FIRST JOHN
Second Cycle
1 John 3:11-24
INTRODUCTION
When we spoke about the teaching format that John would use in 1 John, we said that the method he was using was cyclical in nature. In other words, in the first cycle of teachings, John was going to introduce the major topics under discussion. After he had introduced all 3 topics, in his second cycle he would deal with the 3 topics again but this time develop the topics even further. Another feature of the second cycle would be that he was going to start relating the 3 topics to each other. None of the topics actually operate independently of each other; each is an integral part of the other 2. In other words, you cannot love properly without having correct belief in Jesus Christ and without living a life of righteousness. Moreover, proper faith in Jesus Christ is going to result in loving others and in living righteous lives.
DEFINITION OF LOVE (3:11-18)
Before we look at John's description of love, we need first to consider the person(s) he commands us to love--"love one another (3:11), "love the brethren (3:14). The situation John’s church finds itself in helps explain why John focuses on love for one's fellow Christian—the church is in an uproar because of the division and Christians are not demonstrating love for one another; however, in other passages in which the situation is not divisive, other NT writers (for example, Paul) claim that our first love should always be for the fellow Christian (see Gal. 6:10). Why? As we shall see in 1 John 4:12, a loving community of believers is one of the most powerful pieces of evidence for the existence of Christ. Organizations out in the world are primarily built upon status and power, and as a result they primarily attract people who are obsessed with power and control. When churches engage in similar behavior, they have nothing new to offer the world. They then only offer the world to the world. On the other hand, whenever the church presents itself as a community of loving brothers and sisters, the world is forced to take notice and find an explanation for this community. The only explanation which will do justice is the one which claims that the God of love is alive and present in that community.
Bear in mind 2 things here.
The first reason John gives that Christians should love one another is "For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning [the content of the message actually being] that we should love one another" (3:12). The message of love John is proclaiming is not something new but actually has its origins in the beginning of God's dealings with mankind. It is important that John is not preaching a new message but rather building upon an ancient one.
Our generation tends to emphasize the "new"; old-fashioned things need to be discarded. (C.S. Lewis calls this "chronological snobbery.") In theology, though, the ancient many times is what is valid (G.K. Chesterton argues for the "democracy of the dead"). Why? Because God has always been speaking and since He is consistent (faithful), He's always been speaking the same message—love one another. If the message is new, then either God is fickle and has changed His mind, or else God Himself is growing and changing. Both of these ideas would undermine our belief that God is faithful and would therefore undermine our reason for trusting Him. He is consistent, though, and does not change (Heb. 13:8: "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yes, and forever").
John continues by showing the antiquity of the message. The message of love did not start with Jesus but actually dates back to the time of Cain and Abel, the sons of Adam and Eve. John does not use Cain as a positive example of love but as a negative example. The story of Cain and Abel claims that Cain killed Abel because God's accepted Abel’s sacrifice whereas He rejected Cain's. John develops this even further. According to John, Cain killed Abel because whereas Abel was righteous, Cain was actually "of the Evil One," that is, Satan. When the evil Cain was confronted with the righteous Abel, his only thought was to kill him. How does this story of Cain and Abel teach love? First, God calls Abel Cain's brother, which implies love. Second, the story (a negative example of love) shows that God punishes and condemns hatred. Well, if God is opposed to hate, what is His attitude towards love? We are left to understand that He promotes and loves love.
An improper analysis of this verse could lead to the mistaken view that Cain had no choice in the matter. He was "of the Evil One," that is he had his source in the Evil One and therefore had no choice but to hate and even kill his brother. John, in addition to all the other NT writers, would reject this interpretation. Cain definitely had a choice, and although he was of the Evil One, whenever he killed Abel, the fact is that he did not start out as being of the Evil One. Rather the way he responded to situations ended up putting him in the camp of the Evil One. We start out with freedom of choice because of God's empowering us to do so; however, after we have chosen Satan enough times, the result is that we end up losing our choice and become of the Evil One.
