FELLOWHIP DEEPER WITH GOD
First John 1:5-2:2
Last week we kicked off our First John Series and will continue with this for the next few weeks. Just as a small review of where we visited last week, we saw John writing his letter to Christians to reassure and encourage us in our faith. We saw three areas John was concerned about in the first four verses of Chapter 1. They involved the “Word of life,” the fact we needed God’s Word and it was life, second the need for “eternal life’” through Christ Jesus, and thirdly fellowship. We camped out on fellowship last week mainly fellowship with each other and those in surrounding communities. How was our fellowship, was it grounded in the “Word of God,” was it “mutual” meaning was God involved or where you involved on your own, and last it must be renewed, our fellowship must be renewed on a daily basis not just on Sunday, mornings.
We spoke a little bit on our fellowship with God last week, but mostly on our fellowship with each other and those around us. Today we will explore what it means to have fellowship with our Creator God.
LET’S READ FIRST JOHN 1:5-2:2
Why do we need to have fellowship with God? And how do we have fellowship with God? Through these verses we will uncover the whys and hows of fellowshipping with God today.
1st – Why have fellowship with God.
Verse 5 states – reread
Because “God is light” we should desire to fellowship with Him and see the goodness, the righteousness, and truth that exists in Him. For isn’t this what we seek in a friend? We don’t have to question these attributes in God, because He is truth, light, good, and righteous. Who would not want to have fellowship with someone like this? And to go further one can find that “in him there is no darkness at all.” Sometimes even with the best of our friends they have a shady or dark corner, an area that may not be so great. But, with God, and with our fellowship with Him, He has no dark areas, no dark sides. And we know this because darkness would represent the exact opposite of what John is telling us in that God is the light. The darkness John is talking about here would represent evil, unrighteousness, and falsehood, and God is none of these.
So with some understanding of who God is and why one would want to have fellowship with Him lets look at another area.
Look back over verses 6 -10 with me..
II. Let’s look over some false claims concerning our fellowship with God.
With these verses John is speaking of what our fellowship with God should not be like. We see in verses 6 – 7 John talking about us having fellowship with God but we “walk in the darkness.” If any of you have ever walked in a section of woods or a forest at night you know how dark, dark can be right? This is no different if you claim to fellowship with God yet you continue to be the one walking in darkness. Your life your world your surroundings are pitch black dark. When you feel you are in fellowship with God or just claiming to be so, you are walking in the in darkness yes but even worse you are going against everything God stands for. God is not evil, God does not do wrong, He is light, He is truth. So we go against all this when we walk in the darkness but yet claim we are in fellowship with our God.
So exactly what does that mean if I am claiming to be in fellowship with God yet I am in the darkness? First we are false in our Words, meaning we are lying, we lie to ourselves and we are lying to our God, but yet He already knows this. Second we are false in our Deeds, meaning we due not practice the truth everything we do is to gain for ourselves and not in the light of God. But if we will instead walk in the light and not the darkness we then will live a life in harmony with God’s, “goodness, righteousness, and truth.”
Then family and only then will we experience the fellowship we are to have with our God. Then we will be able to share the life which is eternal and full of joy.
When we move along to verses 8 – 9 we see John describing and speaking of sin. John is still instructing us on how to have great and joyful fellowship with God and yes sin can cause us to walk in the darkness he was just describing to us in the past few verses. Some may look at these two verses and feel that since they became a Christian that they have become sinless. Not so. And if you feel that you have become sinless because you are a Christian you are breaking your fellowship with God because you are deceiving yourself or basically living a lie, your living a life in error, because even the best of all Christians still sin, and you are walking in the darkness John was speaking of earlier.
Christian family we all sin, we have not become sinless just because we have become saved from hell. We need to freely confess our sins to God and because God is faithful and trustworthy as spoke of earlier He will “forgive us of our sins”, He will “cleanse us from all unrighteousness” and He did so and continues to do so through the crucifiction of His only begotten Son Jesus Christ. And because of this because of the mercy God has for us God continues to make this all possible for us to continue to walk in the light of His fellowship and not the darkness of our sin.
Continuing with speaking of sin and how it pulls at our fellowship with God John continues in verse 10 stating –
Re-read verse 10
These are strong words. Claiming as a Christian we have not sinned makes God out to be a liar. How blasphemous this statement could be in our lives if we were to make such a claim. How disasterous this could be stating God is a liar and His Word means nothing. How could anyone make such a claim about their life and sin, and how could one have true fellowship with God making this claim and enjoy it?
Remember this that fellowship with God does not occur by making claims that turn God into a liar.
Let’s look over verses 1 and 2 of chapter 2 once more.
Remember back to last week we learned that one reason John wrote First John was to teach us about not sinning. John has not written this two verses to encourage us to go about sinning and all will be will, but to discourage us not to sin.
The last area I want to talk about this morning is to have fellowship with God we must have an advocate.
When we read verse one of Chapter 2 we see John telling us that “we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense-Jesus Christ the Righteous One.” When we hear the word advocate one might think of a patient advocate one who advocates to help you with your medical needs, or a court advocate for a child who stands in and helps the child during the court process, and the word advocate means to call to one’s side, to one’s aid. Generally an advocate is one who pleads another’s case, intercedes on one’s behalf.
Who can think of a better advocate, a free advocate, a Man who paid it all including His life for you and for me to have unrestricted access to our God. The reason we need Jesus as our advocate to be able to have fellowship with God is because as sinners we are alienated from God. And since Jesus Christ whom was, still is, and will forever be the only human that walked the face of earth He is the perfect, the righteous, the only representative that can come before God on our behalf. Our advocate King Jesus.
So in order to have any fellowship with God whatsoever we have to have Jesus Christ as our Savior to be our advocate to our Father God.
To conclude today’s message on First John and the need for fellowship with God and enjoy the fullness of God completely we must as Christians not walk in the darkness, but in the light and glory of God’s awesomeness, His goodness, His righteousness, and truth.
And a step we must all realize is we have to admit we are still sinners, who will continue to sin, and must use Jesus Christ as our advocate, whom God gave us to forgive us of our sins.
Maybe you don’t have Jesus as your advocate yet, make today the day you choose life over death and ask King Jesus to be your Savior.
