The fellowship of truth, 2 John

I thought I was going to be through with John last week.  We finished up 1 John last Sunday, and I had planned on beginning the book of Mark, which is something I wanted to do months ago actually.  But when I began to study Mark in preparation for this week, I did not feel that God was leading me to do so at this time.  I think that there is still some more that He wants to teach us from John’s letters.  And so this Sunday we are going to look at this very small book of 2 John in it’s entirety.  Just think, you will be able to tell your friends back home that the pastor preached on a whole book of the Bible in one sitting.  

But if you will remember from our studies in 1 John, the theme of that book was fellowship.  And as I said, I thought we had finished all that God had to say on that subject and could move on.  However, I believe that this letter of 2 John also speaks to this subject of fellowship.  As I have said repeatedly, I believe John is teaching that the purpose of the Christian life is fellowship; fellowship with God and fellowship with His people.  So in that vein, I have titled today’s message “The Fellowship of Truth.” Fellowship by definition means like mindedness.  And there is a commonality in fellowship, Christian fellowship, that can only be found in the context of truth.  There is no fellowship of light with darkness.  

The Apostle Paul said in 2Cor. 6:14-18 “Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness?  Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever?  Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, "I WILL DWELL IN THEM AND WALK AMONG THEM; AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD, AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE.  "Therefore, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE," says the Lord. "AND DO NOT TOUCH WHAT IS UNCLEAN; And I will welcome you.  "And I will be a father to you, And you shall be sons and daughters to Me," Says the Lord Almighty.”  

So the truth is the plumb line that delineates fellowship.  You are either walking in the truth, or walking in darkness. As a church we are a fellowship of God’s people. Our whole purpose as a church is to learn the truth, preach the truth, and walk in the truth of God.  And as we do those things, we have fellowship with God and with one another. Jesus said in the gospel of John, “I am the way, the truth and the life.”  He went on to say that “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”  He said on another occasion, “God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” Before He was crucified Jesus told His disciples He would send them the Spirit of Truth, who would lead them into all truth.  Truth is essential to fellowship.  And Christian fellowship is impossible if it is not in the truth.

As I said last week, I sometimes feel inferior to other churches because we do not have all the bells and whistles that people often associate with church.  But as far as I am concerned, the most important purpose of the church is to declare the truth,  defend the truth and walk in the truth.  Everything else is gravy.  And if you don’t get the truth right, then nothing else matters.  Fellowship without the truth is of no greater value than membership in a social club. 

Now as I see it, there are five divisions of this letter.  The first is the theme of the letter, which is the fellowship of the truth.  Secondly, we see five blessings of the truth.  Thirdly, John talks about walking in the truth; fourthly, the opposition to the truth, and finally, the joy of fellowship. 

So let’s look first at what we have already introduced, that is the fellowship of the truth.

John addresses this letter to the chosen lady and her children.  He identifies himself as an elder, which can indicate his apostleship over the churches, as well as possibly his age.  Some have said that he would have been in his 90’s by this point.  I think it has more to do with his position in the church, rather than his age.  Ephesians says the church is built on the foundation of the apostles.  And perhaps by this point, John is the only apostle still living, 

But the interesting thing is who it is addressed to; the chosen lady and her children.  Theologians are split between this being an individual, and it being a pseudonym for a particular church.  My view is that he is addressing a church.  John’s favorite name for Christians in the epistle of 1 John is “little children.”  So I think that the chosen lady is a way of referring to a corporate body of believers, who have been chosen of God, to be the bride of Christ, and her children being the family of God, those that John refers to as being born of God.  So it makes more sense to me that he is speaking to a church, and this letter was shared with other churches who had similar problems and concerns in those days, and as such it came to be accepted in the canon of scripture.

Now notice that in his address, John covers all those elements which are essential to fellowship, which as I said, is the purpose of the church.  Three times in the first 2 verses he mentions truth. And in relation to the truth, he speaks of love and emphasizes the family of fellowship.  He says first of all that there is a love for those who are of the truth.  He loves them, and those who love the truth loves those in the church who are born of God.  Fellowship produces love.  Christian love is the natural outcome of fellowship with God, you will  grow to love Him and love His body, that is His church, His people.  But that love is within the context of truth.  Three times he mentions truth, as if to underline again and again the essential nature of truth to fellowship.  

There is another aspect of truth which is important to note, and that is where he says in vs 2, “the truth which abides in us and will be with us forever.” Jesus said in His high priestly prayer that God’s word is truth.  Listen, God cannot be separated from His word.  God is eternal, and the word of God endures forever.  Isaiah 40:8 says, “The grass withers, the flower fades, But the word of our God endures forever.”  The word of God never fails, and it is an eternal truth that we will still be abiding in 10,000 years from now.  That’s why John calls Jesus the Word in John chapter 1.  The Word which was in the beginning with God, and the Word which was God. The Word of God is eternal truth which will be with us forever.  

Now let’s move on to the second point; the five blessings of truth. Vs3 “Grace, mercy and peace will be with us, from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love.”  I say there are five blessings, but maybe another way of looking at this is that the first three come out of the second two.  Grace, mercy and peace, come out of truth and love. 

We could easily spend an entire sermon on these attributes.  But in the essence of time, let’s just give a brief explanation.  Truth and love are the major pillars of the fellowship of the church.   In my introduction I addressed  the essentiality of truth.  Preaching and practicing the truth are the essential functions of the church.  And we know that fellowship produces love.  Jesus said “they will know you are My disciples by your love for one another.”  Again and again in 1John we are told to love one another.  He is going to say that again in this epistle in vs.5.  So truth and love are the pillars of fellowship in the church. 

