First John 2:3-27

Introduction

In this lesson we are going to move pretty fast because we must cover 24 verses in order to stay on schedule.

In our last lesson we learned about the work of Jesus Christ as our Advocate and our Atoning Sacrifice. Something I want you to think about, we did not cover this to much. But it is only possible for Jesus to be our Advocate and our Atoning Sacrifice because of who He is. Mainly He is the Righteous one. He is God. If Jesus is not God then He is not able to be our advocate. But Jesus must also be fully human. Because if He is not human He cannot be our advocate before the Father, and if He is not God, He is not perfect He cannot be our Atoning Sacrifice because a mere man died which is good for nothing. But If Jesus is Fully God and Fully man, which He is fully both, then His work is amazing and effective.

John uses these two things to launch into a discussion which centers around obedience in vs. 3-6 then John just keeps going.

We are going to move at warp speed so feel free to ask questions if there is anything I am not making clear, or if there is a place where you want us to go further, since we are just going to get a survey of most of the verses in this lesson.

My Assurance comes from obeying God’s Commandments (vs. 3-6)

We as believers know that we have come to know God when we obey. The first theme of assurance in these verses is my assurance come from obeying God’s commandments. John in verse three uses an absolute statement and says by this we know. This is not a mere possibility that John is talking about, but rather by this one can know that they are a true believer. John uses this phrase by this we know eight times in the book. John contrasts a true believer with an unbeliever in this passage. In verse three the true believer is shown, and in verse four the unbeliever is shown. The person that claims to know God, but they do not keep His word, they are not obedient, these people are liars and the truth is not in them. In verse five the contrast between the believer and unbeliever continues. John says BUT whoever keeps His word in him truly the love of God is perfected. The meaning here is that if a man loves God, he will seek to please him and keep his commandments.

So the man that loves God will seek to please God by being obedient. And by this we may be sure that we are in Him. In verse six again we see that the person who says that they abide in God, this person will walk in the same way that He walked. Who exactly is the He in this verse? The He that John is talking about here Jesus. We see this in John fifteen where we are told to abide in the vine and the vine is Jesus. We will walk like He walked, we seek to do the will of the Father in everything that we do, if we are true believers.

My Assurance comes from loving other believers (vs. 9-11)

Those who obey God will also love their fellow brothers. Once again in verses nine through eleven John contrasts a true believer with the way that an unbeliever will live. In these verses we see the second theme of assurance in these verses which is my assurance comes from loving other believers.

Verse nine John says that anyone who claims to walk in the light, those who claim to lead a righteous life, yet this person hates their brother; they are still in the darkness. Love for other people, and more particular in this verse, love for other Christians is a sign of one who is a believer. After stating that those who claim to be in the light yet hate in verse nine John in verse ten tells us what a true believer will do. Whoever loves his brother this is the person who abides or walks and continues in the light. No only is that person in the light and walking in the light but in that person there is no cause for stumbling.

What exactly does John mean by there is no cause of stumbling in this person? The context demands that it applies to the individual believer, if he loves; he walks in the light and therefore does not himself stumble. So the person that is in the light will not stumble. Or as John says there is no cause for stumbling in Him.

Just think of it this way. You are in a dark building. While you are in that dark building you decide to find a way out. What you do not know is that there is a chair in that building. You are walking to find a way out you stumble upon this chair and you trip over it. Now why did you trip over this chair? It was dark you could not see it. Now reverse the situation. You are in the same building but it is well lit. You walk and you see the door and you head towards it. This time as you walk and get near the chair you see it and you avoid it. Just as the person who is walking in the light will be able to see the temptation to sin and you will know how to avoid sin. But those who are in the darkness can not see there sin, because they walk in sin. They are blinded by the darkness as John points it in verse eleven. So those who walk in the light will avoid the chair in the building because the blindness has been removed.

One implication that we see in this verse is that those who walk in the light will not cause other believers to stumble. The meaning of the verse is that they will not personally stumble. But those who walk in the light will live in such a way that they will not cause other people to stumble, because they are on guard and avoid stumbling themselves. Another implication is if we are to love fellow believers we must be a part of the church. In order to love other believers we need to be round other believers, and this takes place within the context of the church.

