1 John | Chapter 5

1 John 5:1-5

“Characteristics of a Christian”

 

  • Introduction
  • 1-5 What is a Christian?

 

Introduction

The apostle John throughout this letter has established what he believed to be the most important truth in life the possibility of: Fellowship with God!!! John described this in an encounter that had happened to him as a young man some 70 years prior, but he says that he had enjoyed the lasting effects throughout his life! Even though he had lived in Judaism throughout his young life prior to his encounter with God; the religion that had been created by the leaders had obscured the truth of the revelation of God that the Word had revealed. But that encounter with Jesus that day by the Sea of Galilee changed his life forever. The Light of the world, the Word of God became visible and dwelt among those disciples for 3 ½ years! As we close this letter, it is very clear that John didn’t want people to miss the single most important thing for all humanity…fellowship with the Living God. John understood this not to be religious instead relational. To aide in this desire, John wrote of three self-tests that the professing believer could take to determine if they were indeed a true follower of Christ. Interestingly enough, these three tests didn’t test a person’s knowledge or intellect, instead they tested a person’s change of behavior, their transformation.

  1. Moral: Having encountered the Living God who by His very nature is Holy has our New Birth produced a change in what we practice morally? If there has been no change in our behavior, then we have not come into a true relationship with our Holy Father!
  2. Social: If we have come into a relationship with God who is loving, and such love has transformed us then this love will operate through us towards others in a love that is called out from us towards others not because of them but instead in spite of them.
  3. Relational: Finally, if we have encountered the Living God who is true; then how He has chosen to reveal Himself to us we will agree with, even if it went against what our religion taught us. This related to the person and work of the Messiah, the Son of God who at His incarnation humbled Himself to dying of a cross for our sin.

Vs. 1-5 What is a Christian?

At the close of this letter the Apostle John will again address those three tests only from a different angle this time by asking indirectly: What are the characteristics of a Christian? Look now at these five verses and note the three choruses John presents as they will provide the outline to the passage as well as John’s definition of the characteristics of a person Born of God.

  1. 1, 4 Born of God: Here we note that the first and primary characteristic of a Christian is NEW BIRTH. A Christian’s is not a person who becomes one by education, environment, or effort. John also informs his readers that a Christian is “Born that way” but not by natural means such as a person being born into the right lineage, a Christian home or nation. The only way a person becomes a Christian is by being BORN of GOD. It is supernatural! Just because it is supernatural, this doesn’t mean that the characteristics are invisible; instead, it is the opposite, because since we are Born of God this New Birth is by its very nature TRANSFORMATIONAL!
  2. 1-3 Loves Him/God: Here John brings up the truth that the person who has encountered the Living God will see a transformation in what they love and how they love.
    • What they love: They will awake after their New Birth with a new love and that will be for the things of God and no longer a thing of the former life and world. Oh, they may stumble in the former loves as a child learns to walk but they will no longer want to live in the loves of the flesh! Their appetites will change as they mature and come to realize how great God’s love for them truly is. This will produce a security that is greater than any other thing or any person they have ever loved. The Christian is never asked to first leave that which they have loved, instead they discover that the things they have loved kept them from enjoying Him who has loved us in spite of us and the security this alone brings.
    • How they love: It will also transform the way we love as we are changed by God’s love that has so loved us in spite of us and not because of us, so we will begin to love one another the same way. We won’t love one another in a selfish way that only precipitates love because of how they make us feel. Instead, we will start loving the way God loves us! This love will grow because His love is perfected in us, and we will love in spite of who they are and because of Who God is.
  3. 4-5 Over comes the world: The final characteristic the apostle John points out is a simple observation that the Christian lives victoriously. The Christian is not immune to the difficulties and adversities of life if anything they are made more difficult by their New Birth. It isn’t the avoidance nor the outcome that causes the Christian to live a victorious life. The Christian isn’t living in the prison of looking for better situations and circumstances to produce happiness. Instead, the victorious Christian has come to realize that it isn’t the situations and circumstances that produce joy, it is instead joy that changes us in the midst of adverse situations and circumstances. The victorious life comes about due to three:
  4. The victory comes NOT from avoidance nor is it limited to our expectations of things working according to our plan and timing. The victorious Christian has a victory that cannot be defeated by those limitations and instead has the understanding that NOTHING will ever be successful in separating us from the only PERSON we MUST have, our Lord whom we are told will never leave us nor forsake us!
  5. The victory also comes by the truth that even during adverse situations and circumstances there is a work in them that is perfecting us. These trials are not Random Attacks instead they are Planned Actsthat are designed for our maturity and growth. Victory does not ask us to enjoy the planned processbut to instead rejoice in the beauty it will produce! (James 1:2-4)
  6. The victory also comes by the truth that the three things that hinder us: The devil, the world system, and our fleshly old nature, will be defeated once for all! The victorious Christian has the hope that awaits us that all we face now that hinder us but in the blink of the eyes and that we will enter a new and glorious sphere where none of those three things shall ever keep us down again and will enjoy for eternity an existence that escapes earthly descriptions.

