FIRST JOHN
Third Test
1 John 2:29-3:10
INTRODUCTION
With this section, John is wrapping up the first cycle in his letter. Previously, he has written about 2 of the tests which a person can undergo to determine whether or not he is a genuine Christian. The first test was the test of obedience to the command to love; the second, correct beliefs about Jesus. The third test is the test of righteousness. A person who is a genuine Christian must generally display a righteous life.
Before going deeper into this section, we need to remember how this passage relates to the overall context of the letter and how it applies to our situation today. With regards to the context of the letter, John's opponents were making a radical distinction between the deeds of the perfect spirit and the deeds of the sinful body. They claimed that the unrighteous deeds they committed in the body had no bearing on the perfect spirit which lived within them and which qualified them to be true Christians. Once more, John claims that you cannot distinguish between the deeds of the spirit and the deeds fo the body. The kind of spirit which controls you determines the kind of deeds you will perform in the body.
With regards to our present-day situation, we find American society in general adopting the kind of attitude John's opponents adopted. A recent poll taken by the Gallup organization discovered that more and more Americans are claiming to be spiritual; on the other hand, the same poll reveals that morals in American society are on the decline. In other words, Americans are claiming that they are spiritual even though they are immoral. They have mistaken warm fuzzy feelings about themselves and God for spirituality. According to John and the rest of the Bible, the truly spiritual person is going to be a moral, righteous person. John's letter has as much relevance today as it did 2000 years ago.
GENERAL THEME: DEMAND FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS (1 John 2:29)
At the beginning of this section, John states absolutely that since God Himself is righteous, then His spiritual children will of necessity be righteous also. Look at some of the terms in this verse. Righteous: normally when we think of this word, we use it to mean that "we are right and they are wrong." The Bible does not use this term primarily in this way. It is primarily a relationship term. The person who is righteous treats God and others rightly. What is the right way to treat God? Since He is God, the only right way to treat Him is to obey Him. As far as being right towards other people, John will elaborate on that at the end of the section. Born of Him: this phrase calls to mind Jesus' statement that unless a person is born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God, that is be saved (John 3:3-5). "Born again" or "born of Him" refers to that act of the Holy Spirit when a person believes in Jesus Christ as his Savior and Lord. At the point of saving faith, the Spirit enters the believer and creates a new spiritual person within him which conforms to the image of Jesus Christ. As that believer responds obediently to God's Word on a daily basis, the new person is energized by the Holy Spirit so that person can actually experience God's life. In this verse, John is claiming that the person who has been born again of the Spirit of God will be like his heavenly Father, that is righteous.
MOTIVATION FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS (1 John 3:1-3)
John next discusses what should motivate you and me to live righteous lives—the great love God has poured out upon you and me. God's love is such that He has not only saved us but that He has also made us His children. Think of all the types of relationships there are in life from which God could have chosen to develop with us. There are the relationships of casual acquaintances, of deep friendship, of lovers, of spouses, etc. God could have saved us and then decided that from here on out we would be casual acquaintances of His. Like a good casual acquaintance, He could have checked on us every now and then to see how we were doing. Of all these relationships, though, He has chosen the relationship of Father/child. If you are a parent, think about how deeply you love your children—how you want to protect them and provide for their every need. Think about how you want only their good. At times we don't really know what's best for them; however, in our hearts we desire only their good. Well, as good a parent as you are, multiply that by a million and you begin to understand the way God loves us and takes care of us.
I've seen this kind of love demonstrated recently in the lives of Gerry and Cheralyn Newberry. Their son David plays college football at USC. This past fall, we never saw Gerry and Cheralyn in SS for the simple reason they were committed to going to every football game David played in—whether in Hawaii or South Bend, Indiana (home of the Fighting Irish). David, Cheralyn and I have a good relationship, and if I were playing football, I know that they might come to one of my games once a year, especially if I played in Corsicana; however, by no means would they travel all around the USA every weekend to watch me play. Why? I'm not their son, whereas David is. Well, God has chosen to have the same kind of relationship with us that they have with David—only more so.