Our society tries every way in the world it can to excuse people's wrongful actions. Whenever the2 young men killed the students at Columbine High School in Colorado, the media was obsessed with trying to find out what "made" these young men do this deed. There is an extent to which we need to probe "causes," but the truth is that these 2 young men chose to perform this deed. We choose either to follow Christ or to follow Satan, but the truth is that WE and nobody else are the ones doing the choosing.
My sister sent me the story of a man named "Michael" who was so optimistic about life that he bordered on being obnoxious. When his fellow employees asked him what made him so optimistic, he replied that he woke up each morning with the choice of having either a good or bad attitude. The choice was his. He simply chose to have the good attitude. About 6 months later when Michael was working on top of a communications tower, he fell 60 feet to the ground. He did not think anything was all that bad until he was rushed to the ER and saw the look on the faces of the doctors and nurses. He could tell that they thought he was a dead man. While they were performing ER on him, someone asked him if he was allergic to anything. When he said "Yes," they stepped back in fear they might have given him some medication injurious to his health. He went on, "I'm allergic to gravity." The ER staff cracked up in laughter. He continued by saying, ""Work on me is if I am alive, not dead." Michael lived not only because of the skill of the ER staff but also because of his attitude. The choice was his and he chose to live. We too are given the choice of what kind of persons we're going to be. God makes those choices a reality.
John claims that Cain killed Abel because whereas Abel's deeds were righteous, Cain's were evil. This act was not unique but actually is repeated on a consistent basis. Those who are unrighteous persecute and hate those who are righteous. As a result, we should not be surprised whenever the world hates us. By "the world," John means that element in mankind which is opposed to the lordship of Jesus Christ. Not only should we not be surprised when the world hates us, we should actually wonder when it does not. Something may be wrong with our witness if the world actually approves of our actions.
LOVE NECESSARY TO EXPERIENCE GOD'S LIFE (3:14-15)
John also characterizes the person who loves as the person who has passed out of death and into life. Moreover, that person has not only passed out of death into life but actually already now abides in life. In chapter 2 we said that John viewed history as below:
Light with first coming of Jesus
|__________________________________________________
|__________________________________________________| end of darkness with 2nd coming of Jesus
Only darkness
We said that before Jesus who is the Light came, only darkness was in the world. When Jesus came, He brought light. The darkness has not been completely done away with; therefore, light and darkness are co-existing. The only time in which these 2 co-exist (and the light is becoming stronger) is dawn. We live at the dawn of time, that point in history when both God's light and Satan’s darkness are co-existing but also when God's light is increasing in power. Now John describes these 2 different spheres with other terms:
| Light | Darkness |
| Jesus Christ | Satan |
| Righteousness | Unrighteousness |
| Salvation | Condemnation |
| Life | Death |
The person who abides in Christ (the Light) must also abide in love, righteousness, life, and salvation.
POSITIVE DEFINITION OF LIVE (3:16-18)
John continues by defining love. By love, John is not referring to just any kind of love; rather he is referring to God's love—agape love. According to John, the cross itself provides the best explanation of God's love, agape love. The best explanation for God's love is that Christ laid down His life for us. As a result of Christ laying down His love for us, we are obligated to lay down our lives for the brethren. If God who is so much greater than we loves others, who are we not to love? If the greatest loves, the lesser should to. Whereas there is a difference between Christ's love and our love—our love cannot save anybody, there still should be a similarity in that our love should be sacrificial like Christ’s love was sacrificial. As God's love cost Jesus His life, so God's love in us should cost us our own lives as well.
Now we can take this strictly literally and claim that Jesus is wanting us to die physically for another Christian (and that may be required one day); however, the normal application of this verse does not always require physical death. Sometimes it requires a whole lot more. John in v. 17 gives a practical application of this verse. If a Christian sees another Christian with a physical need and does not help meet that need, then that Christian who claims to love God is just a lot of hot air. God's love does not have to assume the character of GREAT sacrifice—that will happen maybe only once in a person's life; what it does require IS sacrifice. This kind of love shows practical love to a Christian brother who is difficult to love. It is the love of a fellow Christian when it costs me something—like money or even time.
