1 John: Love Begets Love and Godliness

So, our passage, 1 John 2.

It's kind of a difficult passage, actually.

I really dug into it this week and I'm excited about it, but we have some work to do to get to understand it.

So back in April, I received a speeding ticket.

I think I talked about it.

I talked about it, this ticket I got in South Georgia.

Here's the deal.

I got back, I paid it online.

It was$170.

So I stomached it, right?

I cried a little bit, but I stomached it.

It's like, okay, you know, it's over with.

You know, kind of paid the toll of speeding for the past few years.

And I think it's over.

I thought it was over.

And then in July, I receive a letter that my license is going to be suspended for not paying the ticket.

Well, I go straight into like lawyer mode, right?

Like, and I'm I'm complaining to Christy and I'm making copies of my ticket and receipt and the online printout and the credit card statement, and I write a letter and I get it all folded up in the envelope and I mail it off because I am right.

I'm the one that's right.

And so I mail this all off, and two weeks later I received back a letter explaining to me that I did pay that ticket, and now I had a super speeder ticket.

Has anybody won the super speeder ticket award?

Sounds like an award.

It is not an award.

It is not, and it's not a good thing, mind you, at all.

So I get to pay another$200.

I'm$370 into this thing.

And let me tell you something.

I'm watching my speed.

I'll just be honest.

Like, like it is working.

Like it is clearly working in my life.

And I paid it all.

I paid it all.

So having paid all of that and it working in my life, I would agree it worked in my life.

But even still, there's this part of me that just wishes, I do just wish this officer had looked at me and my pitiful little face there on the side of the road and saw those three little cute girls in the back and realized I had three weddings to pay for at some point in my life, and just had just poured out, you know, just poured out this, you know, just gracious mercy upon me.

And he would have said, Oh, I can see that you'll you're gonna watch your speed.

I can so clearly see this in your face.

You just seem like you've learned your lesson here.

And him, what if he had just said, hey, here's the deal.

I know the judge.

I know the judge in the county.

And here's the deal, I'm gonna go talk to him.

You got the ticket, by the way, because you you did earn that.

So you're getting the ticket, but here's the deal.

I'm gonna go and I'm gonna talk to the judge for you.

And if the judge says you have to pay, like that's the right thing, but I'll I'll pay it for you.

Right?

He would be saying, in that instance, in that dream, dream scenario, he would be saying, I'll be your advocate.

Now let's read the quote that we read last week.

I'm setting you up for verses one and two.

Here's the quote we read last week.

This is from theologian Charles Hodge.

The relationship of Christ to his people is that of a legal advocate to a client.

The former impersonates the latter, the lawyer stands in the client's place.

It is, while it lasts, the most intimate of relationships.

You may not even have to appear in court.

You are not heard, you are not regarded, you are lost in your advocate, who for the time being is your representative.

The advocate, not you as seen, the advocate, not you as heard, the advocate, not you is regarded.

Okay, so I set you up for 1 John 2, 1 and 2.

Let me reread those verses.

My little children, I'm writing these scenes to you so that you may not sin.

But if anyone does sin, so a little bit of reality for John here for us.

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 so last week we talked about this word advocate.

Here's the word.

This word advocate comes from the word paraclete.

It means to represent in a legal matter.

It's an official, binding relationship.

So whatever they achieve, whatever the advocate achieves, you achieve it.

Isn't that amazing?

If they win, you win.

And so we have that as our base as we go into verse 3.

We can't just start in verse ⁇ if we start in verse 3, we could end up in all sorts of performancism or moralism or legalism, all sorts of stuff.

But if we start with verses 1 and 2 as our base, which is what John's doing, he's carrying us through this text.

Verse 3 says this, and by this we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments.

See, verse 3, without verses 1 and 2, we could end up all over the place.

But with verses 1 and 2, we get point number one.

Godliness in our lives is in response and empowerment by the gospel, not for the gospel.