But let’s look at the familiar benediction “Grace, mercy and peace.” Apart from truth and love, we can never really know grace, mercy and peace.  Grace means getting what we don’t deserve; pardon for sin, a new life, eternal life, righteousness.  Mercy is not getting what we do deserve; we deserve death as the penalty for our sin, but God put Christ to death in our place.  And peace, means primarily peace with God.  It’s not the cessation of war, though that might be desirable.  But it’s making peace with God because our offense has been forgiven through the atonement of Jesus Christ by dying on the cross.

There are a lot of churches today that speak of grace, mercy and peace, but they see it as some sort of social panacea.  They reject the truth of God’s word, but still want the blessings of grace, mercy and peace. They do not understand that grace, mercy and peace outside of the redemption through Christ’s blood is impossible.   The truth shall make you free.  Not social justice, not welfare programs, not rehabilitation.  But the truth spoken in love.  Paul said in Ephesians 4:13 that the church body is to “all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.  As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ.”  So truth and love produces grace, mercy and peace through Christ, that we might become unified in the truth and conformed to the image of Christ.

Now that spiritual maturity comes through walking in the truth, John’s third point.  Let’s read vs4,  “I was very glad to find some of your children walking in truth, just as we have received commandment to do from the Father.  Now I ask you, lady, not as though I were writing to you a new commandment, but the one which we have had from the beginning, that we love one another.  And this is love, that we walk according to His commandments. This is the commandment, just as you have heard from the beginning, that you should walk in it.” Three times John emphasizes the need not only to know the truth, but to walk in the truth.

Some of the people in this church, John says, are walking in the truth. Some were being obedient to the truth and some were not.  As James said, we must be doers of the word and not just hearers only.  It’s one thing for the church to preach the truth, but it’s another to have the church walking in the truth.  Walking in the truth requires obedience to the truth.  Trusting in the truth enough to act upon it.

He goes on to describe walking in the truth as walking according to the commandments, and the commandments he sums up as loving one another.  Then in vs6, he tells us what love is; love is walking according to His commandments.  Now he isn’t just talking in circles.  But he is emphasizing what Jesus said, which is “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”  Love then is tied to obedience.  Love is not an emotion, or sentimentality, but love is an act of the will, doing what God tells us to do. 

Jesus defined loving your neighbor as illustrated by the Good Samaritan.  He said a man had been set upon by robbers and was lying beside the road half dead.  Many people passed him by, perhaps thinking that in some way he was responsible for his own misfortune, or perhaps too busy with their own concerns to take the time to help a stranger.  But the  Samaritan got down off his horse, and cleaned him up, bandaged him, and took care of his needs.  He took him to an inn and left money with  instructions for the innkeeper to take care of him until he could return, and he would pay whatever more was necessary.  That was Jesus’s illustration of loving your neighbor, even a stranger  And loving one another in the church family should go even beyond that.  Love is sacrificing your priorities for the sake of another’s benefit.  

In essence, loving one another is the fulfillment of all the law, because if you love one another with the sacrificial love that Christ showed for us, then you cannot lie to one another, you cannot steal from one another, you cannot covet what your brother has, and certainly you will not murder or commit adultery against your brother.  So loving God and loving one another is the fulfillment, or the way to fulfillment, of all the commandments.  Walking according to the commandments then is the way to fellowship in the truth with God and with our fellow brother.

Now the devil knows that walking in the truth is the way to fellowship with God.  And he wants nothing more than to destroy that fellowship you have with God.  He wants to put distance between you and God and ultimately destroy your fellowship with Him and with His church.  Peter said that the devil goes about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may destroy.  And the way the lion destroys and kills an antelope, is he separates him from the herd.  Once he separates you from the church, then he can more easily take you down. And the way the devil works to separate you from the church is to first separate you from the truth. 

Jesus said in John 8:44 that the devil is a liar and the father of liars.  He is a deceiver.  So that is his modus operandi; to tell you a half truth, to twist the truth, to misinterpret the word, and to ultimately get you to believe his lies.  Now that opposition to the truth is John’s fourth point.  Look at vs7, “For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist.  Watch yourselves, that you do not lose what we have accomplished, but that you may receive a full reward.  Anyone who goes too far and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God; the one who abides in the teaching, he has both the Father and the Son.  If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house, and do not give him a greeting;  for the one who gives him a greeting participates in his evil deeds.”  

Now we could spend a month on these verses.  But I just want to hit the highlights for you today.  Notice that the devil has sent many of his emissaries out into the world, wolves in sheep’s clothing, pretending to be preachers of the truth, but instead they are deceiving people.  He calls them the antiChrist.  They are false prophets.  This is not some teaching on eschatology.  This was happening then, and it’s happened in every generation since John. 1John 2:18 says many antiChrists are in the world today, and they are teaching false doctrine.

Paul speaking to the elders of Ephesus said in Acts 20:29-30 "I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock;  and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.” So the church itself is the place where the antiChrists exalt themselves.

Jude speaks of these wolves in sheep’s clothing in Jude 1:4 saying, “For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”  See, these false teachers are teaching grace without works, salvation without sanctification, that somehow you could be spiritual, but not have works that attested to righteousness. James 2:19-20 speaks to the impossibility of faith without works. “You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder. But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?”

Here is the issue in the church at the end of the first century.  False teachers were promoting a teaching called Gnosticism.  And while this teaching involved a lot of heresys, one of it’s principle teachings was that we could worship God in Spirit, but our flesh did not have to be involved.  And they based that on the notion that Jesus had not really come in the flesh, only in Spirit. So they taught that spiritually you could be saved, but physically you could still live in the world.  Spiritually you were righteous, but physically you could live in sin and not have anything to worry about. That philosophy is still in the church today, just under different names.  

So what John is saying is that these people are teaching a form of the gospel, but not the whole truth of the gospel.  And as such they were causing Christians to lose fellowship with God.  They were causing people in the church to forfeit their reward, because there was no fruit to their salvation.  As James said in the 2nd chapter of his epistle which we quoted from a moment ago; “For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.” (James 2:26)  The Spirit gives life to the body.  The body is sanctified by the Spirit, producing the fruit of the Spirit.  The body is brought under submission to the Spirit of God, and thus is conformed to the image of Christ.

