“I WANT TO KNOW ABOUT FELLOWSHIP & FORGIVENESS”
1 John 1:1-10
FBCF – 8/6/23
Jon Daniels
INTRO – Ever heard of The National Enquirer? It’s one of those tabloid magazines that you see as you’re waiting in line at Walmart w/ all the latest juicy celebrity gossip & hottest entertainment news. Find out about all the scandals, the drama, the gossip, the romances, the breakups, the true crime, the ongoing OJ Simpson saga (did you even know that was still a story???), the latest buzz from the royal family. Right now, you can find out the lowdown about JLo, Rosanne Barr, Jennifer Garner, Michael Douglas, Brangelina, &, of course, the Kardashians. I mean, don’t you need to know about them? Don’t you know that your life is incomplete without this knowledge? Campy commercial in the 80’s – “Inquiring minds want to know.”
Let me be clear: I’m not in any way recommending that you become a regular reader of that worthless rag. But I do want to piggyback on that line from their commercial as we begin a new sermon series today from the book of 1 John. Series title – “I Want to Know About…” Over the course of the next month, we are going to look at some of the topics that are covered in this awesome NT book & the importance of those topics to our lives as Christ-followers.
A significant part of the growth & progress of our spiritual lives is to dig into the Word & into issues & subjects that are essential to our Christian lives – our doctrine – that teaching that is imparted to use by the Bible – & our theology – simply put, the study of God. There is so much rich truth in the Bible, so much to learn, so much opportunity for growth & maturity! We can spend the rest of our lives digging into it & still have so much more to learn. And we SHOULD spend the rest of our lives digging into it. Learning & growing is such an awesome part of the Christian life! Learning about God the Father, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, our salvation, heaven & hell, the Church, our spiritual gifts, marriage & family issues, spiritual warfare, the Word of God, assurance of our eternal life. Knowing what you believe & why you believe it is so important in our world today, & its importance is growing all the time.
Unfortunately, many Christians are content to just know that they’re saved & going to heaven – “I’ll leave all that other stuff to the preachers & professors.” Paul Washer: “No one wants to study doctrine any more. They just want to listen to songs & read the back of Christian t-shirts.”
But 2 Timothy 2:15 tells us to “[Study] Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a worker who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth.” (NASB) So let’s jump into 1 John & start digging into 2 important truths today: fellowship & forgiveness.
EXPLANATION – 1 John 1:1-10
1 John is an awesome NT book. Many people’s favorite book (Mark Sandifer). Written by the apostle John who also wrote the Gospel of John, 2 & 3 John, & Revelation.
Like other NT writers, John wrote this letter to counter a false teaching called Gnosticism. The basic belief of this system was that knowledge is the way to salvation. They taught that in order for someone to attain salvation, they had to understand certain formulas that are only revealed to certain special “enlightened” people who saw themselves as superior to those who did not have the necessary knowledge. They also believed that, since knowledge was all that was necessary for salvation, then they could live any way that they wanted to live.
This is one of the reasons that John emphasized fellowship w/ God & w/ other believers as important. The haughty attitudes of the Gnostics interrupted the fellowship of the true believers in Jesus. And John also emphasized that when you know Jesus, you don’t just live any way you want to live, but you say NO to sin & YES to Jesus.
For us as Christ-followers, the only knowledge that we need to have is that we are saved by GRACE alone through faith alone in Christ alone, not through some special secret knowledge that’s available to just a select group of sophisticated individuals. We have died to sin – We are to walk in the newness of our life in Christ – And we are to love God & love others.
APPLICATION – Fellowship & forgiveness are two awesome blessings that come from knowing Jesus Christ.
FELLOWSHIP IS MORE INTIMATE THAN WE UNDERSTAND IT TO BE – v. 1-4
John starts this letter off by immediately pointing us to Jesus. John had heard Him, seen Him, observed Him, & touched Him. This was serious firsthand knowledge.
Then he makes it abundantly clear that, not only does Jesus GIVE us eternal life – He IS eternal life!