Now, the word commandment, it usually makes us think about rules.

Rightfully so, it's kind of what a commandment is.

But this same word here in this passage, it could be translated instruction or way of life.

And this word obey, that's a great word.

That's a biblical word.

But it could also be translated here in this passage as embrace.

So we have this sentence, at least in the ESV, and here's the sentence that's in our passage that I read.

And by this we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments.

That's true.

But we could also word it this way, just as rightfully.

And by this we know that we have come to know him.

If we embrace his way of life, if we embrace his way of life.

So my point is this by seeing the fullness of this text, not that the first translation is wrong, but by seeing the fullness of this text, we see this is about a relationship with Christ.

Faith is about a relationship with Christ and a following of Christ, not a system of rules.

That's what verses one through three altogether give us, that godliness is coming out of this reality, that we are so loved in the grace of God that He provided absolution for us and our full righteousness, that we are already beloved, even before we begin in on any godly life.

Verses four through six.

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 walks.

Now the end of verse five is a little perplexing.

In him truly the love of God is perfected.

And some different commentaries have said that might be more like our love for him is perfected, which that changes everything if that's true.

So a little bit of a mystery there.

And then we get this word no.

It's in verse 3, it's in verse 4, it's in verse 5.

So there's something here that John is doing that this is very important.

This word no comes from the word genosko, which means perceive and understand.

But the thing about this word is it's even richer because it comes from the Jewish phrase for sex.

So this is like like you, like really no, like you you knew her, right?

Like I know my wife, you know your wife, you know your husband, like in a way nobody else does, in the most intimate relational knowing possible, is what John is saying.

So it's not a subscribing to an observance of rules and to-do lists.

This is this is what faith is, a relational knowing in the core of our beings.

And there's a warning here.

Like we can't miss that.

And John's warning is like to say that you know him in this way, like that you know him in the core of your being, and there's no godliness in your heart and coming out of your life.

Well, that just doesn't make sense.

That just it can't be.

Just not the way it works.

He says, knowing Christ should have some effect in your life.

And we're not talking about performancism or perfectionism.

It's not a fear walk or a shame walk.

This is a grace walk, growing in the grace of God that we know coming out of verses 1 and 2.

This is point number two.

Knowing Christ is an imperfect relational walk toward love and obedience.

Knowing Christ is an imperfect relational walk toward love and obedience.

And it's all those things.

That's why I used all those words in that point.

There's a story in Mark 12, verses 29 through 31, and these teachers of the law, they come up to Jesus.

Mark 12:29–31

Maybe you remember this story, because they're hearing Jesus talk about loving people, and it's not the observance of the law, but it's about having a relationship with Him, and they're hearing all this like, hold on, you know.

They're people of the law, they're people who want to obey enough rules in order to be loved and accepted by God.

So they come to Jesus, sort of set them up, and they say, Hey, what's the most important commandment?

And in their minds, there is a right answer, by the way, because that would be Deuteronomy 6, 4 and 5.

And so they have an idea in their mind, and Jesus answers that exact verse when he quotes, Jesus answered, the most important is this, hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.

And then Jesus does this odd thing that nobody had done before, because that was seen as the Shema, the great principle in their faith and religion, and he says, No, no, no, no, this is new.

What I'm doing is the fulfillment of the law.

And he adds Leviticus 19, 18 to it, and he says this, and the second is this, and they didn't ask for two, mind you, but Jesus gives them two, and it's as if he's saying, like, I can't disconnect these two things, like to love God, and then the second is this, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

There is no other commandment greater than these.

This is why John, coming out of verses 1 and 2 about Jesus, the grace of God for you, and he is your advocate and you're fully forgiven and fully righteous, and he moves strategically through these verses, and by the end in 8, 9, 10, and 11, he's saying, Hey, if you don't love your brother and sister, like you're just lying.

Like you don't really love God.

Like loving God translates into loving your brother and sister, it translates into loving your neighbor.

