1 John 2:3-11 • May 3, 2015 • s1099
Pastor John Miller continues our study through the Book of 1 John with an expository message titled “How To Know That You Know Him,” using 1 John 2:3-11 as his text.
Pastor John Miller
May 3, 2015
2:3 Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. 4 He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him. 6 He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked. 7 Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard from the beginning.[b] 8 Again, a new commandment I write to you, which thing is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining. 9 He who says he is in the light, and hates his brother, is in darkness until now. 10 He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. 11 But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
John tells us in his first letter why he wrote this epistle. Let me give you those reasons. Number one, that you may have fullness of joy. Chapter one, verse four. "These things have I written unto you that my joy might be in you and that your joy might be full." He wants us to have fullness of joy. The life that is real in the heart of a believer brings fullness of joy. Secondly, chapter two, verse one, that we sin not. "My little children, these things write I unto you that you sin not." Now, if we have sinned, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. And John says He is our propitiation, our atoning sacrifice. But he writes this letter, number one, fullness of joy. Number two, that you sin not. Number three, that you be not deceive. Look at it with me, chapter two and verse 26.
In chapter two, verse 26, John says, "These things I have written unto you concerning them that would seduce you or lead you astray." So we need to be careful that we are not deceived doctrinally or theologically, that we're led astray by falsehood or false teachers. But none of these things could really have an effect on our lives without reason number four. Why did John write this epistle? Number four, "That you may know that you have eternal life." John chapter five, verse 13. "These things have I written unto you that you may know that you have eternal life." So John wants us to have assurance. And over the years, the more I've thought about it, and the more I've studied it, the more I've preached on the subject to become more and more convinced that if there's anything a Christian needs, he needs to know that he's saved.
He needs to have assurance. This will bring fullness of joy. This will bring freedom from sin. This will help you not to be led astray and you can have that assurance that when you die, you will go to heaven. Now, John wants us to know that we know him. Why? Because false teachers had come into the churches around Ephesus there known as gnostics. It was the beginning stage of what was known as the gnostic heresy. The word gnostic comes from the Greek word ginosko, which means to know or ginos is to know. And they were a group of elitists who taught that they had a superior knowledge and that salvation was through knowledge or information. So John is wanting to write against this heretical teaching known as gnosticism, and they had these false professions. Look at them with me before we examine our text.
In verse four, notice what John says. "He that says, I know him." Now, this is the first profession. They would say with their lips, emphasis say, "I know him. But if you don't keep his commandments, then you lie and you do not the truth." So it's a false profession. I know him, but in reality you don't know him because you're not keeping his word or commandments. Then jump down to verse six. In verse six, John says, "He that sayeth he abides in him on himself also to walk as he walked." So profession number two, "I know him." Okay. Then let me watch your behavior. Let me watch your walk. Let me see how you live your life. You ought to walk even as Jesus walked. And then verse nine, we'll get it in a moment, "He that says he is in the light, but hates his brother is in darkness even till now."
So you say, "I know him." You say, "I abide in him." You say, "I'm walking in the light." Those are things that you say, but your life speaks otherwise. What we believe should determine how we behave and our character should influence our conduct. So what we do is an indication of who we really are in our own essence. Now, there are two tests we're going to look at this morning in this text. The first is the moral test. Do you really know him? Are you a child of God? Are you walking in fellowship with Him? Are you obedient to Him? It's the moral test of obedience and it's based on the fact that John says, "God is light." Remember he says in this epistle, "God is light." As to his very nature, God is holy, so his people are going to walk in what? Holiness.
So that's test number one. Test number two that we'll look at is the social test and that is love. Do you love your brother? Do you love your neighbor? Do you have God's love flowing through you? God is light. You walk in holiness. God is love. You walk in what? Love. So if God is light, His people are light. If God is love, His people walk in love. Now, there's a third test, we won't see it this morning and that is the doctrinal test, a belief in Christ. God is life. God is light, God is love, God is light. He that has the son has eternal life. He that has not the son of God has not life, but the Bible says the wrath of God abides upon him. So let's look at this verse where we see, first of all, the moral test, verses three down to verse six. The moral test of obedience, verses three to six. Follow with me as I read.
