Electrify
Series: Turn the Light On!
Sunday Sermon, November 11, 2007
Intro: Toward the end of the first century, some Christians began drifting away from the truth about Christ. They were losing touch with those who had known Jesus in the flesh as the founders of the church began to die off. They were also being seduced by competing doctrines, especially early forms of Gnosticism. As a result, second- and third-generation believers began to grow cold in their love for each other and lukewarm in their commitment to the truth.
The Apostle John responded to this trend by writing 1, 2, and 3 John. These letters call Christians back to the basics-the truth about Christ and the love of Christ. For that reason, they are crucial for Christians today.
John stresses the themes of:
• Love
• Light
• Knowledge
• And life.
He warnings against:
• Heresy
• False teachers and false prophets
• The deceptive and destructive nature of sin.
John drives home the importance of Christian love.
To be without love is to be without Jesus. To be without Jesus is to be without Life.
The apostle wrote this letter to his dear “little children” (the phrase is used nine times) to help them find assurance of personal salvation and to make their and his joy complete.
John was a Veteran of the Faith. He was likely about 90years old.
I was recently at the funeral of my friend’s father. His Dad was a veteran. At the close service we moved outside so that his fellow veterans could honor his life. They gave Taps, a 21 gun solute and presented my friend with the American flag that had just draped the man’s casket. The words the commander gave that day moved us to reverence and admiration for those who have served and fought for our freedom.
We should all be thankful and honor those who have served and fought OR are now serving and fighting for our freedom.
We should approach John’s letters with such respect. He was the last Apostle standing. In as much as the Kingdom of God is superior to the United States of America we should read with respect.
John MacArthur writes, “When John’s brother James became the church’s first martyr, John bore the loss in a more personal way than the others. As each of the other disciples was martyred one by one, John suffered the grief and pain of additional loss. These were his friends and companions. Soon he alone was left. In some ways, that my have been the most painful suffering of all.”
He was perhaps the last man in the early church-who had actually walked and talked with Jesus. His writing reflects the urgency of that situation. He had to set the church straight.
Mark Driscol calls him: Papa Pastor John / His age and experience a tuned his heart / His words are full of wisdom. These Letters are the Word of God, but they are spoken through the life of the man, John.
John had to root-out the false teaching and lies the enemy had weaseled into the beliefs of those early Christians. The Believer had become unsettled in their security and indeed they were on shaky ground. Truth had been compromised and the Gospel tainted.
John declares, “I am a reliable source, because I am an eyewitness. These false teachers are not credible because they don’t actually know Him.”
He writes to strengthen the faith of the Church and to combat a specific threat to his readers’ faith: Gnosticism. This was a deviant form of Christianity.
• Its adherents’ particular views varied, but they tended to value knowledge as the means of salvation (rather than the Cross),
• They asserted that physical matter was evil, and to teach that the Son of God could not, therefore, have come in the flesh.
• One deadly conclusion the Gnostics drew from there beliefs about physical matter, was sin wasn’t important at all to the sanctification of the spirit. Therefore, they could do whatever they pleased without damaging the spirit.
Text: 1 John 1:1-4 “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— 2 the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— 3 that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.
I. Once you meet Jesus you will never be the same again!
a. Jesus transforms the whole person.
i. Jesus turns the light on for John and electrified his life and passion.
ii. Penned four of the New Testament books, The Gospel of John, I II and III John, and Revelation. And of course the most widely know verse in the Bible: John 3:16
John MacArther, “He wrote than any other New Testament writer about the importance of Love – laying particular stress on the Christian’s love for Christ, Christ’s love for His church, an the love for one another that is supposed to be the hallmark of true believers. The theme of love flows through his writings. But love was a quality he learned from Christ, not something that came naturally to him. In his younger years he was as much a Son of Thunder as James.”
iii. Known as the Apostle of Love; but that wasn’t always his M.O. He was a passionate but brash character.
John MacArther also writes, “If you imagine that John was the way he was often portrayed in medieval art – a meek, mild, pale-skinned, effeminate person, laying around on Jesus’ shoulder looking up at Him with a dove-eyed stare – forget that caricature.”
iv. When we first meet John he is a disciple of John the Baptist.
v. Same fiery personality. He and his brother James got along great with John the Baptist.
vi. John and his older brother James and are rarely seen apart from each other. They were best friends.
b. John’s amazing passion for the truth.
i. This passion shows up in the harshest ways
ii. Once they asked Jesus if he wanted them to call fire down from Heaven onto the Samaritans.
iii. This was the typical attitude of these “soldiers of Truth.”
iv. Love didn’t nullify the Apostle John’s passion for truth.
v. Rather, it gave him the balance he needed.
vi. He retained to the end of his life a deep and abiding love for God’s truth, and he remained bold in proclaiming it to the very end.
vii. Under the control of the Holy Spirit, all his liabilities were exchanged for assets.
viii. Time had not settled his passion down.
ix. John knew the necessity of drawing a clear line.
