Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

You know that moment when you realize that something is off?

It’s when everyone’s attention is on You, like when you present a report at school, or when you‘re getting together with friends.

Right in the middle of an important moment you think that maybe you never brushed your hair today.

And then you reach up and realize it true, you didn’t!

Maybe it’s that time when you really tried your hardest to get to the bathroom in time, but you just didn’t make it all The way there and your pants tell the story for the whole world to see.

And trust Me, this isn’t a problem unique to young children.

Or how about the time when you expressed yourself in the best way you could and everyone laughed at you, and not in a good way.

Public shame is a feeling that none of us appreciate.

But sometimes it seems well deserved.

Like Edmond Aviv who made fun of a neighbor lady and her disabled child for 15 years.

It got so bad that it went to court and along with jail time and community service, the judge sentenced Edmond to 5 hrs of public shame.

he had to write a placard that identified him as a bully that picks on disabled children.

Or there’s the TikTok videos where a girl publicly shames her ex boyfriend for cheating on her.

It’s an awful feeling, even if you do deserve it.

In his first letter to the churches, John introduces a concept he calls ”confidence” and he contrasts this confidence with shame and condemnation.

Not shame for having bed head, but shame for being a sinful human in the presence of a holy and righteous God.

Review

If you heard the first two episodes in this series on 1 John you may remember that John likes to do contrasts.

In chapter 1 the contrast was light vs darkness, where God is light with no darkness at all, and sin is darkness which cannot dwell in the presence of the God who is light.

And he compounds the problem by saying that all of us have sin—all of us have darkness.

Which means we can’t be in God’s presence.

But the goal—the overarching idea in the whole letter of 1 John—is fellowship with God.

And fellowship requires being in God’s presence.

So, how do we sinful humans face a holy God?

We confess, and he promises to forgive.

And then there’s the first part of 1 John 2 where John compares light with love and darkness with hate and makes it super clear that God is righteous and we should be to.

He says point blank that if we don’t love our brothers and sisters in the church then we don’t know God.

Knowing God is very important to John, and he compares knowing God with abiding in Jesus.

So, we have the contrast between light and dark, love and hate, knowing and not knowing, and then this concept of abiding, which sounds a lot like fellowship.

Antichrist

Today we’re in the last part of 1 John 2 and 1 John 3. In this section, we will get to explore a new concept that John calls “confidence.”

Last weekend we finished a series called ”Discovering Revelation” where we studied the book of Revelation and the Antichrist, among other things. 1 John was written before Revelation, but John already has something to say about the antichrist.

So this seems like a fitting transition back into the book of 1 John.

Look at 1 John 2:18

1 John 2:18 (ESV)

18 Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come.

John is pointing to Christ’s statement in Matthew 24 that there would be antichrists and he says, “many antichrists have come.”

Which must put the coming of Jesus just around the corner.

Of course, soon God will give John the visions and dreams that lead to the writing of Revelation.

Only then will John see the bigger picture of the end of the war between Christ and Satan.

It is in Revelation that John will recognize that while there are many antichrists, there is one system call antichrist that must fulfill a long series of prophecies before the second coming of Jesus.

And it’s after that system has been in power and persecuting God’s people for 1,260 years according to Revelation 12 that the “time of the end” will truly begin.

But lets forgive John for being a bit eager here.

The timing of Jesus return is, after all, not John’s point in this letter.

Earlier in chapter 2 John said that we need to “know” Jesus.

And now, there’s an antichrist problem where some people deny that Jesus is either a divine being that existed before time along with the Father and the Spirit to create us, or they deny that Jesus came as a human To redeem us, or they deny both.

This is something about knowing.

Either Jesus is or isn’t, both can’t be true.

Which means there is an important true knowledge of God that is essential for abiding with Him, for fellowshipping with Him.

1 John 2:24 (ESV)

Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you.

If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father.

John is inviting us into an intimacy with God.

But there’s a problem.

Just like with light and love, we fall short.

We have darkness and hat in us, and our knowledge is incomplete.

We don’t truly KNOW God and many of us are ashamed or afraid to approach God.

But John has good news for us:

1 John 2:28 (ESV)

And now, little children, abide in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.

Here’s John’s point about antichrist—unless you know the real thing, you’re going to be shrink away in shame.

That’s not what John wants, and that’s not what Jesus wants.

He wants you to know Him. and to be confident when He comes to raise your hands in the air and say, “this is MY God, I have waited for Him, and he will save me!”

This is the first introduction of the idea of confidence and it’s All about fellowship—abiding with and being with Jesus.

And then John add this:

1 John 2:29 (ESV)

If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him.

If you KNOW that he is righteous…

Knowing Jesus makes all the difference.

And the result is you practice righteousness.

And this is where John decides to put one of the most tender passages in the Bible.

1 John 3:1 (ESV)

1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.

The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

And so we are.

God calls us his children, and so we are.

And don’t God’s children do everything right?

They never make a mistake.

They never sin.

They live in the light and not in darkness.

Except, in the first two chapters of this letter John makes it clear, that’s not the reality of our experience.

God’s people sin—all people sin.

And so John provides the solution—confess.

God’s people sin, and so John points us to our righteous advocate, Jesus Christ.

There’s a lot of pressure to perform as a kid.

No one is expecting perfection—you’re a kid—but you see older people doing things perfectly.

It’s not hard if you’re comparing yourself to feel frustrated or even looked down on for making mistakes.

Older kids can tie their shoes perfectly.

That kid on youtube can spell things incredibly well.

The girl at the next desk over can read so much better and easier than you.

The kid on the playground can dribble a soccer ball with his feet like he’s in control of gravity.

It’s a world of comparisons, and the comparisons we do the most are the ones where we don’t measure up.

Where someone else is better than us.

But life isn’t about comparison.

Each of us have different brains, different skills, different strengths.

What’s easy for one is hard for another.

And what one has been doing for ages, another is just picking up for the first time.

And that first-timer who struggles to kick the soccer ball, much less dribble it between his knees and behind his head, there’s nothing wrong with him.

He just needs time to develop the skill.