1 John 3 Children of God

Who are the children, what do they do, and why?

Read vs 1-10

SEE what kind of love. John starts off this passage by being an example of the Father and His love. When John uses the word see you can imagine him getting down on one knee with a child and directing their vision towards a beautiful flower in a desert. John was writing to disciples. But not his disciples, Christ’s disciples. Christians.

Discipleship should always consist of helping others refocus their gaze on God and the promises in His word. This is what John is doing today, and that is what we shall strive for as well.

We know that John is writing to believers, as in verse one he says “See what kind of love the Father has given to us that we might be called children of God;and so we are.” The Greek word here for children communicates the idea of a child who belongs to the parent in a legal sense, whether natural or adopted. “The world does not know us.” The world doesn’t understand Christians, because they have been changed by God’s love, and the world doesn’t know God and His love.

John makes several conditional statements in a row here. What is a conditional statement? Really it’s a progression of logic. “If this, then...” If you have the hope of Christ, you purify yourself. If you practice sin, you are practicing lawlessness. No one who abides in Him sins. No one whom sins has seen him or known Him. If you practice righteousness, you are righteous and a son of God, if you practice lawlessness, you are a son of the devil. There is no in-between. John is making comparisons throughout his letter, darkness and light, righteousness and sin, son of God, son of the Devil. Remember that he was combatting a heresy called gnosticism. Who can tell me what gnosticism taught? Imagine the most arrogant person you know of. That’s what gnostics were like. And they taught that it didn’t matter what you do with your body. Do you think the sin of gnosticism is present in our culture today? You better believe it. Here are some examples.

“Your body count should be whatever you feel comfortable with, whether that means it’s going to be a total of one or if you’re on the road to 100. There is no right or wrong body count number, so don’t ever let anyone make you feel bad about your number.”

“...there is never a “right” way to do things and there’s always going to be someone doing it better. It is always the right time to pursue something that makes you happy or walk away from something that makes you miserable –”

“Sow your oats.”

Put yourself in the shoes of the apostle John. What is an apostle?

These apostles walked with Jesus and were with him in his earthly ministry, they saw the love he poured out on all those he encountered, watched him die on the cross, rise again, and promise to return. Fast forward maybe 40 years or so and we have a group of Christians who are falling prey to heresy that says that Jesus didn’t exist in the flesh, and therefore it doesn’t matter what you do with your body. Can you imagine how horrifying this must have been for John? This is why he writes in the caring way that he does to his listeners. Because he had great care that their faith would not be shipwrecked.

So what is John saying to them?

John is saying, you can’t just say you’re a believer and have it be true.

Matter of fact if then statements

Do you fall under the crook of God’s word?

Describe what a crook is used for.

My spiritual condition without God is the sheep running around with the bag on his head. And sometimes I go back to the bag.

Give the analogy of the sheepfold and how we need to abide in the fold.

Life will not make sense until you learn to trust the Father and abide in his sheepfold.