I John 4:1-16
Good morning and welcome everyone!
We continue today with the I John series: "In the Light." I don't know about you, but there is
something appealing about the thought of walking in the light. And yet, if we are used to walking in
darkness, we can continue to do it sometimes without even realizing it.
We were redoing our boys bedroom (for several months), and they were
sleeping in the basement. They were
happy to move back upstairs, but honestly, sleeping downstairs was no big
strain for them. They were a lot closer
to the playroom. It was much easier for
the Legos to happen to migrate to where their mattresses were.
In the morning, I would come down to ride on my exercise bike. Since it was before the time change, there
would be enough light that I could just barely find my way safely past the
corner of David's mattress and around to the work room where I could close the
door and turn on the light.
Well, we got the boys moved back upstairs. And the time changed so that it was darker in
the morning and light longer in the evenings.
And yet, I would keep on walking through the basement in the dark until
I could get to the work room. That is
until the day that I kicked a small cart that we have for moving
homeschool notes and things around. It's
like a collapsable hand truck. Elijah
really loves to drive it all around, so when it is not in use, rather than
getting put away, it usually gets left out wherever Elijah decides to park it.
That morning, I must have been feeling particularly optimistic about my
night vision. I came cruising around the
corner of the bookshelf (which I had navigated perfectly, by the way) and I
kicked right into that hand truck. I
didn't break a toe. I didn't fall
down. It wasn't a cataclysmic life
changing event, but there was an immediate realization that I was walking in
the dark for no reason whatsoever.
I could have turned on the light.
Having the light on would have disturbed no one. In fact, the only thing that would have
happened by having the light on would have been my own protection. It would have kept me safe. Now that is a transferrable thought. As we continue and finish up this series, I
encourage you to ask, "Are there any areas of my life where I'm in the
dark?" If so, I encourage you to bring
them into the light as we are encouraged to do in Ephesians 5,
For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as
children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness,
righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds
of darkness, but rather expose them. For
it is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes
visible for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said: “Wake up, sleeper,
rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” Be very careful then, how you live [walk, NASB and KJV]– not
as unwise but as wise … Ephesians 5:8-15
Let's pray that God will guide us into the light in all the areas of
our lives:
Lord Jesus, we need You to illuminate our souls. Father of lights, You delight in Your
children. You have no shade, You have no
turning. You are constant and never
changing in Your love. May we
continually realize that You desire to shine upon us and transform our lives
from darkness into light. May we no
longer be conformed to this world, but be renewed by Your transforming Spirit. In Jesus Name, Amen.
Today, we are going to continue with this idea of seeing clearly. John is not going to use the word light, but
he is going to offer us some warnings so we can stay on the right track,
following God.
Let's begin with verse one there in chapter four:
Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see
whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the
world. I John 4:1
You may remember that Tim ended last time with verse 24 in chapter
3. There it says, "This is how we know
that [God] lives in us: We know it by the Spirit He gave us." So, John is continuing that thought,
following it up with a warning. We have
an encouragement from the Lord, the Holy Spirit placed in us. Ephesians 1 calls it a seal or deposit
guaranteeing our inheritance. That's
good news.
John is warning us that someone who comes and says, "Hey, I've got the
Spirit, too," may have a spirit all right, but it may not be the right
one. You can read about an example in I
Kings 22. King Ahab was a wicked king
of Israel. God was going to allow him to
be destroyed because of all the evil he had done. Ahab was counseled by 400 prophets of foreign
gods to go into battle and that he would be victorious. Micaiah a prophet of the true God said, "No," that Ahab would be killed. Micaiah also
explained that the prophets of the foreign gods have been led astray by a lying
spirit in their mouths.
Those false prophets of Micaiah and Ahab's time were led astray by
lying spirits, not the Spirit of God.
Likewise today, John is saying false prophets, false leaders, and false
teachers will be going out into the world and taking people away from God and
into harm and even destruction.
So, how can we avoid these false prophets, and spirits that are not
coming from God? John gives us a
succinct test:
This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that
acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, I John 4:2
This idea of acknowledging is a bit more than intellectually agreeing
who Jesus is. If you remember, the
demons cried out (before Jesus silenced them) that He was the Son of God. James 2:19 says that the demons believe there
is one God.
This word "acknowledge" is also translated "confess" or "profess" in other
translations. We are talking about
someone willing to make a public confession of who Jesus is and what He has
done for us.
"but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This
is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is
already in the world." I John 4:3
So there is the litmus test. One
who will not confess that Jesus is from God.
