The Christian’s assurance concerning salvation (vs. 13)
“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.”
One of the purposes of John’s letter was to convince the unbelieving, Gnostic follower that Jesus was the Christ.
But here in chapter five John gives us another reason for this letter—it was to assure believers of the eternal life they possess and spur them on toward continued faith in Jesus Christ.
One of the first satanic attacks against the young believer is to cast doubt into his mind concerning his salvation.
The moment you repent (a turning away from your sins and turning to Jesus Christ), a spiritual transaction takes place. The Bible calls it the new birth. The Gospel of John, chapter three, calls it being “born again.”
Peter says you are called out of darkness into God’s wonderful light:
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. (1 Peter 2:9)
Paul says that you are rescued from the domain of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of God’s beloved Son (Col 1:13).
You are now called a “Child of God;” a “saint;” a “beloved”
Eph 1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,
Eph 1:4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love
Eph 1:5 He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will,
Eph 1:6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.
Eph 1:7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace,
Eph 1:8 which He lavished upon us. In all wisdom and insight
All these blessings had nothing to do with you. It was all by His grace! You couldn’t purchase it; the price was too high. You didn’t deserve it; you were a sinner. You couldn’t earn it; the cost was too great. You didn’t find salvation; you and I were the ones who were lost. Salvation had to be purchased for us and freely given to us.
If I couldn’t purchase it, I don’t have to worry about someone stealing it from me.
If I didn’t deserve it, I don’t have to worry about falling into a state of unworthiness and no longer meriting it.
If I couldn’t earn it, I don’t have to worry about wrestling with self-pride.
If I couldn’t find salvation, I don’t have to worry about losing it.
When God gives salvation to the repentant sinner, He doesn’t take it away. We can’t even give it back.
John 10:28 and I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish; and no one shall snatch them out of My hand.
John 10:29 "My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand.
2 Corinthians 1:22 teaches that God has sealed the Christian and given us His Spirit in our hearts as a pledge.
In the Bible a seal is a sign of authenticity. If someone wanted to prove something was real, he would put a seal on it. A seal was also used to signify a completed transaction. When someone sold a plot of land, a seal confirmed the agreement between the buyer and the seller (e.g., Jer. 32:7-15). Most birth certificates issued have an embossed state seal on them to prove they are real.
Scripture also refers to a seal as a sign of authority. When someone acted as a representative for a king, he would carry the king's seal with him. That proved he represented the king's authority.
Scripture mostly uses the seal as a sign of security. When the Bible says we are “sealed with the Spirit,” that means we are secure.
The best Old Testament illustration of that appears in Daniel 6: "The king commanded, and they brought Daniel, and cast him into the den of lions. Now the king spoke and said unto Daniel, Your God, whom you serve continually, He will deliver you. And a stone was brought, and laid upon the mouth of the den; and the king sealed it with his own signet, and with the signet of his lords, that the purpose might not be changed concerning Daniel" (vv. 16-17).
When you are sealed with the Spirit, that means God's purpose in salvation can never be changed. The seal of our security is the Holy Spirit Himself, who assures us by His ongoing intercessory work. That is why in Ephesians 1:13 He is called the "Holy Spirit of promise. "
Ephesians 1:13 says, “In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation--having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise…”
So John writes in back in verse 13 of chapter five, “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.”
His purpose for writing this letter is so that his readers might believe that God incarnated Himself—that He took on human flesh—by believing in this his readers would have eternal life.
Greek scholar Kenneth Wuest comments that John’s purpose for this epistle is not merely that we may have eternal life by believing but that we may know that we have it.
Do you know that eternal life had nothing to do with you?
Do you know that it was all by His grace?
Do you know that you couldn’t purchase it; the price was too high?
Do you know that you didn’t deserve it; you were a sinner?
Do you know that you couldn’t earn it; the cost was too great?
Do you know that you didn’t find salvation and that you were the one that was lost?
Do you know that salvation had to be purchased for you and freely given to you?
John says in verse 13, “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.”