"And hereby we do know." Now, remember, he's writing against these gnostics who had this so-called superior knowledge. And he actually used the word ginosko. Right here we know that we know Him if we keep His commandments. And he then says, here's the first false profession, "I know him," verse four, "but keeps not his commandments. He's a liar and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps his word," now, he goes from commandments to word, "in Him that is this child of God, verily is the love of God perfected. Hereby we know that we are in him." But that says he abides in Him. Same idea. You say you know Him, you say you're in fellowship with Him. You say you abide with Him. So if you say that you abide with Him, verse six, but you yourself ought to then walk even as He walks. Now, remember as I said, John is coming against a false teaching known as gnosticism.
Now, the gnostic's false teaching led to a kind of a liberty where they said God doesn't care about how you live. Gnosticism concerned itself with the intellectual attainment, but Christianity requires a moral conduct. The false teachers claim that knowledge of God freed them from obligations of moral law and responsibility. Now, don't misunderstand this. The Bible clearly teaches that we're saved by grace. That is unearned, undeserved, unmerited favor. You don't do anything to save yourself. Even trusting Jesus to save you is not a work. Faith is not a work. It does require faith in Christ to be saved, but that's not something that merits you salvation. Jesus paid the debt for your sins on the cross and you're simply trusting in his work on that cross. We sing nothing in my hand I bring simply to His what? His cross I cling. So we come and we trust Him, but once we've done that, the evidence that we are born again is a changed life.
Now, to what degree over what period of time, it differs. Some people change radically, quickly. Some people change a little bit, slowly, but there has to be some indication that there is life. And one of those indications is, I begin to love His law. I begin to love His commandments. I begin to love His word and I begin to obey his word and want to do His word. If you say you're a Christian, "I'm a Christian," but you don't read your Bible, you don't obey your Bible, you don't keep His commandments, and I'm going to talk about what these commandments are in just a moment, you have to question yourself. You have to put yourself to the test. "Am I really a child of God?" Being a Christian means that we live and we walk as Jesus walked. So John says, "No, you're not free from God's commands."
Loving obedience is the only way of proving that we truly know God. Nothing can take the place of obedience. Now, not preaching legalism, but nothing can take the place of obedience. You remember the story in the Old Testament when King Saul, the king that wasn't a very good king, he went to kill, slay the Amalekites, Amalek. And through the prophet Samuel, he was told to wipe out everything: men, women, children, animals, and leave nothing alive because of their wickedness was so great. Well, they went to battle. They conquered in battle, but Saul and influenced by the people decided, "These are good sheep." These sheep that are owned by these Amalekites, these are good sheep. Why kill them? We can give them as a sacrifice to God. That'll make God happy. If we give God these sheep, then that's okay. I know God said destroy them, but we're going to give them to God." So when he's coming back from battle, all excited, flushed with victory, Samuel the prophet, one of my heroes in the Bible, the man Samuel. Can't wait to meet him in heaven.
Saul met him and said these words. He said, "Blessed be the name of the Lord. We have done all that God commanded us to do." Now, if I were to free paraphrase Samuel's words, he would've said, "Baloney you have." But that's not what the Hebrew says. He would've said, "No way. If you have done everything God told you to do, obedience, then why do I hear sheep bleating in my ear? Why do I hear the baa baa?" How do you like my sheep impersonation? Pretty good, huh?
"You've done all that the Lord told you to do. No, you have not. Why do I hear sheep?" And then here's what Saul says. He says, "The people influence me and we want to offer them to the Lord. We want to give them to the Lord." And then I love Samuel's words. To obey is better than what? Sacrifice. And to harken is better than the fat of rams. You got that? To obey is better than sacrifice. I can't help but believe that some people come to church thinking, "I'm going to go to church extra this week because I'm going to go to Vegas next week. I got to cover myself."