So here's how this works: the Holy Spirit is convincing you more and more of your belovedness in Christ, verses 1 and 2.

The Holy Spirit is doing that in your life.

And so the Holy Spirit's revealing fears that you have, heart issues, stuff going on in your heart, and in your secure belovedness, which you have in verses 1 and 2.

Don't start in verse 3, which you have in verses 1 and 2, in that security, you don't have any fear to repent.

You don't have any shame to confess.

You can come in the grace of God without fear and without shame in his presence because you are already fully loved before you're anything of some measure of obedience or godliness.

And that is what frees us from escaping into darkness or self-righteousness, which is darkness also.

And it frees us into this imperfect walk with Christ toward love and obedience.

And of course, it's all done imperfectly, so along the way you'll fail, and I'll fail.

Right?

That's why John says, but if you sin, right?

Because he knows.

We get to humble ourselves over and over again in confession and in astonishment that we've been loved the whole time, righteous the whole entire time.

I've lived in nine houses in my life.

I think I counted, it was nine houses, and then if I counted college also, I think it jumped up to 12 or 13.

Here's a picture of the first house I might spent my childhood in.

It had seen better days, mind you, and that is a boat and a wheelchair in the front yard, uh, which I'm not sure about.

That was odd when I saw that on Google.

It was interesting.

Here's a picture of it in the finer days.

That's yes, that's me with a tight roll on top of bass, some bass leather shoes there in the 80s.

That was going on.

Here's one more picture for your enjoyment.

That was my intimidation pose.

I also still wear those shorts at night sometimes, get Christy excited.

Just kind of I strut around the house.

Here's what here's what happens over time.

That house, here's what happens over time, by residing in a home.

By residing in that home.

Some of the values of that home just get inside of me.

Some of the values of your childhood home just got inside of you.

Just by you abiding there, they did.

My mom was a librarian, she read to us when we were little, she bought me Larry Bird biographies when I was that age on that bite.

Books were just in our house.

So sure enough, books are in our house.

The inn table next to my chair in the den, there's eight books there.

There's eight books on my nightstand, there's books on the floorboard of my car.

There's just my children have books.

Like, it's just it's just in me.

It got in me.

When you abide somewhere, some things begin to birth inside of you.

It's just what happens.

And John loves this word abide.

He uses it over and over again.

He uses it 40 times in his gospel, John.

He uses it 27 times in his letters, first, second, and third, John.

He loves this word.

This word comes from the word minnow, and it means to be held, to remain, to be present somewhere.

And here's point number three.

In the grace of God, we get to be at home in the heart of God.

Godliness will work itself out.

In imperfection, but a walk toward love and obedience will work itself out if we get this.

In the grace of God, you get to be at home in the heart of God.

John is saying, as you grow in the awareness of how at home your soul is in God, some of the values of the kingdom start to birth inside of you.

They begin coming out of you.

And so this isn't shame on you or fear on you.

This is know Christ, your advocate.

Grow in the awareness of the home that you have in him.

And one closing thought in my lack of love, in your lack of love for any given person, for your brother or your sister, and in my lack of obedience to godliness, do I realize how fully loved and forgiven and righteous and free I am in the Advocate?

It's the only thing, it's the only way of change for us.

My brothers and sisters, you are free in Christ Jesus to be fully loved, to fail often, and to keep loving and live lives that honor Him.

Let's pray together.

God, thank you for this great passage that teaches us that in the grace of God you call us toward godliness in full reality that you know that we are imperfect.

And that we get to grow in the grace of God that you have given to us of our absolution in your advocacy for us.

That you are not angry with us, you do not shame us, you do not put fear upon us.

Would you woo our hearts to reside more and more in your heart and not to run from you?

Help us to see how much you love us and fully accept us in Christ, that we would stop running from you.

And let you expose all of our fears and all of the ways we withhold love from each other.

So that we might be free in our belovedness to love and honor you.

In Jesus' name, we pray.

Amen.