The Christian’s confidence concerning prayer (vs. 14-15)
1 John 5:14 And this is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
1 John 5:15 And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.
John writes, “This is the confidence.” The word confidence literally means, “freedom of speech.” It also means cheerful courage, boldness and assurance. John is speaking of the attitude the Christian is to have toward a God that both hears and answers our prayers.
What kind of attitude do you have when it comes to approaching God in prayer? Do you believe that God is approachable? Perhaps you grew up under a parent or some authority in your life that was not approachable.
Do you believe that God will hear you when you come before Him in prayer? Do you have the assurance or the confidence that He will answer your prayers?
The word “ask” in verse 14 is in the present tense in the Greek and speaks of continuous action. The idea here is “asking continually for something for ourselves.” Here John is referring to the kind of prayer that we are asking in our own interest.
In the book of James we are chastised for going to God in prayer with selfish motives (4:3). But here in 1 John we are encouraged to come before God for ourselves—to petition God for things that concern us because the focus is not on whether or not our motives are pure; the focus in verse 14 is on the truth that God hears us when we pray.
If we know that God hears us when we pray we should come to Him with confidence and assurance that He will answer our prayers.
Commenting on this passage Pastor John Piper notes that God is eager to attend to our prayers. Piper says, “God is like Eric Liddell, the great Olympic runner of Chariots of Fire, with his feet planted waiting for the gun. Our prayers are the gun. When the gun goes off, Eric Liddell explodes from the starting line. When God hears our prayers, He explodes into action. And our happiness in Him is His prize at the end of the race.”
Last Tuesday at our LIFE Group, Gwen brought some of her hand-made jewelry over and some of our sisters were looking at the beautiful pieces and trying some of them on. My two-year-old granddaughter Taya (picture) had a bunch of the jewelry around her little neck and on her arm and wrist.
When it was time to put the jewelry away, Taya knew that she would be asked to return it to Gwen and so she tried to slip away without anyone noticing her. Taya’s mom called her back and whispered something in her ear which caused her to slowly approach me.
As she got closer, I knew what she wanted. I leaned over and asked, “Do you want Grandpop to buy you some jewelry.” As everyone was looking on, Taya quickly nodded her head. It was one of those “Kodak moments” and I would have purchased the entire lot of jewelry if I had the money—but I didn’t have a cent on me.
The Bible teaches us that God is waiting for us to come before Him in prayer. He loves to lavish His provision, gifts and blessings on His children if we would just ask Him. But unlike me, He has the means to cover it!
John Piper says that God is like the father with the prodigal son, who when he sees his long-lost son far off in the distance, he just can't wait, so he runs out to meet him and gives him a bear hug. It's as though God were on his tip-toes in anticipation of doing us good.
Our heavenly Father is sitting on the edge of His throne of grace eager to hear our prayers and do us good. 2 Chronicles 16:9 shows this same anticipation on God's part. "The eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that he may strongly support those whose heart is completely his." Our prayers are like smoke signals spelling out, "SOS." God loves to answer the cry for help.
One of my favorite passages of Scripture is found in Hebrews chapter four. It says:
Heb 4:14 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.
Heb 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.
Heb 4:16 Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.
The writer is saying that God understands what we are going through—He is not like the deist’s version of the clockmaker-God who wound up the clock at the beginning of creation and went away on a trip leaving us to fend for ourselves.
He is the very-much-involved God who sympathizes with us in our weaknesses because He, in the person of His Son Jesus Christ, became one of us and has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.
The writer of Hebrews encourages us, like John, to draw near to God with confidence—draw near to God with assurance—draw near to God in prayer—take it to Him, He understands and cares! Find His grace to help in the time of your need, the writer says.
There is a song written with lyrics that are based on this passage. The song is called Mercy Seat.
In the darkness, where everything is unknown
I faced the power of sin on my own
I did not know of a place I could go
Where I could find a way to heal my wounded soul
He said that I could come into His presence without fear
Into the holy place where His mercy hovers near
I'm running, I'm running, I'm running to the mercy seat
Where Jesus is calling, He said His grace would cover me
His blood will flow freely, It will provide the healing
I'm running to the mercy seat, I'm running to the mercy seat
Are you living where hope has not been?
