1 John 1:5-10
“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. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But 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. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourself, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” When I signed up to do the devo for today, I originally thought it’d be a great opportunity to share my story with everyone. I’ve been serving at ChristFit for over a year, and many of you don’t know too much about me. However as the time got closer, we decided to start a themed study each week on the book of 1 John, so I switched gears. I was actually a Biblical literature major in college, and I love any excuse to dive into commentaries and study the Bible. So, I pulled out my commentary on 1, 2 and 3 John from the Johannine literature class I took my junior year and set to work geeking out on picking apart these verses with my multiple translations and commentaries. I wrote down quotes that stood out, the historical background of the church at the time, and began to compile everything I loved from the commentaries and studies. And then I sat there and stared at my computer and ended up deleting all of it. As I read these verses, there is so much beauty in the simplicity of the gospel. Freedom in the truth that confessing our sins allows us to walk in fellowship with God and with others. The promise that Jesus’ death and resurrection allows us to walk in the light and break the chains of bondage that sin brings. I’m honestly just reminded of my story, and how God pulled me out of a darkness that overwhelmed me as I tried to be the perfect Christian girl that knew the right answers and did all the right things. My life truly was a picture of the warnings in these verses—I always professed Christ, but inwardly I didn’t understand my need for a Savior. I grew up in a Christian home, studied the Bible at a Christian school, and thought I could do it all on my own. Although I’d never say it out loud, I thought some people needed Jesus to save them, but I was doing fine on my own merit. I found my identity and worth in what I could accomplish, and in what others thought of me as a result. After I graduated from college and moved to Dallas, the foundation I had built began to crumble. Outside of a Christian environment for the first time, I started to question what I believed and pursued relationships with others that were not following God. This led to me living a life that did not point to Christ, even though I still would’ve said that I “had fellowship with Him.” When my brother passed away in June of 2011, my doubt and anger at God rose to the surface. I remember telling Him that I lived up to my end of the deal, but He didn’t live up to His, so I was out. I spent the next 9 months living life the way I wanted to, no longer trying to do the right thing—it wasn’t worth it. I became numb, depressed and empty. I had no hope, and the best way I could describe it is complete darkness. Psalm 81 starts by urging the Israelites to praise God for all He had done to save and protect them. However verses 11-12 say, “But my people did not listen to my voice; Israel would not submit to me. So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts, to follow their own counsels.” What I couldn’t see was that God had done the same with me—He had protected me, and told me what was good and even put me in 4 years of studying His word—but I still missed the Gospel. In the same way as He did with the Israelites, He gave me up to follow my own way. I quickly found that my own way leads to death, and can now say it was His loving kindness that allowed me to experience the darkness of life without Christ, so I could realize that it’s only through his Son’s death and resurrection that I have life. What this picture of light and darkness is really saying is that if God is light, and in Him is no darkness, than God Himself is freedom from death and darkness. One of my favorite parts of these verses is that each warning is met with a promise. John doesn’t just leave us with “what not to do.” While the warnings have been a picture of my past, the promises are a beautiful picture of my present. The last verse of Psalm 81 says “But he would feed you with the finest of the wheat, and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.” Living a life fully known by community that surrounds me, and not just acknowledging my sin and need for a Savior, but regularly confessing that sin has yielded a freedom and satisfaction in Christ I didn’t know existed. Even as someone who is daily pursuing the Lord, the temptation to find satisfaction in the world is constantly knocking at my door. My prayer and challenge for all of us this week is that we would come before the Lord with a willingness to acknowledge where we still search for life outside of Him, and in effect walk in darkness as we claim to be in fellowship with Him. I pray that we would all come to know that He truly does satisfy us with every good thing as we trust in Him and walk in His light.
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This week are going to be starting a study through the Epistle of 1John. Epistle just means letter and we can see from how the letter was written that the letter was written by the Apostle John. John was one of Jesus’ main disciples and was one of the main leaders of the Christian church after Jesus was resurrected.
The purpose of 1 John was to warn the church and its readers of the letter of false teaching that Jesus has come to earth in the flesh both fully God and fully man. The false teaching was that Jesus only appeared to be human and there was no divine Savior who was able to die for sinners. Some scholars believed that this teaching came from a false movement of teaching called Gnosticism which would say that there is a God but He is not knowable. So we can see that this Epistle was written in response to this false teaching. We see that John has this authority for Jesus Himself commissioned John as an apostle and has the authority to write to correct this false teaching that the church is encountering. We can outline the Epistle of 1 John into five parts.
One of the main warnings the John gives to his readers is Satan who is our adversary. We see that the enemy of the Gospel attacks at every point and is trying to deny that Jesus was here on earth both fully God and human able to take away the sins of the world. He threatens to undermine the believer’s confidence before God and having someone believe that one can believe in God without taking part in the love and kindness of God’s character. Eternal Life has appeared. 1 John 1:1-4 states, “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 – 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 – that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too many have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.” The central event of history is the appearance of eternal life in Jesus Christ. John is one of the chosen witnesses who saw, heard, and touched One who had existed from the beginning – the Son of God, whose eternal fellowship with the Father is now extended to others. This extension takes place through the apostolic proclamation, including the writing of Scripture. In the same way, as Paul who is the Apostle who is teaching this and showing that Jesus who is both fully God and fully human who God sent to earth to be the means by which God is able to restore mankind back into relationship with Himself, we who are believers in Jesus Christ are to continue to proclaim that Jesus Christ is the living Son of God and to be able to make a defense for the hope that is within us in Jesus Christ as Peter would encourage us to do. We who are believers in Jesus Christ, have been commissioned by God to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and to teach everything that Jesus has commanded. We know that God has predetermined that He has placed you with where you live and where you dwell so that others may find their way to Him as Acts 17 states. Be faithful, understand that God loves you intimately and that He will not leave you to do this work on your own, but has sent a Helper who is the Holy Spirit to be there with you. When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought joy to my soul.” Psalm 94:19
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