After handling all those snakes, no wonder a healing service followed.

Faith is the essential component of Christianity, yet so many Christians have no clue what Biblical faith is. Faith is not “positive thinking.” It has nothing to do with psychology. To some, faith means believing that you will be able to get a job done on time or that your child’s fever will go down. While there is definite value in positive thinking—Christians should be the most positive people on Earth—this has nothing to do with Biblical faith. The object of real Biblical faith is not one’s need or one’s faith, but God and His Word. We believe in God and we trust in His Word. Of course, this means that a Christian needs to know what the Bible says in order to exercise his faith. With so much Biblical illiteracy in the modern Church, little wonder the nature of faith is so misunderstood.

1. The meaning of faith, 11:1

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. (NIV 84)

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. (NIV)

Now faith means putting our full confidence in the things we hope for, it means being certain of things we cannot see. (J.B. Phillips)

Faith makes us sure of what we hope for and gives us proof of what we cannot see. (CEV)

Oral Roberts, praying for healing. Is this what Biblical faith looks like? Some people think so.

You can search the Bible from cover to cover but you won’t find a definition of what faith is. However, a number of facts about faith are given. Those facts taken together will lead us to a better understanding of Biblical faith.

This verse in the Greek begins with the verb “is.” Faith, then, is a present, ongoing reality in the life of every believer. Faith is not an on again, off again thing practiced in difficult times. Faith is not some ancient virtue simply to be studied. Christian faith is a living faith; it is a way of life. While the word “faith,” pistis, is translated in various ways: belief, trust, fidelity, firm persuasion and conviction, in the Bible faith is always linked to God. So at the outset, we must understand that Biblical faith is not a belief in self or man but in God.

Going a little further, faith is the hypostasis of things hoped for. The Greek word is interesting; it was commonly used in the sense of a “title deed.” A title deed is the foundational document or contract of some transaction. So then, faith is the “title deed” of things hoped for. Hypostasis is sometimes used subjectively, as the NIV has: we are “sure.” But it can also be used objectively, as in the KJV’s “substance.” The common thought promoted by the KJV has led to what used to be known as “the prosperity Gospel,” which taught that believers will be given what we want if we have enough faith. That’s basically what the KJV says; that the things we want, which at present have so substance, will be made real by faith. The problem with that translation is that it doesn’t line up with what the author has been and will be teaching about faith. Genuine Biblical faith is the absolute conviction that God will do what has said He would do. There are spiritual realities, like the promises of God for example, that have no substance at present, but are made real nonetheless—they will be given “substance”–by faith. Our faith convinces us that God’s Word; God’s promises, are true and that they exist whether we can see them or not.

Now, having faith in the promises of God suggests that we actually know what God has promised He would do. This is why so many modern believers live lives full of disappointment and disillusionment: from their perspective, God has not conformed to their wills; He has not given them the things they had been hoping for. But faith has nothing to do with God bending to our wills; faith takes God at His Word. Faith bends our wills to His will for us.

2. The assurance of faith, 11:2, 3

This is what the ancients were commended for. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

Genuine faith is what “the ancients,” or “the elders” were commended for. The ancestors of the the Hebrews reading this very letter had the right kind of faith. But those present-day Hebrews were struggling; they were getting restless, maybe even impatient with God. As far as they were concerned, God was not solving their problems. For the recipients of this letter, life certainly didn’t seem to be getting any better. A lot of frustrated Christians are just like these ancient Hebrews. It’s way too easy to assume God doesn’t care or God isn’t involved when it seems like our prayers go unanswered. But as verse 1 stated, faith in the invisible things of God is “proof” or “evidence” that we know God knows what He is doing. The “things” themselves are not proof of anything; it’s faith that’s important, not the thing hoped for.

If that sounds a little too metaphysical, verse 2 tells us that such thinking is rooted in faith; it’s historically provable. The Hebrews holding this letter were at the end of a long line of faithful men. As this chapter progresses, the author will use examples of people in Hebrew history who bore witness to genuine faith. The faith Christians have is not some pie-in-the-sky ideal, but historical. An apocryphal book, Ecclesiasticus, has a whole section devoted to looking at the faith of historical figures. It begins like this: “Let us now praise famous men…” Faith is self-evident. Rich or poor; sick or healthy; these things don’t enter into it. Possessing a “thing hoped for” is not evidence of faith. Having faith is evidence of faith. All the people noted in Hebrews 11 would be unknown to us today if they didn’t have faith. The faith they had was what made them “famous.”

Granted, all this is hard to grasp. To help us get our minds wrapped around the nature of faith, the writer gives us an example of the nature of faith: creation. The material universe all around us is understandable only on the basis of faith. Christians are sure God did the work, but we weren’t there to see it happening. Not only that, we are told that everything, including the very ground upon which we are standing, was made out of invisible things. Think about the implication of 3: what seems real to our senses is really only a byproduct of that which our senses tell us unreal. So, Biblical faith is so much bigger than merely hoping that your flu symptoms will go away quickly or that you’ll get that new job you’ve been hoping for. Biblical faith is not denying reality, it is the ability to penetrate this superficial world of what we can see so that we can grab hold of the supernatural and eternal realities that lay behind it. Biblical faith is able to punch a hole through this world into the next, and reaching through, bring back that which God has promised.

Biblical faith transcends time and space; it reaches past the boundaries and barriers of this world of flesh and into the high places where the vistas of eternity can be seen. By faith we hold the title deed to that piece of property. When you understand that, you’ll understand what real faith is.

The Gunsmoke set. It looked real, but just like the material world, it was all just a façade.

This material world is a façade; an illusion. What’s real is what we cannot see. Biblical faith is not child’s play; it’s not something for weak-willed, easily influenced losers who see faith as a short cut to getting what they think they deserve in life. Biblical faith is something only mature, reasoning believers can practice. It is based on God’s Word. If you don’t know what’s written in your Bible, you’ll never understand or appreciate what Biblical faith is. But when you know what God’s Word says and you have confidence in what God has said in it, history becomes filled with meanings, your life will make sense, and you’ll face whatever your future may hold without fear.

Another illusion. The lagoon on Gilligan's Island was actually set, right next to the Hollywood Freeway.

CLASSIC EXAMPLES OF GOOD AND BAD LEADERSHIP

3 JOHN

John probably wrote his letters after he wrote the Book of Revelation. If this is the case, then these epistles were written at the close of the first century, close to 100 AD when John was an old man. Even though all three letters were written by the same man, and probably written close together, and have similar themes, they are all quite different. The first letter stresses the importance of the love that holds the family of God together. In his second letter, John warns about the treacherous nature of false teachers and false teaching. As we come to the third letter, we note that it is similar to the second one in that t is also a personal letter, addressed to an individal. It’s theme is also the importance of truth. But it is different. 3 John deals with personalities; with three real people who influenced the church.

1. Gaius: Faithful and helpful, verses 1-8

To my dear friend Gaius, whom I love in the truth. (vs. 1)

This is address on the envelope. Like in his second letter, John refers to himself as “the elder.”

a. Heartfelt expressions, vs. 1, 2

“Gaius” was a very common name in the New Testament era. In fact, Paul knew  three of them! Whoever this Gaius was, John thought a lot of him; his relationship with him was founded on love and trust. Four times the elder refers to this Gaius as “beloved” or “(my) dear friend.” He must have had a wonderful, Christ-like character, and this impressed John. When John wrote that he loved Gaius “in the truth” he is indicating that Gaius was a man of sound doctrine. He believed in the deity of Jesus Christ; he believed in the teaching of the apostles. This must have been refreshing to John who, like Paul, spent so much of his time fighting false teachers and encouraging believers to remain faithful. Here was man who was faithful! John’s wish for Gaius is something we ought to wish for all believers:

Dear friend, I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you, even as your soul is getting along well.

John is hoping that Gaius would continue to be healthy and prosperous; he  was interested in Gaius’ whole life, not just his spiritual life. There is nothing wrong with praying for either good health or prosperity.

b. Reasons to rejoice, vs. 3-8

The “brothers” whom John refers to in verse 3 were probably traveling evangelists or missionaries. They apparently ministered in Gaius’ church and eventually met up with John and told him all about Gaius. Obviously they impressed the brothers greatly. But what was it that impressed these men so much? A clue is given in verses 5-8:

Dear friend, you are faithful in what you are doing for the brothers, even though they are strangers to you. They have told the church about your love. You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God. It was for the sake of the Name that they went out, receiving no help from the pagans. We ought therefore to show hospitality to such men so that we may work together for the truth.

John praises Gaius for this man’s faithful conduct. Not only did Gaius believe the right things, but his conduct grew out of his beliefs. He had given visible proof that he was walking in the truth. These traveling preachers had told John about the kindness of Gaius. Gaius received these “strangers” as friends; as brothers in the Lord. He opened not only his heart to these strangers, but also his home. He showed them “hospitality,” putting these strangers up for a time. This was a big deal, even though it seems like such a simple thing. Traveling preachers and missionaries depended on the hospitality believers, which they didn’t always receive. Recall what Paul, a traveling preacher, asked of Philemon:

And one thing more: Prepare a guest room for me, because I hope to be restored to you in answer to your prayers. (vs. 22)

An interesting piece of extra-biblical writing shows how missionaries and evangelists should both behave and be treated. From “The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,” we read this:

Let every Apostle who comes to you be received as the Lord, but let him not stay more than one day, or if need be a second as well; but if he stay three days, he is a false prophet.

Those who devote themselves to the ministry deserve to be cared for by the Church. Verse 7 seems to indicate that John considered it admirable that these itinerant peachers devoted themselves completely to God’s work, literally not engaging in any kind of secular work at all. Not all members of the church are called to be traveling preachers or missionaries. But helping to support such individuals makes those who stay behind “partners.” Every single believer is a priest, we are all responsible for doing the work of “the ministry” and taking Jesus to the lost. Those who write the check or provide lodging are all involved in doing just that.

