1 John: The Eternal Endowment

Well, happy Labor Day.

Glad you're here.

Glad you're here with us this morning.

And maybe more fitting, happy, uh, happy football.

Um, for many of us, that's a big deal.

Let's fold in here.

There we go.

Uh, we stayed up late last night watching football and the incredible end of the Auburn game.

It was incredible whether you uh love Auburn, hate Auburn, or you're for Oregon.

That's possible, maybe, probably not here.

Um, but uh incredible ending to that game.

Our little family, we were watching the Georgia game uh at the same time, uh, with our red shirts on, and we were in the den all snuggled up, um, you know, halfway bickering to each other because we're all tired and halfway enjoying uh the game.

But we're there watching the game, and so uh we're Georgia fans, but we're playing, we were playing Vanderbilt, and I I I like Vanderbilt.

I have nothing really against Vanderbilt.

It's you know, it's kind of a smarty pants school if we're honest about it.

I I would have liked to have gone there if I could have gotten in there or been able to afford it.

I I would have loved to have gone there.

Uh but I didn't go there, I went to Georgia for those reasons.

So I have high regard for Vanderbilt, right?

High regard for Vanderbilt.

But as soon as the game started, I I don't I don't like Vanderbilt.

I don't I don't want them to win.

Um I'm for Georgia, right?

Like as soon as the game starts, like everything changes.

And Vanderbilt is against us, like at the same time.

Like that immediately happens.

A division is created.

A division is created because of who we are for.

And this is where our text this morning uncomfortably takes us.

It takes us to division because of who we are for.

And so we're gonna work our way through this passage in 1 John chapter 2.

1 John 2 · chapter mention

We could it covered a lot.

Like if we now read it, you're like, wow, that's a lot.

Like we could do like four weeks on this, to be honest.

So we're just we're gonna kind of jump our way through it, and hopefully we'll kind of get the art, the main points of the passage.

So, first off, 1 John 2, verses 18 and 19.

1 John 2:18

Children, it is the last hour.

And as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many Antichrists have come.

Therefore, we know that it is the last hour.

They went out from us, but they were not of us, for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us, but they went out that it might become plain that they all are not of us.

So, point number one is this the truth of Christ divides.

So the background here is a group of people that was in the church, and then they left the church, and the reason why they left the church is because they are antichrist.

Now that's a big word.

And you know what it means?

Against Christ.

That's what it means.

It simply means that a person is against Christ.

They do not believe Jesus is the Christ.

They do not believe Jesus is the Savior of the world, Son of God, come, and that He is forgiveness and righteousness.

And therefore, because they are not for that, they are against that, a division has occurred by the nature of it, just a division has occurred.

And John says, hey, they're antichrists.

Not only that, but they're behaving horribly on their way out, right?

And we get this sense that they're not peacefully kind of walking out of the community and saying, hey, you guys do your thing.

We love you, we're gonna go over here and do our thing.

They're causing havoc.

And John says, hey, these people are antichrists.

Jesus in Luke chapter 12, he says that he comes to cast fire on earth and bring division.

Luke 12 · chapter mention

And then he says in verse 52, for from now on in one house, Jesus talking, for from now on in one house there will be five divided, three against two and two against three.

They will be divided father against son, son against father, mother against daughter, and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law.

We already knew that, and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.

We knew that one also.

Here's what Jesus is saying.

He's saying, I'm the truth.

I am the truth about right and wrong.

I'm the truth about forgiveness.

I'm the truth about your sinfulness.

I'm the truth about absolution.

I'm the truth about righteousness, I'm the truth about your value or your worth and where you're gonna find that in life.

He's saying, and because of that, it causes division.

Because it doesn't follow the ways of the world, of where everybody else is gonna find absolution and justification and righteousness and worth and belovedness.

And Jesus talks about the family because I mean, nowhere can we go where it's any more sensitive than into the family.

Because if somebody in a family that is not following Jesus comes to follow Jesus, and that person in the family cares about their other family members, what happens is out of their care and love, they'll begin to speak something about it to their family, or their family will notice it.

And then the follower of Jesus is speaking to the non-followers of Jesus, and the non-followers of Jesus can easily start to feel judged in that.

And at the same time, the non-followers of Jesus start to think maybe the follower of Jesus has lost their mind, checked it at the door, they're not intellectual anymore, or maybe they're in a cult, they're not sure.

