1 John 2:1-14 (Anthony Fehr / Family Night)

Good evening everybody. I'm glad you could all make it

out this evening. I'm really honoured to be here

with you all tonight. Today we're going to be

continuing in the book of first John, and we'll be in chapter 2

covering verses one through to 14.

While you turn there to recap, Kyle started us in this in First

1 John 1 · chapter mention

John chapter 1. And in this first chapter, John

begins by reminding his readers of the Word that they've heard

and seen that is Christ walking on the earth, living a perfect

life, dying on the cross, and being raised.

Three days later he is proclaiming this truth so that

his listeners may also have fellowship with Christ.

He then goes on to explain that God is light and in him, in Him,

no darkness is found at all. He explains to his readers that

those who have fellowship with Christ must also walk in the

light and those who claim to be in fellowship with Christ and

walk in darkness are liars. John gives readers hope and

explains that when we sin, Jesus is faithful and just to forgive

us and cleanse us. He even explains that we will

all sin and we do all sin and anyone who claims that they

don't sin is a liar. So we're going to continue now

in first John chapter 2, we're going to read verses one through

1 John 2 · chapter mention

to 14. My little children, I am writing

these things to you so that you may not sin, but if anyone does

sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the

righteous. He is the propitiation for our

sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole

world. And by this we know that we have

come to know Him if we keep His commandments.

Whoever says I know Him but does not keep His commandments is a

liar. And the truth is not in him, but

whoever keeps His word in Him. Truly, the love of God is

perfected by this. We may know that we are in Him.

Whoever says He abides in Him ought to walk in the same way in

which He walked. Beloved, I am writing you no new

commandment, but an old commandment that you had from

the beginning. The old commandment is the word

that you have heard. At the same time, it is a new

commandment that I'm writing to you, which is true in Him and in

you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light

is already shining. Whoever says he is in the light

and hates his brother is still in darkness.

Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there

is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is

in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where

he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are

forgiven for His name's sake. I am writing to you, fathers,

because you know Him who is from the beginning.

I am writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the

evil. 1 I write to you, children, because you know the

Father. I write to you, fathers, because

you know him who is from the beginning.

I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the

word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil. 1

Let's pray Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for this beautiful

day that you've blessed us with. We thank you for your word to us

that we can open up and study together.

And I just pray that you would give us a desire to know and

understand your word better. I pray that you would Pierce our

hearts with your word to us this evening as we look to be shaped

by You. I pray that our lives would be

changed by your word and that we would be a light to those in our

daily lives, that we would be bold in our daily life, living

in the light of the gospel so that others may see us and give

glory to you in heaven. Amen. 430 years in Egypt, 40

years in the wilderness, and finally the Israelite people

stood outside of Jericho with the promise of living in the

promised land. The land first promised to

Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and now these would be the

descendants that would finally see this promise come to pass.

The people of Jericho recognized the power not of Israel, but of

Israel's God, and so they were tightly shut, shut and in in

hiding, terrified of what may happen to them.

There were typically a few ways to attack a walled city, by

going over the walls using ladders or ramps, by digging a

tunnel under the wall, by smashing a hole through the

wall, or by laying siege until the city is starved into

submission. But the night before the attack,

Joshua was visited by an Angel who gave him instructions on how

they were to take the city. The plan was unlike anything

that an army would normally use. Anyone without faith in the Lord

would have thought the plan was ridiculous.

Priests were to carry the Ark of the Covenant, and seven priests

bearing 7 trumpets of Ram's horns were to go before the ark,

blowing the trumpets continually.

They were to circle the city once each day for six days.

And on the 7th day the men were to March around the city 7

times. And after the 7th circuit the

priests were to make one long blast on the trumpets, and at

the trumpet sound the people were to shout loudly.

So the next day the people did exactly as the Lord had

instructed, the wall fell and the Israelites went into Jericho

and took over the city. What is so remarkable about this

battle? Victory is not anything to do

with the strategy or with the strength of Israel, but the

faithful, the faithfulness of God to fulfill His promises.

If we look at Joshua chapter 6, verse 2, it says, and the Lord

Joshua 6:2

said to Joshua, see, I have given Jericho into your hand

with its king and mighty men of a veiler.

God had said this to Joshua before the Israelites even began

attacking Jericho. God gave the Israelites victory

over Jericho before they even started fighting.

All they had to do was obey God's instructions and they

would take the city. They had victory over Jericho,

but that didn't mean that they could sit back and do nothing.

They were do no credit for the victory at Jericho, but they

still had to obey the Lord's command.

Could God have sent a lightning strike and taken the city in a

blink of an eye without any help?