Not everyone who says that Jesus is from God has the Spirit, but
definitely, everyone who won't does not have the Spirit.
That's kind of a sticky wicket isn't it. Who knows what a sticky wicket is? Or, maybe a better question is, who doesn't
know what a sticky wicket is?
In croquet, you hit the ball through those little gates. The gates are called wickets. A sticky wicket is one where it is blocked by
another ball so that you can't hit your own easily through the gate. Therefore,
a sticky wicket.
With respect to I John, whether or not someone names the name of Jesus
being a guarantee of whether or not they are a Christian, whether or not they
have the Spirit of God, that can be a
bit of a sticky wicket.
I say that because I have known and do know people who would confess
that Jesus is the Son of God, and yet, the fruit of their own lives is such
that I would say that there is no way that they could have the Spirit of God
working in their lives. Paul talks about
such people in Titus 1:16. He says, "They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him. They are detestable, disobedient and unfit
for doing anything good."
John is more specific on his qualification for the proof of having the
Spirit of God than not having the Spirit.
He does say that it is people who confess that Jesus came in the
flesh. That is an indicator that the
person would believe that Jesus was a sacrifice for our sins. Some of the gnostic heretics had weird ideas
that Jesus was Spirit only or that He inhabited a body only for a time, but
really was not actually a man. A true
believer in Jesus would recognize that He is both fully God and fully man.
That is pretty hard for us to wrap our heads around. Jesus Himself said that He did not do
anything apart from the Father. So, He
did not exercise any authority or power in the flesh other than what God had
given Him. He lived His 33 years on this
earth the same way that we do, except He did it without sinning. Talk about humility!
In the end, I come back to I Samuel 16:7 and what the Lord told Samuel
about choosing Jesse's youngest son David to be king ahead of his older,
stronger and more mature brothers. "Man
looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."
And, what is in our hearts does tend to work it's way out over
time. Jesus said to the Pharisees in
Luke 16:15, "You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men, but
God knows your hearts. What is highly
valued among men is detestable in God's sight." If someone is doing first the things that are highly valued among men,
that is also a clue that they do not have the Spirit of God in them.
That was a detour a little longer than I anticipated. Lets get back to the rest of verse 3. We saw the term antichrist back in chapter
2. This is ultimately a reference to
Satan and the one he will set up as a ruler in this world. John is warning us that the spirit of Satan
is working in this world even before this physical antichrist will come. There is an enemy who wants to steal, kill
and destroy. He is the father of lies
and when he lies, he is speaking his native language. (John 8:44)
You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the
One who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. I John 4:4
This is a tremendous promise.
The One who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. John Bullard shared the verse, John
14:30. There Jesus says that the prince
of this world is coming and he has no part in Jesus. He has no hold, no power over, no claim,
nothing.
If we feel confounded by circumstances or claims that people make, we
should run to Jesus, the one who is greater than he who is in the world. A little child gets this. The older we get, the harder it is for us to
run to the one who loves us, the one who helps us.
Elijah and I had a showdown this week.
I don't know why it is, but I've experience this with all of our
kids. The crazy thing is, you never see
it coming. One night this week, I was
trying to work on something at the dining room table. Elijah comes and climbs up in the chair at
the end of the table. It was too far
away from the table, and I didn't want him trying to reach the table and fall
out of the chair. All I wanted him to do
was sit down just long enough so that I could pull the chair in. Then, I wouldn't care if he was standing in
the chair. My only interest was his
protection.
I said "sit down," and he got this stonewall look on his face. And the battle was joined, the showdown had
begun. I'll spare you the whole story,
but I told him several times to sit down sometimes sweetly sometimes more
firmly that I should have. I picked him
up and swatted him on the bottom once. There were more exhortations to sit down. Then, three more swats followed by more
exhortations. I went and got this small
dowel that we use for spankings. More
exhortations and a physical reminder of what was coming came next. "Do you want a spanking?" I don't know how many spankings occurred. Lots of tears and wailing were present. I was questioning whether or not Elijah even
knew what we were talking about anymore.
Maybe I'm crazy expecting him to understand. At one point I picked him up and moved him
gently from the standing position to the sitting position, trying to make sure
he really knew what "sit" meant.
Finally, he sat down. And he did
the most startling thing. He spun
himself around in the chair where his back was to me and he buried his face
against the chair. His little hand was
holding on to one of the railings. I was
mistaken that he had been crying before.
At that moment, he started wailing and sobbing. He had surrendered his will and obeyed and it
really broke him.