Different Levels of Maturity in the Church (v. 12-14)

Verses 12-14 are sometimes hard to interpret. Some people see the fathers, young men, and little children as being either physical or spiritual. In other words if it is physical it is a literal fathers or older age, and young children are actually little children and young men are actually young men.

What is actually going on here? Why does John write this? This here is referring to a spiritual age or to spiritual maturity. John addresses three different groups. John addresses all of these groups twice and each time it is a little different.

The Little Children

John addresses the little children first. He says I write to you little children because your sins have been forgiven. What does little children mean here? This is talking about a person who has just become a Christian. They are new believers. John writes to reassure that they are believers. So they will not be confused by what John has written.

He says they have been forgiven, but it was nothing that they had done. Instead it had everything to do with what God had done through Jesus Christ. They were forgiven for His Names Sake. It was not for our sake, it was for God’s glory that we were forgiven. God saved us for His glory. We had nothing to do with it, but God alone did.

The second thing John says to the little children is you know the Father. They have come to the Father. They are infatuated with knowing the Father. They are enjoying their prayer life. They are exuberant about their new life and relationship with God.

Fathers

John now addresses the Fathers. Each time he says the same thing to them. They Fathers here refers to the spiritually mature. They know Him who was from the beginning. That is God the Father. They have an intimate knowledge of the Father. They have been through the good times and the bad and throughout all they have continued with the Father. They know the Father.

Young Men

John writes to the young men. These are the people who are growing in their Christian life. They are fighting against the evil one and they have overcome the evil one. But they have not overcome the evil one on their own. They have overcome the evil one because the word of God abides in them. What does this imply then? This implies that these people have been in the word of God. In order for the word of God to abide in them they must be studying the word of God. They must be reading the word of God.

If you think about it this is the way the church is set up. Some are more mature than others and they can help those who are not as mature. But their will be spiritual growth.

My Assurance comes from not loving the world (vs. 15-17)

John in verses nine through eleven showed us who a true believer will love. As we move on to verses fifteen through seventeen we see what a true believer will not love. The true believer will not love the world. This is the third theme of assurance in these verses. My assurance comes from not loving the world.

Verse fifteen is a warning. It is a warning from John that if anyone loves the world the love of the Father is not in them. The love that he is talking about here is an ongoing love. By contrast a true believer will have an ongoing love for the Father. The verse is in the form of an if then statement. If you love the things of the world, then you do not love the Father. We need to define here what John means by the world. It is important to remember as you study your Bible that the term world is usually a generic term and can mean many different things. John does not have in mind here so much the physical place in where we live, but rather the attitudes of the people in this world that we live. Danny Akin says that the world here is, “An evil organized system controlled by the power of the evil one that has aligned itself against God and His Kingdom.” We are not to love the things that are in opposition to God and to the advancement of His Kingdom. But what specifically should we avoid as believers? Well the scriptures have the answer for us in verse sixteen.

In verse sixteen we are told about three desires in the world that are going to pass away. The first is the desire of the flesh. This here is a general term that denotes those things that are for self, and things that are temporal. This first term, desires of the flesh encompass the next two which are more specific. The word desire is used in a negative sense.

The second desire is the desire or the lust of the eyes. This in a word is covetousness. You see what someone else has and you think I have to have that. This is the desire to keep up with the Joneses. If someone gets a promotion at work you want to one up them and you have to get a better promotion. We have to be the best at everything.

The third and final desire that the Christian is to not love of the world is the pride of possessions. What happens in this desire is the person fails to give the glory to God. They fail to recognize that everything that they have is a gift from the hand of God. This attitude proclaims look at what I have done. I have done all of this by myself, me me me me me. The Christian is to not say “look at what I have done.” The Christian is to give God the glory and to thank Him for everything that they have.

These attitudes are passing away, the desires and the attitudes of this world are passing away, but we see in verse seventeen John says that the person who does the will of God will abide forever. The will of God is to be obedient in what he has revealed to us.

