Tag Archives: First Epistle of John

Changing the Rules

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Did you know it is a sin to love the world?  That’s what John said:

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  (1 John 2:15)

But how can that be true, if “God so loved the world…”? (John 3:16a)

Someone once asked me if it was ethical  to keep a valuable guitar. He had been hiking in the wilderness and found it in an old, abandoned house, a home that was evidently abandoned.  He let himself in, looked around and found this rare and beautiful guitar.  Could he keep it?  Was it right?

If you had found that guitar, what would you have decided?   Wouldn’t your “rules” change, depending upon whether or not you thought someone else currently owned the home?  If someone had died and left no heirs, perhaps you would think:  “finders keepers.”  But, if you knew he was still alive but just away on a trip, then taking the guitar would be stealing. What you think it is right to do, would change if you realized you were in someone else’s home.

The same principle is at work when people fail to realize that we live in God’s “home.”   God created this world; it’s His.  Therefore He gets to make the rules.  The rules about what is right and wrong change substantially when you take God out of the equation.   Without God, we assume that we can do whatever seems right to us.  Do you remember in the 60’s when people decided “if it feels good, do it”?  It wasn’t long before we began to discover that that idea wasn’t necessarily accurate.

The “rules” that have been developed since people lost their connection to God, the mindset that assumes that we are in charge of what is right and wrong, is what John calls “the world.”  Jesus coined that term.  The mindset of “the world” is very different from the mindset of Jesus’ “logos.”  If you understand what “the world” means, then this verse that sounds so outrageous begins to make more sense:

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. (1 John 2:15)

We’ll poke and prod this idea next time…

Connections

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Down in the back roads of West Virginia, I met a man who had once known an old guy who fought in the Civil War.  He showed me the house where that guy had been born and had died in the same bed, with his Sharps rifle hanging on the wall.  Although it is unlikely, that guy could have met Abraham Lincoln.  Think about it: Who is your closest connection to antiquity, the person you know who goes back the furthest?

When John “sings his song” to the ones who have followed Jesus the longest, he calls them “fathers” and says this:

I write to you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning.  (1 John 2:13a )

When John “sings” to the newest Christians, he has a couple of different things to say.  Same thing with the “adolescent” believers.  But to the “fathers,” to the mature believers, John repeats this same reminder, word for word:

I write to you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning.  (1 John 2:14a )

What does he mean?  Jesus is the One “who is from the beginning.”   In his Gospel, John opens with these words about Jesus:

In the beginning was the Word (Jesus), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning.  (John 1:1-2)

If you could go back in time and meet just one person, who would it be?  Can you imagine having a chat with one of the Wright brothers, about what it was like to be there for the beginning of flight?   It would be cool to meet Ben Franklin, because he was there at the beginning of this country.  But how about getting to meet Someone Who was “there” at the beginning of everything?  He was not just an observer, but the Creator!

Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. (John 1:3)

John says that He was, that He existed, from the beginning!  He is eternal – timeless.  He is the One, Who “became flesh and made His dwelling among us.” (John 1:14b)

Try to wrap your mind around the enormity of what John is asserting here.  John doesn’t say, “You got to meet him.”  He says, “You fathers have known Him.”   Chances are pretty good that you have met someone famous.  There is a big difference between meeting someone and knowing him.   Knowing means having a deep and intimate relationship with someone.

John reminds those who have followed Jesus for a long time, “Don’t forget, don’t lose touch with this amazing reality, this great privilege.  Since the moment you surrendered by faith to Jesus, He has welcomed you into an authentic relationship.  And He is the One Who has always been.   Imagine!”

