1 John 5:13-21 : What Do You Know?
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Introduction:
What do you know? Most of us think that we know a lot more than we actually do. Let’s be honest, humility isn’t the default setting of the human condition. In fact, study after study shows that those with less understanding of a particular area seem to be more confident in their assertions and understandings than someone who is actually considered an expert in the field. Sometimes ignorance really is bliss!
Yet, when it comes to salvation, the evil one hits us in a different way. Instead of infusing us with pride as he normally does, he tries to overcome us with doubt. The more we learn about the expectations of holiness, the standards of God, the depth of our sin - the more we start to doubt whether we really are saved.
John has spent a great deal of time in this book trying to encourage his readers to understand the assurance of their faith if they are in Christ all the while challenging unbelievers to put their faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone for salvation.
If we aren’t careful, we can quickly be sucked into a spiral of doubt as we read the words of 1 John. Phrases such as no one who has born of God keeps on sinning can rock our world when taken out of context and improperly understood.
So I have entitled this message, “What Do You Know?” I want us to go back to the basics today and answer this question according to John’s famous statement in verse 13 - that you may know that you have eternal life.
Please join me in turning your Bibles to 1 John 5:13-21
Read Full Scripture:
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life.
14 And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.
15 And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.
16 If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life—to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for that.
17 All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death.
18 We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep on sinning, but he who was born of God protects him, and the evil one does not touch him.
19 We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.
20 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.
21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols.
Prayer
John ends his letters with three major assertions. The first is:
I. Followers of Jesus Should…Have Confidence in Their Standing with Christ (13-15)
I. Followers of Jesus Should…Have Confidence in Their Standing with Christ (13-15)
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. 14 And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.
First we see John let us know that he is writing specifically to one set of people in mind - those who believe. I love the second part of verse 13. The phrase “that you may know” is one of comfort and encouragement. And he ends that statement with the biggest issue we could ever consider. That you may know that you have eternal life. As we started off this sermon - some of you may be struggling regarding the question what do you know - especially in light of eternity. John wants to let you know how you can have confidence in Christ.
We can start understanding this more fully by understanding the Greek word for know here.
There were predominately two different Greek words for the verb “to know” in the Greek.
To know:
ginōskō vs. oida
The first was ginōskō (yee-know-sko) and refers more to an experiential knowledge. This is the idea of coming to understand. It is a progression of knowledge.
This is seen in 1 John 2:5
5 but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him:
It is knowing because of experience here.
To know:
ginōskō vs. oida
The second was oida (you-the) and means to know or understand. It is most often translated to know in a cognitive or discerning way. It is more of a factual knowledge and understanding. To put it simply - oida (you-the) knowledge is concrete and complete.
It is interesting that the Greek word for “know” that John chooses for verse 13 is oida (you-the). It is a concrete and complete knowledge. It is one that is built on a firm foundation. The foundation of Jesus Christ. John has written these things -these things likely referring to the preceeding statements about the witnesses of Christ that we discussed last week - the Spirit and the water and the blood which stood for the Holy Spirit and the bookends of Jesus’ earthly ministry being His baptism and crucifixion - but also likely meaning the entire letter - in order that you may know that you have eternal life.
14 And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.
Moving on to verse 14 and 15, we are given quite a promise. We can have confidence of our eternal life mentioned in verse 13 because anything we ask according to his will he will hear and not only will He hear…He will grant the request!
Boy isn’t this a misinterpreted Scripture in today’s church! We have two extremes on this one.
Extreme 1: God will give you whatever you want
Extreme 2: God won’t give you anything
Let’s tackle each of these and work our way to a Biblical view of prayers of petition to God.
Extreme 1 - God will give you whatever you want. Those who hold to a prosperity and health and wellness false gospel rally around verses such as these and name it and claim it. They preach - you want to be rich and healthy - God will give it to you.
14 And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.
Yet they skip over some very important contextual words here. What do we see in verse 14? There is a very important phrase we can’t gloss or skip over.
If we ask anything........according to His will.
God is a sovereign God and when we pray we need to pray as such. It isn’t about our will - it is about God’s will. We find God’s will by reading His Word and prayer. We see in His Word that sometimes His will allows for trials and temptations and illness to befall man. He uses these to bring about more glory for Himself. This is a tough pill to swallow for our humanistic society that is all about worshiping ourselves and being comfortable. But the Scripture is clear that this life is all about glorifying God.
James addresses this:
3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.
We must pray according to the will of God and we must pray in line with glory of God and not ourselves.
