John wants us to live lives that have been freed from
sin. To do this, we must first recognize
that sin has had power over us, but that Jesus’ sacrifice frees us from that
sin and enables us to walk in his light.
Lesson Outcomes:
Through this lessons students should:
1. Confess
that there is no sin or darkens in God.
2. Confess
that we are sinful people who have been dominated by sin.
3. Confess
that Jesus has freed us from slavery to sin so that we might walk in God’s
light.
4. Be
encouraged to go and live a life free from sin.
Catch up on the
story:
First John is categorized as an epistle or letter with
other New Testament works just as the first letter to the Corinthians and the
like. It is categorized as such without
the normal markings of a first-century letter.
For instance, unlike Paul’s letters, we have no greeting. There is no mention of who the author is or
to whom the letter is written.
Nevertheless, First John gets the epistle label. While the work lacks these formal markings,
what becomes clear as one reads the letter is that the author is speaking to a
specific community of faith that is dealing with specific issues regarding
Christology, or how one understands and talks about the nature and person of
Jesus Christ.
It is not crucial to spend too much time seeking to
discover a definitive answer for both the author of First John and its
recipients. What we do know, however, is
that the text presupposes the work of the Gospel of John. The prologue (verses 1-4) strongly echoes the
prologue of John’s gospel. There are
enough similarities between the Gospel of John and First John that one might
suppose that John is the author of both.
At the very least, we can say that John’s followers might be responsible
for the epistles that bear his name. For
simplicity’s sake, we will take the view that the author of the Gospel of John
and First John are the same.
The Text:
The Prologue
(1:1-4)
By
the nature of the way in which John structures the original Greek, we learn
that the focus of this prologue, and the entire work, is the “word of
life.” What is this “word of life?” It is that which was from the very
beginning. Here John echoes the opening
to the Gospel that bears his name. This
“word of life” is none other than the pre-existent second person of the
Trinity. For John’s audience there seems
to have been some tension concerning the nature of Jesus. Some would have emphasized Jesus’ divinity
while downplaying his humanity. A
heresy, Docetism, will spring up which describes Jesus as only appearing to be
human. Others will say that Jesus could
not be fully God and still be human.
John
begins to address this tension by proclaiming that Jesus is this “word of
life.” He has been from the
beginning. In fact, John says, we have
heard him with our ears, seen him with our eyes and touched him with our
hands. This brings a concrete reality to
this “word of life” that at once brings together Jesus’ divinity and his
humanity. Jesus was someone that John
and others could hear, see and touch.
The
“we” language of the prologue does two things.
First, it declares that this witness of Jesus as word of life is not an
individual thing, but was witnessed by the faith community’s earliest
believers. This is not just one guy’s
vision; it is the witness of the community.
The second thing the “we” language does is it invites his hearers to
join, in a fuller sense, that community of faith by embracing both the humanity
and divinity of Jesus. We are not to
suppose that the original hearers of John’s letter are non-Christians. The rest of the tone of the letter will not
support this. Rather, the letter is
addressed to those who already believe but are in danger of slipping into
heresy.
John’s
intent is to proclaim the centrality of the incarnation of Jesus Christ. Jesus is both the message and the center of
the message. He has proclaimed to us the
nature of the Father and we now proclaim what we have heard, seen and
touched. This proclamation is so that
those who hear it might enter into fellowship with the believing community,
whose fellowship is rooted and grounded in fellowship with the Father and the
Son. This fellowship, however, is not
just any fellowship. It is the
fellowship of the Trinity, the love that the Father has for the Son, and the
Son has for the Father. It is a mutual
love, a love that always seeks the good of the other person. It is the love that is sent out, in the power
of the Spirit, to draw others into its fellowship.
In
this prologue John is reminding us that God himself became one of us: a living,
breathing, speaking person, so that we might fully know the Father and enter
into fellowship with him. For all of
time at that!
If…
(1:5-10)
This
message of good news and fellowship with the triune God that John received is
now proclaimed to us. The first message
of this proclamation is that God is light, pure light, in which there is no
darkness. Light has significant meaning
for John, both here and in his Gospel.
This description of God as light concerns both his nature and
being. It means that God is absolute in
his glory, in his truth and in his holiness.[1]
In other words, God is without deficiency in regards to his power and might,
his truthfulness and his set-apartness from creation. Because God is light there is not room for
the darkens of sin and death.