It had been okay for him that time I forced him to sit down. It's kind of like when we tell God, "make me
this or make me that." But sometimes, all
God wants is our obedience. To obey is
better than sacrifice.
The reason I tell you this story is that at that moment of Elijah's
brokenness, I was moved with the most powerful feeling of compassion. I loved him more at that moment than
ever. Even though he had fought me tooth
and nail over a simple request, when he finally yielded and was broken, I was
moved. I called to him and said, "Oh,
Elijah, come here, it will be alright." And, I didn't have to tell him that twice. He spun back around and before I could reach
him (even though I was sitting in the chair right next to him), he had jumped
up and just dove into my arms. I held
him and he held me, tight. He cried for
a short time and then stopped, and I just kept holding him and holding
him. Finally, I loosened my grip, but he
squeezed even tighter. I held him until
he was fully comforted.
That is how we need to be with God.
We need to come to Him, run to Him.
He is the One Who is greater. We
can rest fully and securely in Him. He
is waiting to take us in His arms and hold us just as long as we need Him
to. We have overcome the world through
Him by faith. May we come to him first
in every circumstance or challenge or even discipline that we face.
Let's get back to I John chapter 4:
They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the
world, and the world listens to them. We
are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God
does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the
spirit of falsehood. I John 4:5-6
They are the false prophets.
Here is another view on how to recognize those who are not from
God. They are not willing to listen to
the truth or engage in talking about the truth.
This last sentence is one of the key verses behind the cosmic battle
that is talked about in the Truth Project.
There is one who came to testify to the truth, that is Jesus. Then, there is the message of the world based
on falsehood.
I told Bob Schmitt the other week that I had stopped worrying so much
about what I was going to teach about on the Sunday's when I was going to give
the message. I told him that I found
that God would give me what I needed according to each message. This week was a really jam-packed week for
me. I told Melissa last Sunday the same
thing I told Bob, God would just have to give me the message I needed to
speak. Let me just say that you have to
be careful what you ask for (or boast about).
I drive a little 5-speed. When
you park it, you have to engage the parking brake. I've had the car about 10 years. So, I've put the brake on somewhere between 5
and 10,000 times. It's a pretty natural
action, a habit really.
Monday I ran an errand at work.
I went into a small shop. I started
strolling through the store. There was a
window out toward the parking lot. The
lady at the cash register was next to the window. She said, "Hey is that your car rolling
across the parking lot?" Well, I was the
only person in the shop, and my car was the only one in the parking lot, so by
deductive reasoning, it was easy to determine that, although improbable, it was
likely that it must have been my car rolling across the parking lot.
As I looked up and started to move toward the door, the lady said, "Hey, I think it's going to hit that tree?" At that point, my movements shifted from puzzlement to decided
action. As I made one quickened step,
her voice took on that sound of finality of the past tense, "It hit the
tree." I launched out of the store to see
my car sitting about 50 feet from where I parked it. It had definitely moved.
As I approached the car, I thought about what could have gone wrong. Was the linkage broken, what was wrong with the
parking brake that it couldn't hold the car?
Before I even looked to see the damage, I opened the door and there,
wonder of wonders, the parking brake handle sat obstinately in the down and
released position.
There was nothing wrong with the car.
The problem was the operator. The
car went rolling because I didn't set the brake. I didn't realize it because the parking lot
was almost flat. It was not entirely
flat. It was almost flat. I had time to walk across a driveway around a
small entry area and start perusing some vegetables before the car really
started moving.
The Biblical application to my story is a warning to you, "Don't forget
to set the parking brake in your mind against the spirit of falsehood." James 1:6 says that when we ask God for
wisdom (the Spirit of truth) we must believe and not doubt because that doubt
will result in being tossed back and forth like a wave in the sea. We need to set the parking brake on our
doubt. Do not let your doubts run
rampant in your mind. Confront those
thoughts which run contrary to God and His nature. Stop them before they pick up speed and start
rolling out of control. II Corinthians
10:5 sets the example that we are to demolish arguments and even pretensions
that set themselves up against the knowledge of God.
If you want to study more on this subject, there is a great
Faithwalkers devotional on it from last Sunday, March 16th. You can find a copy on the information table,
or you can go to gccweb.org and subscribe through your email to get that daily
encouragement. There are some real gems
in those devotionals.
I want to warn you of the danger.
But thanks be to God, I want to encourage you as well. My car hit the tree almost dead center of the
bumper. If my car had been about 4 feet
further to the driver side, it would have wiped out a port-a-john. If I had parked about 4 feet further to the
passenger side, it would have gone over a small embankment through a barbed
wire fence and out into a cow pasture.