Yet the other extreme is a problem as well. God won’t give you anything. I’m afraid that conservative evangelical churches have tried to pivot so far from the charismatic prosperity false gospel that we have treated prayer as something that doesn’t matter and doesn’t have any power.
Prayer is very powerful. God does answer prayer. He wants us to pray with passion and fervor. He wants us to pray in expectation that what we pray will happen. Yet he wants us to pray in humility and reverence - acknowledging that He is God and we are not.
Brothers and sisters - rest in the confidence of your standing with Christ. Approach the throne of grace with confidence because of the completed work of Christ (Hebrews 4:16). And...
Scripture References: 1 John 2:5, James 4:3, Hebrews 4:16
II. Followers of Jesus Should…Have Courage to Confront Those Opposed to Christ (16-17)
II. Followers of Jesus Should…Have Courage to Confront Those Opposed to Christ (16-17)
16 If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life—to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death.
It appears that there is a shift in the subject matter from verse 15 to 16. But in fact it is still discussing our confidence before God in prayer. It just moves into discussing why some prayers will be answered and others will not.
Verse 16 here is one of the most difficult passages to interpret in the Bible. There are many different ways that commentators have interpreted this. Many of these interpretations are wrought with theological holes and flaws. My goal is to make this teaching practical and full of truth. I will refrain from going into all of the interpretations and stick with the most Biblically congruent and literal approach to this section of Scripture.
The first question we have to answer is that the sin that does not lead to death occurs in whom? A brother. This word brother has been used throughout the letter of 1 John to refer to believers. We must not misinterpret this to rank sins as so many do. Some may say there are deadly sins and some are not deadly sins. Scripture is clear that all sin leads to death.
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
For the wages of sin is…what? Yes - death.
It is clear that all sin leads to death. It is also clear that John is speaking of a spiritual death in this passage and not a physical death per se.
John is speaking of a believer’s assurance of salvation. True believers will persevere. Their sins will not lead to eternal death because they are covered by the blood of the Lamb. They have salvation through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. They have an intercessor who steps in and forgives them for their sins. As we see in verse 18 - they can’t even continue in sin because of the conviction of the Holy Spirit. They will repent and turn away from their sins because of the wonderful grace of God.
Not only does God use the Holy Spirit to convict - He also uses fellow believers. This is the point of the first part of verse 16. We are to rebuke, albeit humbly, our brothers and sisters who are in sin.
We should not take this verse out of context and go on a legalistic sin-crushing crusade.
We need to approach believers in sin like Jesus taught us to approach them:
3 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.
We must realize that we are sinful as well. Yet, we must be willing to humble ourselves before God in personal repentance and then humbly approach our brothers and sisters who are in sin.
We need to have courage to oppose those, even who are believers, who are in unrepentant sin. We see this clearly shown when Paul confronts Peter’s hypocrisy in Antioch:
11 But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. 12 For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. 13 And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.
Cephas, another name for Peter, was living hypocritically because he feared the Jews. Paul opposed Peter’s sin and addressed it head on. God was glorified by such a rebuke because we see a seeming restoration of their relationship when Paul comes to Peter’s defense in Acts 15 at the Jerusalem Counsel and we see the two in agreement against the Judaizers - those who wanted new converts to act like Jews and obey the Jewish rituals.
In summary of this first part of verse 16 - we see that all sin leads to death unless it is sin that is covered by the blood of Christ in the lives of believers.
But then we see a change of gears in the middle of verse 16 which leaves many confused. There is a sin that leads to death. It is clear that this is no longer talking about a brother or believer. This has now moved on to discussing unbelievers - and likely more specifically - those who were the false teachers he has been teaching against throughout this book that denied the deity of Christ.
We have seen how we can practically deal with sins that do not lead to eternal spiritual death in the lives of believers. We need to gently and humbly confront them. Yet in the lives of unbelievers we see a statement that we should not pray for sins that do lead to death.
How do we practically flesh this out?
There are a couple of important concepts wrapped up in such a teaching. And it requires very careful exposition and interpretation so please don’t misunderstand the teaching that is coming now.
We have seen that we can have confidence that our prayers are heard by God and answered by God if they are according to His will. John wants us to understand that if we pray for someone who is an unbeliever, and they never come to a saving knowledge of Christ - it doesn’t mean that God didn’t hear our prayer. We don’t have to doubt our standing with God because of an unanswered prayer or put more correctly - a prayer that has a no as an answer. It means that He knew that this particular person would never come to a saving knowledge of Christ. This person has willingly rejected the Gospel as freely offered. This prayer was one that we should not have prayed for because it was not according to the will of God as God knew the person would never accept the free gift offered. Yet, God understands our lack of sovereignty and we do not sin by praying for all unbelievers and sharing the Gospel with all. We are to preach the Gospel to all and pray for all lost souls. But we must rest in the fact that it does not reflect upon our standing with God when a prayer is not answered as a yes regarding an unbeliever.