This is still the issue in the church today.  Satan is still deceiving people into thinking that they can have grace, mercy and peace with God without truth and love, without obedience to the truth, without repentance from sin, without coming out of the world.  And when he is successful then he destroys your fellowship with God, he destroys your fellowship with His church, and he destroys your testimony before others so that you hurt the cause of Christ.  And ultimately he may even cause you to lose your life here on earth in your pursuit of worldly idols. 

So what’s John’s admonition to the church?  To avoid such people.  To not have fellowship with them.  To not show hospitality to them.  To see such false teachers as a cancer that corrupts the body which will spread until it destroys completely.  To have a holy horror of false doctrine.  That is what John is saying.  Don’t even eat with such people. Don’t even give them a greeting.  That’s what he said in vs. 10, “If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house, and do not give him a greeting; for the one who gives him a greeting participates in his evil deeds.”

So John says love has a limit, doesn’t it?  Love has no limit for the lost, for the broken hearted, for the afflicted, for the needy.  Love has no limit for the sinner.  But love has a limit for false teaching, for that which purports to be the truth and yet is a slick lie of the devil.  Don’t help those people.  Don’t fellowship with those people.  Certainly don’t support them.  2Cor. 6:17-18 "Therefore, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE," says the Lord. "AND DO NOT TOUCH WHAT IS UNCLEAN; And I will welcome you. And I will be a father to you, And you shall be sons and daughters to Me," Says the Lord Almighty.”

The last aspect of the fellowship of truth which John gives us here is really just a passing reference to something he calls the joy of fellowship.  His goal he says in vs 12 is that their joy may be full.  Listen, there is no greater joy than complete fellowship with God.  You can have a great job, you can have all sorts of possessions, houses, cars.  You can have all that this world can offer and still be miserable.  But if you have complete fellowship with God, then you can have joy in pain, joy in suffering, joy in poverty, joy in being alone.  If your joy is founded in your fellowship with God, then that is full joy, complete joy.  

But sin destroys that joy.  When David sinned against God, he prayed for forgiveness in Psalm 51, and said, “restore unto me the joy of my salvation.”  He repented of his sin, he was restored to fellowship with God, and as a result the joy of his former fellowship was restored unto him.  Nehemiah 8:10 says, “For the joy of the LORD is your strength.” That is what sustains us.

Full fellowship with God results in full joy.  That is where we get the peace that passes all understanding; in the joy of the Lord.  In the joy of knowing you are right with God, and He is with you and you with Him.  Where you have sweet communion with God through the truth of His word.  Where you show your love to Him through obedience to His word.  Where sin has not broken the fellowship and intimacy of your love with Him or with His church. 

John says in 1John 1:4, “these things we have written to you that our joy may be complete.”  He was speaking of the writings of the apostles, the Holy Scriptures, the Bible.  Our joy comes from abiding in His word.  Now at the end of 2 John, he says, “Though I have many things to write to you, I do not want to do so with paper and ink; but I hope to come to you and speak face to face, so that your joy may be made full.”  So there are two aspects to having joy in the Lord. The first is through His word, abiding in His word.  The second is fellowship.  John said he wanted to come in person.  Face to face, person to person.  We are made for fellowship with His body.  We have joy when we have fellowship with one another and have love for one another in the body.  

I can pray for someone.  I can write to someone.  But even better, I can go to someone.  I can touch someone.  I can be the hands of feet of Christ.  That is how our joy may be full, and that is how the love of God is manifested in the church, when we love one another not just in word, but in deed.  We need fellowship.  God has designed us for fellowship with Him and with His family.  Don’t let the lie of Satan deprive you of that fellowship with the Lord.  Stay in the word, and do not neglect the assembling of yourselves together as the body of Christ.  Stay in close fellowship with the flock and do not give the devil an opportunity. 

Heb. 10:19-25 Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh,  and since we have a great priest over the house of God,  let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.  Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful;  and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds,  not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

Four assurances of fellowship, 1 John 5:18-22

We are coming to the end of our study in 1 John.  This is the last message in this epistle, and I trust it has been as beneficial to you as it has to me.  As I have said from the beginning, the theme of 1John is that of fellowship.  Fellowship with God and with His body, the church.  Last week, if you were here, we looked at the confidence of fellowship.  That message is available online for those of you that are interested.  This week we look more completely at the idea of assurance of fellowship, looking specifically at four assurances of fellowship with which John closes out his epistle.  He wants us to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we are Christ’s, and He is ours.  That we abide in Him, and He in us.  That we have fellowship with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.  And that this fellowship is characterized by eternal life, not just an endless life, but abundant life, life animated by the very Spirit of God.   

John says in vs.13 of this chapter, “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.”  Thirty-nine times in the epistle of 1John, he tells us that we might know.  He gives us various tests and evidences and proofs that we might know we have this eternal, abundant life of fellowship with God.  Now today in the closing statement of this passage, we see the word “know” used three times.  And so in keeping with the theme of John’s message, I have entitled this sermon “Four assurances of fellowship.”  

Let’s look then at each of them.  The first assurance of fellowship we find in vs.18, “We know that no one who is born of God sins; but He who was born of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him.”  John has had much to say about sin in this epistle.  He just finished saying in the preceding verses of 16 and 17, that there is a sin that a brother in Christ can commit which is not unto death, and there is also a sin unto death.  Furthermore, he says, all unrighteousness is sin, and there is a sin not unto death.  