And all of this is division.

You see how easy that is?

Even in a loving family, even in a loving family, there is a division because the truth of your life has just altered.

It's just based somewhere else.

And just a little bit of pastoral advice, and you don't have to receive this, maybe just hear it, you don't have to take it.

The division's already there because of Christ.

And until we surrender the desire to be known as right in our family or fix the other people in our family, and I'm gonna fix them by our conversation that I'm gonna have and I'm gonna prove my point, and all of that, until we surrender all of that, you're just adding division upon division.

Right?

The division's already there.

Christ said the division's there.

By nature of me, the division is there.

This doesn't say, like, oh, this gives me the right to be superior and judgmental, and I can cause more division because I am a person of Jesus.

No, it's actually the call to love our family and friends is still there.

Jesus is saying, like, hey, just recognize in that call not to superiority, but servanthood and love and to speak truth in love.

Just recognize there's going to be division in there.

It's not always gonna be easy.

John goes on to begin to speak to those who do believe.

He turns it, you can see in verse 20, but you have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all have knowledge.

Point number two is this in Christ we have an immeasurable endowment inside of us.

So the word anointed there in verse 20 is the word anointing, which comes from the word chrisma, which means smearing or special endowment.

So John's beginning to build imagery for us that's going to carry through this passage.

And John is saying, the Holy Spirit is inside of you.

You've been marked.

He's in you.

You have an anointing, you have an endowment.

And the word carries with it this imagery that comes from the Old Testament.

There's this idea of a smearing of oil that would have been done on kings and priests.

And so John is coming into this imagery and he's saying, You beloved, are like kings and priests.

You have an internal endowment of God that resides in you by the Spirit of God that never ends.

Jumping to verse 24, let what you heard from the beginning abide in you.

And if what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father.

And this is the promise that He made to us eternal life.

Point number three is this we are in union with God by Christ.

We are in union with God by Christ.

So my favorite illustration of this is, and I've done it several times here, and I've grew up seeing this illustration.

Maybe you grew up seeing this illustration in the youth group or whatever.

And so my favorite illustration is this is the tough ware illustration you've been picked up on it.

So we grab some tougherware out of the drawer, and this is this is you.

This is you.

And so at some point in your life, you're saying, you know what, I can't be the savior of my life.

And so you pray a prayer.

God, I repent of my sin.

I want to follow you, Jesus, your savior of my life.

You raise your hand, you walk an aisle, you take communion, you baptize.

I don't know how that was manifested outward.

The point in it is that you have you had a soul and a heart change where you said, in the inner core of who you are, I can't be my own savior.

I need to recognize God, your authority, I'm under you, I need your forgiveness, and I need your righteousness.

And that is in the person of Jesus.

And I repent, I surrender, I want to follow.

And so in that moment, you have Christ coming into you, right?

So now you have you and you and Christ in you.

Now, if we're not careful, what can happen at this point is you have Christ in you, but but then you get sent out to just work really hard because you're a little concerned if you don't work quite hard enough.

Maybe Christ is gonna like sneak out of you, or like you're not gonna be in the right position with God, or that position with God could be threatened, or you know, so you can get on this treadmill of Christian life or doing good enough or being good enough, even while you have the endowment inside of you.

But grace upon graces to realize the entire time it's not just Christ abiding in you, but then you also abide in Christ.

And this is why we as Christians are so unbelievably secure.

Because we abide in Christ, but he's abiding in us.

We have full union.

That's the point here.

We are in union with God by Christ.

We have full union in this secure relationship.

And John's saying, hey, his presence takes up residence in you, and and all of you is in him.

I read this this week, this slide here.

You may feel unworthy, but in Christ you are loved by God.

You may feel guilty, but in Christ you are spotless.

You may feel rejected, but in Christ you have been chosen by God.

You may feel condemned, but in Christ you are righteous.

You may feel lonely, but in Christ you are never alone.

Verse 28 says, and now, because of all of that, because all that good news.

I mean it's huge to understand our position with God because of all of that.

Little children, abide in him, we're just talking about that, so that when he appears, we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.

So there's no fear here, is what John's saying.

If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him.

So verse 29 lays out this kind of train of thought.

Know he's righteous.

We've been talking about our word know the last few weeks.

This is intimate relational knowing in the core of who you are.

So it's not like obligatory religious knowing.