The parking lot didn't have lines, so I was free to park anywhere. I just "happened" to park exactly in line
with a tree 50 feet behind me. I made a
mistake. I didn't put on the parking
brake, and the car went rolling. I could
only stop the car in my own strength if it had been moving very slowly. Even if I had reached the car, depending on
how fast it was rolling, it would have been a dangerous proposition to try and
open the door and get in to stop the car.
Instead, God put a tree in the way and stopped the car for me. I was able to get back in the car and drive
away with no more than some cracked plastic on the bumper. Philippians 4:7 tells us that as we bring all
things to God in prayer, the peace of God will guard our hearts and our minds. When we see that we can't stop the run away
doubts and fears, we need to come to the Lord.
He is not far off. He is
near. When we devote ourselves to Him
and His ways, He will be toward us as it says in Isaiah 58:8, "Our righteous
One will go before us and the glory of the Lord will be our rear guard."
Therefore ...
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and
knows God. Whoever does not love does
not know God, because God is love. I
John 4:7-8
We as believers in God, ones who know God, we cannot help but reflect
God's character. Not just His character,
but His very being, Who He is. God is
love. We must love because God is in us
and lives through us.
There is a song which covers these two verses. It even includes the verse reference, so if
you learn it, then you'll have the verse reference down, too.
What is the focus of our love that John highlights? One another.
This is reminiscent of John 13:34-35 where Jesus gives the disciples a
new commandment that we should love one another just as He has loved us. If we love one another as Jesus loved us,
others cannot help but know that we are His disciples.
This is how God showed His love among us: He sent his one and only Son
into the world that we might live through Him.
This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His
Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
I John 4:9-10
Here is a lovely summary of the good news. God sent His Son, why? That we might live through Him. The act of Jesus coming and God the Father
sending Him, this is the definition of love.
We often hear the joke of that if you look up something in the
dictionary, a picture of someone or something would be found there. Well, when you look up the word love, you
ought to see a picture of Jesus or the cross.
Atonement means our reconciliation with God. We are at one with God. The separating barrier, the wall of our sin
has been removed by Jesus' sacrifice. We
only need to put our faith in Jesus, believe that He died for us, then we are
saved!
Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one
another. No one has ever seen God; but
if we love one another, God lives in us and His love is made complete in
us.
I John 4:11-12
I John 4:11-12
We have no better example. We
have no greater inspiration. As God has
loved us and because God has loved us, we ought to love one another. Through this loving process, God's life is
worked out in our own and and His love is fixed in us. If you want God in You and His love, then
love those whom God has placed in Your family of believers, the body of Christ
that you live and serve in.
A friend of mine at work passed along some writings from John Flavel
who was a 17th century puritan preacher. He wrote some compelling things about our
hearts and how they work. I thought I
would share those.
For though grace has,
in a great measure, rectified the soul, and given it an habitual heavenly
temper; yet sin often actually discomposes it again; so that even a gracious
heart is like a musical instrument, which though it be exactly tuned, a small
matter brings it out of tune again; yea, hang it aside but a little, and it
will need setting again before another lesson can be played upon it. If
gracious hearts are in a desirable frame in one duty, yet how dull, dead, and disordered
when they come to another! ... To keep the heart then, is carefully to preserve
it from sin, which disorders it; and maintain that spiritual frame which fits
it for a life of communion with God.
Do you take his meaning? Grace
has made a great many things right in our souls improving even our
attitudes. However, sin is still hanging
around and messing things up. I really
liked the imagery of tuning an instrument.
Especially, when you think about how the weather affects the tuning of
an instrument. If it's a bit hotter, an
instrument tends to run sharp. If
colder, then it usually runs flat.
Simply not playing an instrument will often result in it getting out of
tune.
We easily can find that our hearts are okay in one situation, but when
we face a different situation, we can be completely undone. Proverbs 4:23 tells us that we must "Guard
our hearts for everything that we do flows out of them." A heart out of order, unguarded, will result
in unpredictable behavior, anger and self-control issues.
We know that we live in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. And we have seen and testify
that the Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. I John 4:13-14
We have both the Spirit in us and the testimony of many witnesses who
have gone before us. In the case of
John, we have an eyewitness of the things that he saw, Jesus the Son of God who
was born and died to be the Savior of the world. It is assurance on top of assurance.