2. Diotrephes: Sinfully ambitious, verses 9-11

After heaping much praise on Gaius, John gets to the heart of the matter: a jerk named Diotrephes. He is totally different than Gaius; a polar opposite, in fact. Obviously, Diotrephes was an arrogant person, but elder John comes short of judging him. Instead, John says he will try to visit the church personlly and deal with him in person.

a. Beware of this person, vs. 9-10

We know nothing about this man, except that his name means “foster child of Zeus,” which suggests he was of Greek ancestry. He was leader in Gaius’ church, but he appeared to be using his position for his own personal advanage.

I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to be first, will have nothing to do with us. So if I come, I will call attention to what he is doing, gossiping maliciously about us. Not satisfied with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers. He also stops those who want to do so and puts them out of the church.

Diotrephes “loves to be first,” meaning that instead of serving his congregation, this man was proud man didn’t recognize any other authority and did what he pleased. His behavior was exactly contrary to the admonition of Jesus found in Matthew 20:26, 27–

Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave…

To make matters worse, refusing to recognize John’s credentials, Diotrephes was making it impossible for the elder to do his job by spreading false stories and tall tales about both John and the other disciples. Not only that, while Gaius behaved like a true believer, Diotrephes did his best to stop any other preachers from coming to “his” church.” He was a meddler at best, and dictator at worst. We may wonder why John felt the need to discuss Diotrephes with Gaius when both men are members of the same church. One possible explanation could be the fact that Gauis freely submitted to the authority of John, while Diotrephes wanted to assume full authority of the church. This little “power struggle” was probably playing out in churches all over the world at this time, as the death of the apostples was leaving a kind of “leadership vacuum.”

b. Following godly examples, vs. 11

Dear friend, do not imitate what is evil but what is good. Anyone who does what is good is from God. Anyone who does what is evil has not seen God.

Diotrephes was a terrible example for any believer to follow, so John warns Gauis accordingly. John is not saying that Gauis is following a bad example, but evil is powerful. Every believer needs to be reminded to shun evil.

3. Demetrius: Highly respected, verses 12-14

Demetrius is well spoken of by everyone—and even by the truth itself. We also speak well of him, and you know that our testimony is true.

a. A man of integrity, vs. 12

Here is a man sound in the faith! Dependable and reliable; the kind of man you’d like to have as a friend. Demetrius was probably one of the members whom Diotrephes was giving a hard time; likely a missionary made to feel unwelcome in Gaius’ church. This is the only time he is mentioned in Scripture.  We know only these things about him for sure:

• His good reputation preceded him. Notice that “everyone” spoke well of this man.
• His devotion to the Gospel was obvious to all. He lived according to the teachings of Scripture, and people noticed that.
• Other elders like John, thought highly of Demetrius.

Given what Demetrius had going for him, Gaius should feel comfortable in not only receiving Demetrius and extending him hospitality.

b. Final words, vs. 13, 14

I have much to write you, but I do not want to do so with pen and ink. I hope to see you soon, and we will talk face to face. Peace to you. The friends here send their greetings. Greet the friends there by name.

Even though John wrote the Gospel of John and the Book of Revelation, two of the longest books of the New Testament, he writes here that he would rather rather talk “face to face” than send a letter. 3 John is a true gem that gives us some powerful insights on personal relationships in the church. The koinonia—fellowship—of 1 John is not easily achieved within a local church and its even harder to maintain. It was even more difficult in the first century. But in these three letters, we see the ideal and the way to achieve it. Godly fellowship is made possible only through the way of love. Fellowship cannot be built on any other foundation.

(c) 2012, WitzEnd

Hebrews10:19—25

As we approach this section of Hebrews chapter 10, the first thing we notice is that the feeling of the letter changes. The author has effectively completed his teaching of doctrine and now he begins his exhortations on the basis of the doctrine. Like any good Bible teacher, he realized that his readers simply being given information wasn’t enough—they needed to be shown practical ways to apply the things they just learned. If this second part of chapter ten speaks of anything, it must surely speak of privilege and responsibility. Christians are the recipients of manifold blessings they neither deserve nor have earned. Because of that, they have a heavy responsibility to the One who blessed them in His  grace.

1.  A new way, 10:19—22

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God …  (verses19—22a)

The main predicate in these four verses is “let us draw near.” Every thing else is secondary to the thought that believers can now “draw near” to God. This great privilege afforded Christians is a result of the actions of Jesus Christ.

Thanks to the shed blood of Jesus, believers are now able to approach God with confidence. This “confidence” is a holy boldness, which is a result of our new relationship with God through Jesus Christ. This is not arrogance or pride in action. Recall the words of the prophet:

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.  And what does the LORD require of you?  To act justly and to love mercy  and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6:8)

According to the teacher, we are able to “enter the Most Holy Place,” which he uses symbolically as the presence of God. All believers are now able to do something that was at one time limited only to members of the priesthood! All believers can enter into the very presence of Almighty God! This great privilege is made possible, not by the shed blood of animals, but by the shed of blood of our Lord and Savior.

This way of approaching God is described as a “new and living way,” as opposed to the old way, which involved the death of animals. This revolutionary way of approaching God was “opened for us through the curtain, that is his body.” This is a very interesting phrase that needs to be looked at and understood.

When our Lord was on the cross, we read this:

...for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. (Luke 23:45)

As Jesus hung bleeding and dying on the Cross, somehow the heavy curtain or veil of the Temple was ripped in two, indicating that the way to God was now open. The word for “veil” is katapetasmatos, meaning “curtain,” but coming from the Greek katapetannumi, meaning “expand.” So this veil was a kind of spiritual “iron curtain” that not only served to separate God from man, but “expanded,” emphasizing the great gulf that exists (and is always growing) between God and man apart from Jesus Christ.

The phrase “that is, his body” is hotly debated. What does it refer to? The natural way to interpret it in the Greek is to associate “his body” with “the veil.” If we take it to mean that, then how do we explain how the body of Jesus separated God from man? Haldman offers this helpful observation:

So long as Christ walked the earth in His beautiful and perfect humanity, He shut men out from God.

Jesus, as the perfect example of how to live, brought only condemnation of sinful man; He demonstrated, while in the flesh, how far from God sinful man really was. His life was a stark and living contrast to life of sinful man. If the “veil” was to become the “way” to God, then it had to destroyed. When the physical body of Jesus was destroyed on the Cross, the way was cleared for sinful man to approach God. His body was destroyed in place of sinful man’s body. The flesh of Jesus was taken out of the way, just like the veil to the Temple was, and offered as a sacrifice so that we could approach God.

The other way to read “that is, his body” is to continue associating “his body” with “the veil,” but to interpret “the veil” with man’s sinfulness, not Christ’s physical body. It is, after all, man’s sin that separates him from God. When Jesus took upon Himself the flesh of man, He eventually bore in that same body, the sins of the world. While He Himself remained sinless, He carried our sins with Him to the Cross. The broken and bleeding Body on the Cross released a power that ripped man’s sinfulness from himself. Because Jesus’ body was destroyed, ours would be saved. He was punished, opening the door for us and we are now free to walk through that door and approach God.

No matter how you interpret this phrase, the point is the same. The thing that once separated us from God has been removed and we therefore have full access into the most holy place.

2. The right way, 10:22—25

Thanks to the continued work of Jesus, our Great High Priest, we can approach God. But there is a right way to enter the new way. We are give a series of exhortations to help us do this right.

Let us draw near (vs. 22). We are to come near to God “with a sincere heart,” which is way of saying that the inner life of man must be right with God. Outward gyrations are not what’s important in approaching God; it’s what’s on the inside of man that counts.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. (Matthew 5:8)

If we would approach God, it must be done sincerely, with a complete dedication to fulfilling the will of God in our lives. A divided or lukewarm heart can never approach God.

Let us hold unswervingly (vs. 23). The great foundational truths of the Word of God must be held and believed so deeply and with such conviction that our entrance into the presence of God will be with absolute confidence. This was the problem with these Hebrew Christians—faith and confidence in the Gospel message had given way to doubt and disbelief. When a Christian gives second place to the Word of God you can be sure they are not spending time in God’s presence because they cannot.

Let us consider, (vs. 24). The final exhortation is to consider others in the Body of Christ. This is a mutual activity in which believers are supposed to be encouraging one another. The word translated “spur” comes from the Greek paroxysmos, which means, oddly enough, “to irritate” or to “to exasperate.” Usually those are negative things, but in the context of this passage, “spur” is a positive thing.

Christians, instead of gossiping and nitpicking each other to death, should be provoking each other to love and good deeds. In other words, we need to take notice of fellow believers, find ways to encourage them and help them where needed. But also, we need be aware of their gifts and talents and find creative ways for them to use those gifts and talents in the performance of “good deeds.”

Verse 25 sounds like another exhortation, but it actually isn’t.

Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

“Meeting together” is the most effective way to fulfil our calling as Christians; we perform the previous exhortations within the local church—in the context of “meeting together.” It seems as though some of these Hebrew Christians were not attending services any longer; they had given up meeting with other believers. The fact is, the practice of meeting together is not dispensable but indispensable to our growth in holiness as Christians.

The modern church is plagued with this problem; individuals who call themselves Christians who join a local church then for some reason seldom if ever show up for services. But apparently this is not a modern problem, even the early church suffered with it. However, this is not just a frustrating problem, it’s a very dangerous practice. Moffatt wrote:

Any early Christian who attempted to live like a pious particle without the support of the community ran serious risks in an age when there was no public opinion to support him.

Or to put it another way, where will a Christian find encouragement if not in his church? Christianity is a belief system that reaches out to people, drawing them together. Other events may draw a crowd—sporting events, concerts, movies—but only Christianity brings people together for a distinct purpose: participation in worship, praise, and work. Christianity is not supposed to be a spectator sport! In a culture that sometimes stresses individualism a little too much, we need to understand that believers need each other to strengthen the spiritual bond they share with Jesus Christ. And you cannot do that by yourself or with your family alone or with your circle of Christian friends alone. You need the local church, and the local church needs you. In a sense, the most selfish thing a Christian can do is to stop attending services at their church.