John repeats his assertion that we are God's children in order to dispel any idea that our being God's children is just a warm and fuzzy way to describe our relationship with God. We're not God's children in name only but also in reality. He claims that at this very moment we are God's children. It is true that we have not experienced everything there is to experience as God's children; when Christ returns, He will transform our bodies so that they will be exactly like the body of God's Great Son, Jesus. Right now, though, we are as much a child of God as we will be when Christ returns and finishes His work of making us completely like Himself and our heavenly Father. Right now because of our relationship with Jesus Christ, we are as much God's children as Christ is.
The result of God making us like His Son, Jesus, is that we start being like Jesus right now before He returns. If Christ is going to purify us completely, we should right now be in the process of purification. When Jesus returns, we should not experience something radically different from what we've been experiencing on earth. Rather, then we should experience the consummation of what God has been doing in our lives since the day He came into our lives—purifying us.
This reminds me of the principle we were taught as children. Some people who claim to be Christians are some of the worst racists on the face of the earth. The question is: if they can’t' get along with Blacks, Hispanics, Orientals, or even Whites while living on this earth, what makes them think they'll get to go to heaven where very race on earth will be represented? The same applies to the principle of purity. When we get to heaven, purity will be one of the dominant characteristics of those who live in heaven. If a person, then, during the present time has a problem with wanting to be pure, he is going to find heaven most unwelcoming where purity will be absolute.
SIN—THE MARK OF THE ANTICHRIST (3:4-6)
For the rest of the section, John is going to explain the reason unrighteousness has no place in the life of the believer. First, John claims that sin is no light matter; rather, sin is equal to lawlessness (3:4). At first glance, this statement does not seem all that startling; however, if you bear in mind the overall context of this letter and know how the word "lawlessness" is used elsewhere in Jewish/Christian literature, you'll see that John IS saying something quite noteworthy. The overall context of the letter is that the last hour has come because the Antichrist has emerged on the scene. The hour is certainly desperate for the Christian church. Moreover, the word "lawlessness" is used elsewhere to describe the actions of the Antichrist himself. The Antichrist is so opposed to the laws of God, that Paul calls the Antichrist the "man of lawlessness" (2 Thess. 2:3, 7). Putting all this together leads us to believe that John is claiming that the person who consistently commits unrighteousness (sin) is actually falling within the sphere of the Antichrist. That person is not merely engaging in sexual immorality, etc., but actually following the Antichrist.
The problem with committing sin consistently goes even deeper than this. The person then who continually sins and therefore follows the Antichrist is going to find himself at cross purposes with Christ Himself. Jesus Himself became a man for the express purpose of taking away sin. "Taking away sin" brings to mind the image of the sacrificial lamb upon which the sins of the nation were put so that the people were pronounced sinless. Not only did Jesus take away sin, He is also sinless. In other words, the person constantly engaging in sin contradicts the very person and character of Jesus Christ.
The result of all this is that the person who abides in Christ does not consistently engage in sin, whereas the person who does consistently commit sin not only does not have a relationship with Christ at the present time but has never had a relationship with Jesus Christ ("has seen Him or knows Him")—no matter how many times that person has walked down the aisle, professed to be a Christian, and then has been baptized. The person's life after he has professed to be a Christian indicates whether or not that profession was sincere in the first place. (This verse alone helps settle the debate between Baptists and Church of Christers about losing one's salvation. Contrary to what the CoCers say, John claims that the person who lives in sin after professing Christ as Savior was never a Christian in the first place—"no one who continues in sin has seen Him or knows Him." The phrase "has seen Him" means that person has never had a saving relationship with Jesus Christ.)