We talked about those somewhat difficult verses last time a great deal.  And I won’t take the time to completely review them again this morning.  But suffice it to say, that a Christian cannot sin unto death, because he has been given eternal life.  He can sin, and that interrupts his fellowship with God, but he cannot sin unto death, because Christ has died for us in our place.  God will not punish us with death when He has already punished Jesus with death on our behalf.  All unrighteousness is sin, and John says there is a sin not unto death.  That sin is the sin committed by a Christian.  But he goes on to say that there is a sin unto death.  And that is the sin of the unbeliever.  He who has rejected the source of life, the Savior of mankind, such a one is still dead in his trespasses and sins.  He is sinning unto death.  He will die in his sins unless he is born again by faith in Christ and repentance of his sin.  

So with that as our context, let us consider what John is saying here in vs.18, and why this should be a comfort and assurance for us.  He says that we know that no one who is born of God sins.  Well, remember in the preceding verses we just saw that there is a sin of a Christian.  It is not unto death, but it is still a sin.  So we need to look closer than just a superficial reading of this verse.  And what we find is that in the Greek language, John was writing using the present tense, speaking of a continuous sin, a habitual sin.  A pattern of continuing in sin.  So he is saying that one who is born of God does not continue in sin.  Sin no longer has dominion over the one born of God.

Now the key is that phrase “born of God.” John uses it twice in this one verse; once to speak of our relationship to God, and once to speak of Christ’s relationship to God.  Our freedom from the power of sin depends not upon our self discipline or will power, but upon our new birth.  When we are born again, we die to the old man, and appeal to God for to become a new creation.  Old things are passed away, and all things become new.  We are born of the Spirit of God.  In this new creation, God gives us a new heart and puts His Spirit within us.  In Ezekiel 36:25-27  God says, ”Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.  I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”

So when you become born again, God gives you the legal standing of righteousness. He gives you the capacity for righteousness.  He gives you the desire for righteousness.  And He gives you the power of the Spirit that you may work the works of righteousness.  Therefore, sin no longer has dominion over you.  As the song we sang a few minutes ago said, “In Christ Alone,” “sin’s curse has lost it’s grip on me.”  Christ has been victorious over sin and death and as His people who are indwelled by His Spirit, we have been given freedom from sin.  So as a Christian we may sin, but we will not continue in sin.  We no longer have a pattern of sinfulness as our characteristic.  That pattern has been broken.  Sin’s hold over us has been broken.  And so we know that no one who is born of God continuously sins.

The second part of that verse is especially meaningful to me.  We know that one who is born of God does not continuously sin, because He who was born of God keeps him…  Folks, that should be a reason to shout “Hallelujah!”  Jesus Christ keeps us.  Listen, it is incumbent upon the Shepherd to keep His sheep.  He defends His sheep from ravening wolves and roaring lions.  We are His sheep of His pasture.  The Good Shepherd laid down His life for His sheep.  Do you think that God is powerful enough to keep us from hell, but not powerful enough to keep us from falling back into a life of sin?  

Jesus said in John 10:27-30  "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me;  and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one.”  I find great comfort in knowing that the Good Shepherd keeps HIs sheep.  He watches over them and protects them, from their lying down to their rising up.  And if you are born of God, then you can rest in the promise that Christ keeps you.  

Listen, this is further evidence that vs16 and 17 are not talking about an unpardonable sin that cannot be forgiven, or a sin by which you can lose your salvation.  Christ is entrusted with keeping His sheep.  He will not let you go.  It’s like the analogy I have said before about when my kids were little.  As we would get ready to cross a busy highway, I would tell my kids, “hold onto Daddy’s hand.”  And though I expected them to obey, I wanted them to hold my hand, I did not rely on their strength to hold onto me, but I held onto them, and nothing they could do would make me let go.  I love my kids, and I can assure you that God loves His children, and nothing can snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 

So the Only Begotten Son of God keeps them.  Then notice a further provision; “and the evil one does not touch him.”  I love that phrase.  I am reminded of Christ’s assurance to Peter in Matt. 16:18, "I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” If you are born of God then you are the church of God.And as the church of God no power of hell can overpower you. I think of another verse in this epistle, 1John 4:4 “You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.”  

Listen, be confident, but not arrogant.  John is not saying that the devil will not try to discourage you, that he will not attack you, that he will not try to deceive you.  The Apostle Paul tells us in Ephesians  that we do in fact wrestle against forces of darkness.  Eph. 6:12 “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”  But though we wrestle against them, we do not fight in our own strength, we fight in the power of God, through the weapons of righteousness.  And through Christ, we are guaranteed the victory as John told us previously in vs 4; “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world--our faith.”

So the devil cannot lay hold of us again to take us back under his dominion.  We have been transferred to the kingdom of God.  Col. 1:13 “For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son.”  Satan cannot do anything to us, that he has not first received permission from our heavenly Father.  We don’t belong to him anymore.  We have been set free through Christ.

Now let’s look at the second assurance.  Vs.19, 1John 5:19 “We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.”  This assurance is really just an extrapolation of the first.  We are born of God.  God knows His children, and keeps His children, and nothing can snatch us out of the Father’s hand.  

And then John shows us the contrast.  You are either in the Kingdom of God, or the dominion of darkness.  There is no middle ground.  You are either born of God or you are born of your father the devil.  John told us in chapter 3 vs 8, “the one who practices sin is of the devil.”  We do not practice sin.  We who are born again do not continuously practice a sinful lifestyle.  We have been changed, reborn, remade.  We have a new nature, and are a new creation.  But those who practice sin are of the devil.  John tells us there are only two options; you either are born of God or you are of the devil. 

And that is evident by the things that you love. 1John 2:15-16 “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.”  

Now this idea of the world which the Bible speaks of, is another means of describing the dominion of darkness, that sphere of influence under the prince of this world, the prince of darkness, even the devil.   The world refers to the world system that Satan has orchestrated through a system of lies and deceits and lusts in such a way as to capture the naive and hold them and ultimately condemn them to destruction.  