Going to church is not like going to your local garden club meeting or scout meeting. When you go to church, you are being obedient to teachings of Scripture and you are showing your love for Christ. Jesus is the Head of the Church. He is present at church when you are there. Jesus is not the president of your local scout troop or garden club. Jesus is the Head of your church and he wants to have fellowship with you in that context. Naturally you can fellowship with your Lord any time of the night or day; but He wants to fellowship with you in context of fellowship with other believers. The Head of church cannot function without the body. The believer is part of the Body of Christ, which Christ presents “to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. “ (Ephesians 5:27)

(c)  2011 WitzEnd

The apostle John, writing.

THIS YOU CAN KNOW!

1 John 4:1—21

The recipients of this letter were members of a church in controversy. The trouble-makers who John was dealing with were not worldly pagans, but people who claimed to be Christians. These false teachers were smart and clever; they cloaked their unbiblical teachings in such a way as to lead some believers astray and plant the seeds of doubt in others.

1. Know what is true, 1 John 4:1—6

Without naming it as such, John is about to teach his readers about one of the gifts of the Spirit given to all born again people: the discerning of spirits. Here is how John begins teachings about this spiritual gift:

Dear friends,do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. (1John4:1)

An interesting point in this verse is John’s use of the word “spirit.” It comes from a Greek word that can mean “wind” or “spirit.” It is the same word of the Holy Spirit. But John’s teachings in this passage are really a profound insight into the spirit-world. Behind every human teacher, false or genuine, is a superhuman force—either the Holy Spirit or an evil spirit, and behind ever spirit is its head—either God or Satan.

a. Test the spirits, verse 1-3

It is the responsibility of individual believers to determine whether or not the person to whom he is listening is teaching something from God or Satan. The Holy Spirit dwells in every true believer, but another spirit lives in the false teachers and John gives two pieces of advice:

• Do not believe every spirit. Common sense tells us that we are unable to actually see a spirit, but we can certainly hear and understand its teachings. Just because a Bible teacher looks good and uses the right words, that doesn’t mean what he is teaching is from God. This is the first part of the discernment process: listen carefully to the teacher and his teaching; don’t blindly accept it. All teachings must be verified in light of the Word of God (see 1 Thessalonians 2:4 and 5:21).

• Many false prophets have gone out into the world. False teachers have made the world their classroom; they are literally all over the place, insidiously making themselves a part of churches and denominations. Their goal is to be heard by Christians and to lead as many of them astray as they can.

But Christians don’t have to be gullible; there is a test to determine the origination of the teaching and the teacher.

Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. (verses 2b, 3a)

The test involves a positive confession that hinges on the doctrine of the Incarnation: Jesus Christ came in the flesh. The false teachers of John’s day taught a corrupt version of the Incarnation, denying the lynch pin teaching of the Gospel that the Son of God became the Son of man.

The second part of this test is a negative confession; actively teaching something that is completely contrary to the revealed Word of God that teaches the divinity of Jesus Christ.

Liberal theology involves both of these points. Liberal theologians never accept on faith orthodox Biblical doctrines that Jesus Christ was, is, and will always be the Son of God; that He came from Heaven, assumed the flesh of man in order to save His people; that Herose bodily from the dead, ascended to heaven and that at an appointed time, that same Jesus will return as He left.  Liberal theologians will always seek to rationalize the teachings of Scripture by downplaying the supernatural elements.

b. Live as overcomers, verses 4—6

John’s emphasis shifts now from the content of the false teacher’s message to the character of his readers.

What about God’s people? Positively there are two things to note. First, even if they don’t feel like it, they have already overcome the false prophets. No matter how many false teachers there are or how smart they appear, Christians have overcome them. Second, believers are from God, false teachers are not. We therefore have Him dwelling in us in the Person of the Holy Spirit.

Another important point often overlooked in this group of verses teaches us something about the true message of God and His messengers:

We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood. (verse 6)

Whoever knows God listens to the real Word being proclaimed from real messengers. Those who don’t know God are not interested in hearing any genuine teaching. This makes common sense. Christians love to hear God’s Word being taught because that Word carries with it a divine authority. But the world doesn’t want to be under God’s authority, therefore it will always prefer false teaching to the real thing.

Part of having godly character is to live as an overcomer; as one who recognizes false teaching and avoids it.  This victory over false teaching and false teachers has nothing to do with our abilities,but with “the one who is in us.”  This One, is of course, the Holy Spirit.  No matter what spirit is opposing us,the Holy Spirit within us will enable us to live as overcomers.

2. Know God through love, 1 John 4:7—14

If the first group of verses in chapter 4 represents John’s teaching on the gift of discernment, then this next group of verses illustrates just one of the results of having the gifts of the Spirit operating in your life: love for the body of Christ. This section of John’s letter is perhaps the best loved part of any of John’s writings. It is the definitive statement about agape love. It is, also, very difficult to follow.

a. Love starts with God, verses 7—11

Verse 7 marks either an abrupt end to a discussion of false teachers or an abrupt beginning of a new teaching. Actually, it’s a continuation of the idea that genuine Christians are markedly different from the imitation Christians called false teachers. Unlike them, true believers love one another. This may be a fruit of the Holy Spirit, but it is our responsibility.

This love we are to have for members of the body of Christ is agape love; this kind of love does not depend on the quality of its object. If we have fellowship with God, if we are born of God, if we walk in the light, we will love others because “love is of God.”

Love, then, is another test of a person’s relationship with God. John does NOT say that everyone who is born of God manifests love, but rather he says this:

Every one who loves has been born of God and knows God. (verse7b)

But this is not a sentimental or emotional love John is referring to. There is a distinction between “natural love” and “Christian love.”  Natural love, the love a man has for a women or parents for children, comes from within the person himself, but it is conditioned by some quality in the other person. But agape love has nothing to do with anything in the other person. Agape love is the kind of love God has for human beings. His love for us is not a response to our love. The response is ours. This is the kind of love we are to have for others, particularly for members of the Body of Christ, but not just for them, for all people.

b.God’s Spirit lives in believers, verses12—16

Verse 12 seems like a statement out of place, but it might have reference to the false teachers who claimed to have supernatural visions of God. John’s response to their grandiose claims is: No one has ever seen God. This is John’s way of saying something Paul said to the Corinthians:

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. (1 Corinthians 13:1)

A false teacher can make all kinds of big claims, but if they don’t have God’s love in them, God is not in them. Three times in this paragraph John writes about the indwelling of God in the true believer—see verses 13, 15, and 16. Each time, he cites an evidence of this indwelling. Here is another test to see if the Holy Spirit is in a person:

• The evidence:...he has given us of his Spirit.(verse13). How is this an evidence?  While we can’t see the Spirit, we can see His fruit. The following two pieces of evidence build on this.

• The evidence: If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God… (verse15) Any body can claim to believe in God, but faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God is evidence that a person is a true believer.

• The evidence: Whoever lives in love.. . (verse16) The indwelling of the Holy Spirit is really the indwelling of love.  John Stott comments: “The natural man can neither believe nor love.  In his fallen and unredeemed state he is both blind and selfish. It is only by the grace of the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of truth and whose first- fruit is love, that man ever comes to believe in Christ and to love others.”

3. Know you abide in God, 1 John 4:15—21

a. Confident in the love of God, verses 15—18

The people Jesus saves are the the people who acknowledge the divine sonship of Jesus Christ. Those who make the confession have the God dwelling in them. Of course, that confession is not enough. The phrase, “Jesus is the Son of God” should not be viewed as a mere confessional statement. Knowing and believing in the divinity of Jesus Christ means having complete faith and confidence in Him and in God’s love.

And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. (verse16)

This verse teaches us something of the nature of saving faith. It involves the intellect: knowing and relying go together. The growth of knowledge results in the growth of faith and they feed off of each other. When it comes to faith, ignorance is not bliss. One of the reasons why so many believers live in disappointment, often feeling neglected by God and being disappointed in God, is because their knowledge of God and how God works is so lacking. These kind of believers have expectations of God not based in His reality.

However, the more we learn about God in His Word, the more we understand His ways, the more our faith and confidence in Him grows because we have realistic expectations of God and we pray prayers that get answered because we pray according to His will.

John’s point is that no believer should ever live in fear because God is dwelling in them. God is love, and perfect love pushes away all fear.

b. Divinely enabled to love, verses 19—21

We love because he first loved us.(verse19)

This is an odd sentence because it is incomplete. We love what or whom? What was on John’s mind when he wrote the words “we love?” Do we love God? Or do we love each other? Perhaps John had both options in mind. No human being can claim that his love for God existed before God’s love for Him! And at the same time, no human being can claim to love everybody on his own! The fact is, our love for God and our love for all people is a copy of God’s love for us. He is the very nature of love and we follow His example.

And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother. (verse21)

John ends his discussion on love by summarizing the law which his readers knew so well. Jesus also brought together the first and greatest commandment (Deuteronomy 6:5) and the second commandment (Leviticus 19:18). Throughout the New Testament, the notion of loving one’s neighbor is stressed. Why is that? We are called to love those around us because to varying degrees they bear the image of God and God has commanded us to love them. With the help of the Holy Spirit, we are able to do just that.

I. Howard Marshall wrote:

The more we realize how much God loved us, the more we shall realize our obligation to love Him in return. It is therefore good for us to constantly renew our knowledge of God’s love as we read of it in the Bible, as we hear it proclaimed in the worship of the church, and as we consider the ways in which our whole life has been molded by experiences of God’s love and care for us.

God’s great love for us allows us to love others the way He loves them. The one who abides in God will obey His commands, and the two greatest commands are to love God and to love others. The two are inseparable.

(c)  2011 WitzEnd

HEBREWS CHAPTER 10

As we begin Hebrews chapter 10, we are beginning the climax of the letter. So far, we have learned a number of things courtesy of the unknown author of this letter to the Hebrews, and we can sum up what we have learned like this: Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is superior to the prophets, the priests, and even the angels; the priesthood of Melchizedek was superior to that of Aaron; and we are about to learn that the entire ceremonial law of the Old Testament was really only a “shadow” of something else to come through the work of Jesus Christ.