On my way to Vegas, I'm going to be like, "Lord, remember, I went to church three times last week." Or I'm going to put more in the offering. I'm going to put a bunch of more money in the offering because I plan on sinning next week and I want to get myself good and covered. To obey is better than sacrifice and to harken better than the fat of rams. You come to church, you lift your hands. Isaiah the prophet told the people of Israel, "There's blood on your hands." You lift your hands to me, but you've committed murder. You're hypocrites." You can't do good things to try to make up for your disobedience. God wants obedience. Now, I'm not a parent of small children anymore, but when our children were young, what did we want from our children? Loving obedience.
"Okay, I'll take the trash out. I have to." You want children that say, which are pretty miraculous if they do, "Yes, mother. Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am. Right away. Yes, I'll do that." And then they do that. We want heartfelt obedience. God wants the same from his children. Ask yourself, "Do I pass the test? Am I obedient to His words?" Now as we look at these verses, notice in verse three, the mark of the believer. He keeps his commandments. He moves from fellowship to knowing Christ to the concept of walking in the light and keeping his commandments. The knowledge John writes about in verse three and four is not a theoretical knowledge or a speculative knowledge, it's an experiential knowledge. It's the Greek word ginosko. It means, "To know from experience." If I say that I know Him, not about Him, but I actually know Him, then I am going to keep His commandments.
Now His commandments there are not the 10 commandments. I believe that those are written now in the fleshly tablets of our heart and they will be lived out in the regenerated life, but I believe that it's the teachings of Christ and the commandments of God in general. It's a general kind of concept for the word of God and the things of God and the teachings of Christ. I found that when I became a Christian and not until I was born again and had the life of God in my soul, that I began to love God's word and want to do God's word and want to obey God's word. It wasn't like, "Do I have to do this to be a Christian? Do I really have to obey? Do I really have to love people?" It's like God gave me His love and God changed my heart and it was the delight to do His command.
Even as Jesus said to the Fathers, "A delight to do thy will, O God." He wanted to be obedient to him. Paul the Apostle said in Philippians chapter three, verse 10, that, "I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His sufferings that I may be conformable unto his image." Knowing Him means that we are shaped and molded into His image. Now, how do we know that we know Him? We keep His commandments. This is in the present tense, by the way, in the Greek. It means ongoingly, continually, habitually.
We willingly, voluntarily keep His commandments and it means submission and conformity to His will found in his word, both our outward conduct and our inward disposition or attitude. Keeping God's commandments is the pattern of life for the person who truly knows God. Now, I want you to notice in verse four and five the application of this test. First you have the claim in verse four, "He that says I know Him." Well, if you claim that, then here's the test. You keep His commandments. So you ask yourself, "Do I pass the test?" The result of failing the test, verse four, "You are a liar and the truth is not in you." Again, here's our beloved Apostle John, who, by the way, is an apostle of love. And because he loves us, he tells us the truth blatantly and openly. "You are a liar." Now, that kind of preaching today won't fill a church.
It's just the opposite that people want to hear. "I'm okay. You're okay. Everything's happy." "You are a liar." "I didn't come to church for you to tell me I'm a liar." "I didn't say it, John did." You know when you throw a rock into a pack of dogs, the one that yelps is the one that got hit. So if you're yelping right now, you are a liar. I didn't say it. I'm hoping you came to hear God's word today. This is what I'm sharing with you. God says you're a liar. "Well, I know, I know. I'm a Christian." But your life is saying otherwise. You ever heard the expression actions speak louder than what?
Words.
So true, so true. Anyone can say, "I know Him," but do you really know Him by obedience? Some pass the test, thankfully verse five, but whosoever keeps his word. There are those who are keeping his word in a general sense. They're walking with Him in fellowship. Barely the love of God is perfected or matured, brought to maturity in the life of that Christian. Hereby we know that we are in Him. This is how we know we are in Him. We're habitually keeping His word or practicing his word. God's love is perfected in our hearts. Jesus said in John 14:21, "He that hath my commandments and keeps them, he it is that loveth me." And notice at the end of verse five, this is how we know we know Him. This is what brings assurance.