John says that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. This world that seems so enticing, so alluring, so entertaining, is actually engineered by the evil one to entrap and be a snare.  As Christians, we should not be seduced by the world’s philosophies, by her entertainments, by her materialism.  For all these things will be one day burned up when God pours out His judgment upon this world.  In Revelation, we see this world system pictured as a harlot named Babylon who is dressed in fine clothing, sitting upon the beast of Satan.  And though she looks alluring, there are all kinds of blasphemies and corruptions within her.  Rev 18:2-4  And he cried out with a mighty voice, saying, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place of demons and a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird. For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the passion of her immorality, and the kings of the earth have committed acts of immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich by the wealth of her sensuality." I heard another voice from heaven, saying, "Come out of her, my people, so that you will not participate in her sins and receive of her plagues.”

As Christians, we must not be tempted by the charms of this world system.  But recognize as James 4:4 says, that friendship with the world is to become an enemy of God.  As Paul says in Gal. 4:9 “But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how is it that you turn back again to the weak and worthless elemental things, to which you desire to be enslaved all over again?”

Paul speaks of this world system in Eph. 2:2 saying, “in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.”  The course of this world he likens to a course of a river, that sweeps along in it’s current the population who seem unaware that they are headed downstream to destruction.  And yet because everyone else seems to be in it as well, they are ignorant of the devil’s schemes to destroy them.  The fact that they don’t realize it, serves even more the purposes of the evil one.  But thanks be to God that we are born of God, have been delivered from this world system and “no power of hell, no scheme of man, can ever pluck me from His hand; till He returns or calls me home, here in the power of Christ I'll stand. “ (In Christ Alone)

The third assurance John gives us of our fellowship is the knowledge of truth.  Vs. 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. This is the true God and eternal life.”  Three times John speaks of what is true, or the truth.  The word translated true is the Greek word alēthinos, which might be better translated as genuine.  

Now in light of that, then consider what John is presenting to us; “ we know that the Son of God has come.”  In other words, He that was in the beginning with God, who was God, has come down to man, to become flesh and blood, so that He might suffer for us the wages of sin, and that we might be made righteous through Him.  That is the gospel; that the Son of God has come.  We have come to know it through faith, and then through experience. As our faith becomes effective we have the witness within us that it is true.  He says, “and give us understanding so that we might know Him who is true.”  

Jesus came to earth to reveal the truth of God.  That we might know the character and nature of God.  And we know that because we see it in Christ.  Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.” He said to Philip, “if you have seen Me, you have seen the Father.”  Hebrews 1:1 says, “God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways,  in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.  And He [that is Christ] is the radiance of [God’s] glory and the exact representation of [God’s] nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.”  

Now we not only have Jesus revealing the truth of God through His nature, but also we have understanding through His Spirit, the Spirit of Truth. John 15:26  "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.”  And John 16:13"But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.”  As vs6 of this chapter says, “It is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth.”  

So what is the truth which we have come to know?  It is the genuine truth concerning God.  Jesus said, God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” That is essential, that we worship God in truth.  And John says that we can know that we worship God in truth, because we are in Christ, who is the genuine Son of God, reflecting the genuine truth of God.  

You know, as a pastor of this church, I am constantly aware of what we lack in comparison to other churches.  I was complaining of our lack of growth the other day, and the person I was speaking to told me that if I became more like other churches, and had a high powered worship band, if I had a high octane children’s program, if I had more of the bells and whistles that we see in the popular churches, then we would be more successful.  And I suppose that he is right.  But let me tell you something. Jesus said you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. A high octane children’s church is not going to set your child free from sin.  A youth group will not necessarily set your teenager free from the entrapment of this world.  Only the truth will make you free.  And the truth is found in the preaching of God’s word.  You can be religious and not be set free.  You can rock out to a great worship band and not be set free.  The whole world can sing “merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily" while floating down the stream to their destruction, but only the truth will set you free.  I want to know the truth of God, that I might have the life of Christ in me.  And that is the purpose of the church. 

Now back to our text, John says He, that is Christ, is the true God and eternal life.Now that’s a tremendous statement. John says Christ is the true God.  We believe that God is three persons in One.  Father, Son and Spirit are equally God, but with different roles in unique personhoods.  Jesus is fully God, and furthermore, as Hebrews says, He is the exact representation of the Father God.  He is God who was made flesh and dwelt among us.  

Doctrinally this is essential to our salvation.  But also this verse is essential to our fellowship.  We are in Him, that is Christ. He is the basis for our relationship to God as sons.  He is how we are born again, that is born of God.  You have to have this relationship with Christ in order to have fellowship with God.  And when you believe in Christ and His work by faith, then God reckons that faith to you as righteousness, and He gives you eternal life.  Remember what we have said repeatedly about the concept of eternal life?  It does not just indicate endless life, but spiritual life, the life of Christ in us.   This is the abundant life that Jesus spoke of.  It is the life of fellowship with the Father and the Son and with HIs bride, the church.

Now there is one final assurance that John gives us as he closes this epistle.  And at first it may seem to not follow the pattern of the first three.  Note that vs.21 does not have the word “know” in it.  John simply closes with “Little children, guard yourselves from idols.”  And I’m sure you wonder, like I did, what relation this could have with the preceding verses.  But if you think about it for a moment, I’m sure you will agree with me as well as with John, that obeying this principle is yet another assurance that you will have fellowship with God.

The fourth assurance of fellowship is that we guard ourselves from idols.  The point that I think John is making here, is that it he has given us three assurances that are the provence of God that we might have fellowship.  But now he is giving us one assurance of ourselves that we might have fellowship with God.  In other words, God is sovereign and He has made sure we have fellowship with Him and will continue to have fellowship, based on His divine will and sovereignty.  But there is also a responsibility that we have in our fellowship with God.  I confess, I do not know where God’s sovereignty ends and my responsibility begins.  God’s sovereignty began before the creation of the earth.  He chose us before the foundation of the earth, the scripture says.  But yet He tells us of our responsibility  to believe, to repent, to confess, to obey, to love one another, to keep His commandments.  So though God’s sovereignty is a great comfort and assurance of my fellowship throughout eternity with God, yet there is also a responsibility on my part to do what He wants me to do.  

