1 John 1:1 What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we beheld and our hands handled, concerning the Word of Life--
2 and the life was manifested, and we have seen and bear witness and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us--
3 what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, that you also may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
4 And these things we write, so that our joy may be made complete.
5 And this is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.
6 IF WE SAY that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth;
7 but if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
8 IF WE SAY that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
10 IF WE SAY that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.
So, what are some things we say that get us into trouble? What are some things we say that are false claims? What are some things we say that reveal where we stand with God and others?
The end of this chapter has three crystal clear “if” statements that have eternal consequences to them and timeless relevance in them.
If we say… John repeats this statement three times and each time he warns against false teachings that produce deceived disciples who abandon the truth of God for a lie. Lies do not bring life, and those who live by lies lose eternal life.
Jesus said in John 8:42-47 (read)
1 John helps us apply Jesus’ words to our lives and enjoy the blessings and benefits of walking in fellowship with Him and one another.
I personally am excited for us to study through first John together. It is one of the most simple and practical New Testament books on the ethics of the Christian life. It uses grand themes of the Christian faith to refute and correct false teachings. It has a beautiful positive message for every Christian and offers clear assurance of eternal life to obedient believers. John 5:13 states it concisely: These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, in order that you may KNOW that you have eternal life.
1 John… Someone has called it “Little John.” (I suppose that would make the gospel “Big John”). We have studied through the gospel of John, John’s book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, and now finally, we will finish our study of John’s writings in the New Testament as we go through these three small letters of John.
Let me introduce the book a bit before we look at those “if” statements at the end of chapter 1.
Many commentaries believe that these letters are the last ones written by John, and are even perhaps the very last biblical documents to be written in the cannon. Even though Revelation is the last book in the New Testament this does not necessarily mean that it was the last book to be written! It was collected as the last book because it is different than all the others. It is a prophecy. The New Testament is in this order: Gospels, history, Paul’s early epistles, late epistles, the general epistles (including 1-3 John) and finally, the one book of prophecy. Someone has noted that John’s Greek actually improves grammatically in the gospels and letters, with Revelation being the weakest Greek grammar of all of John’s writing. Therefore, if John is getting better at writing, he would have written Revelation first and the gospel and letters last. John has proven to be the most versatile writer in the New Testament, penning a Gospel, three epistles, and a book of prophecy.
It may interest you to know that only Revelation has John’s name as its author in it, and it does so four times. On the other hand, the gospel of John carefully preserves the author’s anonymity, nowhere does it openly say who wrote it. On the other hand, the letters of 1-3 John seem to assume that those who receive it will know who the writer is. It is warmly personal and filled with nurturing language. But when it speaks of those who are against the truth, it has some language of fire as well.
The overall theme is walking in the life God gives us in Jesus Christ. There is a strong sense of returning to our first love. John seems to have written this after the first generation of Christians has grown old and another new generation of Christians is needing guidance. One grave danger is that the next generation will want something new and improved and depart from the truth. When the newness wears off, what happens next?
By the time John writes this, there is a doctrinal struggle within the church. They have faced the suffering of persecution, but perhaps now that has lessened. Now, while it is peaceful some of the Christians of the new generation begin to want to make Christianity fit into the world around them. They want a faith that is hip, you know, one that works well in the philosophy of the times.
Three major heresies arose late in the first century that came into full bloom in the second: the Docetae, the Nicolaitans, and the Gnostics. Each of these groups came out of the Christian church when Greek philosophy was used to update and improve on the Word of life. John addresses these and calls them liars, deceivers and antichrists!
That tells us how the apostle of love felt about tampering with the truth of God’s word!
We will point out these as we go through John’s letter.
But let us turn to the first chapter now and let’s listen and learn from God’s word together.
Everything in verses 1-5 leads up to the application in verses 6-10, and indeed, the rest of the book.
Look at verse 3-4 (read)
John tells us his purposes here:
1. We proclaim the word of life to you that you may have fellowship with us, that would be the church the Father and the Son.
2. We write these things so that our joy may be made complete.
We want fellowship and we want complete joy. These are what God’s word brings: eternal life, fellowship with God and one another and complete joy!
Those are good things, wouldn’t you say?
Where can you find them? Only in the light of God through Jesus Christ.
Now we hear some “if” statements that tell us there are threats of lies and deceptions that are creeping in and distorting the truth.
John is saying: If you hear so called Christians saying these things, realize what you are dealing with! There is no improving on the truth of God.
Verse 6 - If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth;
Don’t rush to verse 7 before you let this message sink in. What happens when you see someone claiming to be a Christian and yet you hear them use foul language or show bad attitudes or act in ungodly ways? What if they claim to be a Christian but act like the world, dress immodestly like the world, talk like the world and entertain themselves like the world? What does that imply about Jesus Christ?
Is Jesus’ life worth imitation? Listen to John 2:3-6
This is just an explanation of what he says here in chapter 1:6-7
6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth;
7 but if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
Who has fellowship with God? Who receives the constant cleansing from all sin?
Some so called Christians today would say that you can simply pray a sinner’s prayer and you are saved so that even if you live in sin thereafter, you can not lose your salvation. John calls those people “liars.”
Children of God walk in the light. We are not perfect, but our goal is to be like Jesus and walk as he walked. There are no perfect husbands or wives, but there are faithful ones. God calls us to be faithful, so that through the blood of Christ we can stand before Him. God perfects us through Christ even while we struggle along as we walk in the light.
The Nicolaitans seem to have swallowed the lie that there was no connection between a person’s behavior and the condition of one’s relationship with God. As if you could sin all you wanted and it simply didn’t matter. In fact, some seemed to pursue perversion and excuse it as God wanting them to know the deep things, even the deep things of Satan. Revelation 2:24 mentions this.
John calls such teaching on the carpet and exposes it for what it is: a lie that destroys fellowship with God and other Christians. It leaves one condemned.
Now look at verses 8-9.
8 If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Again, let verse 8 have its say before charging into verse 9 for comfort.
If we say… we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. Today, sin is redefined and turned into a sickness, a disease, an addiction. Let’s make it a medical matter and then we can remove the guilt. By doing this we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
Let’s just call it “normal behavior” or sowing wild oats. It’s just a bit of harmless fun, nothing really evil or terribly wrong. We’re just playing around… there’s nothing wrong with a little playing around! It’s just entertainment, it’s not really sinful! Besides, nobody’s perfect. Ok, ok… they made a mistake! It’s a MISTAKE. How many excuses are there that refuse to call sin what it is?
If we say…
We can say whatever we want about sin, but if we say anything about it that changes what God says, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. Sin separates us from God. The wages of sin is death. When God talks about sin it is deathly serious.
Sometimes we say we sin, but we laugh it off or talk apologetically without any intention of changing, or repenting, of giving it up. That’s deception too.
Do we want to be people of lies or people of the truth?
People of the truth confess our sins. People of the truth know that only God can deliver us and save us from sin and the death it brings.
But lies are powerful. Listen to the last verse of chapter one:
If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.
Listen to John in chapter 3:3-10 (read)
Do you hear what John is saying here? We know who is of God and who is of the devil by looking at what people do.
Jesus said, “By their fruits you will know them.” A good tree produces good fruit and a bad tree produces bad fruit.
When we don’t take sin seriously and confess it, we make God out to be a liar and His word is not in us. If we say we have not sinned, we might as well say God is a liar.
But, if we walk in the light and confess our sins, God will cleanse us and forgive us and keep us in fellowship with Himself and others. God will give us life and make our joy complete.
