Children of God

Introduction

It is impossible to separate someone’s identity from what they do. It is true that at times things are not what they seem, but it is equally true that a tree is known by its fruit. In WW1 during the infamous battles of the Somme, many of the British generals were very decorated, many of them knew military history backwards and forwards and they themselves were known as military giants by their titles and positions, positions that were often passed from father to son. But many of the decisions made at the beginning of the battles, the generals disregard for their own soldiers lives, and their propensity to bring centuries old battle strategies to a modern battlefield showed that many of them were terrible generals. In the end, it’s a high title that makes a good general, it is the actions in war that define them.

In our text today, the same proves to be true of Christians. We are in a spiritual war, a war against evil, sin, and idolatry and for the beauties of an eternal Kingdom with Christ on the Throne. But what of those who claim to be on the Lord’s side, and yet fight against him? Who claim that their sins are forgiven through the death of Christ, but do nothing to put sin to death in their lives. Who claim to love the King, tend to hate his soldiers or act like those of the enemy. This important text is meant to give security to the one fighting the good fight, and conviction to the imposter, so that both may find joy and hope in Christ alone.

Abiding in Christ: Our Identity

The text begins with a command and a reason for that command. The command is very reminiscent of John’s theology and it mirrors the command Jesus gave the disciples in John 15:4. Abide in Christ. Jesus says abide in my and I in you. Like a branch abiding in the vine, we are to abide in Christ and bear the fruit of abiding in Christ. A few years ago my dad and I were trimming some apple trees in the early spring or late winter, when the leaves were just starting to come out. Surprisingly, after a couple of weeks it seemed that enough sap had gotten into those branches so that they started to produce little buds and blossoms. However, even with those beautiful branches covered in blossoms, there was no way that they would have enough power to actually bear apples later that summer. A branch can look lively a while after it is has been cut, but in the long run it will not be able to bear the fruit it needs to bear.

It is important to understand the order of John’s logic here. He is not saying that you need to bear fruit in order to abide in Christ. How foolish would it be to say that a severed branch needs to bear fruit by itself before it can be reattached to the tree. The command is to abide and the reason for the command is this: so that when he appears we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.” If we continue and read the last verse of chapter 2, we get a summery of what John is going to be talking about in the rest of our text today: “If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him.”

So before we dive into the rest of this text, it is most important for us to reach an understanding of what it means to “abide in Christ.” Because this text is clearly parallel to Jesus words in John 15, that is a good place to start when trying to answer this question.

The metaphor of a vine is used extensively throughout the Gospels and even in the Old Testament prophets. In Isaiah 5:1-2 we read

Isaiah 5:1–2 ESV

Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.

Who is this vineyard? Verse 7 tells us:

English Standard Version Chapter 5

For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts

is the house of Israel,

and the men of Judah

are his pleasant planting;

and he looked for justice,

but behold, bloodshed;

for righteousness,

but behold, an outcry!

We already read throughout the NT the people of Israel being referred to as a fig tree without fruit, a poorly tended vineyard or one that does not share its fruit with God. Israel has failed in being God’s vineyard.

So there is a now a new vineyard. Who is it? The true Israel, and it’s not us, at least not primarily. It’s Christ. Christ is the vine, he is the true Israel, he is the one that all of the promises of God were directed at. Here is a majour difference between the Old Covenant and the New. If the Old Covenant were dependent on the faithfulness of Israelites, it would have failed and the promises of God would be void. But because Christ was always the end of those promises, he has guaranteed the success of the covenant and its rewards because he, in his perfect righteousness, bears the fruit of the covenant. The new covenant made in his blood is how God includes us into the covenant blessings through Christ’s righteousness, out sin being laid on him and his righteousness on us. Those in this covenant are, but logical conclusion, those who abide in Christ and therefore those that bear fruit, are the ones that abide in Christ.

The vine of the new covenant is always producing fruit, good fruit, through those who abide in it. In the context of our text, abiding in Christ means to keep the faith, and more specifically it means to not be led astray into false beliefs about Jesus, as we saw last week, and to not be led into sinful practices. It is a call to continue in the faith that you have started, and remain faithful to the Gospel that you have recieved. It is a call of endurance based on the future promises of God’s people. And the purpose is so that you may have confidence and not shrink back in shame at his coming. Why would someone shrink back in shame at his coming? If we think of it in terms of Jesus’ own parables, it would be to never hear the words “well done, good and faithful servant.” It would be to come to the end of your life and be told “depart from me, I never knew you.” It would be the shame of seeing Christ high and lifted up and knowing that you had not believed on him, had not submitted to him and had not loved him.

The confidence to stand before Christ knowing that we are his can only be achieved if we abide in him through faith in his person and work. Belief that he is your saviour, that he is your King, and that he is your brother before the father.