Chapter 9 sets up chapter 10, which continues some significant lines of thoughts. First, Christians must never lose sight of the goal: free access into the Holiest of Holies: The Holy Spirit was showing by this that the way into the Most Holy Place had not yet been disclosed as long as the first tabernacle was still functioning. (Hebrews 9:8)

Second, we need to understand and appreciate that it is only the blood of Jesus that qualifies us by simply purging our consciences from dead acts:

How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God! (Hebrews 9:14)

Lastly, we must always remember the absolute finality of Christ’s once-for-all sacrifice:

But he has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. (Hebrews 9:26b)

These are the important pivot points of chapter 9 which the Hebrew Christians of the New Testament era needed to grasp. As wonderful and as marvelous and as worthy as the Law of Moses was, and in some senses still is, as powerful as the Old Testament sacrificial system was, the coming of Jesus changed everything. The Old Covenant had literally been overtaken by the New Covenant. Christ’s priestly ministry is so superior to the ministry of any earthly priest as to render their work obsolete. The Jewish Christians to whom this letter was written needed to be encouraged to stick with the real thing, Jesus, for to leave Him and return to Judaism would be tantamount to giving back a Christmas gift but keeping the wrapping paper! What a ridiculous thing todo!

Apparently this was a real problem which the teacher deals with in chapter 10 in a very dogmatic way.

1. The Law goes nowhere, 10:1—4

The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming— not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. If it could, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins. But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins, because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

The Law of the Old Covenant had very impressive ceremonies, supported by centuries of tradition, preserving the awareness of God’s holiness while revealing man’s greater need for atonement. Yet in spite of the greatness of the Old Covenant, it could never bring the worshiper into a permanent relationship with God because all those animal sacrifices could do was to remind him of his sin, not remove that sin.

This is why the Law is called a “shadow of the good things,” and not a good thing in and of itself. A shadow can never reveal something, it can only give a rough outline of its reality. When the reality comes, thes hadow is irrelevant. The Law, then, was only an outline of the wonder of the Gospel message; it was, in fact, merely a temporary part of God’s plan.

The very fact that sacrifices had to be repeated over and over and over showed the inadequacy of it all. If a sinner could be made perfect by simply obeying the points of the Old Covenant, then they wouldn’t have needed to keep coming back year after year to have their sins atoned for. No, the fact is, the sin offering could not fix the sinner. The blood of animals slain had no redemptive power. The enormity of sin precludes any natural kind of atonement. The blood of animals couldn’t remove the sin from the sinner any more than “being a good person” today removes sin from the sinner. The sin problem is so big, there is nothing you or any human being can do to alleviate it. The absolute height of human folly is to think you can pin your hope of salvation on your good behavior or your allegiance to some set of man-made rules. Those things,like animal blood, are worthless.

This was something the psalmist grasped long before Hebrews was written:

My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise. (Psalm 51:17)

2.The Law replaced,10:5—18

The writer to the Hebrews was blunt in his explanation of why the sacrifices of the Law had to be repeated ad nausea:

…it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. (verse4)

Those things served a purely temporary function and they pointed to a permanent sacrifice: Jesus Christ came as the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world. The Son of God was to be given the Name Jesus because He was destined to take upon Himself the sin of His people. That mission, in fact, was given back in Psalm 40:7—9, which is quoted in Hebrews 10:5—7. The emphasis on this quotation is the obedience of the Son of God; He would always do the will of His Father.

While all those Old Covenant sacrifices were ordained by God, we are told something startling in verse 8:

“Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them” (although the law required them to be made).”

God is never pleased with anything where faith is not involved. All these sacrifices were designed by God to point the people to the need for a better offering. That was the missing element in Judaism. For centuries sacrifices were made and people followed the letter of the Law but they had no faith.

In contrast to the lack of faith in the people and the ineffectiveness of the sacrifices, we have the words of Christ:

“Here I am, I have come to do your will.” (verse9)

Nothing the priests did and nothing the people did could deal with sin, but Jesus came to do the will of the Father, which was to end the sin problem once and for all!

The wonder of the Word of God is that while these words were written to some ancient Hebrew Christians, their application to the modern Christian is just as powerful now as it was back then. There is nothing you can do apart from Jesus Christ to win God’s favor. It is futile trying to please God on your own; it can’t be done. The Law of Moses could not relieve a guilty conscience; it could not make a sinner right with God on its own. And neither can any other belief system based on the ideas of man, whether it’s dressed up in Christian garb, self-improvement philosophy, or paganism.

The power of verse 14 is breathtaking in its implications:

…by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

The will of God is implemented through the work of His obedient Son, our great High Priest, and part of God’s will is for His people to be made holy. The priests of the Old Covenant couldn’t do this; they couldn’t even do anything to help a guilty conscience!But the Son of God not only takes away the guilt and shame of sin, but He makes us holy. This is a deep, broad redemption, accomplished on the Cross, a result of His obedience. The tenses in this verse should be noted. The sense of verse 14 is this: “We have been sanctified and we still are.” What does this mean to the believer today?Simply put, our complete and definite sanctification is God’s will and it is our experience. What this does not mean is that we no longer need to grow or that we are sinless. To be “made perfect forever” means that God has made us His holy people, but that day by day we are being brought into that spiritual reality experientially through the continued work of Christ in us by the Person of the Holy Spirit.

So, then, we as Christians must surely be the most blessed people on the face of the earth because of this. Not only is our sanctification the will of God, not only is its perfection in us a work of Christ, but its accomplishment is guaranteed by the Holy Spirit:

The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says: “This is the covenant I will make with them after that time, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds.” Then he adds: “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.” (verses 15—18)

What is the Holy Spirit testifying about? He is reminding us of Jeremiah’s inspired prophecy, outlining the New Covenant. The significant point of Jeremiah’s prophecy, the thing that the writer wants his readers to see is verse 17:

“Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.”

God’s forgiveness of our sins is final and complete. What God is saying literally is: “I will be reminded no more.” Modern Christians take this for granted, but to first century believers this truth must have been seismic. In the Old Covenant, God was reminded of His people’s sins every year! But this is not the case under the New Covenant. God does not want to be reminded of His people’s sins because they have been completely eliminated by His Son’s perfect atonement.

3. Our response

We can hardly read this section of Hebrews without seeing the incredible depth of our atonement. By ONE sacrifice, our sins have forever been forgiven; our salvation secured; and our sanctification completed.

If verse 17 is a theological punchline, then verse 16 must be the set up. Whose sins have been forgiven and forgotten? ONLY those who have had God’s laws planted in their hearts and written on their minds. In other words, no provision is made for those who merely profess to Christians but remain double-minded in all they do; no provision is made for those who claim to love Christ but stubbornly persist in their sin. God’s unlimited forgiveness is completely dependent our experiential reality of God’s spiritual work done in us. We have been made holy forever! Now, let’s live like God’s holy people.

(c)  2011 WitzEnd

Jesus calling some disciples to follow Him.

Living As Christ’s Disciple, 1 John 2:3—29

Being a faithful follower of Jesus Christ takes work—mental work. The lazy Christian is one who falls for every new teaching no matter how far from Biblical truth it is. Those of us who been involved in church ministry recognize this to be a big problem. How many of us have wondered, “Why is it easier to believe this or that false teaching but not the truth?” But as prevalent a problem as this may be, it’s not a new one. It’s as old as the church.

The apostle John gives us some guidelines for how to live faithfully as Christ’s disciple. More than guidelines, these are like tests to see if you possess eternal life. Mixed in with these tests, John alludes to the false teachings his readers were flirting with. The tests are moral, social, and doctrinal in nature, which involve the whole person and their behavior, beliefs, and attitudes.

1. Obey Christ’s commands, 1 John 2:3—11

a. Knowing God, vs. 3—6

We know that we have come to know him 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. 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.

The first test is a simple one, given in verse 3. Two things are made clear: we can know Jesus and we can know that we know Him. The popular heresy of John’s day taught that only a select few special people could know God through special knowledge. But John indicates that we can know God and know that we know.

While the Gnostic false teaching that John was confronting taught about “knowing” God, for the Christian, “knowing” God involves more than an intellectual understanding of spiritual things. For us, knowledge of God is inseparable from the experience of righteous living. In other words, a person may run around all day claiming to know God, but if their lives don’t measure up to God’s teaching about righteousness, they’re either a liar or delusional.

So the first test is the test of conduct. This doesn’t mean that everybody who appears to be living a righteous life is a Christian. Many people live according to Biblical principles simply because those principles lead to a good quality of life. Jesus understood this well:

Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 7:21)

What John is getting at is that our greatest desire should be set upon the moral teachings of the Gospel and living them as best we can. Keeping the teachings of Scripture—God’s commands—is the same as walking in the light.

b. Loving others, vs. 7—11

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. (vs. 10, 11)

John had just taught that moral obedience is a test of a relationship with God. Here is another test; the social test—a loving attitude. The Gnostics were a cold, arrogant, exclusive, unloving, and legalistic people. Christians, on the other hand, should be none of those things. No wonder John gave this test to his readers!

The command for believers to “love one another” is both an old and a new command. This command is a very old one, having been given from “the beginning.” We wonder, though, what John meant by that: the beginning of what? The beginning of time? Or since the giving of the Mosaic Law? Or since the founding of the Church?

The first two theories have merit, but it seem likely John has in mind since the beginning of the Church. Jesus taught His followers to love each other, which was really a fresh teaching of the Law of Moses. This command, then, though old, is not obsolete or worn out, just ancient, but absolutely essential for living. The command to love each other should never be forgotten, but should always be fresh and new in the sense that we commit ourselves to it often. It’s too easy for our Christian love to become formal and duty-bound. Blind obedience should never replace spontaneous love. When that happens, the command to “love one another” becomes as worn out as a sock with a hole in the heel. Indeed, obedience must never become a substitute for love, just an evidence of it.

Verses 7 to 11 describe a person in the church who is, hopefully, in the minority! The word “hates” in verses 9 and 11 is written in the present tense, suggesting a continuous way of life. A person cannot, at the same time, live in hate and walk in the light. It’s an impossibility.