And so as John considers fellowship to be a product of our love for God, and our love for God producing ever more intimacy with God, then it makes sense that as the bride of Christ we should guard against committing adultery against God.  Loving the world is a form of idolatry.  And furthermore, idolatry is a form of adultery.  James said it this way in James 4:4 “You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”

Paul speaking of the Old Testament church said in 1Cor. 10:7 “Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written, "THE PEOPLE SAT DOWN TO EAT AND DRINK, AND STOOD UP TO PLAY.”  This really goes back to what we said at the beginning.  That the world system has been strategically engineered by Satan to seduce people to become ensnared by the world, and having become trapped, to be destroyed.  Satan may not be able to destroy a Christian’s eternal destiny, but he can destroy a Christian’s fellowship with God, and as such destroy a Christian’s testimony.  

It’s unlikely that many of us today would bow down to an idol of wood or stone.  But many of us can be found bowing down to the idols of entertainment, or bowing to the idols of sports, or bowing down to the idol of money, or career.  There is no end to the idols that this world offers up in opposition to the truth of life in Christ.  We are so easily led astray to worship false idols who offer us false hope of finding happiness or fulfillment outside of life in Christ.  But just as hope in statues of wood or stone would be futile, so is our hope in idols of this world that sell us the lie that happiness can be found in things of this world.

Folks, there is only one source of joy and contentment and peace and love.  The things of this world that are worth having when all is said and done, can only be found in the life of fellowship with God through Christ.  Nothing else will satisfy.  John said in chapter 1 vs. 3, “These things we write, so that our joy may be made complete.”  Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.  He is the only way to the Father.  And there is no greater joy, no greater peace than that which is found in fellowship with Him.  Little children, guard yourselves from idols. Come out from the world and be separate from her.  These idols of the world will destroy your fellowship with God.  They will never bring you the joy that God can give.  He is the only way to life.  I pray that you will guard yourself against the seductions of this world which can never satisfy.  But Jesus said, “whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”

If you have been born of God, then I trust that the conclusion of this epistle has assured your heart of eternal fellowship with God. That you would guard yourselves from the allure and enticement of the false gods of this world.  That you would cling only to the truth of Christ, and to Christ alone. 

And if you are here today and you don’t know that life of fellowship which Jesus gives, I urge you to receive Him today as your Lord and Savior.  He gives the water of life without cost and gives it freely to all who come to Him.  If you are thirsty for that living water, come to Jesus today, He will satisfy you with the water of eternal life.  Jesus said in John 4:14 “but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life."

The confidence of fellowship, 1 John 5:13-17

We are coming to the close of the epistle of 1 John.  We will more than likely finish it next Sunday, Lord willing.  I came into this epistle with naive expectations that we would spend a short study in it, and then we would begin the gospel of Mark as we started out the summer season.  Turns out God had other plans. This is the seventeenth message in 1 John, with one more to go. This little epistle has taught me much concerning the life of a Christian, particularly in regards to what is Christian fellowship. There have been a number of interpretational challenges, as there is yet again today, but I believe God helped us navigate through them, and I for one, am the better for it.

 If you have been with us during this summer, you will know that I consider fellowship to be the theme of 1 John.  And fellowship with God can only be possible if you have been born again into eternal life. Eternal life is inseparable from fellowship with God.  Now, as I indicated last week, eternal life does not just refer to the longevity of life, but the quality of life.  That which is spiritual is eternal by definition, thus we have to be born again by the Spirit of God, in order to become spiritual, because in our natural state, we are dead spiritually. That is due to the curse of sin from the Garden of Eden, when man ate of the tree, and as God said, they surely died.  Adam and Eve died spiritually.  And as descendants of Adam, all have sinned according to our nature and are spiritually dead.  But once having received eternal life, we have fellowship with the Spirit who abides in us, and as such we now have eternal life in Christ.

Their is another aspect of the phrase eternal life, and that’s the word used for life; zoe in the original Greek.  In Greek there are three words used for life.  There is bios, from which we get the word biology.  It refers to the physical body.  Then there is psuche, from which we get the word psychology.  It refers to the soul, or the mind, emotions and will of man.  Sometimes it is also called the heart.  Heart and soul are interchangeable.  And then there is zoe, which refers to the zest of life, a life of special vitality or animation.  And that word zoe is what the apostles use to speak of spiritual life.  This is the life animated by God, the divine life that is eternal, abundant, and is the source of our fellowship with God.  Without zoe life, we cannot have fellowship with God.  

And by the way, eternal life does not begin when we get to heaven one day.  Eternal life begins at salvation.  Your life in Christ will never end.  Jesus said in John 11:25, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?”  When He said I am the life, He used the word zoe.  We receive the life of Christ, divine life, which is eternal life, the moment we believe in Christ. That zoe life is the full life, abundant life of fellowship with God when we abide in Him and He in us.  As Jesus affirmed in John 10:10, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.”  He’s not talking about physical prosperity, but about the full divine, spiritual life in Christ that results in fellowship with God.

Now John speaks to this indispensable principle of fellowship in vs.13.  We talked about this verse some last time, but we need to look at it again this week to keep  the following verses in context.  Note vs.13, “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.”

Since the very first chapter, John has been concerned that we know that we have real fellowship with God.  He is concerned that we know we have eternal life.  The word "know" appears 39 times in this epistle and seven times in these last verses. This whole epistle is about knowing you have fellowship with God for certain. 

And last time we showed that the way you know you have the eternal zoe life of God, that you have fellowship with God, is through the word of God.  The promises of God are our guarantee, the confidence of our salvation, and our confidence of  fellowship with Him.  We don’t trust in feelings, we don’t trust in experiences, though those things may be significant.  But we trust in the word of God.  And that is why John says that these things have been written down for us, that we might know for certain that we have fellowship with God.  The apostle’s doctrines which are written are scripture, which is inspired by the Spirit of God, that we may know the things of God.