 

1 John 5:1-5

“The Bible is a love letter”

 

  • Introduction
  • 1 Born of God to love like God
  • 2-3 God’s love lightens the load
  • 4-5 Victory over the world

 

 Introduction

We shall take a bit of a more detailed look at these first 5 verses of the 5th chapter of 1st John. The apostle John had at this point in life looked back at what he believed to be the most important truth in life the possibility of: Fellowship with God! It is clear that John didn’t want people to miss out on fellowship with the Living God. So, the Holy Spirit led John to write of three tests that the professing believer could take to determine if they were indeed in fellowship with God. These three tests didn’t test a person’s knowledge or intellect instead they tested a person’s change in their behavior, their transformation.

  1. Moral: If there has been no change in our behavior then we have not truly come into a relationship with our Holy Father!
  2. Social: If we have come into a relationship with God who is loving, then we will operate in this love that is called out from us towards others not because of them but instead in spite of them.
  3. Relational: If we have come in contact with the Living God who is true; then we will agree with the way in which He has chosen to reveal Himself to us.

The Apostle John in this chapter addressed the question of: What are the characteristics of a person who has fellowship with God, or if you will, what is a Christian? These are discovered in the text under three chorus of words or phrases that John presents.

  1. 1, 4 Born of God: Here we note that the first and primary characteristic of a Christian is NEW BIRTH. A Christian is not a person who becomes one by education, environment, or effort. The only way a person becomes a Christian is by being BORN of GOD. It is supernatural! But this supernatural New Birth doesn’t make these characteristics invisible; instead, they are very visible as they show up in our TRANSFORMATION!
  2. 1-3 Loves Him/God: Second, John brought out the truth that the person who has fellowship with God will be visible in both “What they love and how they love”.
    • What they love: They will awake after New Birth with a new love and that will be for the things of God and no longer a thing of the former life and world.
    • How they love: But not just what they love will be visible but HOW THEY LOVE! They won’t love one another in a selfish way based upon how the person makes us feel. They will love the way God loves us!
  1. 4-5 Over comes the world: The final characteristic the apostle John points out is a simple observation that the Christian lives victoriously. Though the Christian is not immune to the difficulties and adversities of life, they nonetheless live a joy filled life. This isn’t accomplished by avoidance nor an outcome that we deem favorable. The victorious life comes about due to three truths:
  2. The Victorious Christian has a victory that cannot be defeated by those limitations and instead has the understanding that NOTHING will ever be successful in separating us from the only PERSON we MUST have, our Lord whom we are told will never leave us nor forsake us!
  3. The victory also comes by the truth that these trials are not “Random Attacks” instead they are “Planned Acts” to which we CAN rejoice in the beauty they will produce! (See James 1:2-4)
  4. Lastly, the truth that the three things that hinder us: The devil, the world system, and our fleshly old nature, will be defeated once for all because He has overcome them.

 

Vs. 1 Born of God to love like God

Vs. 1. The Gnostics denied the identity of Jesus as the Messiah by denying His incarnation. John writes that to do so is to deny the ONLY person that can give a person fellowship God. What John was writing about wasn’t mere intellectual assent to the fact of the incarnation but a heart dependance upon this truth. A person may know that they need air to breath, but what John describes here is the person who is dependent upon consistently taking a breath which demonstrate that they believe with all their heart the truth as to the identity of their Messiah. It is this heart dependancethat has resulted in being “Born of God”. Furthermore, it is only the person who has been born of God that has the divine opportunity to love their brothers and sisters with the same kind of love that God has loved them with. We have a Common Father who sustains us by His continual love that enables us to love others with this love. It is possible that the Christian may try to escape this opportunity by posing a question, “What does a Christian look like that I am supposed to love?” It is a sad reality that much evangelism is never attempted because the believer fails to love the people enslaved to sin. But it is equally true that Christians often fail to love even those who share the same fellowship with God. So, John gives them the answer to the excuse posed by that hypothetical question. Love with God’s love those that have been born of God because the heart dependance on the person of Jesus, God the Son! The Baptist, the Pentecostal, the Calvinist and the Arminianist, none of these divisions should ever keep the follower of Christ from operating in God’s love towards those who are Born of God even though we differ of theological equations. It would do all those Born of God to read the Bible NOT as a TEXTBOOK but instead as a LOVE LETTER!