Talk about connections…

For Spiritual Teenagers

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When a person discovers the truth about Jesus and surrenders to Him, the first few days and weeks of new life is filled with wonder — and also doubt.  Is it really true my sins are forgiven?  Is God really accessible to me as my Father?  In John’s first letter he “sings a song” to those who experience those doubts.  He calls them “dear children” and reassures them of the truth of  those promises.  (See: No Doubt)

But following Jesus isn’t just about coming to faith in Jesus, it’s a lifelong process of learning to consistently live according to Jesus’ “upside-down” understanding of reality.  Jesus’ teachings tend to contradict the knee-jerk reactions we learn from the world.  His command to love with self-sacrifice is perhaps the most stark example of that (See: John vs. John Lennon).  Living by Jesus’ teachings is only possible by the power of His Holy Spirit within us.

Most of us are like spiritual teenagers.  We have passed the excitement and wonder of new life in Christ and are now experimenting and learning how to live this new life.  Frequently we stumble with painful awkwardness.  John “sings his song” to us, too.  He says:

I write to you, young men,
because you have overcome the evil one  (1 John 2:13b)
I write to you, young men,
because you are strong,
and the word of God lives in you,
and you have overcome the evil one.  (1 John 2:14b)

Addressing us as “young men,” John repeats his most urgent reminder:  “you have overcome the evil one.”  Peter, from first hand experience, knew that “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a restless lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).  Lions look for the weak and the frightened.  They don’t waste their energy on those who know they are strong.   That’s why John wants us to know, in the adolescence of this new life in Christ, that we have overcome the evil one.

How did we do that?  Jesus did it, on our behalf, on the cross.  Without meaning to diminish the sacred significance of the crucifixion in any way, it was the ultimate “rope a dope.”  Jesus allowed Satan to take his best shot.  And then He got back up.  In Him we have overcome Satan.

It doesn’t feel  that way, though, does it?  In a fight, or in most athletic contests, there are many things that happen that cause us to feel as though we have lost.  But the person that knows he will win, the one who can feel it in his bones, generally does win.  In our case, John says, we have already won!  

John also reminds us “adolescents in Jesus” that we are strong.  How so?  It’s not in our own strength, but “…because the Word of God lives in you.”   He doesn’t mean we have memorized a bunch of Scripture, although that is a good thing to do.  It is the “logos” of God, the mind and mindset of God that lives in us by His Holy Spirit.

If you have not yet surrendered to Jesus, keep looking and investigating until you become convinced of Who He really is.  None of this will fully make sense to you until you experience it in Jesus.  If you have surrendered by faith, if you have received the new life of the Holy Spirit, then John wants you to understand that the struggle you experience is a normal part of the deal.  It’s as normal as a teenager’s voice cracking when he tries to ask a girl to go to the prom.   But, as you struggle with these various, normal temptations, remember these truths:  you have already won the fight against Satan, and it is the Spirit of God, the Living Word of God in you in Whom you are strong.

No Doubt

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I was halfway out to my car at the end of a long day.  I thought, “Did I lock the workshop?  Better go back and check.”  I knew it was locked, but I couldn’t get past the feeling of doubt that was seeping into my mind.  I went back and shook the door; it was locked (of course…).  Turned around and went back to the car.  But something inside my head was going, “Are you sure?  Maybe it just seemed locked…”  Did you ever find yourself doubting something you knew was true?  It’s okay; you don’t have to raise your hand.  I think most of us have had moments of doubt like that.

John was a man who had walked with Jesus, saw Him die, and who spoke with Him after his resurrection.  Now, perhaps as much as 40 years later, with the wisdom and perspective that only come to the elderly, he observes some troubling changes in the body of believers.  He could have scolded them, tried to lay down the law.  But John knew that if he could solidify some of the basic truths in their hearts, help them turn away from doubting things they knew to be true, that the Holy Spirit would keep them on track.  So he writes a kind of song to the believers – to the ones newest in the faith, to those who are in their most robust years of living out their faith, and to those who have grown old in the faith.

To the newest believers, he writes:

I write to you, dear children,

because your sins have been forgiven on account of his name. (1 John 2:12)

When someone says, “I forgive you,” even though it is a relief, we more or less assume that they haven’t done so completely, or that if we did the same bad thing again they would “unforgive” us.  That’s why it is so hard for new believers to truly understand that God’s forgiveness doesn’t work that way.  When God forgives our sins, they have been forgiven, all of them.  It’s over!  John knows that doubting that can undermine our understanding and experience of everything else about our life in Jesus.  John knows Satan knows that, too, and loves to tempt us to doubt.  So he nails it down for the children in the faith.  You are forgiven.