There is also an aspect taught here that we need to re calibrate our prayers. This may sound very harsh but it is the most loving thing I can say in regards to unbelievers. When praying for unbelievers, we should not pray for relief from the burdens of their lives. We should not pray for their comfort. Brothers and sisters - these persons are in sin that leads to eternal death. This is sin that is not covered by the blood of Christ. We shouldn’t pray that they don’t reap the consequences of their sins. Because these consequences may be exactly the means of grace that God is using to lead them to repentance! Our focus needs to be on their hearts and not their comfort. The current situations of their lives pale in comparison to the situations of their eternal souls. We do not know what the future holds. We do not have the sovereign knowledge of God. We don’t know who is going to respond to the Gospel and who is not going to respond. So we pray for all unbelievers.
John ends this section with a statement of summary. All wrongdoing is sin. There isn’t some sin that is more wrong than others. Yes, there are some sins that have worse consequences and some sins that are more grievous according to God - but all wrongdoing and sin deserves the same punishment - eternal death in the Lake of Fire. But yet there is sin that does not lead to death - meaning those sins that are covered by Jesus Christ.
I pray that you have accepted the free gift of salvation offered to you. I pray that your sins are not the ones that lead to eternal death any longer because they are covered by the blood. If not, please humble yourself under the gentle and merciful hand our Savior, Jesus Christ.
To those who are believers - we must have the courage to oppose those who in opposition to Christ - whether they be believers or unbelievers. And we need to be willing to do this humbly and graciously.
As followers of Jesus… we also:
Scripture References: Romans 6:23, Matthew 7:3-5, Gal 2:11-13, Acts 15
III. Followers of Jesus Should…Have Commitment to the Truth of Christ (18-21)
III. Followers of Jesus Should…Have Commitment to the Truth of Christ (18-21)
18 We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep on sinning, but he who was born of God protects him, and the evil one does not touch him. 19 We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. 20 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. 21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols.
We must leave our lives of habitual, unrepentant sin when we turn to Christ. This is only done by His grace and mercy however. We don’t clean ourselves up first and then come to the cross. We come to the cross and He deals with our sin and starts the process of sanctification in our lives - meaning He makes us more like Christ.
Once we are His, he promises His mighty protection over us. So many will ask me - Can a demon possess me if I am a believer? Absolutely not my friends! John lets us know here that the evil one does not touch him - meaning that Satan and his demons cannot have their grip on your soul. Yes, you can be tried and tempted. But they can never have your soul or possess you. God, as the Person of the Holy Spirit, indwells believers and He does not share the room with the evil one! He is an exclusive God. He does not share the throne with Satan.
Yet verse 19 shows us that Satan does have much power in this world. The power has been allowed him by a sovereign God. We know that we do face trials and troubles while here. But in the middle of this terrible condition that our world is in because of the fall of man and the entrance of sin into the world we get to verse 20.
20 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.
John MacArthur states:
John’s threefold use of the word true in this verse stresses the importance of understanding the truth in a world filled with Satan’s lies.
- John MacArthur
Christ is the way and the truth and the life (John 14:6). The Apostle John wants us to know as he writes that Jesus Christ is the only truth in the midst of a dark world. Eternal life comes through Jesus and Jesus alone.
21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols.
John ends the letter in somewhat of an awkward way to the average reader. Keep yourselves from idols. Verse 20 seemed like more of a climactic end. Why is there a verse 21? We haven’t seen John address idol worship at all in this book in regards to worshipping images or golden calves.
Yet as D. Akin so wonderfully put it:
“It may appear that John’s final address is somewhat anticlimactic, but in reality it confirms a very important truth he has been establishing in this last section of the epistle and in the entire epistle itself: Reject the false and embrace the real.”
- D. Akin
The final summary of the book of John in these last few verses is to embrace the Truth - namely Jesus Christ - and reject the false - namely false teachers and Satan. True followers of Jesus have a commitment to the truth of Christ.
Scripture References: John 14:6
Conclusion
As we come to an end I want to ask you again - What do you know? Are you assured that you are in Christ? Do you embrace the real and the truth and reject the false and the lies? I pray that we, as followers of Christ are walking in confidence, in courage, and in commitment.
If you would like to learn more about salvation through Jesus Christ or want to obey Jesus by obeying the first commandment of a believer in going through the waters of baptism - please see me after the service.
Prayer
God bless and have a blessed week!