Sermon Transcript
Well, that was sure encouraging. I hope that your heart’s been lifted. We’re going to spend some time now looking into the Scriptures, into the last section, the last little part in the book of 1 John. We’ve been studying through 1 John for, man, probably 6 months almost. And today we come to our final study.
Next week we get on to another series. Dan will tell you a little bit about that before we leave this morning. But as I was looking at this passage, 1 John 5, verses 13 to 21, you might open up The Message notes if you’ve got that there or your Bible or whatever is going to help you today study this with us. But as I was looking at this passage, I was thinking about things that we need to know, and it got me thinking about how I think I have a need-to-know memory, which basically is if I need to know it, then I’ll try to know it, you know, I’ll try to remember it, but that doesn’t always happen. But anyway, Some of you probably identify with that sort of thing.
You remember the things that you need to know. So in that, there are a lot of other things that I could know. That means that since I don’t spend time trying to know those other things, maybe in as great of effort, that means that I would be a terrible contestant on Jeopardy. So if you’re aware of Jeopardy, maybe you even saw the recent tournament that they had, the GOAT. Tournament, the Greatest of All Time tournament, where they brought 3 guys back: Ken Jennings, James Holzhauer, and Brad Ritter.
And, you know, if you watch the 4-day tournament, just, it was mind-boggling what these guys remember and what these guys know. Seriously, as you watch through it, as I did, I hardly knew a thing in comparison. In fact, there are probably like 400 or so clues that came up in the 4 nights, I think I got 4 questions. That was it. You know, that would have been all that I could think of.
And the rest, you know, I had no clue what was going on. There are a lot of things that maybe you identify in a similar way, that you could know that you don’t know, things that we maybe really don’t care to know. Some of you don’t care to know that your car has oil in it, for instance. All right? So, in case you didn’t know, most cars have oil in the car.
Which means that it’s important to check the oil occasionally and see how the oil is, and if it’s low, then add some more oil. Some of you probably would not know how to add oil to your car. You say, I don’t really need to know that, so why should I bother with that? That’s some information that my husband knows or mechanic knows that, and that’s fine for them to know it. I don’t want to waste my time knowing stuff that I don’t need to know.
In fact, you might say, what’s car oil anyway? You know, I don’t even want to go there. I know something about Essential oils. I know something about doTERRA or, you know, Young Living, these kind of oils. I could tell you a lot about those oils, essential oils, but, you know, some of you are saying, what’s an essential oil?
Well, it’s probably you don’t know anything about that because you care not to know about that, or you don’t need to know that, or whatever it is. One of my first professors in college, a history professor, he felt, I guess, bad as things were just about ready to wind up with the final. And so, on the Friday before the Monday final, he brought in a sheet of paper and he passed it out to the class and he said, listen, on this are the things that you need to know for the final on Monday. You ever had a teacher do this? It’s kind of nice, isn’t it, where they just give it right there to you?
So, he gave this to us and he said something along the lines of, listen, I know that we’ve been talking about a lot of history, probably a lot of it you already forgot, But there are some things that you need to remember, especially if you want to get an A on the final. You’re going to need to know these things if you want to ace the final. It’s to your advantage, he says. Your mom— you’re going to make your mommy happy if you know these things. It’ll make you feel good inside.
So when you show up on Monday, you just need to know these things. So pay attention to this review handout and do your best. And then you’ll do your best on the test. I like that. I’m a need-to-know guy, so if that’s all I need to know, good.
I’m going to try to work on that. Well, for the past 6 months, we’ve been reading through and studying through 1 John, and 1 John has been a need-to-know book. These are things that we need to know to be sure about our relationship with God. These are matters that John said are essential in the Christian life. And I just want to say, as we bring this to a close today, thank you for your participation in this series.
I think this has been a great series. I think we’ve learned a lot together. Thank you for your prayers. Thank you for the other teaching pastors, for Dan and Steve, and how they brought it every time they stood up here. They were understandable.
They were accurate in their interpretations. They were commendable and brought application. And so, all of that’s been a part of this series. And as we look back on what’s been covered in this series, there’s a lot that we could know. There’s a lot that we could go over.