• He says all he says without qualification and without any softening of the hard lines.
• He spoke in black-and-white, absolute, certain terms, and he did not waste ink coloring in all the gray areas.
I was listening to guy this week tell a story of when he first visited the Grand Canyon, He arrived in the middle of the night and there was no moon that night. The sky was pitch-black. He drove up into the park, pulled off the road. Got his sleeping bag from the truck, stretched it out on the ground and went to sleep. In the morning, he reached out his arm to stretch awake. He noticed his hand didn’t touch the ground. As he looked he could see, that he was two feet away from a 500 foot shear cliff. He spent the whole night two feet away from sudden and certain death.
John thinks and writes with these shear differences: Light and Darkness, the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Satan, This is Truth and this is a Lie, this is right and this is wrong.
• John didn’t spend time in shallow water. Sink or swim was his style.
• In fact, if you look at John’s early years he is the least likely of the Disciples to be known as the Apostle of love. John had one driving passion in those early years, the passion for TRUTH.
• But after three intense years with Jesus, the Lord transformed and melted his heart into one driven by TWO equal passions, Truth AND Love.
John’s eyes were opened. He was driven by a passion FOR the truth. He wanted to sort out and clearly define truth, we wanted to chisel into stone the commandments.
II. Once you meet Jesus you know Truth, Life and Love.
a. All truth is a reflection of Him.
i. Jesus doesn’t just point the Way, teach the truth and illuminate the path leading to eternal life or teach how to love.
ii. This isn’t about self-help. He IS the Way, He IS Truth, He is Love, He is Life.
iii. Jesus isn’t a reflection of the truth of Scripture, or an example of the Law.
All good works apart from Him are filthy rags.
Apart from Jesus there is No way to heaven,
Apart from Jesus there is no light, life or Love.
He is the embodiment of the totality of truth, life and love.
There is no truth apart from Him.
Everything good and true and pure is derived from Jesus.
iv. If Jesus was completely removed, all truth, life, light and love would completely cease.
v. But don’t people who don’t accept Jesus also love their families, don’t they have truth aren’t they alive. Scripture tells us that the law of God is “written” everyone’s heart. What is written on the heart produces temporary results, because God is good. His mercy reaches even the worst of sinners.
vi. However, they don’t have TRUTH they have a reflection of truth written on their hearts. This is written in hope that when they see Jesus, what is written in part on their hearts will recognize Him as it’s completion.
vii. Jesus said, “I want you to abide IN me, and I will abide IN you. And also, apart from me, you can do nothing.”
b. Jesus was manifest to them.
i. Jesus thrusts Himself into our world so we can clearly see him.
ii. This is why John uses the word “Manifest.”
iii. We touched, saw, marveled at him and we heard Him.
• He was and is real.
• He was and is Truth, Life and Love.
c. Now John is declaring to the Church who Jesus is.
i. John knew that the Gnostics were attempting to dismantle Jesus. They weren’t denying Jesus, they just wanted to subtract from Him.
ii. We certainly have modern day Gnostics. People who would not come right out and deny Jesus, but they want to dissect Him, they want to subtract from Him. They wish to add Jesus to something else. Or they want to say, Jesus is a truth. Jesus is a way. They want to say Jesus was a good man, teacher or prophet.
Imagine with me, John standing here at this pulpit saying these words. Listen I’m going to tell you exactly what I saw, what I know is true, I am a first hand witness of, I saw Him with my own eyes, I touched Him, I marveled at Him.
These words may be read with an even, somber meter. But believe me they weren’t written with that attitude. This is man with a passion for His Lord. And now he stands with urgency in His heart by which he writes. He knows what is at stake. He stands as possibly the last of those alive who personally, tangibly knew the Lord. He sees the threat, he knows the truth.
iii. John tells us so that we too may KNOW Jesus and have FELLOWSHIP with Him.
iv. So that Jesus will be Manifest to us.
v. So that we too will KNOW HIM WHO IS TRUTH, LIFE AND LOVE.
vi. SO that we would move away from stale religion and have a passion to fellowship with JESUS and with His people.
Conclusion:
Passion for Truth; Passion for Love; Passion for Jesus