A bit later, he addresses the newest Christians again:

I write to you, dear children,

because you have known the Father.  (1 John 2:13c)

John knows how essential it is for us to understand that God – Almighty God, Creator of the Universe –  is our Father.  Jesus taught us by His example to approach God as our “Abba,” our Papa, particularly in times of great distress (Mark 14:36).

John “sings” to the new believer, reminding him (or her) that God, Who is their loving Father, has completely and irrevocably forgiven them all their sins.  He has not done so capriciously, but rather has accepted full payment on their behalf in the blood of His Son, Jesus.  “…your sins have been forgiven on account of His Name.”  

Maybe you have had some doubts about those basic truths.  Let John’s “song” sing to you.

Hate is Blind

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They say “Love is blind” but John says they got it wrong.  Hate is blind.  Here it is:

Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness.  Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness; he does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded him.  (1 John 2:9-11)

Love, as Jesus taught it, is a radical choice to put aside what I want so I can take care of what you need.  Hate is the opposite:  taking care of what I want instead of ministering to what you need.  Thus, the default attitude of the world – take care of number 1, in effect is hate.

The interesting thing, is that John says people hate  because they have been blinded by “the darkness.”  The darkness, in John’s words, is the attitude of people in the world who have not received the Holy Spirit.  They live in the darkness and are blinded by it.

Jesus, on the other hand, John says, is the Source of “Light.”

In him was life, and that life was the light of men.  The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. (John 1:4-5)

John’s logic (and Jesus’ “logos”) leads us to this conclusion:  If we understood reality the way Jesus does, if we had not been blinded by the ways of the world, we would naturally love.  Self-sacrificial love, Jesus’ kind of love, would make more sense to us than selfishness or hate.   Trouble is, people don’t like to change.  Radical, “upside down,” ideas are threatening to our comfortable rhythms as we live in the “same-old same-old.”    That’s why Jesus said:

This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.   (John 3:19)

This is a tough teaching.  Tough, but true.  How is it with you?

The Light You Shine

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John wrote in a confusing way about an “old command” that is a “new command.”  (For more about that, see: John vs. John Lennon)  The “old command” (Love your neighbor) is made new, by Jesus redefining what love is.  Jesus’ kind of love, the “new command” He gave, is simple to describe but impossible to do.  Love, He taught, is a choice to put aside what I want in order to minister to what you need.   Sounds simple, but it is impossible on our own, because we are wired by our experiences in this world to “take care of number one” as a number one priority.  Jesus’ kind of love doesn’t make sense in our world; it only makes sense when you see the world through His lenses, His “logos.”  That Greek word, weakly translated in English as “word,” really goes way deeper.  It describes a whole mindset and understanding of reality.

When you read a book, and are observed doing so by your dog, your “logos” of what you are doing is very different from your dog’s “logos” of what is happening.  See that?

Jesus’ commands fit beautifully when you understand His “logos.”  In a very real sense, His commands are a part of His way of seeing reality.  That is why, in 1 John 2:7, John wrote, “This old command is the message (that’s the word, “logos”) you have heard.”

When you live in Jesus’ logos, His kind of love emerges in what you do, not from self-effort but from the Holy Spirit, living within you.   (See: Who Can Fix It?)  That is why John wrote about this “new command”:

…its truth is seen in him (Jesus) and you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.  (1 John 2:8)

John said that the light of Jesus shines in those who have come to Him by faith.  Already.