Now John tells us in vs 14 that there is another proof, or evidence, that we have this fellowship, this zoe life of God abiding in us.  And that evidence is answered prayer.  Answered prayer is one of the most satisfying evidences of your fellowship with God.  Sometimes they are major things we have been praying for, and God answers them.  And sometimes there are small things we pray for, and God answers them.  But whether they are big or small, answered prayer is one of the best confirmations of our fellowship with God, and one of the most tangible evidences that we share the zoe life of Christ. 

But if the truth be known, answered prayer is an evidence which is sometimes lacking in our lives, is it not?  We pray for things, we try to muster up faith that God will answer it, and then oftentimes He doesn’t seem to answer.  And rather than encouraging our faith, it sometimes works to discourage us.  

However John seems to give us this blank check that if we ask, we will receive what we ask for.  But in actuality, it’s important to give full consideration to these verses if we hope to see this evidence of our life with Christ. Let’s look at the verses 14 and 15; “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.”

Now let’s break this verse down.  First of all, I want you to notice that we are to pray confidently.  Now confidence is not presumption.  Confidence is not arrogance.  Confidence is not commanding God to do whatever we ask.  If that were so, then we should worship ourselves, rather than worship God.  If He exists to do our bidding, then He isn’t a God, He is a genie, and if we rub Aladdin’s lamp just so, and say the words just the right way, then abracadabra, God is at our service, and we get our wish!

No, that is not the God of the Bible.  But we are told to be confident. We have that confidence because of our relationship to God through Christ who is our Great High Priest.  Consider what 

Hebrews 4:14-16 says, “Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

This kind of confidence arises from the knowledge of two fundamental principles of prayer, which John gives us here: the certainty of hearing, and the certainty of having. Notice both of these elements: "If we ask anything according to his will, we know that he hears us." Now also notice that there is a caveat; according to His will.  Perhaps the major reason for most of the unanswered prayers of the world is they are not according to God's will, and therefore they are not heard. John makes it explicitly clear that a prayer that is according to God's will is always heard. Thus he dismisses all those concepts of prayer which imply that prayer is a means of getting God to do our will. Prayer is never that.

In fact, James makes it clear that prayer offered on the wrong terms, according to our will rather than God’s, will not be answered.  Look at James 4:2,3; “You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures.”  The idea there is that you pray for things based on worldly lusts.  

Jesus said in John 14:14  "If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.”  That is the basis for the traditional ending to most of our prayers.  “We ask these things in Jesus’ name, Amen.”  That however, is not what Jesus intended.  To ask in His name is not simply to tack on Jesus’ name at the end of our prayer, but to ask according to Him, according to His nature, His character.  And we know that Jesus was the visible image of the invisible God.  He did everything which the Father was doing.  Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.”  So to ask in His name is to ask according to His will.  It means the same thing.  So when we ask according to His will, John says He hears us.  Or perhaps better, He listens to us. 

Now that is all that John explicitly says about prayer.  That is the only condition he seems to put upon it; that we ask in accordance with God’s will.  But that still leaves a lot of questions unanswered.  The Bible has much to say about prayer.  And if you go through the Old and New Testaments, you will find a lot of principles that apply to effective prayer.  But what John seems to be presuming to be understood, is that this effective prayer he is talking about happens as a result of true fellowship with God.  When you are in fellowship with God, abiding in Him, He abiding in you, His word abiding in you, and you abiding in obedience to His commandments, when all that encompasses true fellowship is in effect, then you will ask according to His will and He will do it.  

Now if you are living outside of His will, then that would mean you are living in sin, wouldn’t it?  If you sin, John says in chapter 1, then you don’t have fellowship with God.  Sin breaks fellowship with God.  As a Christian, sin will not make you lose your salvation, but it will disrupt your fellowship with God.  1John 1:6 “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.”  So the answer to unconfessed sin is to confess it, and be cleansed of it, so that we can have restored fellowship with God.  But in an unconfessed state of sin, then we can expect not to have our prayers answered.  David said in Psalm 66:18, "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.” 

In fact, let me expand on that principle in a positive light.  After years of reading James 5 regarding what James calls “effective prayer”, I finally saw the connection.  James 5:16b, “The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.”  It finally dawned on me one day that the secret to effective prayer is a “righteous man.”  A man that does not regard iniquity in his heart.  So James says in the same verse, “confess your sins one to another and pray for one another that you may be healed.”  He isn’t talking about being healed from physical illness, but from a spiritual illness.  Sin being an illness that besets the zoe life and disrupts the fellowship we have with God. So confessing our sins makes us whole again, restoring our full fellowship with God.  That whole fellowship is the secret to answered prayer.

Now John is going to give us an illustration that will help to explain this principle of how God answers the prayer of those in fellowship with Him.  And I will admit, that I wish John had come up with a different illustration.  John has a way of making something simple sound confusing.  But nevertheless, it is for our own good to be challenged by this type of illustration.  It forces us to consider scripture in light of scripture.  But I will say that the following verses have been the source of many a debate, and not a few false doctrines.  Now I don’t claim to be smarter than everyone else. But after much pray and consideration I think I know what John is saying here. I guess that God is showing that not many wise, not many noble are called, but God has chosen the foolish things to shame the wise.  So in that vein, let me try to explain John’s illustration.  First let’s read the word; vs.16-17 “If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this. All unrighteousness is sin, and there is a sin not leading to death.”

Now as I alluded to while ago, there have been a lot of interpretations of these verses for centuries among theologians.  And there have also been some false teachings that have arisen out of these verses.  Some have tried to say this teaches that you can lose your salvation, or that you can somehow commit a sin which is not forgivable.  Well, in consideration of time, I cannot address every false teaching here today.  I will say, however, that you cannot lose what you have not acquired.  Christ purchased your salvation, and God granted it to you on the basis of faith in Christ.  It is eternal life that you received by grace.  Not eternal, then whoops, you lost it!  Eternal or better yet, everlasting life is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. 

