes? This morning I want you to see that two paths that are shown in this passage and ask yourself, which path am I following? Which path am I walking down?

Turn with me to 3 John and we can see what these two different paths look like.

Hear the reading of God’s word: 3 John starting in verse 1

1 The elder to the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth.

2 Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul. 3 For I rejoiced greatly when the brothers came and testified to your truth, as indeed you are walking in the truth. 4 I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

5 Beloved, it is a faithful thing you do in all your efforts for these brothers, strangers as they are, 6 who testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their journey in a manner worthy of God. 7 For they have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. 8 Therefore we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth.

9 I have written something to the church, but Diotrephes, who likes to put himself first, does not acknowledge our authority. 10 So if I come, I will bring up what he is doing, talking wicked nonsense against us. And not content with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers, and also stops those who want to and puts them out of the church.

11 Beloved, do not imitate evil but imitate good. Whoever does good is from God; whoever does evil has not seen God. 12 Demetrius has received a good testimony from everyone, and from the truth itself. We also add our testimony, and you know that our testimony is true.

13 I had much to write to you, but I would rather not write with pen and ink. 14 I hope to see you soon, and we will talk face to face.

15 Peace be to you. The friends greet you. Greet the friends, each by name.

This is the word of the Lord:

My beloved

John begins his letter by addressing Gaius as the beloved. John then doubles up and says that he loves Gaius in the truth. What a greeting. You can feel the love for this man dripping of the tongue of John. This letter is written first and foremost in love.

John is demonstrating the love that an elder has for his people. And I personally am so blessed to be at Exodus Church where we see this loves poured out from our elders and pastors. Exodus Church is a church that is blessed to have elders and pastors who love their church the same that John loved Gaius.

I can’t count the number of times that one of these men has assisted me and shown true love. From helping me move, to praying over sick family members, to reaching out when a loved one died, to picking me up when my car died. Exodus we are blessed by the men that God has called to lead out church. They love us, the church with a love that is special.

This is how the church is supposed to be. The elders are supposed to love their people, just as John loves Gaius. Verse 2 shows that it is a wholistic love, John speaks of Gaius health both physical and spiritual. He prays that Gaius would be in good health in all manners.

And then John rejoices to hear the report of what Gaius has been doing. And he has heard good things. Gaius is following the path of life. John writes to him what he has heard and praises him for his faithfulness. Look with me at verse 5-8

English Standard Version Chapter 1

5 Beloved, it is a faithful thing you do in all your efforts for these brothers, strangers as they are, 6 who testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their journey in a manner worthy of God. 7 For they have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. 8 Therefore we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth.

Hospitality and Charity

John is praising Gaius here for his hospitality. Gaius is a man who is helping brothers in the faith, men he doesn’t even know and is showing hospitality to them. John praises him for supporting these people so that he may be a fellow worker for the truth.

For Gaius to assist and help these brothers is actually for him to be a fellow worker in the truth. Gaius is partnering in ministry of what appear to be missionaries. These are men who are going out from Gaius, accepting help from him to be a worker in the truth.

Gaius has welcomed in these men and assisted them. He has provided everything that these men need, it says they don’t have to accept anything from the Gentiles, or the unbelievers. Instead the church and Gaius leading it has provided everything that these men need. They don’t need to search out help from anyone else except for the church.

This is important because hospitality is one of the defining characteristics of Christianity. As Christians one of our callings is to be a hospitable people. To be charitable. This is how we love our neighbor but it is also how we love our Lord.

Christ himself talks about this in Matthew 25:34-40

Matthew 25:34–40 ESV

Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

The King, Jesus says to these people that they are blessed by the Father for providing food, clothing, and water to those who were in need. Because what Christians do to the least of those is what we do to Christ. We may not even realize it but this is a ministry of loving our neighbor but also of loving God. To be hospitable and to be charitable is to abide by the great to commandments, Love God and love your neighbor.

This is why Christians have a history of being such a hospitable and charitable people. If you look through the history of the world whenever there is disaster, or plague, wars, the people who are there to help are those who have faith in Christ.