Vs. 2-3 God’s love lightens the load

Vs. 2-3 The words “by this” are in the Greek “IN THIS” and John’s use of the word IN tells the reader that what he wrote about was not a mere sentiment but the VERY REASON why we can now love as the Children of God. Our loving God’s children with God’s love comes from our FIRST loving God seen in our obedience to His Word. When we allow God’s Word to penetrate the hardest substance known to humanity, our own heart, then we place ourselves in the right position to loving God’s children with God’s love! Loving with God’s Love is NEVER divorced from loving God and obeying His word in our own lives. The love of God is not some mushy emotional sentiment. It is Truth demonstrated in actions, and those commandments John declares are NOT burdensome, and the word used here in the Greek is grievous or heavy. The reason for this is that God’s love for us makes the lifting light and a delight instead of a burden. Jesus never laid upon a person to carry a commandment without first equipping them and enabling them to carry it. To carry the commandment is another demonstration of God’s love through us. The opposite is also true according to the apostle John in that: “If the Christian disobeys the God’s Word, they will soon lose the security that such a life produces, and this will cause a loss of confidence towards God Himself.” This will lead to a dishonesty and bitterness towards God and His people! In the end all that will be left from this disobedience will be only the burden of religion by which this poor person has been reduced to trying to please God in their own power. What we learn is these two truths:

  • God’s love lightens the load whereas disobedience to God’s Word adds weight that we cannot move!
  • God’s perfecting love produces a joy filled obedience!

John reminds his readers that fellowship with God is one that practical and relational and not a loveless intellectualismthat was characteristic of the law.

 

Vs. 4-5 Victory over the world

Vs. 4-5 The reason that God’s commands are not heavy is due to the reality that they came after our new birth instead of a prerequisite to new birth. God changed us before we were given the blessed opportunity to live out what we have been transformed to do. It is this very new birth that causes us to be victorious in our new life in Christ. The context of the use of the word here is that of God’s maturing love and John’s point is that God’s maturing love overcomes all obstacles. The reason for this is that with just our flesh we find it natural to disobey God’s commands but because we are born of God and given His nature it is now natural for us to obey His word by His spirit! Thus, our victory comes about by our faith and trust in His nature and His spirit within us. Our faith must be in who Jesus IS and that is God the Son, not what the false teachers wanted to make Him. There is NO power in the name of Jesus if He is merely a good teacher, prophet, created being or any other person other than God the Son! If not then our faith would be misplaced in a big case of mistaken identity. When we trust in THE person and THE work of the Son of God, our trust is rewarded. Someone could recommend a mechanic for my car that doesn’t run by saying, “You need to go so Fred, he is the best mechanic ever and He can fix your car and get you going.” That may very well be true but what if you towed your car to where you thought was Fred’s shop only it wasn’t the right place, but it the owner shared the same name. You would have to identify specifically who Fred was to ensure that he could make new what wasn’t running! Faith IS NOT Believing in spite of EVIDENCE; it is instead OBEYING in spite of CONSEQUENCES. Our foe is the world that would include anything and anyone apart from God. With a transformed life comes a far easier lift of the commandments of God when compared to the bondage of the world! Our victory is guaranteed because of new birth through our continued trust in the same Son of God that saved us, being more than able to sanctify us as we travel towards Him being more than able to transform us.

 

 

1 John 5:6-10

“THE FACT of faith, Part 1”

 

  • Introduction
  • 6 The Spirt is truth

 

Introduction

As we are nearing the end of this letter John revisits the truths that were placed upon his heart by the Holy Spirit. The point of the letter was to convey the greatest event that can happen upon any individual in life…. that they can enter through New Birth a sphere by which they can enjoy “Fellowship with God”. Humanity was designed for this encounter but lost it at the fall. It is not reinstated by humanities quest through the means of education, environment, or effort. NO, a person becomes a Christian only by being BORN of GOD. This supernatural encounter is not invisible; instead, it is visible as they show up in our TRANSFORMATION! This is noticeable in a person who is enjoying fellowship with God’s love as well as how they love. Another characteristic that the apostle John pointed out was a simple observation that the Christian just lives victoriously. Though not immune to the difficulties and adversities of life they nonetheless live a joy filled life. Furthermore, this isn’t necessitated upon avoidance to adversity neither is it accomplished through favorable outcomes. Instead, the victorious life comes about due to three truths:

  1. The understanding that NOTHING will ever be successful in separating us from the only PERSON we MUST have, our Lord Jesus, whom we are told will never leave us nor forsake us!
  2. The victory also comes by the truth that these trials are not “Random Attacks” instead they are “Planned Acts” to which we CAN “rejoice in the beauty they will produce”! (See James 1:2-4)
  3. Lastly, the truth that the three things that hinder us: The devil, the world system, and our fleshly old nature, will be defeat once for all because He has overcome them.