It's like a Christian that starts to sin and just practice sin. You know what? The devil's going to show up on your front door and he's going to say, "You're not saved. You're not a Christian, you're not a believer." And I do believe that Christians can fall into sin and I believe though that Satan will come to condemn you. If you're in Christ, there's no condemnation, but there is conviction. And condemnation pushes you away from Christ, conviction draws you to Christ. If you're feeling condemned, like, "I can't pray, I can't go to church, I can't read my Bible," that's condemnation from the devil and he's trying to push you away. But if you're going, "Oh God, please forgive me. Oh God, I'm sorry. Oh God, I love you. Oh God, I want to keep your commandments. Please wash me from my sins," then that's indication the spirit of God is working in your heart and he's drawing you back to Jesus Christ.
That's a good thing. You need to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit. And this morning, if God is convicting you, listen to his voice, respond to it and come to Him. Remember John 1:9. "If we confess our sin, he's faithful and just to what? Forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all our unrighteousness." Be willing and ready to turn back. Now, if we are truly walking as He walked, verse six, we're going to walk in holiness. We're going to walk in the light, verse seven. We're going to walk in forgiveness. Ephesians chapter four, verse 23, "Be kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another even as God for Christ's sake has what? Forgiven you." So if I'm going to walk as He walked, if I'm going to walk like Jesus, then I'm going to walk in holiness, I'm going to walk in forgiveness. And husbands are going to love their wives, Ephesians five. Paul says, "Husbands love your wives how?" All the women are quoting the verse right now. "I know that verse, Peter."
The guys are kind of like, "I don't know. What does it say?" Isn't it funny that the wives know the husbands verses and the husbands know the wives verses and they shoot them at each other? Pay attention to what God says to you and do it. It says, "Husbands love your wives agape, I go pay your wives, as Christ loved the church." So if I'm going to walk as Jesus walked as a husband, I'm going to love my wife as he loved the church. And then he qualifies it even further, gave himself for it. Jesus gave himself for the church. Husbands ought to give themselves for their wives. How does this happen? Well, I believe it happens by not impersonation, we aren't going to impersonate Christ but impartation. You might want to write that down. The Christian life is not impersonation, it's impartation. It's Christ living in you and living through you.
Galatians chapter two, verse 20, "I am crucified with Christ, "Paul said. "Nevertheless, I live. Yet, not I, but what? Christ lives in me." Amen. John Miller is dead. He died the moment he believed in Jesus Christ. He was crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live. Yet, it's not me anymore. It's Christ in me. Christ is living in me and he's living through me to help me walk in holiness, to help me walk in submission to help me walk in law. As I quoted earlier, Jesus said, "I do always those things that please the Father." Do you do those things that please the Father? Is the passion of your life to know His word, to obey His word, to be submitted to His word? What is your attitude toward the word of God and how do you view the commandments of God? Do you pass the test? Here's the second test, and we won't carry too long, the social test, love.
God is light. His children walk in holiness. God is love. His children walk in love. Verse seven to 11, brethren. Some translations have beloved. "I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment." Which you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you have heard from the beginning. And again in verse eight, "Again now a new commandment I write unto you which thing is true and in Him is true because the darkness is past and the true light now shines." "He who says, there it is again, "He who says that he is in the light," synonymous with in fellowship keeping his commandments or I know him. Now it's in the light and he hates his brother, he is in darkness even till now. John earlier said, "You're a liar." Now he says, "You're in darkness." Notice verse 10. "But he that loves his brother abides in the light and there is no occasion of stumbling in Him, but he that hates his brother is in darkness. He walks in darkness. He knows not where he is going."