Being of Jesus Side: Our Practice

But belief bears its fruit in action, and this is what John expounds upon in the following verses. First, take a look at verses 1-3 of chapter 3. First, the love of God is highlighted by the fact that we should be made children of God, and so we are. If you have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are a child of God. That is the love that we have recieved from God, a real tangible love that we can have confidence in. The reason the world does not know us, why we look so different from them and why they tend to hate us and our message, is because we are children of God and they are children of this world and of the devil. In other words, we are on a different side of a great conflict than the rest of humanity and as a result we tend to look kinda different from them. The biggest and really the only important difference is that we do things that support our side of the conflict and they do things that support their side of the conflict.

As children of God, we do not yet know exactly what we will look like when we reach maturity in glory, but we have a pretty good guess because our character will be like that of our father. So everyone who has this hope of glory purifies himself as he himself is pure. This uncovers the prime motivation behind sanctification in the Christians life: to be like our Father. If we are abiding in Christ, we have recieved the Spirit of truth. Truth that gives us understanding into who God is and that our purpose in life is to know God and reflect his image in our own existence. Sin stands in the way of that goal, and knowing that Christ has not only died to save us from the guilt of sin but also it’s power, a true Christian eagerly desires to take that opportunity to grow and become more like what they are made to be.

If God told you that his will for your life was to make you a world-record breaking runner, and that’s really what you wanted to do, the way to show God that you really desired what he had promised, was to go out and start running. Anything else would communicate apathy, like you don’t care. John’s point is that a true child of God does care, they want to be what they have been promised to be, and their lifestyle will communicate that.

This is contrasted with those who practice sin and lawlessness. As children of God, we know that Jesus goal was to take away sin. That was the whole point of his coming, to deal with our sin. John is pointing out that it doesn’t make any sense to be a child of the God who sent his own son to die in order to end sin while we continue to indulge in the sin that God is trying to get rid of. It is impossible to be on God’s side if you support, promote, and live in the things that he hates.

It’s judging the tree by its fruit. A just person is known as just by his justice, a loving person is known as loving by their love. So a Christian is known as a Christ by being in Christ and emulating his character. God sent Christ on a mission to destroy the works of the devil, the sins and rebellion that earn the wrath of God, that he died for for us, and being a child of God means being on God’s side in the cosmic battle against sin. Whose side are you on? This is the assurance John wants his readers to have, as well as the motivation to keep fighting sin in their lives.

This also serves as a warning against any kind of antinomian teaching, the teaching that Christians don’t have to worry about not sinning because we are forgiven in Christ. This is a horrendous abuse of Gospel truth. It is true that Christ has taken all of our sins and that our good works add nothing to our salvation. It’s also true that our sins as Christians cannot lose our salvation. But it’s also true that Christ isn’t just saving us from the guilt of sin, but from the love of sin as well. If God hasn’t saved you from loving sin and wanting sin and having a lifestyle of sin, then he hasn’t saved you at all. Again, this is balanced with the truth that every Christian still falls into sin and struggles with it, but no Christian can live loving sin and living with it peacefully in their lives. If you are a Christian, sin is your enemy. All sin, not just the ones you don’t like. Your pride is your enemy, your lust is your enemy, your gossip is your enemy. And for John most importantly, a lack of love for other Christians is your enemy.

You will fall into sin in this life, if you don’t acknowledge that you don’t know God according to 1:8. But you life needs to actively show that sin is your enemy, not your indulgence. There is no room in your life as a Christian for any sin that you can quietly enjoy behind closed doors. It is your enemy, and your confidence as a Christian is meant to come by a growing hate for sin in your own life. This will result in gradual growth as you become more like Christ and less like your old, sin-loving self.

And in concluding, this shows itself nowhere more clearly than in love for other Christians. It is so easy to get so lost in our private struggles with sin that we forget to fight for love with other believers. As we saw a few weeks ago, loving other Christians is not the same as tolerating other Christians. If you are in a war, fighting the enemy is important, but helping your allies is just as important.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Christians have been given the freedom to desire righteousness because of our status as children of God. By his Spirit, our natures have been changed. In our desire for righteousness, powered by love for Christ and by the Spirit of holiness, we will find the joy and meaning that sin could never give us in our old lives. Christianity is not a life of “don’t do this and don’t do that.” It’s the freedom to escape the demonic desires of sin and pursue the joyful desire for righteousness. While we remain in this world, there will be war in our hearts as the new battles the old, but have confidence! If the war is there, if love for Christ is there, than you will experience victory over sin as time goes by. And if the war is not there, if you are still a slave to sin, there is hope for you too. Come to Christ, leave sin behind, and abide in the true vine. There is nothing you need to do, or can do, to save yourself from the Kingdom of evil except to entrust yourself by faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and the life in his resurrection. Come now, you don’t have to wait, and know the joy and confidence there is in being a child of God.