When we “love our brother,” two things happen. First, we are “living in the light.” That is, we are living in the sphere of God’s light, which shines on us. We are true believers.

Second, when we “love our brother,” there is “nothing in us to make him stumble.” The sense of that phrase is literally, “there is no stumbling block in us.” When we are walking in His light, we have nothing in our lives to stumble over or anything in us to cause others to stumble.

2. Don’t love the world, 1 John 2:12—17

a. Truth for all ages, vs. 12—15

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

John has some words of encouragement for his readers. This is the overriding admonition for believers of all ages and maturity. John groups his readers into “children,” “fathers,” and “young men.” Since women are not mentioned we may assume women are perfect (I write that as a husband of one).

“Dear children” (verse 12) is John’s favorite term of endearment for all congregations as a whole. So to all believers, of all ages and standings, this assurance is given: “Your sins have been forgiven.” And what an assurance that is! Everything begins with forgiveness. Once confessed, our sins may be forgiven and we are then able to enter into fellowship with both God and the Body of Christ.

“Fathers” refers to the senior members of the congregation, those who had some authority within the church. These would be mature believers, both in years and faith.

“Young men” who are “strong” adds a new dimension of thought concerning believers. These have “overcome,” suggesting those who have experienced victory in Christ. This ought to be state of all believers, who are ever in conflict with evil, yet always victorious because Christ has overcome death, hell, and the grave. The Psalmist has a good piece of advice for this group:

How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word. (Psalm 119:9)

In verse 13 there is kind of play on words not apparent in the English. Back in verse 12, the Greek for “children” is teknia. But here it is paidia, emphasizing not age but a relationship—a subordinate relationship of one who needs to sit under authority and instruction. Here is the position all believers should strive for:

I write to you, dear children, because you have known the Father. (vs. 13b)

What John is saying is this: his readers have to know God personally because they sat under the teachings and instruction of godly men.

All members of the church, then, from the oldest to the youngest, both in the faith and in chronology of years, must not love the world or live as worldly people. It’s a bit ironic that the apostle of love, who writes all about how we ought love, gives a stern piece of advice NOT to love something: the world. As much as we ought to love the Body of Christ, we ought to NOT love the world outside of that Body.

b. Flesh, eyes, and the pride of life, vs. 16, 17

For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.

John’s mood seems to swing from that of an old man giving words of assurance to a stern old man giving a serious warning. The tense of these verses is not the perfect but the present imperative: he is giving a command! The command is back in verse 15: Do NOT love the world. What love for the world or worldliness involves is now spelled out for us: (1) the cravings of the sinful men; (2) the lust of his eyes; and (3) the boasting of what he has and does.

Believers should not love the world because the world is temporary and is passing away. What John is saying here quite startling, actually. “Pass away” is the same verb in the same tense (present) as was used back in verse 8 to describe the present downfall of darkness. Here, the “darkness” is “the world,” and again John describes it as even now passing away. The chilling assumption is that when the world passes, those who are a part of it will pass as well.

3. Abide in Christ, 1 John 2:18—29

This is the last of John’s “tests,” the doctrine test—the necessity to believe right. Here John has returned the purpose of his letter—to combat false teaching and false teachers by giving his readers solid teachings.

John indicates in verse 18 that he and his readers were living in, literally, “the last hour.” The early church was very conscious that Christ could return at any moment, and that’s why so many of the New Testament’s admonitions about holiness and purity of life are viewed in that context. The thought being, live right and believe right because Christ could return in the next moment. Getting caught with one’s hand in the proverbial cookie jar is powerful motivation to live God-pleasing lives!

a. Antichrists and the anointing, vs. 18—21

Like John and his friends, we too are living in the “last hour.” It’s a long hour, but the dangers of his day are the dangers of ours. False teachers—antichrists—are all over the place, spewing their bad teachings and leading many ignorant believers astray. In John’s day, the identity of the antichrists he was concerned about is clear: they seemed to be one-time members of the church!

They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us… (vs. 19)

They masqueraded as believers but revealed their true colors when they left—went out from—the company of true believers, to strike out on their own, preaching their own gospel.

We learn something about two important doctrines of the Church here. First, we get an inkling of what “the perseverance of the saints” involves. Only those who remain absolutely faithful to Christ until the end are truly saved. Endurance saves no one, but it is a characteristic of one who is saved. And second, we see the doctrine of “the true church,” or what the true church looks like. Only those who are true to Christ are members of the Church and only He knows what that is.

But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know the truth. I do not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie comes from the truth. (vs. 20, 21)

What assurance for true believers! We who persevere in the faith have two powerful things going for us: (1) We “have an anointing from the Holy One.” The “Holy One” could refer to either Christ or God, but the anointing definitely refers to the Holy Spirit. The true believer is anointed just like Christ was: by the Holy Spirit. In this sense, we are like Him. The “but” suggests that the false teachers didn’t have this anointing at all. They were running around claiming to be like Christ, yet they were empty. Meanwhile, those who remained true to Him are like Him in the sense that the same anointing fills them as filled Christ. (2) John’s readers “know the truth.” This is an assurance every single believer has because it doesn’t depend on a seminary education:

As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit—just as it has taught you, remain in him. (vs. 27)

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth (John 14:17) and He becomes our teacher. It’s easy to be intimidated by teachers, and especially false teachers, who use big words and wordy arguments, but it was important to John that his readers understand that they don’t need to feel this way because they have real knowledge of God, taught to them by the Holy Spirit Himself. This same Spirit also helps believers distinguish between true teaching and error.

b. The Christ, vs. 22, 23

Who is the liar? It is the man who denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a man is the antichrist—he denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also.

The rhetorical question provides another test. One who denies that Jesus is the Christ—the false teachers—is an antichrist. To deny Christ is to deny the Father. Without getting in to an in depth teaching on Gnosticism, the modern application is obvious. Many people claim to “believe in God,” yet have no relationship whatsoever with Jesus Christ or even fail to recognize His divinity. Such people are not part of the Body of Christ.

c. Safeguards against heresy, vs. 24—29

See that what you have heard from the beginning remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. (vs. 24)

Unlike the false teachers who gave up on the true Gospel, John urges his readers not to. If a believer clings to the true teachings of Scriptures, they may protect themselves from the trap of the false teachers. Paul wrote what about a time when people wouldn’t be following John’s advice:

For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. (1 Timothy 4:3, 4)

It takes work to remain faithful to the teachings of Scripture; false teachings always appeal to the flesh and the sinful nature, even while they pretend to be spiritual.

Verse 27 gives us the reason why John wrote the things he did:

I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray.

But even he recognized that no matter how much he wrote and taught them about the truth, there was One who could do more than he ever could:

As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit—just as it has taught you, remain in him.

It’s important to listen to the right teaching; to believe the right things. John’s readers had heard the right teachings from him plus they had the Holy Spirit’s ongoing ministry within them. So there are two forms of protection against heresy: the truth of the Word God, read and taught, and the Spirit of Truth. A believer who has both of these protections operating in his life in balance will not fall prey to false teachers. But balance is important. One should not focus on the Scripture at the expense of the the Spirit or vice versa. The best safeguard against false teaching is a knowledge of the truth gained through personal study of the Word, exposure to solid Bible teaching, and Spirit-led illumination.

(c)  2011 WitzEnd

Mr Hyde, the way some people view Paul's wretched man in Romans 7

Chapter 7 of Romans is directly related to something Paul wrote back in chapter 6:

For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace. (Romans 6:14)

The verses in between 6:14 and 7:1 dealt with a possible objection to that statement:

Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? (6:15)

In answer to that, Paul used the slave-master analogy. As far as Paul was concerned, a Christian, unlike any other person on earth, should be able to not sin because his life is now lived under simple obedience to God’s will. The Christian is now a slave of righteousness whereas he used to be slave of sin. Only the person who has been set free from sin can serve God in obedience.

In chapter 7, Paul uses another analogy to make essentially the same point before moving on to new ideas.

1. Dead to the law: a second illustration, 7:1—6

Paul taught that Christians have died not only to sin, but also to the Law. Both the sin and the Law exercise authority over a person only as long as that person is alive. That makes sense; it’s obvious. When somebody dies, they no longer have a relationship with anything one Earth, including the Law. Now, when a person becomes a Christian, obviously they don’t physically die. So how are we set free sin and the the Law? We are made “new creations” in Jesus Christ—we are considered to be dead to sin and the Law by God, just as Jesus died physically to sin and the Law. This simply means that a Christian is no longer obligated to sin and the Law’s claim on the person is canceled. In a sense, as far as the Law is concerned, the new believer has become a “spiritual corpse.”

To illustrate that principle, Paul turns from the slave-master analogy to a new analogy: marriage. A married woman is legally bound to her husband only so long as he alive. When he dies, she is set free from that covenant, and therefore free to marry again. But if she jumps the gun and lives with another man while her husband is alive, she has not only sinned but has broken the Law.

It’s an imperfect analogy, and as John Knox observed, it’s “awkward and confused.” It’s always tricky to read too much into any analogy, whether it’s found in the Bible or heard from a pulpit. However, it seems Paul’s reasoning goes like this: As long as we (the husband) live in the flesh, we (the wife) are completely governed by the Law. In other words, the death of the husband is the death of “our old self” in Christ. When we died with Christ (described in Romans 6), we were set free from the Law, illustrated by the wife (our new self) being free to marry again. Paul is not teaching about marriage, but about being free from the Law, just as he had done previously using the master-slave analogy.

The “awkward” and “confused” illustration is really a very simple way to sum up the whole issue of the Christian’s relationship to the Law and to sin, to Christ and to holiness.