Why? Because the darkness has blinded his eyes. He's blind because of the darkness. Now, keeping God's commands are evidence of a real knowledge of God. But now John singles out a specific command for special attention. The command is to love. Why does he use this one command? Well, as I've mentioned, God is not only light, but God is also love. And if we're the children of God, then we're going to walk in love. But remember that John was thinking also the false teachers, the gnostics, whose arrogant, contemptuous, exclusiveness was the epitome of unloving attitude. If ever there was a birthmark of the true follower of Christ, that birthmark is what? It's love. It's love.
The birthmark of the Christian is love. It's not a bumper sticker. "I see you're a Christian, you have a sticker on your car. I see you're Christian, you have a Christian haircut. You're wearing Christian shoes." The birthmark of a Christian is love for God is love. Jesus said, "By this, shall all men know that you are my disciples, that you have love one for another." Now, let's look together at this text in verses seven and eight. We see love's oldness. We see love's oldness. You say, "Well, what do you mean love's oldness?" To love others is not a new commandment. He says that in verse seven.
He says, "This is not a new commandment." It's not new in time, it's old. It's been around a long time. But an old commandment, which you had from the beginning, the old commandment is this, the word which you have heard from the beginning. Did you know that way back in the Old Testament, God said to love Him with all your heart, soul, strength and mind and to love your neighbor? I know that's hard, as yourself. Well, they asked Jesus, "Who is my neighbor?" Your neighbor is anyone in need. It doesn't matter what color he is, doesn't matter where he lives, doesn't matter what church he goes to, and it doesn't really matter even what religious faith he follows. Anyone who is in need is your neighbor. Read the story of the good Samaritan.
Now, the Jews interpreted that of my neighbor our fellow Jews. I don't have to love Gentiles. We sometimes interpret that my neighbor as a person that goes to my church, believes what I believe and lives where I live and acts the way I act and likes what I like. But our neighbor is anyone in need and we need to have that love for others. And this is an old commandment, it's not new. Even Jesus himself and his ministry said, "This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you." So it is old, but now it's new, verse eight. This confuses people. Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in Him that is Christ and in you, that is the believer. Why? Because the darkness is passed. You were unregenerate. You were unsaved. Now you're born again. Now you're a child of God.
Now you're living in the light and the true light now shines. So in verse seven, we have the oldness of the law of love and in verse eight, we have the newness of the law of love. Jesus gave the law of love a new dimension, a new depth. The word new there in verse eight is not newness in time chronology. It's newness in quality or type. It's like when you buy a box of cereal you've be eaten for a long time and then there's a thing on the box that says, "New and improved," which it never really is. New and improved because you changed the color of the box? You put one more raisin in Raisin Bran?
What's the deal? You ever wonder why when you buy a big box, it's only half full too. It's like a rip-off. The big bag of chips, there's one chip in there. Six bucks for one chip. It's not new, it's not improved. But Jesus said, "A new commandment I give unto you." You go, "Wow, that's cool. New commandment. What's it going to be?" That you love one another. You go, "That's not new." But he didn't stop there. He qualified the commandment, "As I have loved you." You go, "That is new. That's new." Not that that you just love each other, but you love each other the way I have loved you. It has a new dimension. It has a new depth. I like to think of it. It has a new quality. It has a new quality. God wants us to love one another as Christ has loved us. I've got a quote, I think they'll put it up on the screen for you, I love it. It says, "Doctrinal Christianity is always old. Experiential Christianity is always new." The doctrine doesn't change.
When I preach on Sunday morning, I better preach the same gospel that Paul preached, that John preached, that Peter preached. It's not, "Oh preacher, give us something new. Give us something exciting. Give us something tantalizing." If it's new, it's not true. If it's true, it's not new. And I make no apologies for that. I'm preaching the old gospel of the cross of Jesus Christ. Salvation is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Grace alone, faith alone, through Christ alone. And that will never, ever, ever change. Don't listen to some new guy that comes along and says, "Oh, God will save you by good works," or "God will save you by your own righteousness," or "God will overlook your sin," or "Sin doesn't matter." The gospel doesn't change. But guess what? Those who have received the gospel every morning, His mercies are brand new. Isn't that great? Someone likened it unto the sun.