But when we get to 1 John 5:13-21, you kind of get a need-to-know section. And I say it’s a need-to-know section because I think what John is doing here is pulling together the big things that he’s talked about in the book and really gives us 5 need-to-knows, if you want to think of it that way, in the final 9 verses. The word know, you’ll notice this as we go through here, the word know is used 7 times. And these are things that we need to call to mind, some facts that we need to live in light of for our well-being, but also for the development of our relationship with God and for God’s family. So, we’re going to just focus on 5 truths, 5 matters that we need to know, and it really makes a nice summary of the entire book of 1 John.
And we’re going to use our fingers. You already see me kind of pushing my— this hand out there. We’re going to use our fingers to help us remember what we need to know. There are 5 fingers, there are 5 things that we need to know that will be helpful as we take this book with us. So, John begins, verse 13, I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.
First thing that John says we need to know is that we have eternal life. That’s the first and foremost focus, really, in the entire book of 1 John. He’s been focusing on this matter of life and eternal life. And how life or eternal life is found in the Son. He said, as we focused last week, if you have the Son, you have life.
If you don’t have the Son of God, you don’t have life. So, it’s all connected to the Son, and John wants us to know for sure that we have eternal life. And the word that he uses here for know is the word oida. It’s a word that we’ve talked about before in this series, but it speaks about knowing the facts. And the facts are this, that if you believe in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, If you trust in Jesus Christ, in the name of the Son of God, in Jesus, you put your faith in Jesus Christ, you have eternal life.
So, we’re going to use our index finger or our first finger to remind us. Try this. Get your finger freed up. There you go. We’re going to use our first finger to remind us that this first important matter that we need to know is that we have eternal life.
And John talks about it as a factual thing, as something that you can factually know that you have eternal life. Now, he doesn’t stop there because eternal life is not something just to know with your mind, it’s something to experience in your heart. So in John 17:3, John also wrote the Gospel of John. John 17:3, John speaks about this matter, eternal life, in this way. He says, now this is eternal life.
He says, that they may know, oh, how about that, they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent. Now, that know, John 17:3, is different than the know in 1 John 5:13. 1 John 5:13 is oida, which means to know the facts. John 17:3, the word that’s used here for know is ginosko, and ginosko is to experience the facts. It’s to— it’s knowledge gained by experience.
And what John is saying is that God, in this relationship that we have through his Son Jesus Christ, wants to experience a growing intimate relationship with God incarnate. So you might think of it this way. My wife Bernice, she has a relationship with coffee. For years Bernice only knew about coffee. She only had an oida.
She knew the facts about coffee, but lately she’s come to know, ginosko, coffee intimately. She has a special relationship with coffee now so that it’s a daily thing in her life. She’s experiencing coffee firsthand. She has a thing for coffee. They are very close.
That’s the picture here. That’s what John is getting at. He’s getting at this intimate growing relationship and that eternal life isn’t just something to experience factually, it’s something to experience relationally. I love how C.S. Lewis puts it.
He says, the relationship between God and man is more private and intimate than any possible relation between 2 fellow creatures. Now think about that. Would you say that describes your relationship with God? That’s what God longs for. He longs for you to experience an intimate, personal relationship with Him, an intimate, close, precious relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
So, it’s something that’s not just an intellectual thing, it’s an emotional thing. It’s not something just in our heads, but it connects with our hearts. In fact, the Apostle Paul talked about how important that is in his life. In Philippians 3:8, he says, what is more, I consider Everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing— ginosko, experiencing, experiencing this knowledge— of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ.
So here’s the Apostle Paul not just pursuing knowledge, but he’s pursuing an intimate relationship with God through Jesus Christ. You say, well, that’s for a spiritual giant like Paul. No, that’s something that everyday Christians can have as well. And so the first thing that John has focused on is this whole matter of eternal life, knowing and experiencing eternal life. That’s another way of saying God doesn’t want us to wait until eternity to experience this life.
This life we can begin to experience and benefit by right now so that this life can fill us with hope instead of doubt, and this life will fill us with joy instead of worry, and this life will fill us with peace instead of panic. We need to know that. We need to know that we have eternal life. That’s of first importance. Then John says, verses 14 and 15, this is the confidence we have in approaching God, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
And if we know that He hears us whenever we ask, we know that we have what we have asked of Him. Secondly, he says we need to know that God hears and answers our prayers. We need to know that God hears and He answers our prayers. Now, let’s use our pinky finger for this one, all right? So we’ve got the index finger for this first matter, we need to know that we have eternal life.
