Sermon Cloud

Last week, when I previewed our new series “House Rules – a study of 1,2, and 3 John” I explained the title of the series in this way.  Every single family has rules that are specific just to their family.  They are those little things that define individual households and to a certain extent, demonstrate the values of a particular family. 

·        For example, at our house we have a few of those.

o       One of those is, “No whining and dining,” which means you cannot whine at my dinner table.  You may not like what we are having for dinner, but you can’t whine about.

o       Another one is that you must at least take a “No thank you bite,” which means if you are eating something brand new for the first time, you have to at least take bite and say, “No thank you,” before deciding you don’t like it.

o       When I was a kid, the rule was that it was always better to confess than to be found out which meant you were going to get a much less profound beating if you told your parents what you did rather than them founding out from someone else.  I remember one time walking into the kitchen and my parents said, “We know what you have been up to.”  I was petrified.

o       One family in our congregation has this rule about the dinner table:  “Clear, Cheer, and Chore” - clear your plate, show gratitude and thankfulness with a cheer for Mom or Dad for having prepared the meal, and chore being help cleanup afterwards. 

o       Isn’t amazing how many rules we make for eating btw?

·        Well, the family of God is no different.  Belonging to that family comes with certain expectations and values.  As we approach the letters of John, those expectations and values are exactly what we are going to find.  In fact, John, one of Jesus’ disciples, is going to use a lot of family language.

o       His most common way of addressing the people in the letter is, “my children,” or “my dear children.” 

o       Sometimes, he will sound like Hulk Hogan and say, “brothers,” and once in a while he will even say, “my dear friends.”

·        But no matter how he addresses the letter, the tone is always one of a kind family elder dispensing wisdom as to how to live.  The interesting thing though is that this in to wisdom in a vacuum.

o       What I mean is that He is not just giving you random truths to live by.  He is giving theological truth by which to guide you in greater living . 

·        Let me explain what I mean. 

o       When someone just walks up to you and starts giving you advice or just tells you what to do, most folks don’t respond well.  The thought is that that their advice is more or less just veiled criticism because it is not based on prior understanding.   It just feels like an attack. 

o       However, if you notice, the writers of Scripture, and very much Jesus Himself, frame the practical truths of how to live our lives around the solid theological truths of who God is.

o       Let me give you an example.  In Romans 8, Paul talks about how we should endure suffering with great joy.  Now that truth alone is harsh.  That’s like walking up to someone who is suffering and saying, “Hey, stop your whining.  Nobody likes a whiner.”

o       But Paul doesn’t give that truth alone or truth in a vacuum.  He says:

§         Our present suffering doesn’t compare to the glory we will have in heaven.

§         If we suffer for Jesus, we will be glorified with Him.

§         And as we struggle, we have a great hope for the future.  Just in the same that the earth groans to be liberated from the effects of sin, so do we.

o       Framing that truth in that way is lot more gracious, encouraging, and inspiring than just saying, “Hey buck up little camper.  Have some joy.”

·        We find much greater meaning and much greater sensitivity in our hearts when wisdom, encouragement, and advice are attached to truths of scripture or to theological depth surrounding the person of Jesus.  That is what we are going to find in the books of 1,2, and 3 John. 

·        Having said that, let’s ask, “How should the children of God live in light of who Jesus is and what He has done for us?”  Pretty simple.  Let’s see.

1 John 1:1-5

1:1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— 2 the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— 3 that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4 And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.  5 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.

·        Now when we read this passage, we need to have a small grammar lesson.  Notice how verse 1 speaks of “that which was from the beginning.”  This verse does not say, “Who was from the beginning.”  At first I didn’t trust the distinction chalking it up to a translation issues, but the “that which” there is specific and the same distinction is also made there in the Greek.  The first verse is not just speaking about a who but also a that.  The first word is not just speaking about Jesus specifically but more than that.

·        So what are we talking about here?  Look at the end of verse one.

·        This verse is talking about the word of life or essentially, the truths of the Gospel surrounding Jesus.  You see, from the foundation of the earth, the truth that Jesus would save a people to Himself has been planned, and John, Jesus’ brother got to see and look and feel the manifestation of that word of life, Jesus Christ.

·        Jesus was made manifest, or took on flesh and partly because of John’s faithfulness in proclaiming eternal life through Jesus who was with the Father, these things have been revealed to the people of John’s day. 

·        And that which John saw and heard He proclaims to us so that God might create a fellowship of those who have fellowship with Jesus and the Father.

·        In verse 3, we see that one of the goals of God is to create a community, a family, a fellowship that is bound by connection to Jesus Christ. 

·        John takes great joy in proclaiming this message, and His joy is complete as others believe it.

·        Specifically, let’s sum it up this way.  That message is this:  God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.  The God we worship is purity and righteousness and light defined.  There is no impurity, unrighteous or darkness in Him or in anything He does.  Because of that, if you are going to have fellowship with Him, if you are going to be part of the family, then you also have to be full of purity, righteousness and light.