They actually said, "Old as the sun, new as the dawn." I like that. And I started thinking about that. Every morning when you get up, you watch the sun come up. You don't get all bummed out because it's the same sun. "Man, I'm really bummed out. I got up this morning and I watched the sun come up and it's the same old sun I saw yesterday. Every day of my life, the same old sun, same old sun, same old sun. Is there anything new in this universe?"
But who does not love to get up in the morning and experience the sun rising? I know it's hard to get up, but once you see that sun rising, instead of saying, "Good morning, Lord," when you wake up you say, "Good Lord, it's morning." I'm not a good early riser. My wife pops out of bed before I do, but I love to watch the sun come up. And those mornings when I get to sit out on the porch and it faces the sun rise in the east and I see that sun come up and the warmth of that sun and the glory of its radiance.
And it's just such a wonderful thing to experience the sunrise everywhere. And that's the way God's fresh mercy comes to the child of God every day. Great is His mercy. Every morning God's mercy is fresh and it's new. It doesn't grow old. And the love of God shed abroad in your heart can be a new and powerful and wonderful experience. It's newness in this era. But notice the test applied and we'll wrap this up. Verse nine to 11, the test apply. In verse nine, these verses John makes clear that one's response to the commands to love reveals a person's essential character. "The man who habitually breaks the command shows that he belongs to darkness." Follow with me, verse nine. "He that says that he is in the light walks in darkness. He's not really a child of God. He hates his brother. He's in darkness until now."
And the tense of that statement, "He's in darkness till now," means he's been in darkness, he is in darkness, and he will go on in darkness. Because he hates his brother, he is living in darkness. But notice the contrast verse 10 and 11 with the love verse, verse 10 and the haters in verse 11. In verse 10, he says, "He that loves his brother, though, he is abiding in the light and there's no occasion of stumbling in him." So a couple of things. Number one, if you love your brother, you are in the light. You are a child of God walking in fellowship with God. And secondly, you do not stumble. The word stumble is in the Greek skandalon.
We get our word scandal from it. In its origin, though, it's an interesting word, it was used for a little trip stick in a fowler's trap. And when I was a boy, some of you guys can relate to this, I used to put a box in the backyard and I put a stick propping the box up. I'd tie a rope to the stick and then I'd back up around the corner of the house in a hiding place and I put bread under the box. And when a bird came to get the bread, I pulled a stick. Down comes the box, I got me a bird. Yes, your pastor did that when he was young.
Thank God I got saved, right? And only once did I catch a bird and I freaked out. I didn't know what to do with the thing. I ran to mom, "Mom, I got a bird. What do I do with it?" But that little stick, that little stick that would pull with a string and bring down the box, that was a skandalon. That was the trip stick. So it has the idea, it's come into the language of meaning to stumble. And as we stumble, we offend others as well as we stumble ourselves, but we offend others.
There's nothing more unloving, there's nothing more unloving for you than to live a life of sin. Why? Because you stumble other people. If I sin, I stumble my wife. If I sin, I stumble my children. If I sin, I stumble the congregation. If I sin, I stumble other people. I offend you. I scandal. I scandal you. I stumble you. If I am loving other people as I should love them, I do not want to stumble them. I don't want to stumble in darkness, hatred and darkness, and I don't want to stumble other people. And maybe you're struggling with that right now. Notice it's they are in the darkness is their existence. They're walking in darkness. So not only in the darkness, but their actions are in darkness. And verse 11, "They know not where they are going." Goals in life, there's no purpose. There's no direction. You ever walked into a dark room, you can't see anything and you can't find the light switch and you're trying to fish your way around?