2. What good is the Law? 7:7—13

Once again, a new question is raised:

What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? (7:7)

It would be easy for some of Paul’s readers to get that impression, so now Paul is going to deal with the Law. His answer is very emphatic: the Law is most definitely NOT sin! However, there is a relationship between the Law and sin, which is explained in verses 7—11. In a sentence, the Law showed Paul what sin was. That sounds good, and while Paul declares the Law to be a good thing, it did produce a major problem in him: it seemed stirred up a desire to sin. This isn’t a fault of the Law, it illustrates the sneaky nature of temptation, which goes right back to the Garden of Eden;

“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:4, 5)

Eve was faced with a law from God; a commandment; a prohibition. Because human nature naturally rebels against God, when the desire was stirred up within her, she rebelled against what God wanted and did what she wanted to do. As every parent knows, often the word “don’t” is really a challenge to “do” as far as the child is concerned. That’s not a fault of the parent, it’s the “fault” of the child.

Just like a parent informs a child what is right and wrong, so the Law defines sin and it makes one aware of it. Of course, sin exists without the Law; we are all familiar with the old saying, “Ignorance of the law is no excuse.” Sin literally takes advantage of the Law to tempt a person to do evil. This is the gist of verse 13:

Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! But in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.

Paul paints a particularly nasty picture of sin. Not only can it do its work successfully on its own, but it can also use something good, the Law, to accomplish it’s nefarious end.

3. The futility of the Law, 7:14—25

The letter takes a dramatic and personal turn at this point. Up till now, Paul has used the slave-master and marriage illustrations to explain the relation between the Law and sin and the believer. Now he uses a third illustration: himself. This might well be the most powerful illustration to prove his point for every believer can relate. Ovid understood Paul’s problem:

My reason this, my passion that, persuades.  I see the right, and approve it too;  I hate the wrong, and yet the pursue.

English poet Francis Quarles confessed to having the same problem:

I like, dislike, lament for what I could not; I do, undo; yet still do what I should not, And, at the selfsame instant, will the thing I would not.

We get a sense of the frustration Paul must have felt as he wrote verses 18—20:

I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

“I” and “me” are two words that need to understood if the meaning of this passage is to understood. It seems as though Paul is aware of “two selves” within fighting against each other. One self, “I,” or “self,” wants to do what is good, but the other “self” chooses to do what is not good. This first “self” is identified in verses 22 and 23:

For in my inner being I delight in God’s law. (verse 22)

I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind… (verse 23)

The other “self” is identified as “my sinful nature,” in verse 18, and it always wants to do the things that run contrary to the first “self.”

Is it possible that Christians have these “two selves” warring against each other? Is Paul suggesting believers somehow have a black dog and a white dog battling each other with themselves for dominion?  Do Christians have something in common with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?  The answer is found inverse 20:

Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

Here is a conundrum: Romans 6:6 tells us that our “old nature,” that is, our “sinful nature,” is dead:

For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin…

Key to understanding these warring personalities is the phrase “sin living in me.” Can a Christian have sin dwelling in them? NO! This indwelling of sin is in contrast to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, which Paul will discuss in chapter 8. Our earthly nature is (or was) riddled with sin and, unfortunately, often dominates (or dominated) the side of us that truly wants (or wanted) to do what was right. Indwelt by the Holy Spirit at our conversion, our earthly nature was slain. Prior to that, when we were indwelt by sin, we were subject to death. What Paul is describing in these verses is not Paul, the redeemed man, but Paul, the fallen man; a man, who is always rebelling against God. Remember, Paul is using himself as an illustration of the relationship that the Law and sin have to man. As an unredeemed, fallen man, no matter how much Paul wanted to do good; no matter how much Paul loved God’s Law, he found that there was another law at work, one that bound him to commit the sin and forsake the Law. This “other law” is merely the law that bound a wife to her husband and a slave to his master.

Note verse 24:

What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?

The “body” in this verse refers to Paul’s old self; his sinful nature. Even though Paul is writing is the present tense, he is actually referring to himself before he became a believer. We know that Paul must be writing about his past because of what he wrote in 8:9—

You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you.

The “wretched man,” then is NOT Paul the Christian, but Paul the man of the flesh, being controlled by his sinful nature. The wretched man can NEVER be the Christian; the wretched man is the fallen, sinful man who is forced to sin even when he’d rather obey God’s law.

Wesley sums up Romans 7 in a most effective way:

The character here assumed is that of a man, first ignorant of the Law, then under it, and sincerely, but ineffectually, striving to serve God. To have spoken this of himself, or any true believer, would have been foreign to the whole scope of the discourse; nay, utterly contrary thereto, as well as to what is expressly asserted.

In a sense, Romans 7 is sort of like the book of Ecclesiastes. The Teacher of that Old Testament book knows God but he wrote his book as though he did not—he viewed life from the standpoint of the natural man; the man who did not know God so as to expose the vanity of a life with God in it.

The value of Romans 7 is beyond measure. It dispels the popular, unbiblical idea that human nature is basically good. Human nature cannot be basically good for it is enslaved to evil. This chapter also does away with the myth that holiness can be achieved by obeying either the Law of Moses or any other law. No matter how determined a person may be to do good and live good, they will be powerless to do so apart from the grace of God.

(c)  2011 WitzEnd

Romans 6

Paul continues his line of thought, relating the believer’s present position in Christ to how that believer should live his life.

Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. (Romans 6:8—10)

After giving his readers a lot of information about the believer’s identification with Christ as illustrated by water baptism, Paul begins this new section with the assumption that “we died with Christ.” His readers are true believers, not just Christians in name only, but Christians who have experienced Jesus Christ in a real, personal way. All of us who have named Christ as Savior are related to Him and we share in His death to sin and His resurrection. But what “died to sin” mean?

1. Christ’s experience with sin: Our experience with sin

When the Son of God entered the sphere of humanity, He left the glories of Heaven. He left a place of sinless perfection; a place of purity, uncorrupted by sin, and completely separated from sin in every sense of the word. He left that place and entered a world dominated by sin and evil. Jesus was immediately confronted by sin’s presence and power. Think about it; for some 33 years our Lord walked among the evil of sin; it’s tentacles always reaching out to Him, seeking to get Him in their grip. Jesus, like all men, lived a life surrounded by the darkness of sin.

When He went to the Cross, He assumed our sin, for He had none of His own. He bore the wrath of God against our sin; He was punished for all the sinful, rebellious acts every single human being had ever and will ever commit.

When we consider the awful, horrendous hours our Lord spent on the Cross, preceded by over 30 years of having to deal with sin after leaving an environment of complete sinlessness, no wonder He cried out “It is finished” when He died! What a relief it must have been for Him to bow His head and release His Spirit. At that moment, it was over for Jesus. His time on Earth was finally over. His nightmare with sin and the effects of sin were over forever.

In much the same way, Christians who are united—glued—to Christ, can throw up their hands and rejoice in the fact that just like their Lord, they may cry out, “It is finished” and breathe a sigh of relief because they are dead to sin and no longer under any obligation to look for or yield to sin. The tyranny of sin, as far as the redeemed is concerned, is over!

But, not only did Jesus die to sin, He rose to a new life, and we did too! What a marvelous thought! You see, when Jesus was alive, in the flesh, He had an obligation to deal with sin. Though He never sinned, He had to deal with sin and the effects of sin. But after His death, Christ arose, completely done with sin, able to give full attention to God the Father and the glories of Heaven. In same way, believers who are continually besieged by sin day and night; having to deal with it over and over and over again; strangled in its relentless grip, are finally released and are finally able to devote more of themselves to serving Christ and pleasing God the Father. Like Christ, believers have a new life.

2. How to live that new life

In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. (vs. 11)

Here is how Paul helps his readers to experience what Jesus experienced: “In the same way…” We have to acknowledge that this is not the easiest thing to do. We do, after all, live in a world of sin. Unlike Christ who got to return to sinless paradise, we’re stuck here on Mother Earth. So how in the world to we live a “new life” while we are still here, in the same old place? Paul gives us the answer in verses 12—14 with a series of exhortations. The interesting thing about Paul’s exhortations is that without them, we have a very unbalanced view of the Christian life. Without the exhortations, we get the impression that “God does it all.” All the Christian has to do is coast along until he dies then goes to Heaven. Talk about unbalanced! With these exhortations, though, we see that while our salvation is a work of God alone, our Christian life is ours to live; God won’t live it for us. For the whole of our existence on Earth, we must consciously fight against and rebel against sin’s rule. The decisions to sin or not sin are ours to make; God won’t make them for us.

This is the great paradox for the believer. We are dead to sin, yet sin is all around us. We are alive to Christ, yet still living in the flesh. We have been declared fully righteous by God, yet still sinners who need forgiveness. We are called to live NOW like we are already living in the Kingdom, yet the Kingdom is nowhere in sight. How can we do that? Paul gives us the key in three points:

a. Counting, verse 11.

This is a real challenge to believers: to become in reality what we are in Christ potentially. Hodge comments:

If in point of fact believes are partakers of the death and life of Christ; if they die with Him and live with Him, then they should so regard themselves. They should receive this truth, with all its consoling and sanctifying power, into their hearts, and manifest it in their lives.

b. No reign, verse 12.

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires.

The implication here is that sin has been reigning, but it should not any longer. The believer must do his part and refuse to obey the calling to sin. The word “obey” means “to listen” or “to heed.” If a believer wants to live a holy life, then he himself must STOP listening to the wooing of sin. This we must do for ourselves; God won’t do it for us. He can help up; this is one of the ministries of the Holy Spirit in fact, but in the end, we must decide to obey God instead of listening to lies of Satan.

c. Offering, verse 13.

Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.

To “offer” comes from the Greek parastesate, written in the aorist imperative meaning, “present yourselves by one decisive act”. Christians are to refuse to offer themselves to sin and encouraged to offer themselves to another: God. We are to stop offering parts of our bodies to sin (eyes, hands, free will, mind, etc.) as instruments against God. Instead, we are to offer those parts to God, for the sake of righteousness.

So, it’s not enough to simply will ourselves to stop sinning. If we do that, a vacuum is created and, lo and behold, what will get sucked into the vacuum? Different kinds of sins, that’s what. In order to avoid creating a vacuum, when we stop offering ourselves to sin, we must start offering ourselves to God.

