godly man
Living a Balanced Life Week 10 (Teaching Outline)
Living a Balanced Life
(An In-Depth Study of First John)
Week 10
Commentary
Loving the Brothers and Sisters
1 John 3:11-18
Outline
To genuinely love someone is to forget about self. The thought that connects this week’s text and the preceding paragraph that we studied last week comes in 1 John 3:10. “By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.” The first clause of that verse sums up the previous paragraph (3:4–10) in which John argued that a lifestyle of righteousness, or of not sinning, is the essential evidence of being a child of God, indwelt by the very seed of God (v. 9), increasingly sharing the nature of him in whom there is no sin (v. 5). On the other hand, a lifestyle of habitual, persistent, unrepentant sin is clear evidence of being not a child of God but a child of the devil, sharing the nature of him who has been sinning from the beginning (v. 8).
Verse 11 begins with the conjunction “for” and shows that in John’s mind verse 11 is the foundation of the idea in verse 10. Verse 10 makes the shift from the idea of practicing righteous in general to loving your brother specifically. The reason he can make that shift is that the command to love one another was what his readers had heard from the beginning. The moral imperative for Christians to love one another was at the heart of the apostolic gospel. And it still is. From the very beginning, from the very first time they heard the gospel, John’s readers knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what God would expect. God expects it only because God empowers it. What God empowers John’s readers to do is both simple and profound; love your brother.
Doctrine is of the essence of the gospel—doctrine about the character of God; about human sin; about the mediator, Jesus Christ, who is the God-man; about his life, death, and resurrection to forgive the sins of his people and give them eternal life; about the need for a personal response of faith to appropriate the work of Christ into one’s own life. But it is equally true that the essence of the gospel includes the moral imperatives of repentance and of a new life of love lived under the lordship of Christ and empowered by his Spirit. Any gospel you believe, any gospel you proclaim that does not include both doctrine and ethics (truth and love) is only half a gospel, totally out of balance, radically distorted, hopelessly deficient. Both doctrine and ethics are at the heart of the gospel because they are so inextricably linked. Therefore, righteous living void of love is hollow religion. This section of text calls for balance in a way that is not optional in relation to salvation.
Message Heard from the Beginning (vs 11)
Simple message – “love one another”
Profound in its essence – no Gospel without it; vs 3:10
Old Commandment – Love vs 2:7-10
Walking in the Light, free to love
Lifestyle of Love (vs 14)
Proves we move from death to life
14a – love the “brethren”
14b- love for all
A lifestyle of love is a matter of life or death
Either Love or Murder (vs 15)
Matter of love or hate, life-giver or murderer (no one sits the fence)
John learned from Jesus (Matthew 5:21-22)
Example of Cain (vs 12-13)
Original account – Genesis 4 Cain murders Able
Able sacrificed in faith – Hebrews 4:11
Darkness wants to murder Light (1 John 3:19-20)
Example of Christ (vs 16)
We know love because we have seen love
- Great Sacrifice
- Meets our deepest needs
- Had the greatest possible motive
LIFE APPLICATION
Allowing the worlds goods to be a vehicle of love not a source of pride
Allowing our eyes to “see” needs
Being righteous without love is a good definition of Religion. So, Religion is Rules without Relationship. Here is the illustration of Religion vs Gospel:
RELIGION: I obey-therefore I’m accepted.
THE GOSPEL: I’m accepted-therefore I obey.
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RELIGION: Motivation is based on fear and insecurity.
THE GOSPEL: Motivation is based on grateful joy.
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RELIGION: I obey God in order to get things from God.
THE GOSPEL: I obey God to get to God-to delight and resemble Him.
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RELIGION: When circumstances in my life go wrong, I am angry at God or my self, since I believe, like Job’s friends that anyone who is good deserves a comfortable life
THE GOSPEL: When circumstances in my life go wrong, I struggle but I know all my punishment fell on Jesus and that while he may allow this for my training, he will exercise his Fatherly love within my trial.
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RELIGION: When I am criticized I am furious or devastated because it is critical that I think of myself as a ‘good person’. Threats to that self-image must be destroyed at all costs.