You are probably thinking, “If this means I must perfectly resemble Jesus in every way, I’m so far off that mark it’s hopeless…”  Don’t freak out.  Instead, look carefully at the verbs in verse 8 above:

… its truth is seen in him and you, because the darkness  is passing and the true light is already shining.  (1 John 2:8)

When someone surrenders to Jesus by faith, receiving His gift of forgiveness and fellowship with God, the Holy Spirit begins to live within his or her soul, as God always intended.  (See: Who Can Fix It?)  In John’s words, “the true light is already shining.”  However, that person is still profoundly shaped by all of life’s experiences and illusions.  Those habits, personality traits and outright addictions don’t simply vanish.  John says “the darkness is passing.”  

Picture a bright light shining in a room full of smoke so thick you can hardly see it.  A window is raised for fresh air to blow through the room.  The smoke is passing, but the light is already shining.

Jesus shines through the life of those who have fully trusted Him.  They are not perfect; they may not even be aware of how He is doing so at any one moment.  However, “the truth is seen,” John says, in Jesus and in you, too.    That’s how we know we know Jesus.  That’s how they know, too.

John vs. John Lennon

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Last time we got together, I made this statement:  “God loves us so He can love others through us.   That’s His purpose.”  And I said,” Jesus gave us many commands.  He summarized them in one command: “Love one another.” (See “The Acid Test”)

Did you buy that?  Is that true?  If it is, does that mean the Beatles were right when they sang:

“It’s easy…   All you need is love… (ya ta da da da…)  Love is all you need…”  

And if you think John the Apostle and John Lennon were on the same page, think again.  There is a vast difference between the feel-good and be-nice kind of love behind the Beatles’ lyric (and most other pop songs) and what  Jesus commanded us to practice.  Jesus’ idea of love put a new, radical twist on an old command.  That’s why John wrote:

Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.  (1 John 2:7-8 )

The old command, the one “you have had since the beginning,” came right out of the earliest writings of the Old Testament: “… love your neighbor as yourself.” (Leviticus 19:18b).   But this old command was made new, radically new, when explained and demonstrated by Jesus.    John says you can see that new understanding, that new truth in Jesus.  How?

Jesus made “love your neighbor as yourself” new by comparing it to and combining it with  “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength,” and declaring these intertwined commands to be the foundation of all the teachings of the Bible.

All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”  (Matthew 22:40)

But Jesus also made this old command new by His teaching and His example.  Love, He taught, is a choice to put aside what I want in order to minister to what you need.    A simple example might be for me to love you, by setting aside my desire to express anger and frustration, so that I can give you the opportunity to be understood.   Simple, but not so simple, right?   Jesus taught the most extreme example of that kind of love:

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.  (John 15:13)

This new, radical form of love, is not the sappy idea the Beatles were singing about.   It is not “easy,” as they sang.   This new understanding of love was demonstrated most fully in Jesus’ choice to endure a bloody, violent death, so that you and I could live!   

But what does John mean when he says that “its truth is seen in Him and you“?   Chew on that.  See if you can figure it out and we’ll take it up next time.

The Acid Test

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Hurricane Sandy left chaos, confusion, darkness and despair in her wake.  In the midst of those dark circumstances, Salem Church, (http://salemchurchnyc.org) on Staten Island,  shined in bright contrast.  Relief, rescue and reconstruction efforts poured out into the community (and continue to do so today) as they put hands, backs and feet to their informal church slogan: “We’re going to love on people until they ask us why.”  They pass the acid test.  They get it.  Get what?  Get this:

God loves us so He can love others through us.   That’s His purpose.  Jesus lived that and taught that:

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.  (John 15:9 a)

Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” (John 20:21)

When we receive God’s love, He changes us and then loves others through us.  As we extend His love to others, the purpose of God’s love to us is accomplished.  In the words of John, God’s love is made complete.

But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him.  (1 John 2:5a)

When you send a text, your purpose in sending it is not made complete until the text is received and read.  God’s love to us is not made complete until we “obey His Word” by extending His love to others.  Jesus gave us many commands.  He summarized them in one command: “Love one another.”  He said:

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.  By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35 )

Jesus said that our love for one another would be the acid test for the genuineness of our belief in Him.  He said, all men would know.  John says, we can know, too:

But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him:  Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. (1 John 2:5-6 )

It’s the acid test.