If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them
and they in God. And so we know and rely
on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God,
and God in them. I John 4:15-16
Friday was Taryn's birthday. She
turned 17. Seventeen! Where did the time go? I love her and am so proud of her. Friday morning, as I was getting ready for
work, I reflected on how she was such a little thing when she was born, just 6
lbs 9 oz. My thoughts whisked me back to
those days and what it was like bringing her home from the hospital. I remember as we left, we were escorted out
by a volunteer of the hospital. She was
an elderly lady in her late seventies or possibly early eighties. She was bent over by osteoporosis. I was 24 years old. I remember thinking with disbelief, "They are
actually going to let us walk out of here with a living breathing human
being." I took Taryn up and buckled her
in the car seat. She was so tiny that
the seat just seemed to swallow her. The
buckles and straps were as big as she was.
It was a five point harness and the middle buckle was touching the
buckle that went across her legs and waist.
As I stepped down from the car, the elderly volunteer said with a
surprise, "Oh I almost forgot! I need to
check your car seat." She then leaned
over into the car and ever so gently wiggled the seat. "There," she declared, "That's good." My brain was racing with forces and
accelerations and decelerations of what an accident might bring. Her gentle tug could in no way prove that I
had put the seat in correctly. I
remember standing there under that covered awning, keys in hand, my wife in the
passenger seat, my baby buckled in the car seat, the nice lady walking back in
the hospital with the wheelchair. And
there I was, responsible for life, not just my own, but my wife and now this
infant girl.
Who would I rely upon? Old
Charlie Brown usually cuts right to the heart of the matter. I remember him once praying in a
cartoon. "Who comforts the
comforter?" I found the comic strip
after a brief search. His prayer is not
actually comfort but reassurer, but the meaning is nearly the same. Let's look
at it together:
I think we all would agree that we need a reassurer. Who do we rely on? I think John give us clear direction. "And so we know and rely on the love God has
for us. God is love."
You all know by now that I rely often on Charles Spurgeon for insight
and quotes. I find that my own words and
thoughts are inadequate, but Spurgeon is able even after more than a century to
say it far better than I could. So, I'm
going to read from his words from the 19th century.
Nothing gives the
believer so much joy as fellowship with Christ. He has enjoyment as others have
in the common mercies of life, he can be glad both in God's gifts and God's
works; but in all these separately, yea, and in all of them added together, he
doth not find such substantial delight as in the matchless person of his Lord
Jesus. He has wine which no vineyard on earth ever yielded; he has bread which
all the corn-fields of Egypt could never bring forth. Where can such sweetness
be found as we have tasted in communion with our Beloved? In our esteem, the joys of earth are little
better than husks for swine compared with Jesus, the heavenly manna. We would
rather have one mouthful of Christ's love, and a sip of his fellowship, than a
whole world full of carnal delights. What is the chaff to the wheat? What is
the sparkling paste to the true diamond? What is a dream to the glorious
reality? What is time's mirth, in its
best trim, compared to our Lord Jesus in His most despised estate? If you know
anything of the inner life, you will confess that our highest, purest, and most
enduring joys must be the fruit of the tree of life which is in the midst of
the Paradise of God. No spring yields such sweet water as that well of God
which was dug with the soldier's spear. All earthly bliss is of the earth
earthy, but the comforts of Christ's presence are like Himself, heavenly. We
can review our communion with Jesus, and find no regrets of emptiness therein;
there are no dregs in this wine, no dead flies in this ointment. The joy of the
Lord is solid and enduring. Vanity hath not looked upon it, but discretion and
prudence testify that it abideth the test of years, and is in time and in
eternity worthy to be called "the only true delight." For
nourishment, consolation, exhilaration, and refreshment, no wine can rival the
love of Jesus. Let us drink to the full.
What more shall I say? David
wrote in Psalm 63 that he would glorify God because God's love is better than
life. There is nothing to compare
against it. It is the pearl of great
price. Though it cost everything we
have, it is worth every penny. Though it
means we must take up our cross daily and put to death the misdeeds of our
flesh, it is worth that sacrifice and it is worth any shame or humiliation that
we fear. (Not that our fears of shame
and humiliation are justified, for it says in Romans 10:11 that anyone who
trusts in Him will never be put to shame.)
Brothers and sisters, we may and we must rely on God (Psalm 59). He is our supply and our life. Every good gift comes from Him (James
1:17). Our hope will not disappoint (Rom
5:5). We can depend on Him.
Let us pray:
Father God, Your precious promises are true. You have demonstrated Your love for us in
this that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God, help us to depend on You in every
circumstance. May we not be deceived by
the lies and falsehoods of this world.
Let us keep our eyes fixed on You, the author and perfecter of our
faith. We praise Your Name, Jesus. Amen.
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