The reason that person has never had a relationship with Christ is that the Christian abides in Christ. What does abiding in Christ involve? It means being sensitive to His leadership and then following Him in His strength and power. As a result of this, abiding in Christ necessarily results in a pure and righteous life. Why? Because Christ will never lead me to commit acts of unrighteousness. If I am truly following Him, then I am going to lead a righteous, Christ-like life.
SIN—THE MARK OF THE DEVIL (3:7-10)
John once more states the theme of this section in v. 7: "Little children, let no one deceive you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous just as He is righteous." The fact that he warns them about people trying to deceive them shows that this is exactly what is happening—somebody is trying to deceive them, that is John's opponents. Maybe they claimed to have moved up to a higher level of spirituality. They might have claimed to be above the "morality of this world" so that they could commit sin and it not affect their relationship with God. They might have claimed that what they were teaching was a new morality. Whatever means they were using to try to deceive John’s followers, John was saying that a right relationship with God will show itself in right deeds to one's self and others.
John once more goes even further. The person who consistently engages in sin falls within Satan's domain and sphere ("of the devil"). It is bad enough that this person falls within the sphere of the Antichrist; it is even worse though that this person is actually a follower of Satan himself, the real force behind the Antichrist.
Why does consistently engaging gin sin link a person to Satan? Because just like that person engages consistently in sin, so Satan himself consistently engages in sin. In fact, he has been sinning consistently since the first time he rebelled against God and attempted to dethrone Him (see Rev. 12:7-9). Moreover, just as Christ became a man to destroy sin and the works of the Antichrist, so He became man also to destroy the works of Satan. By becoming a man with a human nature in addition to the divine nature, by dying in the cross, by being raised spiritually from the dead, and by linking us to Himself, Christ put to death our sinful nature and now places the Spirit of the resurrection within us to give us the power to experience His resurrected life. Furthermore, He will return to finish His work by raising us from the dead and making us completely like Him, thereby once and forever breaking Satan's power in our lives.
John gives one final reason sin and the believer are incompatible—God’s seed abides in the Christian. By "seed" John is referring to the spiritual nature God puts in us (begets in us) at the time of our salvation. This spiritual nature is living and organic, and as such is determined to grow and take over us completely. When Christ returns, the spiritual nature will be completely dominate, whereas our old human (and now sinful nature) will be completely eradicated. As a result, whenever we give into our sin nature, we are launching a direct attack against this new divine nature. The struggle can be so intense and make the believer utterly miserable. The Bible teaches that a person cannot lose his/her salvation; however, this verse and others similar to it indicate that the believer can become even more miserable than the most wretched of sinners whenever he yields consistently to sin. That Christian may not lose his salvation, but he will certainly feel like it because the divine nature will make that Christian so miserable.
Finally, John defines for us what he means by righteousness: "anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother." Love for others is the Christian definition of righteousness. For some Christians, righteousness is a code of conduct one should follow and even use to bludgeon others who do not follow that code. Some of those "Christians" are the meanest people to walk on the face of God's earth. This is not Christian righteousness; it is self-righteousness which wreaks of Satan himself. God's righteousness is the love Christ Himself showed while on earth. The righteousness He demonstrated was the righteousness of love. Because He loved others, He treated them lovingly and therefore righteously.
Christ's love, then, motivates me to treat people the way I would have them treat me. Our president (Clinton) recently committed certain acts which some people OK'd because they claimed the acts were between consenting adults. Whatever you might say about those acts, they were not righteous because they were not acts of love. Why? Because no older married man would ever love a young single girl by debasing her. Instead, he would love her by showing her the utmost dignity and respect. Moreover, in this same situation, the only way he could treat his wife right was by loving her by remaining faithful to her. We’re to treat the poor right by loving them and helping them rise from their poverty. We're to treat Christians who have fallen into sin right by lovingly confronting them and trying to help restore them to their relationship with Jesus Christ. We are to treat our children right by lovingly helping them for the most part learn how to handle life without always fighting their battles for them. Moreover, we to treat them right by lovingly allowing them to suffer the consequences for their "mistakes."