Secondly, We need to know, pinky for prayers, that God answers our prayers. God wants us to know that he hears and he answers our prayers. Now, if you just think about good communication, Relationship 101 tells us that there needs to be talking in good communication, but that’s not all. There needs to be listening, right? There is speaking and there is hearing.
And God is inviting us into that kind of relationship with Him so that good communication is a part of the relationships so that we come to Him and we ask. And when we ask, we know that He hears us, that He really wants us to talk to Him. He is not like that person that sits oftentimes next to us on the airplane that who before they do anything else, they put in earbuds or they put on noise-canceling headphones. What is that person saying? They are saying what?
They are saying, we’re not talking, all right? I may be sitting here, but I’m going into my private zone right now. We’re not talking. Well, God wants us to know that he hears us and he invites us into communication with him whenever we ask. We don’t have to beg him to listen.
He’s listening and he’s ready to listen. And it’s important that we know that and we pray in light of that, but it’s also important, as it says, that we know that God’s answers are conditioned. And what are they conditioned upon? They’re conditioned upon us asking— do you see it there? Asking according to his will, meaning asking in line with his plans and his purposes, with belief and trust that when we ask according to his will, that his will and his plans are best.
And so we want his desires over our desires. You know, one of the things we do when we communicate with each other, hopefully, is we get on the same page, right? We try to align our wills so that we’re not operating independent of one another, so we have these conversations where we hear and we listen and we talk. And so, we try to get in— let me use the word tandem. We try to be in tandem with each other, kind of like 2 people riding a tandem bicycle where the front rider is steering the bicycle and that person pedals, but the back rider doesn’t steer the bicycle, but that person does pedal, and they get to enjoy the ride wherever the front rider is taking us.
Tandem. You can go tandem skydiving. 2 people jump out of an airplane together. They’re strapped together during the entire descent. Hear that?
It’s not just part of the descent. They’re strapped together the entire descent. The instructor or the licensed skydiver is in charge, and it’s— he’s responsible or she’s responsible for everything that happens between the time that they jump out of the plane until they land safely on the ground, which, of course, before they land on the ground, concerns or includes the deployment of a parachute at just the right time. And all the while, the person who signed up to be a part of this tandem event is doing what? They’re enjoying the ride.
They’re the thrill seeker. They’re along for the dive, you might call it. Well, both of those analogies fit our relationship with God. God is the front rider on our bike. He’s also the licensed skydiver who knows what he is doing.
And the best thing that we could do is live and pray in tandem with him by following his will and enjoying the ride. And that happens best when we pray like Jesus prayed. So how did Jesus pray? Well, you remember when he was praying before he was arrested and tried and ultimately crucified, how he prayed? He prayed, Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me, yet not my will but yours be done.
Jesus prayed according to God’s will. He wanted God’s perfect plan even though— and if you look at the account— even though it was emotionally painful, even though He sweat blood, even though He shed tears, even though He uttered loud cries, He wanted God’s will and He surrendered His will to God’s will. And when He taught His disciples to pray, He said, pray this way: Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. And He had already taught them to deny themselves and to take up Jesus’ cross daily and to follow Him. In other words, This is all about us setting our wants and our desires and our preferences aside for the Lord’s and not making the mistake of telling the Lord how to do it.
You ever made the mistake of trying to tell somebody who’s older than you and smarter than you and wiser than you how to do something? You ever made that mistake when you should have said, oh, whatever you want? You know, you know, you’ve been around longer than I have. No, don’t say it that way, but you know, whatever you think is best, let’s just do that. I made this mistake after a friend of mine and his son picked me up, gave me a ride to a breakfast meeting in Phoenix, Arizona.
We were running behind at the time, and so while I was sitting in the back seat and they were driving, I spoke up and I suggested that they take a shortcut. Little old me sitting in the backseat, 3 years in Phoenix, I suggested from the backseat that they take a shortcut. I gave specifically the shortcut. While the guy in the front seat driving the car, Glenn, is a retired captain, 30 years on the Phoenix Police Department. I in the backseat am telling him to take a shortcut.
Do you think that he knows any shortcuts? I mean, having been on the department that long, absolutely, he knows the quickest, the best way to get to breakfast on time, even more than me. Wouldn’t it make sense for me sitting in the backseat, instead of telling him what to do, just to sit back there and enjoy the ride and leave the driving to Glenn? That’s the picture. What makes us think that we know better than God?