THE GOSPEL: When I am criticized I struggle, but it is not critical for me to think of myself as a ‘good person.’ My identity is not built on my record or my performance but on God’s love for me in Christ. I can take criticism.
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RELIGION: My identity and self-worth are based mainly on how hard I work. Or how moral I am, and so I must look down on those I perceive as lazy or immoral. I disdain and feel superior to ‘the other.
THE GOSPEL: My identity and self-worth are centered on the one who died for His enemies, who was excluded from the city for me. I am saved by sheer grace. So I can’t look down on those who believe or practice something different from me. Only by grace I am what I am. I’ve no inner need to win arguments.
Living a Balanced Life Week 9 (Audio and Video)
Living a Balanced Life Week 9 (Teaching Outline)
Living a Balanced Life
(An In-Depth Study of First John)
Week 9
Commentary
Sin and the Christian
1 John 3:1-10
Outline
“You are what you eat.” This idiom has been around for centuries. In a culture focused on health and nutrition its meaning is clear; take in healthy food, be healthy. Of course, no one would say that just because you eat healthy you will never get sick. Most of the people in my immediate family eat healthy but all of us are prone to colds and flu on occasion. However, when a family member does catch a cold, recovery time is quick. A healthy body has a strong immune system. To be a member of a health conscience family is to be influenced, educated, and conformed to a healthy lifestyle.
In much the same light, John presents a section of text focused on the Christian and sin. To open the discussion, family is the main point. Listen to John’s opening comment, “Look at the sort of love the Father has given us!” (vs 1) This family is centered on the greatness of the Father. In particular, the love of the Father is in view when it comes to His greatness. In this great love, God has called us his children. To understand the meaning of being “born again” into the family of God, is to understand the lifestyle of righteousness. John states plainly, “No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.” (vs 6) John, or any other Biblical author, can make this type of statement casually. John genuinely believes that the love of the Father has done much more than simply save us from sin.
John knows that to be in the family of God, God MUST be in the family. John refers to this as each and every child having the seed of God inside. “No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God.” (vs 9) In other words, something in this adoption into God’s family goes far beyond earthly adoption. If I find a child and want to take him into my home, I cannot cause the child to be born again. I take him and I love him with the personality and temperament that he has from his biological parents. I influence with love, but I do not get into the very nature of the person and change it. But God does. The love that John has in view here in verse 3 is not the love that merely takes care of paper work and adopts. John sees it as much more. God moves in, by his Spirit, his seed, John calls it, and imparts something of himself to us, so that we take on a family resemblance.
This is the foundation from which John will submit the remainder of his argument. God’s children, though sometimes found in sin, do not live a lifestyle of sin. To be at home with God means to be at home with the very nature of God. John returns to the concept that the child of God will behave in a manner that is similar to his Father’s nature. The one who is “born of God” will not continue in sin.
Children of God (vs 1-3)
Beyond Rescue
Beyond Adoption
Children of God are:
- Led by the Spirit of God
- Lights in the world
- Heirs of All Things
False Teachers (vs 4-7)
Jesus come in the flesh (vs 7)
- False teachers disconnect Spirit and flesh (4:1-3)
- False teachers- you can be righteous yet do no righteousness (vs 4-7)
- Yet humanity has been folded into the Godhead forever
The Reason the Son of God Appeared (vs 8)
Destroy the works of the devil
The works of the devil are sins
Sin is lawlessness (rebellion)
How did the Son of God destroy the devils works? (vs 8-9)
His appearing (life, death, resurrection; the Gospel)
New Birth (You must be born again, John 3:3-7)
The Gospel and not sinless perfection
Vs 9 “makes a practice of sinning”
Remember verses 8 and 10 from chapter 1
LIFE APPLICATION
Presumption – lukewarm toward sin
Despair – works will never be good enough to prove I’m born of God
Run to the Advocate
Living a Balanced Life Week 8 (Audio and Video)
Living a Balanced Life Week 8 (Teaching Outline)
Living a Balanced Life
(An In-Depth Study of First John)
Week 8
Commentary
The Abiding Word
1 John 2:18-29
Outline
As we come to the end of chapter two one thing is abundantly clear; John loves God and John loves the children of God. In John’s day, just like today, truth for a majority was relative. To those who left the church and sound doctrine, truth changed with popular culture. They saw themselves as “progressives”. They understood truth as the latest teaching designed by the human heart. John assures his readers that the truth never changes. Whether the 1st century or the 21st century, “that which was from the beginning”, the message delivered by Christ to the Apostles and then to the church, has not changed. Nothing new has been added. The message is the Gospel. Inside this truth is found a deep and abiding love for God which overflows toward others. John reaffirms the core of Christianity, saying that either we exhibit the sound doctrine, obedience, and love that characterize all Christians, or else we are not true Christians.