Sometimes my wife will go to bed before I do. She gets up before I do, goes to bed before I do and the room is dark. Or I'll turn out the light, she'll leave the light on for me. I'll turn out the light, but the light's over here and the bed's over there, it's always like I find myself thinking, "This feels so stupid." I'm going like this. I'm going, "I know there's something right there. I don't want to bump it." And it's like, "Where is it?" And then I kind of, "Well, I think it's a little bit over here," and I'm over here. And it takes me 10 minutes to get to bed.
I am just walking around in the darkness. I don't want to stumble. People stumble because they have hatred. The hatred leads to darkness and the darkness leads to blindness. I was struck by the progression here. We don't often put it in this order: hate, darkness, blindness. Sometimes we say, "Well, he's blind because he hates. He's blind because he's in darkness and he's in darkness or you're in darkness because you hate." You want to be blind, you want to live in darkness, allow hatred to control your life. I won't forgive. I won't love that person. They hurt me, they wronged me. I won't love them, I won't forgive them. And you allow yourself to be filled with hatred, and the hatred then puts you in darkness. And the darkness blinds your eyes so you can't see, and then you're going like this through life. You don't know where you're going.
Do you know if you shut your eyes and refuse to use them for a prolonged period of time, your eyes will atrophy, you will go blind? If you lived in utter darkness, you will go blind. Hatred leads to darkness, darkness leads to blindness. This is depicting a person that is not a Christian does not walk in the light. So here's my closing questions. Do you keep His commandments? Do you love your brother and your sisters and others? Do you pass the test? Do you pass the moral test? Do you keep His commandments? Do you pass the social test? Do you love your brothers? If you are a child of God, you walk in the light, you confess your sins, you obey His commands, you love your brother. If you are a child, not a child of God, you walk in darkness, you deny your sinfulness and you don't keep His commandments and you hate your brother, test yourself. When I was in school, I hated tests.
If it was a test, "Mom, I'm sick. Mom, I can't go to school today. Mom, please don't send me to school." "John, why don't you want to go to school?" Because we're having a test." If I ever passed a test, I was elated. "Mom, mom, I got a D! I got a D!" Don't let your kids hear this sermon. But when it comes to knowing whether or not you have eternal life, test yourself. Do I want to know what God says in His word, how I'm to behave? A husband, a wife, a worker, a Christian? Do I eagerly say, "Speak, Lord, your servant is listening."? Or when God speaks through His word, do I say, "I know what God says, but I'm not going to do it."? I've heard people say, professing Christians say, "I know God says not to do it, but I'm going to do it anyway."
Excuse me? You claim to be a Christian. You know what God's word says and you say, "I'm not going to do it anyway."? For the Christian, there's no option there. You love God, you keep His commandments. You love God, you obey Him. I constantly have people say, "I'm a Christian, but I don't do this and I don't do that. I know the Bible says that, I don't want to do this. I know the Bible says that, I don't want to do that." You better test yourself. Are you really a child of God? Do you really know Him? Have you been saved? Have you been born again? Are you walking in the light as He is in the light? Are you walking in love? For God is love. Let's pray.
Pastor John Miller continues our study through the Book of 1 John with an expository message titled “How To Know That You Know Him,” using 1 John 2:3-11 as his text.
Pastor John Miller is the Senior Pastor of Revival Christian Fellowship in Menifee, California. He began his pastoral ministry in 1973 by leading a Bible study of six people. God eventually grew that study into Calvary Chapel of San Bernardino, and after pastoring there for 39 years, Pastor John became the Senior Pastor of Revival in June of 2012. Learn more about Pastor John
Pastor John Miller continues our study through the Book of 1 John with an expository message titled “How To Know That You Know Him,” using 1 John 2:3-11 as his text.
Pastor John Miller
May 3, 2015
A study through the book of 1 John by Pastor John Miller taught at Revival Christian Fellowship in April 2015.
1 John 1:1–4
1 John 1:5–2:2
1 John 2:3–11
1 John 2:12–17
1 John 2:18–23