1 John 2:24-29. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on October 29, 2017.
If Jesus were to return today would I be joyful without restraint, or would I be fearful with shame? This is a powerful question. The idea of facing Jesus (He who knows what is in a man) face to face can be intimidating. Yet, it is important to recognize that God’s desire is not for this to be a scary and fearful thing. Rather, He wants it to be a joyous event in which you can confidently come into the presence of Jesus, the One who paid the price for your sins. He loves you and, whether it is at your death or the 2nd Coming, we need not fear that He will reject us. The whole purpose of Jesus was to bring us into a close relationship with the Father, to make us a part of His family, and to cast out the fear of any rejection. Now this is not a braggart’s confidence that we see in this world. It is not a confidence built on our great self-attainment. No, it is a confidence that is made of far stronger metal. It is that which comes from an experience of the love of the Heavenly Father who as adopted us into His family. I pray that you will allow the Holy Spirit to remove fear from your heart and replace it with a confidence in Him.
In verse 24 Paul has just finished warning believers of false teachers and even “antichrists” that would try to deceive them and lead them astray. This verse is a conclusion to that section (“Therefore”). Though John’s statement in verse 24 does not explicitly state what it is he wants them to have dwelling in them, the statements all around it leave no question that he is thinking of the truth they had received from the beginning. It is interesting that believers are told to “let that (truth) abide in you…” The truth of God comes into our hearts and naturally wants to dwell there and grow. Thus Jesus used the parable of the seed of God’s Word being sown into the soil of people’s hearts. Am I allowing that seed to take root and grow, as it will naturally do, or am I doing things that are adverse to this? We can reject the Truth, but we can also displace it by filling our hearts and minds with the false-truths of this world. Let us cling to the Truth of God.
John is writing to people of whom he is intimately aware of the Truth that they received “from the beginning.” He knows that they received solid, undefiled truth. However, over time they are being tempted by other so-called truths and twisting of what they knew. Yet, Christianity is not just about receiving the Truth about life. It is about receiving the revelation that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He is the only way to the Father, and in Him Truth is a person, not just a statement of fact. This connection between Jesus and the Truth must be understood by all His followers. John sees this as so important that he ties our fellowship with Jesus and the Father to our holding on to the Truths about Him. If the Truth of the Gospel (Who Jesus was and What He was doing) dwells in our hearts then we will abide in the Son and the Father. The opposite is implied that if we let go of that Truth then we will no longer be dwelling in the Son and the Father. To embrace the Gospel is more than embracing a set of propositions. It is embracing a relationship with the only being of whom it can be said He is Truth. To use another analogy that Jesus gave us in John 15, to believe the Truth of the Gospel is to connect to Jesus with a living relationship. We draw life out of our relationship with Him. You cannot have one without the other. We cannot claim intimacy with the Son and Father, and yet toss aside the Truth which we received from the beginning. As I said earlier, this statement is to people whom John knows well what it was they received. The tragedy is that many in this world have received everything but the Truth. Some are raised in atheism, and others in false religion, and others yet who are raised in perversions of Christianity. These people should not hold on to what they received from the beginning. The key is that we are holding on to the Truth that the Apostles of Jesus transmitted to us in voice and in writing, and refusing to be separated from them by any voices that have risen since then. To remain in fellowship with Jesus is to hold fast to the teaching received from His apostles. This cannot be avoided.
In verse 25 he reminds us that this is the promise that God gave us, eternal life. Those who embrace the Truth about Jesus and the Truth of Jesus are now connected to eternal life. When we speak of eternal life it is easy to focus solely on length of time. It is true that eternal life is of unending duration. However, if you read the passages of the Bible that speak of “eternal life” it will be clear that it is more about quality of life than it is about quantity. We don’t just live, but we experience the very life of God (i.e. eternal life). We live in a world that owes its existence to God and yet is separated from the eternal life of God. It is dying even as it lives. But in Christ we are living even as we die. The eternal life that we are connected to is not intimidated by death, but in the end will swallow it up in victory. This is the life that Christians can experience right now. No, I won’t live forever in this mortal flesh, but I have a relationship with a kind of life that is greater than mortal death. This life is extremely important and we need to live in Christ in order to experience it. This world works daily to try and extend life, deferring the consequences of our fleshly desires. Though we may open such a Pandora’s Box through technology, it will not give us the life that we desire. It will only bring us to greater sin and sorrow. Jesus is the only way to true life. God’s plan will work, but man’s plan will only forge ever stronger chains for mankind.