In the 2nd and 3rd century during the Antonine and Cyprian Plagues, the people who were tending to the sick were Christians. They risked their own life to help nurse and ease the suffering of the sick. During the black plague the puritans were the ones who stayed and helped the sick. During the cholera outbreak, Charles Spurgeon was on the frontlines of the cholera outbreak, evangelizing and ministering to the sick. Just this month when we saw horrendous flooding in South Carolina, one of the first groups to respond was the Southern Baptist Convention. The path of being a Christian is a path of being hospitable, of being charitable, of helping those who are in need.

And this is the history of Exodus Church. Beloved you have walked in the paths of our forefathers. Exodus Church is known is for its hospitality and charity. We have families who open their homes for community groups, for dinners, for game nights, for birthday parties, and for bible studies. Exodus is a charitable church that has faithfully given its funds towards pregnancy resource centers, missionaries, families in need, and gifts for our pastors and elders. We are a church that cares for its community, we have men who mentor fatherless youth, we have hosted bible studies at public schools, we have opened our own school, we have preached the gospel at national days of prayer, we have taken a stand during pride month, we have loved those in Wichita well.

Exodus Church you have done all these things to the least of these and as such have done them to Christ. This is the path of life, the way of truth that you have faithfully walked in. Do not falter but finish the race well because you have done so good. You are the beloved, and you are walking the path of Christ.

Do not depart from this path, for there is a path of death, a path leads to destruction, and those who follow will come to their end. This is a path of wickedness, sin, and the path of death. The path of a man named Diotrephes.

Look with me at verses 9-10

English Standard Version Chapter 1

9 I have written something to the church, but Diotrephes, who likes to put himself first, does not acknowledge our authority. 10 So if I come, I will bring up what he is doing, talking wicked nonsense against us. And not content with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers, and also stops those who want to and puts them out of the church.

I’m just going to start with this, probably the worst place to see your name written is in the infallible word of God as a rebuke by an apostle. This is a scary place to be. Diotrephes is a man who is walking down the path of death. He is a man who has departed from the way of life and now is under severe rebuke from John.

John tells us what this man has done, he is prideful - he puts himself first, he does not acknowledge the authority of the apostles, he is talking wicked nonsense, and he is refusing to greet the brothers and is putting them outside of the church.

Diotrephes is the picture of the path of death. As Gaius is doing all of these things well we see Diotrephes who is the exact opposite. Where Gaius is hospitable, Diotrephes is kicking people out. Where Gaius is humble and assisting the brothers, Diotrephes is putting himself first. The way of life and death. The way of Gaius and Diotrephes.

This is a story that we have seen before in our bibles. The bible likes to tell the story of those who reject the people of God. Diotrephes is putting out the people of God, he does now welcome them in. While Gaius does welcome them in. The one who welcomes is the one who receives salvation while the one who rejects faces destruction.

We see this story in Jericho, where Rahab welcomes in the spies and protects them and is saved when the Israelites destroy this city. We see this in Sodom and Gomorrah where Lot is the only one who protects the visitors and he and his daughters are saved from the Lord’s wrath. And we see this in 3 John, Gaius is praised for his while Diotrephes is condemned for putting out those from the church.

The Christian path is one of hospitality and Diotrephes has forgotten this. He has not been welcoming, he has not given his time and money and opened up his home to the brothers instead he has kicked them out of the church.

And Church hear this, the reason that hospitality is so important is because when we are hospitable we are imaging God. Our God is a hospitable God so for us to be hospitable is to bear the image of God. Hospitality is so important because the entirety of the bible can be summed up as the Lord welcoming people to his feast. The Lord is hospitable and welcoming people to a wedding feast.

Revelation 19 tells us this - look with me starting in verse 6

English Standard Version Chapter 19

6 Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out,

“Hallelujah!

For the Lord our God

the Almighty reigns.

7  Let us rejoice and exult

and give him the glory,

for the marriage of the Lamb has come,

and his Bride has made herself ready;

8  it was granted her to clothe herself

with fine linen, bright and pure”—

for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.

9 And the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” And he said to me, “These are the true words of God.”

The telos or the end goal of man is to come to the feast of the lamb. We get a small glimpse of this every Sunday when we come together at the Lord’s table. We get a chance to taste a small bit of what our life is leading up to. And this is the why the sin of Diotrephes is so severe. He is pushing people out the church. People that John calls brothers. Who are you Diotrephes to gatekeep the hospitality of the Lord? Who are you to put brothers outside of the church?