The
next few verses are set off by a series of “if”s. Because God is true light we must walk in the
light. If, John says, we are walking in
darkness there can be no way that we are enjoying true fellowship with
God. Those who inhabit the darkness,
that is walk in sin, yet say that they live in the light, deceive
themselves. They may say all the right
things. They may have all the right
answers, but they do not do what is true.
Wesley says this about the verse, “If
we say—Either with our tongue, or in our heart, if we endeavor to persuade
either ourselves or others, we have
fellowship with him—While we walk, either inwardly or outwardly, in darkness—In sin of any kind, we do not the truth—Our actions prove
that the truth is not in us.”[2] But, John says, if we walk in the light we
are able to have fellowship, not just with God, but with one another as
well. As we step out into the light of
Jesus’ love, it exposes our sin. Then
the blood of Jesus cleanses us from those sins.
The light exposes us for who we really are. Christ’s sacrifice brings us into full
fellowship with God.
John
moves on by presenting a tension within the Christian life. In the first place, as he has already said,
if we walk in darkness of sin then we do not have fellowship with God. We are liars.
But in the next set of conditional statements John says that if we claim
to be without sin we are liars too!
Perhaps, John is speaking to those who are not yet in the faith but who
claim to be without sin. Keeping in mind
that John’s letter is likely not written to those who have not yet come to
place their faith in Jesus, this seems not to be the case.
If
John is really speaking to a group of believers, then he is likely making a
distinction between different kinds of perfectionism. The first type, which it seems like some who
have some influence in the community that John is addressing would espouse,
asserted that they were sinless and not guilty of committing sins since their
conversion. Perhaps the form of
perfectionism that John is combating is close to those older Nazarenes I grew
up with who would say things like this, “I’ve been saved and sanctified and
haven’t sinned since!” Implicit in this
kind of statement is that the movement toward Christlikeness is over. The reality is, in my experience anyway, that
those who made these kinds of statements failed to live out their
Christlikeness. In John’s words they
deceived themselves.
The
second kind of perfectionism, of which John will speak and advocate for in
chapters 3 and 5, deals with the stopping of habitual sin.[3] It is not that they are unable to sin, but
that, through fellowship with one another, fellowship with God through the
power of the Holy Spirit, the Christian is capable of not sinning. This is the nature of perfectionism that John
Wesley will promote. As Christians we are
to give ourselves over to the power of the Spirit’s work in our lives so that
we may walk fully in the light. Our
walking in the light, by virtue of it being in the light, necessitates that our
sins are exposed and done away with. We
once walked in darkness, but now that we walk in the light we have put away
those habitual sins.
Now,
in the very next phrase, John will pen one of the lines that every student of
evangelism will memorize, “If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just
will forgive us our sins and cleans us from all unrighteousness.” In the context of the current conversation I
believe that John is referring to the sins of those who are moving toward
Christlikeness but who occasionally stumble because of the weakness of the
spirit and the flesh. When we do so, we
must confess, that is, bring those deeds into the light of God’s love. Here’s the good news: those sins will be
forgiven and the Spirit will continue to clean us from all unrighteousness.
Here
John confesses that it is because God is faithful and just that we will be
forgiven and cleansed. Often we hold
these two ideas at odds with one another.
A proper reading of both the Old and New Testaments will show that God’s
faithfulness and his justice go hand in hand.
God is faithful,
Because he had promised
this blessing, by the unanimous voice of all his prophets. [God is] just—Surely then he will punish: no, for this very reason he will
pardon. This may seem strange; but upon the evangelical principle of atonement
and redemption, it is undoubtedly true. Because when the debt is paid, or the
purchase made, it is the part of equity to cancel the bond, and consign over
the purchased possession: both to forgive
us our sins—To take away all the guilt of them, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness—To purify our souls from
every kind and every degree of it.[4]
John rounds out the
section with one last conditional statement.
If we claim sinlessness of the first order we discussed above, we not
only declare ourselves liars, but we make God out to be a liar as well!
Little Children! (2:1-2)
Here
John’s pastoral intentions come out. He
addresses his audience as his little children.
He is not talking down to his audience, but is addressing them with a
term of endearment. His purpose for
writing is so that they may not sin by saying that they are without the
possibility of sin. In a way he is
urging those who are errant in his audience to confess their arrogant sin of
presumed sinlessness.
In
doing so they give themselves over, not to a vengeful and vindictive God, but
to Christ who is our advocate with the Father.