·        Immediately, we see a few things relevant to us in light of these few verses.

o       We don’t serve a God who made up His plan B once everything went haywire in the Garden. It was part of God’s sovereign plan all along for Jesus to be the Savior of a particular people.  That is the Word of life.

o       Our gathering here is not an afterthought or part of God peeking into the future and trying to figure how to fix the mess.  Our being here is part of an eternal plan to redeem a people.

o       And like the Gospel of John says, Jesus is also the word and that word became flesh and dwelt among us.

o       God intends to create a community, the church, out of those that have fellowship with God the Father and Jesus His son.

o       Since God the Father and Jesus the Son are light with no impurity or sin in them, so must His people be.

·        Uh oh.  I think you see the dilemma.  In fact our dilemma is expressed for us pretty well in 1 John 1:6-10.  Let me see if I can express these verses almost as if they were a conversation in our head.

·        If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, WE lie and do not practice the truth.

o       We hear that and think, “Okay, I think I have fellowship with God, and though I’m not perfect, I don’t think I walk in darkness.  I don’t want to be a liar.  So I guess I walk in the…light?

·        Well, 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 cleanses us from all sin.

o       Okay, so if I walk in the light I should have fellowship with other believers and Jesus because His blood cleanses us from our sin.

o       I feel pretty good, I mean I’m walking in the light and Jesus loves me.  I guess those people who don’t stink.  They must walk in darkness and don’t have fellowship.  Aha, I feel pretty good about myself.

o       Anticipating that we might get a little big-headed pretty quickly, we see…

·        If we say we have no sin, We deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

o       Oh, so a fundamental truth of being a part of Jesus Christ is that we are not sinless but actually sinful.  Part of the truth of God residing in you is your ongoing realization that you are sinful.

·        Now let’s take a break here because this can be kind of confusing.  If you walk in darkness, you can’t have fellowship with Jesus.  If you walk in the light you can.  But you can’t say you are sinless because if you do then you don’t know the truth.  So what’s the solution?  The solution is found in the next verse.

·        If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

o       Okay, so I walk in the light and not in the darkness which seems to imply not just a habit but the inclination of my life.  Walking in the light is what I do.  It defines me

o       I can’t say I am without sin though even though I walk in the light.  In fact, confessing my sin is one of the characteristics of being part of the family of God. 

o       And if I confess my sin, Jesus will not only forgive me but cleanse me of all unrighteousness. 

o       That speaks to that verse in Micah we saw last week.  Being cleansed from sin is similar to God’s casting our sins into the depths of the sea.  We are removed from our sins and they are no longer held against us.

o       But just in case we are tempted to get self-righteous again, John says,

·        If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and His word is not in us.

o       Don’t let any one think or tell you for a minute that they have never sinned or that they no longer sin.  If that was true, the God would be a liar.  Now how would that make God a liar?

o       Well God for example in Romans 3:23 that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.  So we know we have all sinned at some point.

o       And just the verse before offers the very present hope of confessing our sins and His being just and faithful to continually forgive us which means that we continually sin and must continually confess.

·        So having said all of that, let’s talk…house rules.  Let’s talk about what it means to be a believer or part of the family of God.  Please forgive me for the large application, but I think there are several things that characterize the child of God in this passage.

·        First, claiming to believe and being a part of the family of God means a consistent growing life of obedience and transformation. 

o       The children of God will not be perfect, but their life will be described as walking in the light and not in the darkness.

o       John doesn’t pull any punches.  We are liars if we claim to have fellowship with God but consistently walk in darkness.

·        If we are part of the family of God, then we must have fellowship with other believers. 

o       Specifically, we have fellowship with each other because we all stand cleansed of unrighteousness before God.

o       This is not a loose, “Hey I have Christians friends,” this is a created community out of the design of God.

·        If we are part of the family of God, we walk in humility.

o       If you or anyone else who claims to be a Christians say they have no sin in their lives, you and they are deceived and don’t know the truth.

·        If we are part of the family of God, we confess our sins regularly and are forgiven regularly.

o       A regular habit of the believer is to walk before their God, confessing sin, and asking for forgiveness of that sin.

·        If we are part of the family of God, we are honest and admit to each other and to the world that we are sinners.

o       Listen, if you aren’t honest about your sin, and you present yourself and not constantly needing forgiveness, by default you calling God your Father a liar.

o       Lack of honesty about your sin is evidence that the word is not in you.

·        Pursue your Savior, pursue the Word in you, pursue the community in which God has place you and then you will walk in…

o       Obedience, Fellowship, Humility, Confession, and Honesty

·        Folks, these qualities should be the central descriptions of the community that we are seeking to create here at Sovereign King.  We should be obedient, pursuing fellowship, walking before God and men in humility, we should confess our sins regularly, and we should deal with God and men in honesty

·        AND if we engage and love our community as we are called to, these will be the central qualities by which we interact with others and the qualities that we call them to embrace as well.

·        Folks will say, hey those folks at Sovereign King love Jesus and they are humble and honest?  Wow, maybe I should reconsider this Christianity thing. 

·        Even if folks don’t reconsider the Christianity thing, their impression of the church will at least be shaped in God glorifying way.

·        So, let’s ask ourselves as family, are we defined by obedience, fellowship, humility, confession and honest?

·        Folks, these verses speak about our posture:  our posture towards God, each other, and the world.

·        If our posture is not defined by obedience, fellowship, humility, confession, and honesty, then we will be perceived as an enemy or judge.

·        If our posture is defined by obedience, fellowship, humility, confession, and honesty, the we will be perceived as advocates as people willing to serve and bear the burdens of others.