Lost in a curse of a lifetime of sin
Look, the illusions, they never come true
I know where there's a place of mercy for you
He said that you could come into His presence without fear
Into the holy place where His mercy hovers near
Come running, come running, come running to the mercy seat
Where Jesus is calling, His grace will be a covering
His blood will flow freely, It will provide the healing
Come running to the mercy seat
Back in 1st John, we are told, “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.”
But there is a problem that many of us experience when it comes to prayer. If God is so eager to answer our prayers, why have we all experienced (more often than not) the times that God has not granted the petitions we’ve asked of Him?
There is much more teaching in the Bible on answered prayer than unanswered prayer. There are more examples in the Bible where men and women of God cried out to God and He heard and answered-- than specific cases where God was silent when people prayed.
The Scripture doesn't say a lot on the problem of unanswered prayer, but it does provide us a few clues why God would give you the “silent treatment.”
1 Peter 3:7 teaches the husband that if he doesn’t live with her in an understanding way and honor her that his prayers would be hindered.
James 4:3 teaches that requests brought to God with selfish motives will not be fulfilled.
We saw several weeks ago in 1 John 3:22 that if we disobey God's commandments, our prayers won't be answered.
And in our passage this morning in 1 John 5:14 there is an all-important qualifier attached to our prayers. "If we ask anything according to his will, He hears us." The problem for many people is that they pray for things that are not according to the will of God.
How does one pray according to the will of God?
Last Tuesday our LIFE Group had an activity where we split off into smaller groups and had to come up with five prayers that God was sure to say “yes” to. These were to be prayers that we knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that God would grant.
We all agreed that the kind of prayer that gets answered was the kind of prayer that was based on Scripture. So it didn’t surprise me when each group shared their prayers; most were either Bible verses or prayers based on a verse of Scripture.
Praying according to the will of God is praying according to Scripture. In other words, why would you ask God for something that the Bible forbids the Christian to possess.
In Titus 3:1-2 Paul tells Titus, a pastor, to “Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men.”
Pastors would do well to that passage of Scripture into a prayer.
Now, is John saying that before the Christian prays, he or she should diligently search the Bible before uttering a word? I don’t think this is what he is saying.
There are going to be times when we won’t have the time to search the Scripture—like the time when one of my children was born premature. Just after the doctor had delivered her 2lb frame, they fought to maintain her heart rate—I didn’t have time to search the Scripture for God’s will—I just prayed!
I remember the time some years ago when our kitchen stove caught on fire—I didn’t have time to seek the Scripture for the will of God. I was praying while I put out the fire!
Perhaps this means that we ought to take the time to familiarize ourselves with the will of God as expressed in His Word, the Bible so that when it comes time for us to pray we already know His will.
But there are also going to be situations that you and I will encounter that the Bible doesn’t specifically address. For example, when you are ready to purchase a car, is there anything in the Bible about cars? Does God’s Word let us know explicitly about whether we should get a Nissan or a BMW?
God purposed that His written Word would not address in specifics every situation that we could ever go through or else a million Libraries of Congress would not be big enough to contain them. God ingeniously created a book that addresses the generalities of our experiences and when sought through the power of His Spirit, addresses the specifics.
Thus Paul writes in 2 Timothy 3:16, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
When it comes to prayer, the Bible lets us know that there are going to be times when we don’t even know how we ought to pray His will. Even though we have studied the Scriptures we still won’t know how to appropriate them in prayer.
There are going to be times when we are tempted to pray not as we ought because the weakness of our flesh and the propensity of our flesh to pray self-centered prayers—it is in these times that God’s Spirit comes alongside the believer to help us to pray. This is what Paul teaches in Romans 8:
Rom 8:26 And in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words;
Rom 8:27 and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
John’s point back in our text is that God is chomping at the bit and ready to hear our requests and respond to them but there are conditions to our prayers. John lets us know that when we come to God, we should do so with the stipulation, “If it be thy will.”
1 John 5:14 And this is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
1 John 5:15 And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.
Praying according to the will of God.
Mat 6:5 "And when you pray, you are not to be as the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners, in order to be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.
Mat 6:6 "But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will repay you.
Mat 6:7 "And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition, as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.
Mat 6:8 "Therefore do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need, before you ask Him.