How Do You Know?

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Before the leaves start turning, I check to make sure my furnace is going to work.  First, I need to know if the pilot light is still burning.  Because I can’t see it or hear it, I’d need to take the furnace apart to look.  But an easier way is to turn up the thermostat and wait a few minutes.  If warm air comes out of my heating vents, then I know that my pilot light is lit.   I can tell the condition of the pilot light, by the evidence of the warm air.

In the same way,

 We know that we have come to know him [Jesus] if we obey his commands.  The man who says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him.  (1 John 2:3-4)

Observe carefully, John does NOT say if you obey, then Jesus will accept you.  It says that you can be sure you “know” Jesus by the evidence of how you tend to obey His commands.  If you are as naturally rebellious as I am, you are probably thinking, “What’s all this about obedience?”  It goes back to what the word “know” means.

A friend of mine met a guy who was also canoeing along the shore of Maine, near where he lives.  No big deal, just two guys who happened on each other and were enjoying the same sport.  That is, until my friend found out he was chatting with the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.  Knowing who he was, changed my friend’s behavior. If the judge had asked him to do something he would have been more naturally inclined to obey, out of respect.  When you “know” that Jesus is God – Almighty God- and that He has told us some things we really ought to do, it will change how you act.  It just will.  That’s part of what it means to “know.”

But “knowing” is also a word that means “having an intimate relationship.”  When you enjoy a rich, fulfilling relationship with someone, and that person wants you to do something, you tend to want to do it, right?  Suppose your favorite uncle, the one who really took an interest in you from way back when you were a kid, wants you to take your shoes off in his house…   See what I mean?

That’s what John means.  If you have any doubt about whether you really have come to know Jesus, you could spend a lot of time analyzing all your thoughts and motives and so on.  Or, you could check to see if you tend to want to do what Jesus told us to do.  Simple.

There’s more to it, but we’ll get to that next time.

No Pushover

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Try to imagine what would happen if criminals were let off, in the hope that they would learn their lesson and straighten up.  How well do you suppose that would work?  “You better not steal, because if you do, we’ll haul you into court and pronounce you innocent!”  Dumb, right?   Dumb by human logic, but elegantly effective by God’s logic.

If you haven’t read it already, go back to the previous post (“Facing the Truth About Sin“).  John writes that when followers of Jesus sin and confess, God forgives them and purifies them.  But then he writes this:

My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. (1 John 2:1a)

God’s strategy to help you stop sinning is to reassure you that He will forgive you and fix you.  So you won’t miss the point, the rest of that verse says this:

But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. (1 John 2:1b)

How can that possibly work?  In human courts, leniency increases lawlessness.  But, there is a crucial difference:  In human leniency, nobody pays.  The underlying attitude is, “Oh, we’ll just pretend this didn’t happen.  You go home and try to behave…”   That’s not how it works in God’s court.   In God’s court, absolute justice is required, sin must be punished.  And Jesus pays.

He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. (1 John 2:2 )

If you fully understand what verse 2 means, then you start to see why verse 1 would work.  When we understand how much it cost to forgive us with complete justice, we are less likely to do it again.

But there is another reason God’s system works.  Because Jesus has fully paid for our sin, when God purifies us (gives us a clean slate, so to speak) (1 John 1:9), He actually washes away the guilt.  Those who study addiction say that one of the most common triggers to compulsively repeating an addictive behavior is guilt.  For example, I’ve been told that people who are hopelessly in debt, wrestling with feeling guilty about it, commonly go out and buy a new car, hoping it will make them feel better.  The same pattern is observed in most addictions.  By paying for and taking on our guilt, Jesus breaks those chains.

The cross is the focal point of God’s Grace and His Truth.  In Truth you are guilty and justice demands a punishment; by Grace He forgives you and pays for you.

The Word (Jesus) became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.  (John 1:14)

God truly forgives but He is no pushover.