In John’s mind, the truth does not originate from inside a person. If a person is found with the truth in them, John makes it clear that God is at work. John makes this point with the use of two words that are not common to most casual conversations; “abiding” and “anointed”. Truth is revealed by an anointing of the Spirit of God and an abiding in the Word of God. It’s no wonder John strongly encourages us to “abide in Him”. (1 John 2:28) This being the case, John would agree that a professing Christian that is never abiding in the Word of God and never praying is living a life that is prone to following lies (antichrist).
However, in this section of Scripture, filled with warnings about the spirit of antichrist found in this last hour, rests some of John’s most encouraging and assuring words to all those who are truly born again. John is confident that the truth is in you by the power of the Holy Spirit. (vs 20) He is confident that the truth that you heard from the beginning is such a part of your life that you will abide in the Son and the Father. (vs 24) In other words, both a theological depth and an intimate personal experience with the truth (God) is found in the life of every believer. This keeps life balanced. This establishes and maintains our system of values. Despite the power of the spirit of antichrist in the world, John knows believers will persevere. He remembers Jesus’ teaching… “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)
Understanding the Times
Verse 18 is chiastic in structure:
A. This is the last hour
B. Antichrist is coming
B′. Many antichrists have come
A′. This is the last hour
The first part of v. 19 (like v. 18) is chiastic:
A. They went out from us
B. They did not really belong to us
B′. If they had belonged to us
A′. They would have remained with us.
Result: We live in a last hour of great deception.
The WORD and the SPIRIT
Anointed: Truth is a gift (vs 20; 27)
Abiding: Truth never changes (vs 24a)
Persevering: Truth always keeps (19, 24b, 2 John 9)
LIFE APPLICATION
Lifestyle of the anointed is to abide
Abiding gives rise to:
- Growth in understanding
- Power to practice the truth
- Ever increasing confidence
Living a Balanced Life Week 7 (Audio and Video)
Living a Balanced Life Week 7 (Teaching Outline)
Living a Balanced Life
(An In-Depth Study of First John)
Week 7
Commentary
Seek First the Kingdom
1 John 2:15-17
Outline
It has been said that the human heart is an idol factory. It should be abundantly obvious that God, our creator, designed us to worship. For, worship we do. The problem, ever since the rebellion in the garden, is we worship idols and not the only one worthy of worship. John is not unaware of the allure of created things. He knows that everything the world offers is not only temporary, but if worshipped (or loved) always leads the worshipper away from God.
Therefore, our text for this session contains one bold commandment; “Do not love the world or the things in the world.” John learned at the feet of Jesus. No doubt he remembers the time that Jesus gave similar warnings…“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” (Matthew 6:24) John, like Jesus, is saying that no one can love both the world and God at the same time. John is stating that our allegiance must not be divided. Our affection must be focused and specific.
John’s view of love for God comes from the understanding that the highest form of love is founded on loyalty and commitment. For John, and for us, to form allegiance with the world is to declare opposition to God. Once again we come face-to-face with a life balance issue. John is not requiring us to rid ourselves of material possessions. He is simply and boldly requiring us to rid ourselves of misguided affections. He is requiring that the way we live our life reflect the way Jesus lived his. “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” (Matthew 6:33)
The question we ask ourselves would be…is my desire for home, family, and career first and foremost a desire for God? Do I desire dinner because I desire God? Do I want a job because in it I will discover God and love God? Do I long for a spouse because I am hungry for God and hope to see him and love him in my husband/wife? Do I desire the child and the healthy body and the good night’s rest and the morning sun and the great book and the evening with friends for God’s sake? Do I have an eye for God in everything I desire? (See Colossians 3:17; 1 Corinthians 10:31.)