Remember the verse I quoted Jesus saying a few minutes ago? “He who believes on Me will never die.”  There is an overwhelming  preponderance of scripture which we don’t have time to review this morning which support the eternal nature of our new birth, and it would be foolish to suggest a doctrine on the basis of this one passage which might seem on the surface contrary to other scriptures which so clearly teach the perseverance and eternal security of the saints.  

Throughout all of John’s epistle, he has been contrasting the true life of fellowship with that which is not in fellowship.  He has contrasted the walk in the Light, with the walk in darkness.  He has contrasted being born again, with being dead in your sins.  Now in this passage, he is affirming the eternal life that comes in response to our faith.  And he has shown multiple evidences of our faith; such as love, fellowship, keeping the commandments, and answered prayers.  So in that context, the same contrast of spiritual life vs spiritual death is being shown here.  

The life which is in fellowship with God, loves His brother in Christ.  John has emphasized that again and again.  So John says when we that are in fellowship with God see a brother who has sinned a sin not leading unto death, he shall ask and god will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death.  First of all then, we know that this is a fellow believer.  He is saved.  He has been born again.  But he has sinned.  However the sin is not unto death.  Now what does that mean? 

Well, Romans 6:23 has the answer.  “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”  So then, God has placed on Jesus the penalty of our sin, and He crucified Christ, putting Him to death for our sin, and transferred the life-giving righteousness of Christ to us, even eternal life. The believer cannot sin unto death, since he has been made spiritually, eternally alive.  So there is a sin for the believer which is not unto spiritual death.  That is the plain and simple meaning.  Christ has already died for their sin.  To punish that sin by death again would be double jeopardy.  And God is not an unjust judge.  

But nevertheless, we know that God’s will is that we do not sin.  And sin breaks our fellowship with God, and it carries with it the consequences of sin which can affect our mortal bodies.  So as a loving brother in Christ, we pray for our sinning brother, that he might be forgiven, and that he might be restored to life, that is restored to the full fellowship with God that we are designed to have.  

Now the interesting thing John is saying is that we can pray for this brother, for their restoration and God will do it.  John is giving this as an illustration of praying according to the will of God.  And if you remember that verse from James I quoted a few minutes ago, you will see that James said virtually the same thing.  He says, “Confess your sins one to another, and pray for one another that you may be healed, (spiritual healing).  The word translated healed also can mean making whole.  He goes on to say in James 5:15,  “and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him.”  And then James adds, that the effective prayer of a righteous man accomplishes much.  

Now that’s a tremendous principle incorporating loving one another and answered prayer.  And it’s a tremendous example of praying in accordance to the will of God.  God’s desire is that we have fellowship with Him, and that we abide in Him, and He is us, and that we keep His commandments and that we love one another.  And we are able to help one another and express our love for one another as we pray for each other that God will restore our erring brother. 

Understanding that side of the equation then should make it easier to understand the other side of the equation.  And John expresses that as follows; “There is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this.”  What is this sin leading to death?  Should we live in fear that somehow we could fall into this sin which plunges us to eternal death, which is unforgivable?  No, not at all.  If the brother who sins a sin not leading to death is saved because he has received the gift of salvation on the basis of faith in Christ’s atonement, then what is the contrast to that?  It’s the one who is not a believer.  The one who has not believed unto salvation is one whose sin leads to death.  He is still dead in his trespasses and sin.  

So if you see this unsaved person leading a sinful life, John is not suggesting that we pray an intercessory prayer for such a person that they might be restored to fellowship.  God will not restore someone to fellowship who has not first been born again spiritually having received eternal life.  We are not told not to pray for their restoration, but obviously we should pray for such a person’s salvation.  We should pray that God will bring them under the conviction of the Holy Spirit.  But we cannot pray for their fellowship, because fellowship must be predicated on a relationship with Jesus Christ as our Savior.

Now John is writing to believers.  He has just said he wants to affirm their faith, so that they may have confidence of eternal life, and confidence of answered prayers as a further evidence that they have fellowship with God.  And so he doesn’t want to end on emphasizing the life of an unbeliever, but the life of a believer.  So John says in vs.17, “All unrighteousness is sin, and there is a sin not leading to death.”  Sin is unfortunately a reality in the life of a believer.  It should become less and less frequent, as we are conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, and as we grow in maturity and faith in the process the Bible calls sanctification.  We learn to mortify the flesh.  We become more like Christ as we draw closer to Him and walk with Him. 

But as John said in chapter 1 vs. 10, “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.”  So sin is going to happen occasionally in the life of a believer.  But it is not a sin unto death.  There is no death Jesus said for a believer.  He has died in our place that we might have life.  But when we sin as Christians, we hurt our fellowship with God, we get a guilty conscience, we hurt our testimony, and we hurt the cause of Christ.  So in 1John 1:9 he gives us the antidote; “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Well, I hope that you know as John has written, that you have the eternal life which is given on the basis of faith in Christ. If you don’t know you have eternal life, then the invitation to be born again spiritually is extended to you today.  Christ has paid the penalty for your sins.  If you reject Him as your Lord and Savior, then you today are dead in your sins.  You will one day be subjected to eternal death for your decision to reject the truth of God.  But if you confess your sins, He is faithful and just to forgive you and cleanse you from all unrighteousness and give you eternal life.  Simply call on Jesus to save you today.

For those of you that are saved in the audience.  I trust that you have the confidence of your salvation.  I hope that you have the confidence to pray according to the will of God.  And I hope that you will pray for one another, especially those that are struggling in sin, that they might be restored to the life of fellowship we were designed to live.  That their joy and ours might be full.  Let us pray.