For sure. But He wanted the Israelites to

be a part, be a part of it, to show them His faithfulness.

They still had to pick up their swords, obey God's instructions,

and go into battle. They were already given victory

over their enemies, but that didn't mean they would not face

hard times. They would lose men, they would

sin against God, and they would have to continue to fight.

In a similar way, all of us who truly put our faith in Christ

have victory over sin and death through Jesus Christ our

Saviour. And just like the Israelites, we

do not have the power to save ourselves.

We have nothing to boast in regarding our salvation other

than to boast in Christ. Before we even entered the

world, Christ gave us this victory.

We did nothing to earn it. So where does that leave us?

What is our responsibility in this life?

Are there battles that we need to fight?

Like the Israelites, we do indeed have VV in Christ, but

God still calls us to obey Him. He calls us to pick up the sword

of the Spirit, the Word of God, and look to be perfected in

Christ. We have battles to fight in this

world before we enter our final home with our Father in heaven.

What we will see through First John chapter 2 is that there are

1 John 2 · chapter mention

battles in this life that are ours to fight, and there are

battles that we have no business fighting because they have

already been won. We will see that we need to

fight the battle between sin and truth.

We need to fight the battle between light and darkness, and

we need to stop fighting the battle for our salvation.

So the first battle we need to fight is the battle between sin

and truth. Let's begin again by rereading

verses 3 to verse 6. John says, and by this we know

that we have come to know Him if we keep His commandments.

Whoever says I know Him but does not keep His commandments is a

liar. And the truth is not in him, but

whoever keeps His word in him. Truly the love of God is

perfected. By this we may know that we are

in Him. Whoever says He abides in Him

ought to walk in the same way in which He walked.

So the evidence of someone having fellowship with Christ is

pretty simple according to John, Someone who keeps his

commandments. A loving obedience of God's

command is a natural result of fellowship with Him.

And when we commit our life to Christ and put our faith in Him,

we are given a new heart. This heart has God's

commandments written on it. This new heart desires to follow

those commandments. We also have the Holy Spirit

that convicts us and leads us when our flesh desires to go

back to sin. John goes even further in verse

4 to say that whoever knows him and does not keep his commands

is a liar and the truth is not in him.

So if anybody claims to know Christ and follow Christ, but

yet lives completely opposite to His commands, it is right to

question his devotion to Christ. John is so certain of Jesus

Christ's saving and changing power that he says anybody who

is not changed by it does not know Christ as they should.

John continues in verse 5 by saying, Whoever keeps his word

in him, truly the love of God is perfected.

By this. We may know that we are in Him.

Whoever says He abides in Him ought to walk in the same way in

which he walked. Those who have been truly

transformed by Christ's loving sacrifice will obey His word,

and they will be perfected or sanctified as they continue to

grow in their knowledge, in their love for Christ.

Everybody's walk may look a little bit different, different

people grow at different paces, but the fact remains that

anybody who is truly saved will be changed and will act

differently than they did before they were saved.

We cannot go through life thinking that we're good enough.

Oh, I'd say I do more good things than bad things.

I don't, I don't think I'm, I think I'm all right.

Not only is that likely not true, it is not the attitude of

a believer. We are to strive to be perfect

as our Father in heaven is perfect.

Of course, we will never achieve perfection, but it is what we

are to fight for. Think of a marriage

relationship. Would we ever say that it is OK

to disrespect our spouse? Sometimes when you sit down with

your wife or your your husband, do you say to each other, listen

honey, this week I'm hoping to only disrespect you twice, maybe

three times. And I think if I keep it to

three, I think that's really good.

Of course, you never do that. I think we would all agree that

it is never OK to disrespect your spouse and you should

never. We would never say that we

desire to do it. Instead, our desire is to love

them and be patient with them always.

Yet we all fall short. But the desire should remain.

We do not want to disrespect our spouse.

It is the same with our sin. We should never be OK with our

sin. We need to fight the battle

between sin and truth because first of all, God tells us to,

and because sin separates while truth draws us closer to God.

So are we grieved by our sin or do we shrug it off because we

are fallen and we can't help it? As Christians, we need to battle

daily against sin. So how do we practically do

that? I think our D groups do a

wonderful job of this. Our discipleship groups involve

four to five guys or four to five women and a group meeting

weekly to talk about their Bible reading, talk about their sin

and their struggles, and hold each other accountable and pray

for each other. These D groups, when taken

seriously, are huge in our battle against sin, but only if

we take them seriously. We cannot excuse sin in these

groups. We're not there to make each

other feel normal in our sin because Oh well, we all do it.

These groups are there so that when I fall, one of my members

will take me by the hand and say to me, what are you doing?