Main Point (vs 15)
Do not love the world or the things in the world.
Four reasons why:
- If you love the world, you don’t love God
- Everything of the world is not of God
- The world is passing away
- The one who does the will of God abides forever
What is the world’s?
- The desires of the flesh
- The desires of the eyes
- The pride of life
John’s Idea of Eternal Life
Faith (believe) and Love for God
- Inseparable
- “Trust in Christ” and “Love for God” to John are the same
- No love for God, no saving faith
Example – Repentance
Big difference between ‘self-righteous repentance’ and ‘gospel-centered repentance’
Self-righteous: repentance only out of fear of God’s anger and punishment; repentance for ‘being bad’ or ‘doing wrong things’
Gospel-centered: repentance out of love for God and his commands, knowing He loves us always as a Father loves his child; repentance not merely from bad actions, but from the very desire to seek the flesh/world/sin instead of God; from a desire to have a living and active relationship with God
LIFE APPLICATION
Boast only in the Lord
God is in ALL of life, Desire God!
Living a Balanced Life Week 6 (Audio and Video)
Living a Balanced Life Week 6 (Teaching Outline)
Living a Balanced Life
(An In-Depth Study of First John)
Week 6
Commentary
The Victorious Christian Life
1 John 2:12-14
Outline
I share my father’s name. At 16 years of age, I walked into the showroom of my local motorcycle dealer and financed the motorcycle of my dreams with that name. This was a time in banking before social security numbers. The bank assumed that my father was purchasing this rocket ship. I lived in a small town and conducted business with a small town banker and before the deal was closed my banker discovered that it was my father’s 16 year old son that was requesting the loan. In spite of the fact I had no credit experience, the banker approved the loan. His reasoning???… “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree”. I rode off in a blaze of glory!
Like me riding the coattails of my father’s credit history, the Apostle John assures every true believer that they are victorious in the name. The first and most fundamental offering of encouragement John gives his readers is the fact they are forgiven of sins and that forgiveness remains effective in their lives. This forgiveness occurs because the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ made the mercy and grace of God available to those who repent of their sins and believe in the name of Jesus.
Every verb in our text (vs 12-14) is in the perfect tense. In other words, the power in this name (Jesus), stands for the person and completed work of Jesus in its totality; Jesus proclaimed from the cross, “It is finished”. Therefore, John is stating that everyone who confesses the name of Jesus is saved and as a result of that confession they now have access to the power of that name.
John states that we overcome the ‘evil one’ (Satan). This victory implies battles. It is through prayer and the Word that every believer has communion with the Father and gains direction and power for the battle. In this session we will explore who this battle is with and how it is we overcome the enemy. This victorious strength comes from our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, whose victory over the evil one grants us the ability to triumph. (1 John 5:4)
Why does John address three groups?
- Little children – the church
- Fathers – Leaders
- Young Men – the strong
The pattern in John’s letter:
- Assurance
- Vigilance
Summing up the pattern so far in the letter:
- (1:7) If we walk in the light…ours sins are cleansed (2:12) Your sins ARE forgiven!
- (2:4) If you don’t keep the commandments, you are a liar and the truth is not in you (2:13) But you DO KNOW HIM!
- (3:8) Live in sin and you are of the Devil (2:13) But you have OVERCOME the evil one!
Overcoming the evil one (vs 14b)
Young men who are strong:
- Overcome the evil one
- Have the Word of God abiding in them (Prayer and the Word)
The Word of God overcomes Satan
Satan’s MO:
- Accuse Christians regarding sins past (Rev. 12:10-11) / (1 John 2:1-2)
- Tempt Christians into future sin (John 8:32; 17:17) / (1 John 2:14b)
LIFE APPLICATION
Lies can only be defeated by the TRUTH
Let the Word abide in you!
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