The Church (vs.18-19)

Just a quick note on verses 18-19. John says it is the last hour and the antichrist is coming and even now many antichrists have come already. The antichrists that have come are those who are against Christ. They do not want anything to do with Christ, they do not want anything to do with the body of Christ the church.

John is thinking here of the heretics, more than likely. The reason is of what comes next. The heretics went out from the believing community. They did not want anything to do with the church. If they would have been a true believer they would not have left the church. Those who are true believers will be tied to a local church. If someone says they are a Christian and yet they want nothing to do with the body of Christ, for which he shed His blood, they are more than likely not a Christian. It is within the church where we are taught the word of God. It is within the church where discipleship takes place. The church is the place where we are held accountable for how we live. A believer will be committed to the local church, and those who neglect the church or deny the importance of the truth may not or are not true believers.

My Assurance comes from knowing the truth (vs. 20-21)

John’s readers have an anointing that teaches them all things. Now don’t get freaked out by the word anointing. It is not some mystical thing that just happens and then we have knowledge. The anointing that they have received is from the holy one. This anointing that all believers’ posses gives them all knowledge. So the theme of assurance we see is my assurance comes from knowing the truth.

There are a couple of questions that need to be answered to know how we have assurance from knowing the truth. First off what is the anointing that we have received? Colin Kruse says, “In this verse anointing is used to describe the anointing that the readers have from the Holy one is best interpreted as a reference to the Holy Spirit with whom they have been endowed by God (when they first believed), and who confirms to them the truth of the message that they heard at that time.” The Holy Spirit is the anointing that John is referring to here in this verse. This is one thing that is given to all believers when they believe and He is the Spirit of truth, and will lead all believers in the truth and not into falsehood.

The second question to answer is what does all knowledge mean? To answer this we will start with the negative aspect of it. This does not mean that John’s readers know everything that there is to know. As Christians we should not be know it alls. Those people who know everything there is to know about everything. That is what it does not mean. The positive side of it is the have full knowledge of who Jesus is, and the reason this is so is because of the anointing or the Holy Spirit that dwells within the believer. The Spirit leads them into all truth and therefore they know all things as pertaining to Jesus Christ. The knowledge of Jesus fits with the context, as we see in verse twenty-two John now moves on to the topic of a correct confession of Jesus.

So we have assurance because a true believer will know the truth about Jesus. The true believer will be able to spot falsehoods because of the Spirit that dwells within them. Christians have a built in lie detector. The true believer will know the truth and they will spot falsehoods. How will a believer spot falsehoods? There are two ways. The first one is what John says in this verse. They have an anointing, and because of this anointing they have all knowledge. The second way a believer will be able to spot falsehoods is by studying the truth. People who work in counterfeit bills do not hone their skill by studying counterfeit bills. They can spot the false one because they have studied the real McCoy. Just like people who work in spotting counterfeit bills believers must study the truth. We do not need to devote our time to studying false religions, although that has its place, but we should spend the majority of our time studying the truth, that way we can spot the lies that other religions tell us and what people believe.

My Assurance comes from a correct confession of Jesus and the Father (vs. 22-23)

Not only will a true believer know the truth about Jesus, because the Holy Spirit dwells within them, but they will also have a correct confession of Jesus and the Father. That is the theme of assurance that John writes about in verses twenty-two and twenty-three. Now once again here John is stating what the Gnostics believed. They denied that Jesus is the Christ. John says here that anyone who denies that Jesus is the Christ is two things. First off they are a liar. Second off they are antichrists. This means that any person who tries to separate the two natures of Jesus, His physical nature and His divine nature, they are actually against Christ. They are against Jesus. They really do not have anything to do with Jesus, even if they claim to have fellowship with Him. They are against Him because they deny the very essence of who He is. They deny what holds Christianity together, mainly that God took the form of a man in Jesus Christ, while remaining God, and lived a perfect life, and died to atone for sin. Those who deny this do not have fellowship with Jesus but are actually against Him.