Now verse 26 turns our attention back to those deceivers that would try to separate us from the Truth (i.e. the eternal life of the Son and the Father). There are many deceivers today. Some wear religious garb and give sermons on whatever day of the week they hold dear. Others have websites that promise all manner of secret knowledge that will fill that sense of lacking that you have. When I look at most of the TV and movie programming, the music, and books of this world, I see a continual onslaught of the idea that we can be good without having to believe in a God, Sin, and a Savior. We are pointed to ourselves, or mankind as a whole, as the answer to fixing everything and having a great life. We are encouraged to put our faith in mankind’s ability to achieve all this through the power of science and developing technologies. Such deceivers, whether they know it or not, serve only one purpose: to separate us from the Truth, whether we have received it yet or not. It is to separate us from a relationship with Jesus in which we experience eternal life in the now. How are we to keep from falling to such deceptions?
John points to the anointing within all God’s children (vs. 27). His main point is that you do not need some guru to come along and explain everything for you. They already had Jesus and the Truth about Him. They were not missing out on any special knowledge. If you are a Christian, but feel that you are missing something, the answer is not to pursue information “out there.” All you need to do is get back to the Truth and the Faith once and for all delivered unto the Saints, that is the Word of God. When you are reading God’s Word and daily walking in a living relationship with Jesus, you are not missing anything. Deceivers many claim to be Christ or to be from Christ, but none of them have come, riding on the clouds of heaven and descending to the Mt. of Olives. Too many Christians are hungry for a miracle worker or a wise teacher, when we already have the anointing of God Himself, the Holy Spirit, dwelling within our life. The metaphor of anointing reminds us of the special calling to which we are called. “The anointing” points to the Holy Spirit coming into the life of a person in order to live for God and accomplish His business. This Spirit dwells in believers and leads us to become more like Jesus. John’s point is not to say there should be no teachers. They wouldn’t have come to know the Gospel without teachers and all churches had teachers in their midst. But once you have come to know the Truth and have entered into relationship with Jesus through God’s Spirit, you have all that you need to be acceptable to God and live a full life. You are not lacking anything.
When a person lives such a life they are ready for the return of Christ (vs. 28). You can have confidence that you are ready for His return, a confidence born of the Holy Spirit and not the false spirit of this age. The Pharisees had great confidence, but it was based upon their own ideas, and their own works. Analyze your own confidence. What is it based upon? If it is something other than the witness of the Holy Spirit within you, and the Word of God, then you have a confidence that is like those Pharisees. The Holy Spirit will lead us to put our confidence in Jesus and His work (past, present, and future) in our life. That daily relationship of learning to take our feelings, desires, and hopes before Jesus, and learning to trust Him over them, is crucial to growing a proper confidence. Those who are confident in Christ will rejoice at His coming. But those who are confident in themselves and the things of this world will be ashamed. Ashamed because they did not truly trust in Him, or ashamed because they deserted Him and lived for themselves. Ashamed because they will be separated from Him and not have eternal life. Now the words in verse 28 are literally, “and that we might not be made ashamed from Him.” The preposition is often translated as before. Though this is true, the preposition in the Greek actually emphasizes separation. Such a person will not just be ashamed before Jesus, but also be separated from Jesus and His eternal life.
Are you ready for the return of Christ? Will it be a time of rejoicing and celebration, or one of fear and shame? If we have continued with Him through temptations, trials, and sufferings, then we will have nothing but a confident rejoicing when we come before Him. It will be a final uniting with one who has helped us through all the good and the bad of this life, and more than that, the one who loved us enough to lay His life down for us. Such a being you would never have to be afraid of unless you had deserted Him along the way.