Sermon Tone Analysis

The Unction and Anointing

1 John 2:18-27

We receive Christ as our savior the Holy Spirit comes and dwells in us.

The Holy spirit convicts

The Holy Spirit teaches

The Holy spirit guides

The Holy Spirit help us understand

In this section John talks about the counterfeiters of the day.

Crooks have been counterfeiting money ever since its inception.

In antiquity, gold coins were filled with lead.

When I was a boy slugs were used in vending machines.

Today, you can counterfeit money in the privacy of your own home because of easy access to laser printers.

The Secret Service prints a pamphlet titled Know Your Money that explains how to detect counterfeit money.

As odd as it sounds, their training does not include how to recognize the counterfeit.

Instead, they become so familiar with the authentic that the counterfeit is recognized by sight and touch.

In the first century, the last surviving disciple warned the first generation of millennials about counterfeit messengers.

He doesn't waste much time listing their evil traits.

Instead, he warned his audience to become so familiar with Scripture that the contrast between light and darkness is obvious.

In John's first letter he lists the differences between the genuine and the counterfeit.

First, there's a social test: the genuine believer loves God and his neighbor as himself.

Second, there's a doctrinal test: the genuine believer accepts Jesus Christ as God's only begotten Son.

And then there's a moral test: the genuine believer walks in the light.

There's one acid test that determines a tree's identity, and that's the fruit it produces.

Even children understand that concept.

Illustration here

The Unction and Anointing helps us

I.Watch and Test

In the light of the deceptions of the last hour (2:18–23).

2:18.

John’s general warning against the world is now followed by a warning against one of its end-time manifestations.

The false teachers who were present were worldly to the core (cf.

4:5).

The readers knew about the predicted advent of the Antichrist and needed to be alerted to the appearance of many who would display his traits of hostility toward God’s Christ.

This is a clear indication that history has entered a climactic era: the last hour.

Despite the lapse of centuries since John wrote, the climax of all things impends in a special way.

The stage has been set for history’s final drama.

2:19.

Of the false teachers John had in mind, he wrote, They went out from us.

The word “us” here is most naturally taken as the apostolic first person plural of this epistle (see 1:1–5; 4:6).

“Us” contrasts with the “you” in 2:20–21, which referred to the readers.

It does not make sense that the false teachers had left the churches to which the readers belonged.

If they had, how were they still a problem?

On the other hand if, like the legalists of Acts 15, they had seceded from the apostolic churches of Jerusalem and Judea, then they were a particular threat to the readers because they came to them claiming roots in the soil out of which Christianity arose.

Thus John was eager to deny any connection with them.

They did not really belong to us paraphrases an expression more literally rendered, “they were not of us.”

The writer’s point was that these men did not really share the spirit and perspective of the apostolic circle, for if they had their secession would not have taken place.

Heresy in the Christian church, whether on the part of its saved members or unsaved people in it, always unmasks a fundamental disharmony with the spirit and doctrine of the apostles.

A man in touch with God will submit to apostolic instruction (cf. 1 John 4:6).

2:20–21.

The readers were well fortified against the antichrists, however, since they had an anointing from the Holy One (i.e., from God).

The “anointing” is no doubt the Holy Spirit since, according to verse 27, the anointing “teaches.”

This clearly suggests that the “anointing” is conceived of as a Person.

Jesus Himself was “anointed” with the Holy Spirit (cf.

Acts 10:38).

(For the possibility that the term suggests that the church leaders are in view, see the Introduction.)

As a result of their “anointing,” the readers (perhaps primarily the church leaders) had adequate instruction in the truth of God.

John wrote them precisely because their apprehension of the truth was correct and because … the truth should never be confused with a lie.

2:22–23.

The antichrists are liars for they deny that Jesus is the Christ, that is, God’s Son and the appointed Savior (cf.

John 4:29, 42; 20:31).

This denial involves also a denial of the Father.

Any claim they might make to having the Father’s approval is false.

One cannot have the Father without the Son.

To reject One is to reject the Other.

D. In light of the readers’ responsibilities to abide (2:24–27).

2:24.

The readers must see that what they have heard from the beginning (cf.

1:1; 2:7; 3:11) remains in them.

If it does (NIV paraphrases here), they will remain in the Son and in the Father.

The term translated “remain” is again menō, which the NIV renders as “live” and “lives” in 2:6, 10, 14, 17.

John’s point was that if the readers would resist the lies of the antichrists and let the truth they had heard from the beginning “abide” (or “be at home”) in them, they would continue to “abide” in the fellowship of God the Father and God the Son.

2:25–26.

They could also continue to rest on the divine promise of eternal life.

As John later insisted (5:9–13; cf.

5:20), they could be sure that they possessed this on the basis of God’s testimony to that fact.

It may well be that the antichrists denied that the readers were actually saved, since John went right on to say, I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray (cf.

3:7).

Coming as they evidently did from the apostolic churches of Judea, these men apparently sought to undermine the readers’ conviction that Jesus is the Christ and that they had eternal life through Him.

John’s insistence that his readers genuinely know God and know His truth (2:12–14, 21) was part of his strategy for fortifying them against the antichrists.

2:27.

The readers did not need teaching from the antichrists or, for that matter, from anyone.

Their anointing … received from God, remains in them and was a sufficient Teacher.

This, along with verses 12–14, may imply that John’s readers were relatively spiritually mature, since the immature need human teachers (cf.

Heb.

5:12).

This is appropriate if John were addressing church leaders, but it would also suit a congregation that had long been in the faith.

Unlike the antichrists, who may have claimed some form of inspiration, the readers’ anointing was real, not counterfeit.

They needed to remain (menete, “abide”) in Him (the pronoun can refer to the anointing) and rely fully on His continuing instruction.

IV.

The Body of the Epistle (2:28–4:19)

In the section just completed (2:12–27), John wrote both to assure his readers of the validity of their spiritual experiences and to warn them against the antichrists who denied that validity.

In what may be described as the body of his letter, John then explored the true character and consequences of that form of experience which the readers already had and needed to maintain.

A. The theme stated (2:28).

2:28.

Many commentators see a major break here.

The words continue in Him involve again the Greek verb menō (“abide”) which has already occurred 10 times in verses 6–27.

(John used menō 66 of the 112 times it occurs in the NT: 40 in John, 23 in 1 John, and 3 in 2 John.)

In accord with his basic theme about fellowship (1 John 1:3), John once more enjoined the “abiding” life.

But now he introduced the new thought of being confident before Christ at His coming.

The Greek words rendered “be confident” are literally “have confidence.”

The latter is parrēsia, a word that can signify a bold freedom of speech.

John used it again in 3:21; 4:17; 5:14.

If the readers would maintain their fellowship with God, they would enjoy a genuine boldness of speech when they would meet their Lord.

How this can be so is the subject of 2:29–4:19.

Should a believer fail to abide in Him, however, there is the possibility of shame when Christ comes.

This intimates divine disapproval at the judgment seat of Christ, referred to in 4:17–19.

The NIV‘s unashamed before Him might be more literally rendered: “not be ashamed before Him.”

The possibility is real but does not, of course, suggest the loss of salvation.

B. Discerning the children of God (2:29–3:10a)

At this point John began to develop a line of thought which culminates in the acquisition of the boldness of which he had just spoken (2:28; cf.

4:17–19).

The fellowship with the apostolic circle and with God which he had in mind (cf.