3. A new kind of bondage, 6:15—23

Now, Paul has claimed that believers are not under the Law. However, this does not mean that they are free from the demands of righteousness. Just because one has been set free from the Mosaic Law as a covenant system does not mean they are now indifferent to God’s moral will. In other words, freedom from the the legalism of the Law is not freedom to sin. All believers, not just Jewish converts, need God’s moral law to help them see the seriousness of sin. Even though it sounds like Christians are free from God’s law, in a sense they aren’t:

To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. (1 Corinthians 9:21)

It’s vitally important for believers, in this day of moral relativism and pluralism, to remember that while we are no longer in bondage to sin, we are in bondage to the will of God. It sounds funny, so Paul adds this:

I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. (vs. 19)

The “example” he is speaking about is the “slave-master” illustration, which helps us understand the simple fact that, as Jesus Himself taught, nobody can serve two masters. Serving God is an all or nothing proposition. The fact that Paul had to use an “example from everyday life” shows us how difficult a concept this is. Once we were completely sold out to sin, now we need to be completely sold out to Christ. Once we were forced to sin, now we able to walk away from it.

This is a result of our acceptance of the Gospel; we are not only set free from captivity to sin, but enslaved us to a new master: righteousness. In this context, “righteousness” refers to ethical goodness.

This is also what holiness is. Instead of letting sin use our bodies, leading us to a sense of moral indifference, we are to offer our bodies in the service of God, leading us to perform acts of righteousness.

Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. (vs. 19b)

The word “holiness” comes from the Greek hagiasmos, which itself is part of a word group that includes such words as “holy,” “saint,” “purify,” “hallowed,” and “holiness.” Primarily, the sense of hagiasmos is to be set apart completely for the use of God. This is hagiasmos as far as God is concerned. But it has a secondary meaning as far as man is concerned. Because he has been set apart for God’s use, man now has an obligation to fulfill God’s will for him, which includes performing acts of righteousness. This is something a believer needs to do for himself; God will not force him to perform holy acts, but He often places the believer in the position of having to make the choice of performing them or not. In this way, man’s free will is protected and at the same time, the believer is developing a character like his heavenly Father’s.

F.F. Bruce paraphrases the last part of Paul’s thought like this:

A slave’s former owner has no more authority over him if he becomes someone else’s property. This is what happened to you. You have passed from the service of sin into the service of God: your business is now to do what God desires and not what sin dictates.

Finally, verse 23 is really a contrast to help drive home Paul’s point of the nature of our new life in Christ (it’s God’s gift to us) with it’s benefits and our old life with it consequences:

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

To help the believer make the right choice, we see on the one hand that sin produces death as a just reward for living in a way that displeases God. But on the other hand, God is full of grace, which results in the calling of many people to Himself.

Most commentators see the word “wages” being used here in the military sense of a soldier’s rations or pay. Sin, then, is viewed as a General who pays out these wages to those under his command. What a depressing way to view life without Jesus Christ! What a contrast to God’s free gift of grace! Instead of being ordered around by an overbearing General, not having any say in the matter, we instead have been placed into a relationship with a loving Heavenly Father who loves us, respects us, and gives us far more than mere wages.

(c)  2011 WitzEnd

For the purpose of this miniseries, we determined that Jesus came to Earth for four reasons. The first two included (1) to destroy the Devil’s works, and (2) to take away sins. The third and fourth reasons for the Son of God coming in the flesh are (3) to reveal the Father and (4) to prepare for the Second Advent.

1. To reveal the Father, John 14:9

Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?

By the time we get to John 14, Jesus’ end is near. He had been talking to His friends and three times He was interrupted. First by Thomas, who asked:

“Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” (vs. 5)

While He was answering Thomas, Philip piped up and asked:

“Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.” (vs. 8)

Finally, Judas (the other one), butted in and asked:

“But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?” (vs. 22)

We have to admire our Lord’s patience with His “closest friends.” For three years these men walked with Jesus, talked with Jesus, were witnesses to multiplied miracles and still they were clueless about who this Man was.

But it was Philip’s question that really showed what these men wanted. They understood that somehow this Man Jesus had a unique relationship with God, and what these men really wanted to was see Yahweh—to have the same special relationship with Him that Jesus had. Jesus’ answer to Philip was so simple, it must have left the apostle speechless:

Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. (vs. 9)

We get the impression that Jesus was mildly surprised that Philip hadn’t recognized Him for who He was. But then it’s not all that uncommon to miss God because we all approach the subject of “God the Father” with different preconceived notions that may or may not bear any resemblance to the reality of who He really is.

A lot of people today—Christians included—are like the Hebrews of the Old Testament, who had a highly intellectual concept of God because God had taught them all about Himself through His prophets and His Word. You can’t read the Old Testament without seeing the effort God went to to reveal Himself to His covenant people. From Genesis to Malachi we can see a kind of progressive revelation of God to the Hebrews. And yet, in spite of a growing head-knowledge of God, there was at the same time a corresponding moral decay in the people. Knowing facts about God is not what changes a life. It may change behavior for a while, but unless God is experienced at the heart level, a person will remain dedicated to serving themselves, not Him.

The profusion of religions and cults around Israel showed that man was always looking for something or someone to worship. Sin had so separated him from the true God that instead of seeking Him, man created gods in his image or in images that sprang from his imagination.

But all that changed with Advent, 2,000 years ago. Before He visited man in the flesh of man, in the person of His Son, God’s presence among His people was highly symbolic and sporadic. The fact is, before the coming of Christ, there was really no abiding presence of God on Earth or in His people. At various times throughout the Old Testament dispensation, the Spirit of God would come upon a person for a time to accomplish a special purpose. With the exception of King David, we have no record of God’s Spirit dwelling in anybody. God would manifest His presence in the form of clouds or smoke or in other supernatural manifestations. At the Advent, though, Jesus appeared to manifest God.

In answer to Philip’s question to to “see the Father,” Jesus’ response suggested that after three years, Philip had seen enough of Jesus to see the Father in Him. But, what exactly did Philip see in Jesus?

Philip was the very first man Jesus called to follow Him, though not the first one to actually follow our Lord. After Jesus asked Philip to follow Him, note what Philip did:

Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” (John 1:45)

That was the first thing Philip saw in Jesus: here was the One who embodied all the ideals of Moses and the prophets.

Next, we see Jesus asking Philip a question about where to get some bread to feed a large group of hungry followers. We are told that our Lord asked him this question to “test Philip.” Philip’s answer showed that he considered it impossible to feel all the people:

“Eight months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” (John 6:7)

And yet right after that, we see Philip, along with the other apostles, sitting down with all those hungry people, waiting to be fed. Philip saw in Jesus One who was, in some unfathomable way, able to satisfy human hunger. He didn’t understand how it was possible, but that didn’t stop him from enjoying what Jesus was offering.

In John 12, we see Philip again. This time, a group of Greeks approached Philip wanting to see Jesus. Jesus’ response to Philip showed a perfect harmony between the Son and the Father:

“Now my heart is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name!” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.” (John 12:27, 28)

This is what Philip saw and heard!

Finally, in John 14, Philip wanted to see the Father. How could Philip not see the Father in Jesus after all he had seen Jesus do and say? But he didn’t. He may have seen and heard, but what he saw and heard didn’t meant anything at the time. It wasn’t until after Pentecost that the light finally dawned upon Philip. It was then that Philip saw it all, and he knew that Jesus came to reveal the Father.

2. To prepare for a Second Advent, Hebrews 9:28

So Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.

Here is the final reason Jesus came: He came to prepare for another coming. The first three reasons for Advent were all necessary in order that there could be a second Advent.

At Christmas time, the First Coming was greeting with joy and gladness.

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.” (Luke 2:13, 14)

Certainly the angels were thrilled that the Son of God appeared in the flesh, and a handful of thoughtful men were excited, but then what? All that happiness and goodwill sort of faded away. Something was missing in the first Advent. Certainly the Messiah came, but what really changed in the world. Jesus came to end the Devil’s works, to take away sin, and to reveal the Father, but as we look at the world around us even today, we’d be hard-pressed to see any of that taking place. No, the First Advent really demands something more.

The writer to the Hebrews makes a startling assertion: Christ will appear a second time. This is not referring to some kind of mystical, spiritual coming into people’s hearts! We’re talking a literal, physical, visible appearing of Christ. This Second Coming is all over the Old Testament and the New Testament; it is an essential doctrine; it is the consummation of all things.

It is unfortunate that so many Christian fail to see the surety of the Second Coming, and among those who know it’s going to happen remain unmoved! When Christ ascended to Heaven, angels appeared to those who saw Him leave:

This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven. (Acts 1:11b)

There’s no doubt about it, men of Jerusalem! Jesus is going to come back, but not as He came the first time, but as He left. The angels cannot be wrong!  Jesus Christ is going to come back.

Paul cannot be wrong!

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. (1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17)

This is the blessed hope of the Church! This great doctrine of the Second Advent is what gave the early Church its hope, motivation, and encouragement. It should still do that for us today. Imagine what the Church would look like if ever day she lifted her face toward the eastern sky in expectation that this day could be that day of days! Wouldn’t we take our faith much more seriously if we honestly believed that our Lord could appear at any moment?

James, the half-brother of our Lord can’t be wrong:

You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near. (James 5:8)

Peter wrote these encouraging words; he can’t be wrong:

Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. (1 Peter 1:13)

John, the apostle who was perhaps closest to Jesus, was he wrong when he wrote:

Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. (1 John 3:2)

And Jude couldn’t have been wrong:

But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. (Jude, vs 20, 21)

Every New Testament writer writes about a Second Advent. But the writer to Hebrews gives us the reason: to bring salvation to those waiting for Him. Before we deal with what that means, note that when Jesus comes the second time, it will NOT be to bear sin. The whole of the First Advent revolved around sin. Jesus came to deal with sin. His first Advent actually revealed sin. From the Slaughter of the Innocents to the His death on the Cross, the presence of Christ on earth brought sin into the light for all to see.

He not only shone the light on sin, but he bore sin, and not just on the Cross, but all through His life, Jesus bore sin. He bore its limitations while He was living and working as a Man. In poverty, sorrow, and loneliness, our Lord bore sin. Ultimately, of course, He bore sin all the way to the Cross, where He dealt with it once and for all.