Not even Jesus fell into that trap. Aren’t you glad? Aren’t you glad that Jesus surrendered his will to God’s will so that ultimately he went to the cross and he made a way for us to experience eternal life?
Your will, not mine. We need to know that God hears and he answers prayers, prayers that are in line with his will. Now, just so John’s readers got that point, John gave them a very interesting illustration. Some of us look at this and we’re troubled by this illustration. Verses 16 and 17, he said, if anyone sees his brother commit a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray and God will give him life.
I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I’m not saying that he should pray about that. All wrongdoing is sin, and there is a sin that does not lead to death. Troubled yet?
Yeah, when you look at this text, this is something that’s outside of usually anything that we think is a part of the Christian life or life with God. I want you just to notice, which I think will help us understand, is that John is trying to say, so this is how we should pray. Notice the words, he should pray. And those words are used twice in this passage. So John is focused on the importance of loving other siblings in God’s family, loving others in God’s family.
And one of the ways that we show each other that we love each other is by praying for each other, especially when a brother or sister in Christ has fallen into sin. And if they have fallen into sin— and do you think that’s possible, that a brother or sister in Christ could fall into sin? Do you think that that might happen? Along the way? Oh, I think so.
That when it happens, one of the best things that we can do is to pray for them. And we pray— what he’s saying here just before, and pull it into this passage— we pray knowing that God hears us and he answers our prayers. And that being the case, then when somebody has fallen into sin or is tempted by sin or whatever it might be, then we would pray for God’s intervention in that brother or sister in Christ’s life so that they would come under conviction and they would come to a place of repentance, turn from the sin. They would come to a place of repentance. They would confess their sin, and their life in Christ would be restored.
Simply said, love prays for a sinning sibling. Love prays for a sinning sibling. Now, when we pray, we need to be aware that there are 2 kinds of sin. That’s what he says. There’s a sin unto life, verse 16, a sin that does not lead to death.
And then there is a sin unto death, verse 16, a sin that leads to death. Now, that’s where this thing gets tough. You’re saying, what in the world’s going on with that? I mean, does that really happen, or is there any precedent in Scripture that a Christ follower could sin and lose his or her life? Any precedent for that?
Well, actually, we do have precedent. You remember Ananias and Sapphira in the early church and how they decided that they were going to lie and be deceitful, and ultimately they lost their lives? You can read about it in Acts chapter 5. Or maybe you want to read in 1 Corinthians about the church at Corinth and how the church at Corinth evidently was messed up when it came to the love feast and the Lord’s Supper. And there were some who were coming to the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy manner so that Paul says, for this reason, many among you are weak and sick and a number sleep, which being translated is, they’ve died.
They lost their lives. So, there is some kind of precedent for sin that ultimately can lead to to death. Now, the question is, what exactly is that sin? We’re not told, are we? You don’t see it anywhere here.
In fact, for us to try to say, well, it’s this or this or whatever it is, would be pure speculation. I mean, the closest that we can come to knowing what the sin possibly could be would be the unpardonable sin. The unpardonable sin, Jesus said, was to attribute the works of God to Satan.
And that person who would show signs that they do not even know the Lord is going to go to their grave without the hope of eternal life in Jesus Christ. But what John has in question here is, how do you pray for somebody who’s living in sin?
And especially if it’s sin that doesn’t lead to death, or what about if it is sin that possibly could lead to death, what should we do?
Well, I’ll tell you this, he says, don’t pray for their death. We should not pray for their death.
What is he saying? He’s saying that there are people who are living in sin right now, believers who are living in sin right now. One of the ways that you could pray is you could say, Lord, just take them. I mean, enough is enough, don’t you think? He doesn’t say— he says we should not pray for their death.
If anything, we should be praying for their life. Quite frankly, we don’t know if it’s a sin unto death or a sin unto life, do we? We don’t have that kind of knowledge or discernment or whatever you want to call it. So then how do we pray? Here’s how I pray.
If they’re still alive, pray. That’s how I pray. Okay? If they haven’t died, that means we can still pray for them, can’t we? That so far it’s not the sin unto death.
I need to pray for them. And why would I want to pray for them? Because I know that God answers prayer, and He answers prayer according to His will. And we know it’s God’s will that we not sin and that we don’t live in sin. And so, let’s pray that way.