The question that John addresses in the final verses of this letter is: “How can a person be confident in this conviction that they have fellowship with God?” Humanity has always strived after certainty. People are always looking for something or someone that will establish confidence that the course in life that they have chosen is the right one. Such a quest has produced numerous counterfeits like:

  • Astrology, (confidence in the stars)
  • Tarot Cards, (confidence in the cards)
  • Palm Readers, (confidence in our hands)
  • Fortune Tellers, (confidence in those who have died).

Unfortunately, these counterfeits to confidence have also found the same opportunity within the walls of the church in the form of personal prophecies these false prophets inevitably blame the person they offered their false assurances to when what they “named and claimed” that was to cause confidence, NOW only brings about calamity.

How wonderful it is that God understands our need for confident in our conviction and gives us His Divine certainty. His answer towards our FAITH is that our assurance is based upon a FACT! As we look out through the rest of the 5thchapter of 1st John, we will see that our confidence, or our faith is based upon a single fact! Furthermore, this fact will produce four assurances! In other words, our confidence in this FACT will cause four consequences in our life:

  • THE FACT: Vs. 6-10 Jesus is God the Son
  • The Consequences: Vs. 11-21
  1. 11-13 Confidence in this truth will change our destiny. Our assurance of Eternal life.
  2. 14-15 Confidence in this truth will change our communication. Assurance of answered prayer.
  3. 16-19 Confidence in this truth will change our direction. Assurance of continued transformation.
  4. 20-21 Confidence in this truth will change our confidence. Assurance of the completion of our race.

Those blessed assurances are all built upon the ONE FACT, the Divine Certainty that is wrapped up NOT in a principalbut in a Person, Jesus Christ who is in FACT the Son of God. It is this fact that will examine before we look at the assurances that our confidence in this fact produces.

 

Vs. 6 The Spirt is truth

Vs. 6 This verse starts with the words “This is He” and that should cause the reader to ask, who is He? And the answer to that is to be found in verse 5 where the Apostle John tied the victorious Christian life is dependent upon our faith being only in the Son of God! As I said, this is only as secure as the truth that it is dependent upon. The Christian’s confidence is NOT based upon a person’s opinion or testimony as John will point out in verse 9. People will believe what others tell them all the time. So what John offers the Christian is Someone far more reliable to establish our confidence as he reminds his readers of “Three Witnesses” that testified to the Deity of Jesus at his incarnation. This is why John will contrast this testimony to the testimony of the false teachers in verse 9. In this verse John uses words that were designed to counter the Cerinthian Gnostic heresy that was popular at this time. These false teachers taught that was “Jesus was only a person, only human, and not God the Son. Their teaching was that the divine elemen,t the CHRIST came upon a normal human at his baptism and this divine element left Jesus before his death upon the cross.” To counter this false teaching John presents THESE truths. There are three words used here that state the truth that we need to be aware of in this verse: “This is HE WHO CAME by water and blood—-JESUS CHRIST.” Most people would focus upon the statement “by water and blood” and miss what John says in the words “HE WHO CAME—-JESUS CHRIST”. The words HE WHO CAME identify Jesus as the same person who John calls the Son of God in verse 5 and says that This “Jesus, the Son of God CAME INTO TIME AND SPACE THAT WAY!” This is further strengthened by the use of the words “Jesus Christ” which as you know is not His first and last name and instead link together the person with His purpose and having said that Jesus came into His purpose already being God the Son and it was NOT bestowed upon Him at His baptism as these false teachers claimed.

Now we examine the words “by water and blood” as we now understand the context of this passage being to bring in the truth to the Cerinthian Gnostic heresy of the divine element the CHRIST came upon a normal human at his baptism and this divine element left Jesus before his death upon the cross makes the interpretation a bit more obvious as John goes right after their false claim by mentioning “WATER” which these false teachers claimed that the divine elementcame upon him at “baptism”. Thus the “BLOOD” refers to Jesus’ bloody death upon the cross, where the false teachers claimed the divine element left Jesus. What John points out in verse 9 was that there were many professing Christians who were quick to trust the testimony of false teachers with regards to the identity of Jesus while not believing the God’s own testimony! We only need to read the gospel accounts to find out what the truth: There are three times that God the Father gave His testimony of His Son’s identity, and they are at the beginning of Jesus earthly ministry at His baptism, then in the middle of His ministry at Jesus transfiguration and lastly on the cross. Next, we will examine in more detail the other two testimonies of God concerning His Son and why this fact produces confidence that will have great consequences in our lives!