John will say that, by virtue of Jesus being our atoning sacrifice,
Jesus is able to present our case before the Father who will forgive because he
is faithful and just. This is an open
invitation for confession. We can confess,
not out of fear, but in the confident hope that one who is greater than us
speaks on our behalf.
Not
only is God’s forgiveness of sins for those who are a part of the faith, for
those who walk in fellowship with God, but for the whole world. Part of what may have been at work in John’s
context is that some might have presumed that due to God’s revealing of himself
to them, that God’s salvation was just for them. John dismisses this idea. God has revealed himself to the believing
community so that they might begin and continue to reveal God to the whole
world.
So What…?
Two things are important as we begin our journey though
First John. First, even though this
letter is written mainly to those who are already, in some form at least, a
part of the believing community of faith, it speaks to those outside of the
faith. With no apology, John points to
the reality and nature of sin. Sin is a
part of who we are to the very core. We
are all sinful people. Jesus Christ, the
fullest expression of God, is light and life.
There is no sin, no darkness at all in him. We cannot have life apart from the light that
Jesus brings. John invites those who are
in darkness, those who refuse to believe that they are in darkness, to quit
deceiving themselves and step into the light.
Our God, who is faithful and just, will forgive our sins and cleanse us
from it.
Secondly, John’s message speaks to those of us who have
been a part of the faith community for a long time. It challenges us to look at our lives
retrospectively. Are we resting on work
that Christ has done in our life in the past?
Do we think, that because of what Jesus and the Spirit has done in our
life, we are without habitual sin? Are
we mindful of Christ’s call for us to grow in grace? John urges us to bring our habitual and
eventual slip ups to Christ in confession.
As we do so, we are able to enjoy continued fellowship with one another
and with the Father. At the end of the
day, John wants us, and the whole world it seems, to walk in the light and
fellowship with God. We can do this
because of Jesus’ sacrifice for us.
Critical Discussion Questions:
- What does God look like in this text/Who is God in this text/What is God doing in this text?
- There is a historical and tangible reality to God in Jesus Christ. God has revealed himself to us. He was something people could hear, see and touch.
- God is inviting us to walk in fellowship with him and his church. Confession is an important part of our continued fellowship with God and one another.
- What does holiness/salvation look like in this text?
- Our holiness comes from the work of the Spirit in our lives. It is contingent upon our continual confession of sin. The Christian sanctified life is one of constant reflection on our actions and attitude.
- How does an encounter with this story shape who we are and who we should become?
- The call is to become a holy people who understand the holy nature of God and that we cannot walk in sin and remain in fellowship with God. The Spirit gives us the power to be free from the need to sin. Therefore, we should seek to walk in the light.
Specific Discussion Questions:
Read
the text aloud. Then, read the text to yourself quietly. Read it slowly, as if you were very
unfamiliar with the story.
1.
John begins by declaring what “we” have
seen and heard and touched concerning the word of life. What does John mean by this?
2.
John says that he is proclaiming what he
has witnessed so that his hearers might have fellowship with him and with
God. How might fellowship with a
believing community of faith and fellowship with God be connected?
3.
We confess that God is triune, meaning
that God is three in one, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Father loves the Son, the Son returns the
love of the Father, and the Spirit is sent out by the Father and the Son, in
love, to draw humanity into fellowship with the Triune God. How might this be a model for us as a
believing community of faith?
4.
In verse 5, John declares that the
content of the message he is proclaiming is that “God is light, and in him
there is no darkness at all.” What does
it mean that God is light? What does
darkness represent?
5.
What does John mean by “walking in
darkness?” What does it mean to “walk in
the light as he himself is in the light” mean?
6.
What kind of connection might there be
between walking in the light and having fellowship with one another? With God?
7.
John also says that those who say that
they have no sin are liars. It appears
that John is contradicting his earlier statement in verse 6. How might we reconcile that apparent contradiction?
8.
John says that if we confess our sins,
our habitual sins and our slip ups, God is faithful and just and will cleanse
us from all unrighteousness. In what contexts can we be transparent and confess
our sins?
For printable copies of this lesson and the participant's handout, click here and here.
[1] Stephen S.
Smalley, 1, 2, 3 John, Revised edition (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2009),
20.
[2] John
Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the New
Testament, Fourth American Edition (New York: J. Soule and T. Mason, 1818),
656.
[3] Smalley, 30.
[4] Wesley, 657.
No comments:
Post a Comment