Mat 6:9 "Pray, then, in this way: 'Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy name.
Mat 6:10 'Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.
What is praying according to the will of God?
Praying according to the will of God means having the right concept of God.
He is our sovereign God. His will cannot be thwarted. In Job 42:2 Job says to the Lord, “I know that Thou canst do all things, And that no purpose of Thine can be thwarted.”
In Isaiah 46:9-1 God says, “I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things which have not been done, Saying, 'My purpose will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure'.”
God is not a cosmic genie. We do not go shopping in God’s department store and with God’s credit card in order to meet our own desires.
You and I would do well to pray for the things that God wills and purposes and pray against the things that God condemns.
Praying according to the will of God is confining your prayers to requests that align with His plans and purposes and result in His glory.
Answered prayer is always going to result in God’s glory. This is why we don’t get some of the things that we ask God for—they will not bring God glory.
Someone has said, “Prayer means asking God to do His will which we have embraced. In other words, when we make God’s will to be our will, our will will be done because it is His will, and His will is done always.”
Praying according to the will of God means that I must surrender my own will.
In Mark 14:36 Jesus said as He prayed, "Abba, Father, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will."
Sometimes God takes the Christian into uncharted arenas of uncertainty, struggle and pain—and we are inclined to look for the easy road and we pray for the easy road.
We must remember to pray as Jesus did, acknowledging God’s ability to deliver us but also our resolve to trust Him on the road of suffering that He has placed us on.
Praying according to the will of God means accepting the fact that we will grow when God says “No.”
A car was being driven along the road. The wealthy mother sat on the front seat and the maid, caring for her spoiled baby, on the back seat. The child began screaming for something. The mother impatiently said, "Why don't you let him have what he wants?" The nurse let him have it.
What he was crying for was a wasp on the window. Then he really screamed when he felt the terrible sting of the wasp. The mother then called out to ask, "What is the matter with him now?" The maid quietly replied, "He got what he wanted."
If you are a parent, think of all the times your children have asked you for things that would hurt them. Think of all the “No’s” you’ve uttered from your mouth that have helped your child to grow and mature as he or she rested in your wisdom.
God is a wise and loving Father who grants to His children only the things that would help them not harm them.
I. Sanctification, avoiding sexual immorality and impurity is God’s will for us.
1 Th 4:3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality;
1 Th 4:4 that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor,
1 Th 4:5 not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God;
1 Th 4:6 and that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter because the Lord is the avenger in all these things, just as we also told you before and solemnly warned you.
1 Th 4:7 For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification.
1 Th 4:8 Consequently, he who rejects this is not rejecting man but the God who gives His Holy Spirit to you.
II. Wise living is God’s will for us
Eph 5:15 Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise,
Eph 5:16 making the most of your time, because the days are evil.
Eph 5:17 So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.
III. Avoiding worldliness and pursuing spiritual transformation is God’s will for us
Rom 12:1 I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
Rom 12:2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
IV. Continued rejoicing, ceaseless prayer and constant thanksgiving is God’s will for us.
1 Th 5:16 Rejoice always;
1 Th 5:17 pray without ceasing;
1 Th 5:18 in everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.
V. Suffering is God’s will for us
1 Pet 4:19 Therefore, let those also who suffer according to the will of God entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right.
The story is told of a small town in which there were no liquor stores. Eventually, however, a nightclub was built right on Main Street. Members of one of the churches in the area were so disturbed that they conducted several all-night prayer meetings, and asked the Lord to burn down that den of iniquity. Lightning struck the tavern a short time later, and it was completely destroyed by fire.
The owner, knowing how the church people had prayed, sued them for the damages. His attorney claimed that their prayers had caused the loss. The congregation, on the other hand, hired a lawyer and fought the charges.
After much deliberation the judge declared, "It's the opinion of this court that wherever the guilt may lie, the tavern keeper is the one who really believes in prayer while the church members do not!"
Let’s begin to pray according to the will of God no matter what the cost and here is one more thing we can pray about that is according to the will of God:
2 Pet 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
Praying according to the will of God is praying that as many as possible would come to know the forgiveness of sins that is offered in Jesus Christ.