We pray that people will turn from their sin and come to the love of God and will confess and forsake their sin and find cleansing and forgiveness and the fullness of life in a vibrant personal relationship with the Lord. You know what? I know that the Lord wants that. And I can pray confidently, and you can pray confidently. We can pray in tandem with God’s will.
We can pray and ask God to bring that person to a point of repentance so that they come back into a vibrant relationship with God. So, what do we need to know? We need to know, first of all, that we have eternal life. We need to know, secondly, that God hears and answers our prayers, especially those that are in line with his will. And then we need to know this, verse 18, we know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin.
The One who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot harm him. We also need to know that you are done, you and I are done, if you’re a Christ follower, we are done with habitual sin, that we’re not going to continue to sin, that we’re not going to live continually in habitual, intentional sin. And the reason why we’re not going to live continually in habitual sin is because of God’s work in us to protect us and to change us. So, this one of the 5 fingers, we’re going to use the long finger or the middle finger. Be careful here.
Don’t single it out, all right? It’ll get you into trouble. But this is a reminder that that’s what sin will do. It’ll get you into trouble. Sin is not something to play around with.
Sin is not something to take lightly. And the good news is, is that a person who’s born into God’s family, God is going to intervene in ways to keep this individual safe. Do you see that? Safe from the evil one who would love nothing more than to steal your life away. Now, that just sounds like God, doesn’t it, that He would want to keep His children safe?
It sounds just like a protective or watchful mom or dad of a newborn baby. How do they treat that newborn baby? With vigilance. They’re protective. They go on a surveillance patrol.
They’re ready to step in when they see danger lurking or presenting itself. They don’t want the child to be hurt or harmed in any way, and so they are there to protect the child. Well, in similar ways, this is saying a child of God is not going to continue to live in sins, the sins of the past, because our Father is going to work to keep us safe from harm, from the evil one. He’s going to work to keep us safe from the evil one. So, He is going to intervene by keeping the evil one away so that the evil one no longer has the upper hand.
And He’s also going to work in us in such a way that He’s going to fill our hearts and minds with His will so we know what He wants. He’s going to work in us in such a way that we grow in greater love and intimacy with His Son so that what’s in the world is less attractive to us. And He’s going to fill us with the Holy Spirit to empower and change us from the inside out. So a true child of God, comparatively speaking, comparatively speaking, will sin less, not more. They will not— listen— they will not live in sin.
That’s what he’s saying. A child of God is not going to continue to habitually live in sin. When you sin as a believer in Jesus Christ, you will be convicted for your sin, and at that point you’ve got a decision to make. And hopefully the decision is to confess your sin to God and turn from it, repent, and turn back to him. It’s God’s desire that we not be people who continue to sin.
We need to know that. And then he says in verse 19, and we know that we are children of God, and the whole world is under the control of the evil one. We also, fourthly, need to know that we belong to God. We’re going to use the ring finger on this one, the ring finger, that we belong to God, that God through Jesus Christ has made us the bride of Christ, the bride of Christ. And our identity and our worth and our value are no longer defined by the world, the values that the world has, the accolades, the notoriety, the affirmation, approval, status, and votes.
That’s not what we’re after. What we long to do is to experience our identity in Christ. So we look to God for our new life. We look to our new family that we have in Christ for this new life. We are His and And we are in him.
And the day that we said yes to this relationship with God through Jesus Christ, we became members of his family, which means we have transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. You talk about an upgrade. Doesn’t that sound like an upgrade to you? We’ve moved from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. You ever flown first class?
I mean, it’s pretty nice up there on the other side of the curtain, isn’t it? I’ve been on the other side of the curtain a couple times when we got a couple complimentary upgrades, and I’ll tell you one thing, of all the times I’ve ever flown, all the times I’ve ever flown, this is the only time I ever wanted the flight to continue. You know what I mean? I was like, yeah, I love all this service up here. This is really a nice time, and all of that.
We wish we could just have first class all the time, but guess what? We got an upgrade, the best upgrade a person could ever get, and that is we have been upgraded from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, and he’s saying we need to live in light of that new life that we have in Christ, that we belong to Him, and we have new standing in Christ, and we need to know that. We need to live in light of that. And finally, there’s one last thing that we need to know. 1 John 5:20-21, he says, we know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true, and we are in Him who is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ.
He’s the true God and eternal life. Dear children, keep yourselves from idols. Fifth, we need to know that God is the one true God. He says that when we connect with God, we’re connecting to the one who is truth. In fact, this truth was explained by His Son Jesus, who is the truth.