You can't, you can't be doing that.

Or they'll say to me, why didn't you do a hear journal this week?

Why aren't you reading your Bible?

What's going on? If we are willing to join AD

group and be honest to them, to ourselves and to God about our

sin, that is a huge step in the battle between sin and truth.

Because when sin is exposed, it loses its power very quickly.

But when when sin is hidden, it festers.

It leads to bigger sin, more sin, and it breaks up family and

destroys relationships. Nobody wakes up one morning and

decides that they want to cheat on their wife.

Nobody wakes up one morning and decides to become a drunk.

It starts much sooner than that. When hidden sin is not exposed

and is, and it is allowed to fester and fester and fester and

we do not have to wonder what's right and what's wrong.

It's all in God's Word. So if you open God's Word and it

teaches you to do something, then do it.

And if it says to stop doing something, then stop.

Be malleable and be willing to learn and be changed by God's

Word as you allow it to shape your life rather than your sin

or the beliefs of the world shaping you.

Pick up the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God each and every

day. Join AD group or find somebody

that you can be accountable to and fight the battle against sin

and desire rather to know the truth and live in the truth.

Not only are are we to fight the battle between sin and truth, we

also need to fight the battle between light and darkness.

Let's continue reading verses 7 through to 11.

Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old

commandment that you had from the beginning.

The old commandment is the word that you have heard.

At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to

you, which is true in him and in you.

Because the darkness is passing away and the true light is

already shining. Whoever says he is in the light

and hates his brother is still in darkness.

Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there

is no cause for stumbling, but whoever hates his brother is in

the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where

he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

John is teaching both an old commandment and a new

commandment old, and that from the beginning God's command was

to love him and to love others. Jesus confirmed but also renewed

these teachings when He gave this command to His apostles in

John chapter 13 verse 34. A new commandment I give to you

John 13:34

that you love one another just as I have loved you.

You also are to love one another.

By this all people will know that you are my disciples if you

have love for one another. Jesus says that love is the way

that the world will know that believers are in Christ.

The age to come has not yet fully arrived, but is

progressively coming as the darkness passes away into light.

The true light is already shining, that is Jesus.

John is explaining to his listeners that when they embrace

this new commandment to love, they also are shining God's

light in a world full of darkness.

Then jumping back to first John in in verse 9, John goes on to

say that anyone who says he is in the light but hates his

brother is still in darkness, but whoever loves his brother

abides in the light. We can do all the right things,

we can know all the right scriptures, be knowledgeable in

every way, but if we lack love, we have nothing.

The difference between somebody walking in light versus darkness

is love. Turn with me to 1st Corinthians

chapter 13. Now this is a a chapter often

used at wedding ceremonies, but it is actually written to

describe how fellow believers we're supposed to love one

another. So this the chapter starts by

saying this. If I speak in tongue in the

tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy

gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers

and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all

faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

If I give away all that I have and I deliver up my body to be

burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is everything. Anything we do without love is

pointless. But how do we love?

Well, if we continue reading in First Corinthians, he continues

to say love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast.

It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own

way. It is not irritable or

resentful. It does not rejoice at

wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,

endures all things. Love never ends.

As for prophecies, they will pass away.

As for tongues, they will cease. As for knowledge, it will pass

away. Do we love our brothers and

sisters in Christ in that way? Or are we jealous of them,

wishing we had their job, their car, their house, their gifts?

Does our heart break when we hear of a brother who has fallen

into sin? Or do we say to ourselves, boy,

I'm not surprised he fell into sin, he sure had it coming.

Do we hear gossip about a brother or sister in Christ and

immediately join in and assume it's true?

Or do we seek the truth for them?

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,

and endures all things. While there is a place for

calling out sin in a loving way, there is nothing our brothers or

sisters in Christ can do that would excuse us of this

responsibility to love them. Gossip, hate, and slander, they

come really easy to us. We're good at it.

Even. Love takes intentional hard

work, and we have to fight this battle between this light and

darkness and desire. Love over hate.

We first and foremost love our brothers and sisters in Christ

and desire unity with them. But also we shine the light of

Christ to unbelievers and we love them also.

Not the kind of love the world talks about making people OK

with their sin. We love them by sharing the

gospel with them, desiring for them to see their need for

Christ and the hope that is in Christ.

This battle for love will go against every fabric of society

because it is it is a love that will not not make sense to the

world. I think of Jesus's words in the

Sermon on the Mount when he says you have heard that it was said

an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

But I tell you, do not resist an evil person.

If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other

cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you

and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.

If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.

Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the

one who wants to borrow from you.

You have heard that it was said, love your neighbor and hate your

enemy. But I tell you, love your

enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be

children of your Father in heaven.