It's the core of who you are, the most intimate possible way of knowing.

If you're going to know he is righteous, then you will be born again and then practice righteousness.

And what we've been talking about in this language that John's been building with the idea of practicing righteousness, it's not me, it doesn't mean we're perfect.

It actually means that there's an imperfect walk in an ongoing direction towards godliness.

Point number four is this because Christ abides in us, we abide with confidence.

Now, this word confidence comes from the word paressea, which means ease.

I didn't get that feeling when I read the verse.

That was what was so interesting when I studied that word and clicked a few things on my computer, and I got down to that meaning.

Ease.

Well, I didn't see that coming.

Isn't that interesting?

Because John's building an image for us to grasp, but because that we are at ease because we are already held and loved.

We are called to abide in the wealth already given to us in his presence in us.

This is that endowment that John is talking about.

This is what brings security of the self and empowerment for change.

Back to my school, University of Georgia.

We have an endowment of one billion dollars.

I thought that was kind of impressive until I looked up the endowment of Vanderbilt University.

They have an endowment of five billion dollars.

So then I began to nerd out a little bit about endowments this week.

And I'll be honest, I can get a little bit into that.

And so I'm I'm Googling away, I'm like way down the rabbit trail.

And sometimes churches have endowments.

I don't know if you realize that.

Sometimes a church will have an endowment.

We don't.

Um you're welcome to, you know, if you want to gather together, I can reserve a room in the church, y'all can talk that through of how that could happen.

We're open, we're open to such things.

So I begin to nerd out, and so I found this one church, this one church, it's one of the wealthiest churches in the entire world because of its endowment.

Here's a picture of the land.

This is a picture of the land that it was started on and built on in 1696.

Here's a picture of that land today.

That's the land today.

So you've picked up on where it's at.

It's in Lower Manhattan.

It was started in 1696.

Here's a picture of the church in 1846 there in Lower Manhattan.

Now, here's a picture of the outside view of the church today, and the inside of the church today.

So the history of this church is Trinity Church there in Lower Manhattan.

In 1696, a group of Anglicans started a church in Lower Manhattan.

Their rent was 60 bushels of wheat.

Okay, that's how the rent was being laid out.

In 1705, the Queen of England, Anne, gave the church 205 acres of land in New York City.

Whew.

So they start all sorts of stuff over time.

In the mid-1700s, they start King's College, which turns into Columbia University.

Many of the leaders of our country were members of the church.

Alexander Hamilton's buried in the cemetery there.

And they still own today, they own 14 acres of land in New York City.

They're one of the largest landowners.

That church is one of the largest landowners in New York City.

They have 5.5 million, 5.5 million square feet of commercial real estate.

This acts as an endowment of over$6 billion for that church that we just saw.

Their assets, those assets every year, they just create hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars every single year for that church.

Here's the point.

The point is they have a reservoir of wealth by gift from centuries ago.

Now maybe you agree or disagree on whether a church should have an endowment, not really the point.

The point is an endowment is a reservoir of wealth by gift to sustain you, no matter what.

No matter what life throws at you, no matter what you throw at yourself.

And John's just building this imagery throughout this passage is getting stronger and stronger and stronger.

And he's saying, you beloved, have the presence of God in you, and you are in Christ.

Christ in you, you in Christ.

You have been anointed like kings and like priests.

You have a wealth of absolution and forgiveness and righteousness and value and worth inside of you.

An endowment that will never go away.

A wealth, an embarrassment of wealth that will never fade.

And it is not by what you do or have done or will do, it is by gift from centuries ago.

Because of Christ's word.

My brothers and sisters, this is the good news of Jesus the Christ.

Let's pray together.

God, thank you for this good news that we have inside of us your very presence.

And the work of Christ is enough for us, more than enough.

That we have an endowment inside of us.

We have been anointed like kings and like priests.

And though we are not perfect, and we are sinners.

We are in complete reliance upon this gift.

To sustain our absolution, our forgiveness, and our righteousness.

Help us to see more and more what is true about us because you have deemed it so.

Help this imagery of this morning built by John for us.

May it just resonate in our hearts and our minds.

That we don't have to go out and build a wealth of morality.

We don't have to build a wealth of wealth or a wealth of status.

And in all the ways that we have come so short of creating any wealth of these things.

The gift of Christ is sufficient.

We thank you for this great gift.

Help us in our faith.