But not only do these people deny Jesus, but John also calls them antichrists because they deny the Father as well. These people have missed it totally. By denying that Jesus was the Christ, they deny the Father as well. Since it was the Father who planned from the foundation of the world that he would send His Son Jesus Christ to earth, and His Son would be the God man, He would be God in the Flesh. By denying that Jesus was the Christ they are now against the Father and the Son. So what exactly is John teaching us here? This is where our theme of assurance comes into play. John is making sure that we get things right.

John is teaching us here that you cannot have the Son and have the Father, and you cannot have the Father and have the Son. If we claim to be in a relationship with Jesus we cannot say that we do not want the Father. The true believer will have a true confession of Jesus and the Father that is they will confess both of them and will want both of them. You cannot separate the two; they are one in the same. Two different people, but they are still in the Godhead. It is a package deal. In fact true believers will confess and want all three members of the trinity. There are some people, and this is becoming a popular view, who are Jesus only. In other words Jesus is all three persons of the godhead. At one time Jesus was the Father, then while on earth Jesus was actually Jesus Christ, and now Jesus is in the role of the Spirit. This view does serious damage to Christianity, and is unbiblical.

My Assurance comes from the gospel (vs. 24-25)

Another theme of assurance that John writes in this chapter is that the true believers assurance comes from the gospel. In verse twenty-four when John says let what you heard from the beginning abide in you, he is talking about the gospel. This would have been the first thing that they would have learned to begin their relationship with Jesus Christ. We are to abide in the gospel; we are to continue in the gospel. This is why it is so important for believers to still think and meditate on what God has done for sinners in the gospel. It is so easy to forget and become numb to what God has done for sinners, and the depth to which He has done it. He did it ALL. There is nothing that God missed when he set His redemptive plan in motion. He was not in heaven thinking oh I hope this works, I don’t know what else to do if it fails. God knew exactly what he was doing in the gospel.

John goes on to say that if we as believers abide or continue in the gospel then we will abide in the Son and the Father. If we remember the gospel and what God did for us in the gospel then we will continue with the Son and the Father because we know and meditate on what was accomplished for us.

In verse twenty-five we see a promise that was made to believers. The and in this verse indicates that John is going to relate further blessing from abiding in the gospel, and abiding in Christ. The further blessing that we see is that those who abide in the gospel, those who abide in the Son and the Father these people have eternal life. We as believers can be assured that we have eternal life because we abide in the gospel and we abide in the Son and the Father. This is a promise that we have from God. The great thing about abiding though is we do not do it alone. God is there with us and His Holy Spirit is giving us the strength to keep going to persevere in the gospel of grace and to continue to walk with the Father and the Son and the Spirit. The believer can be assured by the gospel, and by abiding in it, because those who do posses eternal life.

Do we not need any Teachers as Believers? (vs.26-27)

John writes to these believers about those who are trying to deceive them.

John points out two things about believers in this verse. First the anointing that believers have is the Holy Spirit (See 3:24). The anointing believers have received abides in them.

Second this anointing, the Holy Spirit, as stated above, teaches believers all things and therefore believers have no need for anyone to teach them. But is John saying here that teachers in and of themselves are not essential? John is saying here that as believers we have NO NEED for anyone to teach us the truth about Jesus Christ. These heretics came into the church and were trying to teach them false things about Jesus. Believers know the truth about Jesus. They know who Jesus is and therefore they have no need for anyone to teach them about Jesus. If John were saying there was no need for teachers at all then he would not have written this letter. But these believers know who Jesus is and they have no need for anyone to teach them the truth about Jesus because they have an anointing which abides in them, The Holy Spirit.


Conclusion

Here is a summary of the ways John Assures believers in these verses.

• As we obey God and we are assured,

• When we love other believers we our assured and also we see what we are not to love, which is the world with its desires.

• Next we are assured as believers because we know the truth because the Holy Spirit dwells within us.

• Next we can be assured because we have a correct confession of the Father and the Son, that is to say that we do not claim one and do not want the other.

• And lastly our assurance as believers comes from abiding in the gospel and the Father and the Son, and assuring us that we have eternal life.