He causes His Son to rise on the evil and the good, and sends

rain on the righteous and unrighteous.

If you love those who love you, what reward will you get?

Are not even the tax collectors doing that?

And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more

than others? Do not even pagans do that?

Be there, be perfect. Therefore, as your Heavenly

Father is perfect, if you live your life with this sort of love

to those around you, regardless of what you think they may

deserve, people will look at you like you've got a third eye.

They will wonder, what in the world is this guy on?

Why does he treat people so well no matter what they do to him?

And in that moment when all the eyes are on you, you are shining

the light of Christ, and you can look at them and point them to

Jesus and say he is why I live the way that I do.

Wake up each day and ask God to bring you opportunities to shine

His light. Fight against the darkness that

can sometimes feel like it's prevailing in this world, and

fight it with the light of Jesus Christ.

We are called to fight the battle between sin and truth,

between light and darkness, but we must also stop trying to

fight the battle for our salvation.

I want to close out tonight by reading verses 12 to 14 and

verses 1 and 2. I am writing to you, little

children, because your sins are forgiven for His name's sake.

I am writing to you, fathers, because you know Him who is from

the beginning. I am writing to you, young men,

because you have overcome the evil 1.

I write to you, children, because you know the Father.

I write to you, fathers, because you know Him who is from the

beginning. I write to you, young men,

because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and

you have overcome the evil. 1 Then jumping to verses one and

two, my little children, I am writing these things to you so

that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have

an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but

also for the sins of the whole world.

In this first verse, John gives his reason for writing these

things so that they won't sin. And like we've already said,

Christ's sacrifice does not give us a license to sin, but should

give us a desire to flee from sin and instead desire to obey

his commandments and shine his light.

But John recognizes that we will fall short.

We do fall short and we will sin.

In fact, in chapter 1, he says that anyone who says he doesn't

sin is a liar. So he goes on to say, but if

anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father.

Jesus Christ the righteous is the propitiation for our sins,

and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

These verses are the foundation of our faith in Christ.

God being a just and holy God must punish sin.

It has to be paid for. And because He loves us so much,

He does not want us to die having to face that punishment.

So He made a way. He made a plan before the

foundations of the earth for us to join Him in His glorious

presence. So while we were still sinners,

He sent his only Son down to earth to become a man, to live a

perfect life that we couldn't. He who knew no sin became sin on

our behalf so that God might see us as righteous.

He died a brutal death on the cross in our place, taking all

our sins onto Himself. Then he didn't stay there, but

he defeated death and was raised on the third day.

And now, after all that, after He's paid our debt, appeased

God's wrath, experienced the brutal death that we deserve, he

sits with God the Father in heaven, and He advocates to the

Father for us. Our sin is what put Jesus on the

cross, and yet He still loves us so much that He actively is

lobbying on our behalf to the Father and makes us righteous in

His sight. Do we realize how amazing this

this is? This is why we fight the battle

against sin. This is why we fight the battle

for light over darkness. Not to earn our salvation or to

check some sort of box and make ourselves feel good, but because

we have a Saviour who not only died for us, but who now sits

with the Father and advocates for us.

So how do we find the endurance and the desire to fight the

battle against sin and against darkness?

We must preach this gospel to ourselves and to others day in

and day out. If we do this, we will be

changed and others will be changed as well.

Not because we worked a little harder to stop sinning, but

because the Gospel of Jesus Christ has power to save and

change lives and it will change yours.

In fact, it is the only thing that has power to save.

We cannot save ourselves or others.

We can never hear the gospel enough because despite how

amazing this sacrifice and this good news is, we forget it.

Or maybe we don't forget it, but we don't think about it or let

it sink in. But if we're willing to preach

this gospel to ourselves every day, if we stop fighting the

battle for our salvation, but find joy and hope in the battle

already won in Jesus Christ our Savior, our lives will be

changed. We will love one another more.

We will sin less and less, and make no mistake, we'll still sin

and fall short of the glory of God.

But take heart because Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior has

overcome the world. He's already won.

It was finished on the cross. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, I thank you again for this day that you've

blessed us with. I thank you for your Son, Jesus,

who you sent down to to die in our place, to take our sin unto

himself and to to take the punishment that we deserved.

And he was he didn't stay there, but he was raised on the third

day. And he, we just thank you that

he now sits beside you and advocates for us on our behalf.

And I just pray that you would help us to take heart in that

truth, in that promise that we would just continue to fight the

battle against sin, the battle against darkness while we we

live in this temporary world, that we would shine your light

wherever we go and just continue to be sanctified in the truth of

Jesus Christ. Amen.