He embodied the truth. Jesus said, I am the way and the truth. So what Paul— or what John is saying here is stop looking elsewhere for truth. Look to Christ. In Christ, if you have God, you have the true God.
So we use our thumb here to remind us of the true God. Thumb, T, thumb, the true God. And as we think about the true God, we realize that we have all the truth that we need in him. I mean, for us to look to the world as our truth source is ridiculous. God’s truth is superior to man’s truth.
I heard Laura pray earlier about, Lord, help us not believe the lies of the world. Absolutely. That when we connect with a god, we connect with our true God, and that means we’ve got to be careful to— as John ends the letter, we’ve got to be careful to keep ourselves from idols. What’s an idol? An idol is a god substitute, isn’t it?
It’s anything that stands between you and God, anything that could possibly take the place of God. I like how Kevin DeYoung puts it. He says this regarding God. God says, I am the only God that you need. Don’t turn to Baal.
Don’t turn to statues. Don’t turn to animals or friends or abilities either. Let nothing capture your gaze and affections ahead of me. Keep yourselves from idols. I don’t know if you realize this, but these words are a perfect ending to this book.
Some of us, we see them and it looks kind of like, ah, he just tagged those on there or something. It’s kind of an addendum or something that just came out of nowhere. No, these are a perfect ending to the book. Just like in the 10 Commandments, the 10th commandment is, thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not covet your neighbor’s house, your neighbor’s wife, or your neighbor’s donkey.
And you think about the other 9 commandments that came before that one and you say, what? Why that one? Again, Kevin DeYoung mentions this. He says, it may seem strange that the 10 Commandments starts with such lofty ideals— I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods before me— and then ends with a prosaic whimper: stop looking at that donkey. Why?
Why does he pull it together with do not covet? Because do not covet is the summation of all of the 10 Commandments. Don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, don’t steal, don’t lie. God was saying, don’t put another person, place, or possession in front of me. And so John is saying the same thing.
Keep yourselves from idols, or keep yourselves from lesser gods. Idolatry is coveting. It’s the desire to have something more than God gives me. You know, if only I had blank. And you fill in the blank, I would be happy.
What’s the blank for you? Is it a house? Is it a car? Is it a spouse? Is it children?
Grandchildren? Good looks? A successful career? A perfect figure? More money?
What is it? And John is pleading with them and people like us who are God’s dear children to not put a person, place, or thing above God, something that we might be tempted to think that we just can’t live without this. Is that a frequent struggle? Oh, absolutely. Wanting something more than we have right now, is that a struggle?
Absolutely. If only I had a girlfriend. If only I were engaged. If only I was retired. If only I had a better job.
If only, if only, if only. See, what this does is it causes us to stop and say, what am I chasing? Am I chasing the world’s lies, or am I chasing God’s truth? What do I love the most? What do you think about when you’re in the shower or on the way to work or driving home or when you’re folding laundry, what is the one thing that you need in order to be truly happy?
If the answer is anything but God, guess what? You’re an idolater. So am I.
So, little children, 4 words, keep yourselves from idols. The life that you long for is found in knowing and loving The true God. It’s found in living in close communion with God, with the one who wants us to know, I have eternal life. God hears and he answers my prayers. I’m done with habitual sin.
I belong to God, and God is the true God. All of that John is saying here at the end. This is something we need to know. We need to know it with our minds. We need to know it in our experience, not just factually.
We need to experience this knowledge, because when we experience this knowledge, we begin to experience eternal life now that’s going to extend in forever. Amen. Let’s pray. Lord, thanks for this book. Thank you for what we’ve learned.
Thank you for convicting us and affirming us, for loving us. Thank you for inviting us into relationship with you through your Son. Thank you, Lord, that that opportunity is still open to anybody, even that’s here this morning, God, that you want them in your family. We pray for them. We pray that they would respond to your love by saying, yes, I want that, and they would receive life through Jesus Christ.
If that’s the desire of your heart, tell God that this morning. He’ll hear that prayer.
And Father, we want to experience life in its fullness, so help us in light of what we’ve thought about and talked about, in light of where we’ve been convicted and where we’ve been affirmed.
Help us experience not just with our mind but with our hearts, our whole being, Eternal life. May it transform us. May it make us the people you want us to be. May it make an impact through our lives on others who so desperately need the same life. We pray for this in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
