“ASSURANCE THAT ABIDES”

1 John 3:21 NKJV

21 Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence toward God.

I. A SETTLED HEART

1 John 3:22–23 NKJV

22 And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight. 23 And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment.

John 15:10 NKJV

10 If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.

1 John 4:1–3 NKJV

1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, 3 and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world.

II.THE TRUTH TEST

Acts 17:11 NKJV

11 These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.

1 John 4:4–6 NKJV

4 You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. 5 They are of the world. Therefore they speak as of the world, and the world hears them. 6 We are of God. He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

III. GREATER STILL

Romans 8:37 NKJV

37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

Luke 9:23 NKJV

23 Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.

1 Corinthians 2:12 NKJV

12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.