I've seen Christians who profess to love Christ and the lost and they are willing to give financially to mission organizations or even local organizations. Yet if you ask that person if they've ever witnessed to anybody, they'll turn around and say, "No." In many cases, giving the money was easy. It was like a salve which soother a guilty conscience. Or they may want to give money to mission groups which evangelize the blacks overseas, and yet they profess that blacks in American would feel more comfortable worshiping in black churches. (Actually these mission lovers would feel more comfortable if blacks worshiped in their own black churches.) Again, the money can become nothing more than easy love and by means the kind of love that Jesus Himself demonstrated on the cross. God's love demands sacrifice on my part.
LOVE--EVIDENCE THAT A PERSON IS SAVED (3:19-20)
The result of loving the way that Jesus loves is that the Christian can be assured that he really is a Christian, in spite of everything his conscience may be saying to him. In these verses, John is dealing with a situation which has bothered some Christians. Some Christians have an over-sensitive conscience. Maybe they were raised by parents who were overly critical. Maybe at some time in their lives, they felt like they committed a horrendous sin when all along they were innocent of the very crime they thought that they had committed. The movie The Lion King dealt with this very issue. The evil uncle Scar had killed the king Mufasa and then blamed his nephew Simba. For years Simba carried on his shoulders the guilt of having killed his own father. Although it was false guilt, it was still guilt; and guilt of such magnitude that it almost destroyed him. Only at the end of the movie did he discover that all those years of feeling guilty were totally wasted. Well, the same applies to many Christians who carry around a large burden of false guilt. Whatever happened in the past, these Christians not only find it impossible to forgive themselves but also find it difficult to believe that God Himself would forgive them.
John claims that some Christians have the problem of false guilt or even guilt that God has forgiven but they've not let go of. How then can they know that they are OK with God? How can they know whether or not they are right with God? By seeing if God's kind of love is operating in their lives. If a Christian is loving the way Jesus loved, then s/he can rest assured that s/he and God are OK no matter what his/her conscience is telling him/her. God's love in a person can never be humanly manufactured. Only God can produce that kind of love, and if a person is loving the way God loves, then God is living through that person and that person is OK with God.
CONSEQUENCES OF A CLEAR CONSCIENCE—A DYNAMIC PRAYER LIFE (3:21-24)
We need to process seriously the problem of guilt in our lives. If we have real guilt, we need to confess it so that Christ can remove it (1 John 1:9). If we have false guilt, we need to trust the fact that God is in us because we see His love operating through us. It is important that we deal with this because guilt—whether false or real—can paralyze the Christian spiritually and emotionally. The Christian will feel like he is not worthy even to be called God's child, much less minister in His name or enjoy the life Christ died to give him or her.
Removing that guilt results in confident praying. Confidence in the presence of God is a serious mark of any true child of God. Nearly every person who calls me at church goes through my secretary. This helps her screen calls from salespersons and also lets me know in advance who's calling so that I can be personable on the phone from the first second I talk to that person. My children, though, don't have to go through the secretary. They have access to my personal extension. They can call me any time of the day. They have direct access to me. It's not anything they had to earn. They have it simply because they are my children and I love them. When we truly appreciate who we are and what kind of relationship we have with God, we can have all the confidence in the world that we have God's direct personal extension. We can be sure that God hears our prayers.
We can also be sure that God answers our prayers positively if we fulfill one condition—keep the commandments and do the things that are pleasing in His sight. What commandment in particular does He command us to keep? The command to believe in His Son Jesus and love other Christians. Believing in Jesus involves more than just mere intellectual assent that Jesus died on the cross. Rather, it involves believing that He is Lord and then demonstrating it daily by obeying Him. The greatest command Jesus expects us to obey is the one to love other Christians. The result of this is that whenever a person is praying, he's not praying from his own selfish desires, but is actually going to pray for the things that Jesus is commanding him to pray for. How do I know what Jesus wants me to pray for? By living so close to Him by obeying Him that I can know what I wants from me. That kind of prayer life is powerful and one which consistently yields results.
Just as love springs from a right relationship with Jesus Christ, so also this kind of love produces a right relationship with Christ (3:24). Maybe I am not loving the way Christ loved and as a result I feel distant from Christ. John says then all I need to do is start loving the way Christ loved.