- John 14:6
- John 1:4 – “In Him [Jesus] was life…”
- Acts 3:15 – Peter – “…you killed the Author of life…”
And then John introduces the concept of “fellowship.” When we think of fellowship, we think events/parties, of potluck dinners at the church – dinner on the ground – pizza w/ the youth group. We even call those events “fellowships” – homemade ice cream fellowship – boiled peanut fellowship – men’s…women’s…senior adult…kids’ fellowship.
Nothing necessarily wrong – I love boiled peanuts! I love pizza! I love homemade ice cream!
But the fellowship that we are talking about & that John wrote about is so much more intimate than just sitting around eating. Gk word koinonia – it means “participation.” It means that you enter into relationship. The lifeblood of the Christian life is deep fellowship w/ Jesus & w/ each other in the Body of Christ. You don’t just sit down to eat w/ someone at the churchwide dinner on the grounds – you enter into relationship w/ that person b/c you both share a common bond through your relationship w/ Jesus. That’s what fellowship is. It multiplies joy (“completes” it – v. 4). It meets needs. It motivates prayer. It moves us to worship. It makes life better & stronger & more purposeful.
FORGIVENESS IS MORE NECESSARY THAN WE THINK IT TO BE – v. 5-6, 8
We are sinners in desperate need of God’s forgiveness. But so often, we try to minimize our sins, lie about our sins, & think that our sins really aren’t that bad. We have our categories of the REALLY bad sins & the REALLY bad sinners, & we are secretly thankful that we aren’t one of them.
- We are like the Pharisee in parable Jesus told in Luke 18 – “I thank you, God, that I am not like other people—cheaters, sinners, adulterers. I’m certainly not like that tax collector [or you will in the blank w/ your idea of a really bad sinner]! I fast twice a week, and I give you a tenth of my income.”
But the truth is that the most active church member we have is just as much a sinner as the drug dealer in the inner city, or the abortion doctor, or the drag queen, or the murderer & rapist. The “not so bad sins” committed by the churchgoers will send us to hell just as quickly as the heinous sins of the pagans in the world. We need forgiveness!
- We think we can play around in the darkness & still be in the light – WRONG!
- We think we can live in sin & still be in fellowship w/ God – WRONG!
- We think that as long as we aren’t as bad as someone else, we’re ok – WRONG!
If you don’t know Jesus, you need to be saved today so that you can be set free from the penalty of sin – death & hell. He will forgive you & set you free forever from that penalty.
For those of us who are saved, we’ve been set free from the penalty of sin, but we will have to daily deal w/ the presence & pull of sin. We still need forgiveness!
GOD IS MORE AWESOME THAN WE COMPREHEND HIM TO BE – v. 9
Here’s the great news for today: Forgiveness is available RIGHT NOW from our awesome God!
- Rich Mullins – “Our God is an awesome God…”
“confess” – to agree w/ God – to say the same thing as God. In this verse, it means to say the same thing about our sin as God says about our sin.
- It is heinous & horrible in the sight of God.
- It separates us from God.
- It condemns us before God.
To confess means that we are making no excuses for our sin. We are not going to try to conceal or minimize our sin. We are not going to try to justify our sin. We are not going to try to blame someone else for our sin. It means that, w/ a broken & contrite heart, we are going to admit our sin & we desperately need God’s forgiveness.
The moment we do that, our awesome God faithfully, immediately, & completely forgives us & cleanses us
- He & only He can forgive us!
- He & only He can cleanse us!
- He & only He can purify us!
- He & only He can heal us!
And that’s EXACTLY what He does EVERY TIME WE CONFESS OUR SINS TO HIM! What an awesome God!
- “Our Father is simply inclined to forgive. This distinguishes Him from all invented gods & from all humanity. He is eager to forgive at the slightest hint that we acknowledge our sin & guilt.” (Edward Welch, https://gracequotes.org/topic/god-forgiveness/)
CONCLUSION
- WE GET LIFE FROM JESUS
- WE FELLOWSHIP WITH JESUS
- WE ARE FORGIVEN BECAUSE OF JESUS
So come to Jesus!