At the First Advent, sin at its very root was dealt with, at His Second Advent all creation will celebrate the victory that sin has been crushed. Jesus Christ will not come in sorrow and sadness, but to bring everlasting joy. He won’t come in loneliness, but the saints of the ages will come with Him. We celebrate the First Advent, where there was no room at the Inn for Him. But at the Second Advent, the whole universe will have to make room for Him. The First Advent was for atonement. The Second Advent for administration, for Jesus Christ will come the second time as King of Kings and Lord of Lords to establish an everlasting kingdom in righteousness and holiness.

At His Second Advent, there will be complete salvation for the believer—complete righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. The Second Advent will be a joyous occasion for those who know Christ. We are waiting, patiently, in the midst of earth’s struggle, which is really our struggle.  When Jesus comes, the conflict that persists within every believer will finally be over; we will be made whole in every way.  Heaven is waiting for the Second Advent. Hell is waiting for the Second Advent. Indeed, all creation is groaning in anticipation of the Second Advent.

He is coming! This Christmas Season, may the hope of the Second Advent fill your hearts. Today, we stand between the Advents. Our relation to the first determines our relation to the second. May Jesus Christ find room in your hearts today to prepare you for the day when He comes again.

(c)  2011 Witzend

All believers are called into fellowship with God.

Fellowship With God, 1 John 1

The first four verses of John’s first letter are unlike the beginning of most New Testament letters and very uncharacteristic of the author’s style. The structure of the paragraph is complex and we get the impression that John was so excited about his subject matter and the truths he was wanting to write about that his thoughts literally rushed out of his mind and onto the page. There are no greetings and no preliminaries. He gets right to the point.

After declaring some very deep theological truths concerning the Word—Jesus Christ—he states the primary purpose for his letter: that we, believers, may have fellowship with God through sharing the life of Christ. This fellowship that believers may have with one another is best understood in light of the eternal life we share.

1. Fellowship with Father and Son, 1:1—3

a. The Word of Life, vs. 1, 2

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us.

This “introduction” parallels that of Hebrews, but Hebrews is written is a much more classical style of Greek. John’s letter is typically Semitic Greek, made up of short clauses connected by the conjunction “and.” Let’s briefly look at the clauses;

• That which was from the beginning. It is interesting that it is “that” and not “who.” John could have used “who,” because certainly Jesus Christ was from the beginning. But he uses “that” because the subject is not really Jesus Christ; it is much broader than that. John is about discus the Person of Christ and the message of Christ. Both the Person and His Gospel are what have existed “from the beginning.”

• Which we have heard. The “we” is editorial. John has in mind he and all the disciples who personally heard the teachings of their Lord from His own lips.

• Which we have seen with our eyes. In a sense, this phrase is redundant. It’s a way of saying he and the disciples heard Jesus teaching with their ears and saw Him with their eyes. But it’s also a way of saying they saw Jesus’ physical body; the Son of God was no ghost. This was John’s way of combating the Docetic notion that Jesus was a sort of phantom and not a real person.

• Which we have looked at and our hands of touched. With purpose, John makes it clear using a series of verbs that he was most definitely not only a eyewitness to Jesus, not only student of Jesus, but he had a close relationship with the Lord: he saw him and touched him. All of John’s physical senses, in other words, came into contact with the Lord.

• This we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The phrase “this we proclaim” was added by translators to make a kind of summary and conclude the sentence. Both the Word of Life and the Gospel which John preached were from the beginning.

Why did John refer to Jesus as the Word (logos)? The term logos was used by many different religions and philosophies in the first century, so it would have been familiar to his readers, if not to the modern reader. We don’t generally view “the Word” as a person, but John’s readers would have had no difficulty understanding that he was writing about a Word—a Person—much greater than the word of other beliefs.

Verse two is parenthetical in the sense that is a restatement of verse one.

b. Shared life, vs. 3

We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.

John resumes his line of thought after the parenthetical comment of the second verse and repeats the verb “proclaim.” He is emphasizing that his message, and the message of the other disciples, came straight from the Source Himself. Why does he take such pains to stress this? He was probably wanting to distinguish himself and his friends from the many false teachers that were rampant in the first century church, often preaching doctrines that denied Christ’s human nature and bodily resurrection.

But the exciting part of verse three is not so much John’s emphasis, but his stated purpose. The purpose of this letter was to invite its readers into the fellowship of the apostles who were the eyewitnesses of the life and times of Jesus Christ. Fellowship with God and with God’s people is the natural result of the proclamation of the Gospel and its acceptance by those who hear it. Salvation, then, is the bedrock of Christian fellowship, and fellowship is the visible manifestation—the social consequence—of those whose hearts have been redeemed by Christ.

“Fellowship” comes from the Greek koinonia, and means “to share something in common with another.” What Christians have in common is unique to the Christian community. What ties Christians together is not family or children or careers, but mutual experiences with Jesus Christ. Koinonia can only happen in the context of the Church of Jesus Christ, among true believes.

2. Fellowship in the light, 1:4—7

a. Joy in Christ, vs. 4

We write this to make our joy complete.

Here is the secondary purpose for this letter: to make his joy, and that of his friends, complete. True joy for the believer is found in fellowship with God and fellowship with other believers. Christian fellowship is something that transcends time and space for nothing can interfere with it, not even death.

The essence of what John is teaching is this: there can be no real fellowship which produces joy outside of Christ. What does this mean for Christians? It means that the closest, most meaningful relationships in our lives will necessarily be with those who themselves are in a relationship with Jesus Christ.

b. No darkness in Christ, vs. 5

This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.

The “substance” of the message John heard from Jesus Christ was that “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.” What a simple, but deeply profound statement! The way it is written in the Greek stresses it’s emphatic meaning. “Light” occurs first in the Greek sentence, giving it place of prominence; while its opposite, “darkness,” is seen with a double-negative, underscoring its emphasis.

God is pure light, meaning two things: God has revealed Himself to man perfectly and He Himself is morally pure. God is a revealing God; He is not an arrogant, game-playing god like the Gnostic gods of John’s day and the imitation gods of today. Yahweh doesn’t reveal Himself to a select group of enlightened individuals, but to all who seek Him. Light is not mixed with impurities, like darkness. Light is pure in every sense.

c. Cleansing by Christ, vs. 6, 7

If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

When one is cleansed by Christ, certain verifiable changes occur in the believer. The word “if” introduces a new thought, which is a refutation of false teaching of John’s day. The false teaching, a result of Gnostic heresy so widespread in first century churches, went something like this: You could live in sin and still have fellowship with Christ. John insists this is impossible, though he is in no way teaching that Christians may live sinless lives. “Walk” is written in the present tense, and it refers to one’s continual moral activity. John is not referring to occasional lapses into sinful acts, but a habitual lifestyle of walking, not in the light, but constantly in the dark.

Here is a tremendous truth: a Christian can only have fellowship when they have literally surrendered their dark ways and are, to the best of their ability with the help of the Holy Spirit, walking in God’s light.

3. Fellowship through cleansing, 1:8—2:2

a. Self-deceit, vs. 8

If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

John must have been familiar with Proverbs 28:13 when he wrote this verse:

He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy.

Here is another powerful truth that seems lost on many modern believers. The Gnostics of John’s day truly believed in “sinless perfection.” They believed they had progressed beyond sinfulness; they had become perfect.

John’s choice of words in verse 8 is significant. He does not write, “we do not sin,” but rather we claim to be “without sin.” Again, the notion is a state of being. The fact is, we all sin, only a deluded person could claim to be “without sin!” If we say we have no sin, then we are not seeing ourselves clearly. People who think this way are way out of touch without reality.

b. Confession of sin, vs. 9, 10

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.

If we see ourselves in God’s light, we see that do sin. Confession of those sins is essential. We must be honest with ourselves and with God; we must not hide or cover up our sins or make excuses for them. We must confess our sins to God and He will forgive us.

As if to answer the reader who may be fearful of God’s reaction to his sins, John makes sure they understand that God is faithful and just. God cannot do anything but forgive a repentant sinner. God is absolutely true to the terms of His New Covenant:

“For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” (Jeremiah 31:34)

c. Our advocate, 2:1, 2

My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.

With the exception of Jesus, we are all sinners. We may know God’s Word, and we may walk in the light, but we all stumble from time to time. What is the remedy for those who fall into sin?

John refutes the Gnostic claim of verse 10 (claiming we do not sin) with these two thoughts.

First, another purpose of this letter is to help his readers not to commit sinful acts. “Will not sin” is written in the aorist tense, speaking not of a habitual lifestyle this time, but of individual acts of sin. He wanted his readers to be as sinless as possible; this must be the ideal for all believers.

Second, we see that this ideal, as worthy as it is, is not possible 100% of the time. John may have wanted them to not commit acts of sin, but he assumed they would, and provides a wonderful truth: the redeemed sinner has an advocate in Heaven, with God the Father!

The word “advocate” comes from the Greek paracleton, elsewhere seen as “comforter.” The term “advocate” has a variety of meanings in the New Testament. The “paraclete” is one who comes to comfort, one who is sent to help. Here, the word describes the One who pleads the Christian’s cause before God. Jesus is the One in Heaven, speaking in our defense. Our advocate does not claim our innocence, but confesses our guilt and secures forgiveness from God the Father. He can do this because He Himself is completely righteous.

Adam Clarke observed:

From these verses we learn that a poor backslider need not despair of again finding mercy; this passage holds out sufficient encouragement for his hope. There is scarcely another such in the Bible, and why? That sinners might not presume on the mercy of God. And why this one? That no backslider might utterly despair. Here, then, is a guard against presumption on the one hand, and despondency on the other.

John’s teaching about fellowship stood in stark contrast with the errors that filled the first century church, and it stands against the false teachings of that riddle the Church today. We cannot enjoy unbroken fellowship with God and God’s people if we are living in sin. Sin cannot be taken lightly, and it will be exposed for what it is. Our actions betray our hearts and they are measured against God’s standards.

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