This is a grievous sin. First Diotrephes has ignored the apostolic authority and now he has taken the place of the apostles by refusing to welcome the brothers and putting them outside of the church. This man who puts himself first has now placed himself as the ultimate authority in the church, he has given himself the power to decide who is welcome in the church and who is not.

This is not biblically based church discipline, or a pastor who is shepherding his flock. John tells us this is a man who has put himself first, a man who is after his own glory, his own power. Diotrephes is not trying to protect the flock, instead he is a man who the flock must be protected from, he is a man after his own intentions. Diotrephes has departed from the faith, he is walking a path that can only lead to destruction.

And as we read this we realize how sad this story really is. Diotrephes did not start out this way. He has some position in the church that was well earned. He has grown to a position of prominence in a faithful church. And we see that John had reached out written a letter before to warn of the Diotrephes. This man that we see putting people out the church did not start out this way. Something took place that took him down the path of death. Something turned his affections away from Christ and lead him to be against Christ and to harm his bride.

Diotrephes did not wake up one day and decide I’m going to become the villain of the epistle of 3 John. No sin got a small hold of him and he slowly and steadily went down this path. This is what sin does, it starts off small so that it can lead our affections away from Christ. No man wakes up wanting to ruin his life, but sin takes us down this dark and twisted path, but it always start with something little.

Think of Edmund in the Chronicles of Narnia, he didn’t wake up one morning and say Im going to betray my family, have Aslan die in my spot and become a slave to the white witch. No, it started with a kid who had a gluttonous attraction to Turkish delights, and if you have ever had a turkish delight you realize how ridiculous this sin really is.

This is how sin gets ahold of us, it snags us with just a little taste before dragging us willfully down a path of destruction and death. But the good news is that there is hope for repentance, God does not slam the door on those who have departed but instead there is a chance to leave the path of death and return to the path of life.

Through the cross, through repentance, through our confession every Sunday morning, God brings his people back onto the path of life. Those who have strayed are brought back onto the proper way. We see this in Pilgrims Progress all the time. It feels like every chapter Christian is straying from the path, but the Lord is faithful to his people. Those who repent can continue on down the path of life.

There is still hope for the path of life. Gaius has faithfully walked this path and sadly Diotrephes has not. But John is going to end by giving hope to Gaius, he is going to give him a command and then provide with him a companion for this path of life.

Look with me at the end of this epistle, starting in verse 11

English Standard Version (Chapter 1)

11 Beloved, do not imitate evil but imitate good. Whoever does good is from God; whoever does evil has not seen God. 12 Demetrius has received a good testimony from everyone, and from the truth itself. We also add our testimony, and you know that our testimony is true.

13 I had much to write to you, but I would rather not write with pen and ink. 14 I hope to see you soon, and we will talk face to face.

15 Peace be to you. The friends greet you. Greet the friends, each by name.

John ends his letter with a command to not imitate evil but to imitate good. Imitate the good that is from God. Imitate Gaius do not imitate Diotrephes.

And what does it mean to imitate good, what does it mean to be in the path of life? John tells us it by being like the third name in this epistle. It is to be Demetrius. Demetrius comes bearing the testimony from everyone and from John himself. This is a man who is walking the path of life, a man whose life has shown the fruit of his faithfulness, he is man like Gaius himself.

This is how John ends his letter. A call to remember to imitate good and an example of a man who is doing this. Demetrius is a man who comes having proved his walk.

John writes to Gaius his friend who he loves, a friend he wants to see face to face. A friend that he greets and wishes peace upon.

To this friend he calls him to remember what path he is on. To continue the good work that he has been doing. And do not depart down the path of death. But instead be walk down the path of imitating what is good, good that is from God.

And this is my call to you today Exodus Church, imitate what is good. Imitate good men like Gaius who are following the Lord, who are from God. Do not depart this path by chasing after vain sins and fancies, that disappear quickly, like Turkish delights. But instead cling fast to the teachings you have received, and do not depart from the path of life.

There are two paths. You must examine which path will you follow. Are you going down the path of Diotrephes, a path of pride, of ignoring the teachings of the apostles. A path of seeking your own glory and kicking out people from the church.

Or are you following the path of Gaius, the path of life, the path of hospitality, the path of charity, of welcoming the brother. The path of being the friend of John and being the beloved of the elder. This is the path to follow Exodus Church.

Which path will you follow? Gaius or Diotrephes? Light or darkness? Life or death?

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - Amen.