1 JOHN 3

This morning rather than picking out a particular theme I thought I’d go through today’s passage and pick out a few things that strike me about what John is saying in his letter.

You might find it helpful to refer to the text on your service sheets.

Firstly, John reminds us that a Christians we are children of God. 

Just as a child becomes a part of an earthly family at birth, so we become part of a spiritual family when we were born again. In this spiritual family, we are sons and daughters of God — God’s children.  

Many people struggle with feeling valued and can feel worthless and insignificant. But as Christians we are highly valued. As John says “See what love the Father has given us that we should be called children of God.”

The fact that God loves us and calls us his children and sent his own beloved son to die for us, shows us our enormous value in his sight.

And God wants us to recognise our value and to treat ourselves and others accordingly. We shouldn’t abuse ourselves or others because we are extremely precious in God’s sight. 

As His children, as Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans, we are heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ.

Being a co-heir with Christ means that we share in the inheritance of Jesus - an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade.

This inheritance – is received both immediately and in the future.

As we are birthed into God’s kingdom, we are immediately saved from God’s wrath. We immediately receive God’s Holy Spirit who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance. We immediately receive eternal life and forgiveness. 

We immediately become righteous and made clean in God’s sight and we are able to call God - Abba father.

There are numerous other benefits of being a child of God which apply the moment we are born again, but there are also future benefits which we will inherit only when we die.

As John points out in verse 2, although the full revelation of what we will be isn’t yet known, we do know that when we die, we will be like him.

Paul tells us in his first letter to the Corinthians - like Jesus, we will receive spiritual bodies that won’t wear out or perish. He says; “just as we have borne the image of the earthly man (in other words Adam), so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man (in other words Jesus).”

And as the writer to the Hebrews tells us, we will be made perfect for ever. 

We will receive the full benefits of Jesus’ death on the cross for us - and the completion of God’s work to make us holy – just as he is holy.

This is the hope that we have that helps us to purify ourselves, as John puts it in verse 3.

As we wait for the completion of our salvation and our eventual perfection in heaven, the knowledge that it is coming should inspire us to live on earth in a holy and morally upright way.

We should seek to live lives that honour God and we should seek with God’s help to become more and more like Jesus.  

Indeed, the Christian life should be a gradual process of becoming more like Christ or as Paul puts it - being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory.

Several years ago, I heard a speaker at New Wine describe the process of becoming more Christ-like very clearly and quite amusingly and it has really stuck with me.

He compared this process to a pig gradually changing into a sheep.

And he said it started with the pig receiving the spirit of a sheep and finding that it didn’t really want to roll in the mud any more with the other pigs but wanted to eat nice fresh green grass.

He said sometimes of course the pig forgot itself and went back to the mud and had a good roll around but then felt uncomfortable and returned to the grass.

And he described - as this process continued - the pig’s grunt gradually changing to more of a bleet, and it growing tufts of white wool on its back.

He said of course the pig’s transformation into a sheep wouldn’t be complete until it went to heaven but the process started on earth – and was dependant on the pig co-operating with and submitting to the spirit of the sheep it had received.

He also made the point that this process was irreversible – that that he who had begun this good work in us would carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

Of course, what interrupts and interferes with this process of our sanctification – becoming more Christ-like - is sin which is what John talks about in the next few verses.

Verses 6 and 9 are quite difficult, but I think what John is saying is that although as Christians on occasion we will sin – we won’t sin habitually or purposely and without compunction.

Of course we will get stuff wrong and on occasion we will allow ourselves to be tempted, but when we sin we will be conscious of it and uncomfortable with it and genuinely want to change.

Using the analogy of the pig changing into the sheep, we will be uncomfortable if we go for a roll in the mud because we will be conscious that we are acting against our new nature – the nature to be Christ-like.

As John says in verse 9, we won’t continue to sin because God’s seed – the spirit of Jesus lives in us.

A person who continues to sin is a person who is not sorry or troubled by bad things they do. A person who is blasé and unconcerned about sin and perhaps doesn’t even recognise it.

So, I don’t think John is referring to Christians who genuinely struggle with areas of vulnerability and temptation but who are conscious that they are doing wrong and troubled by it.

Chapter 7 of Paul’s letter to the Romans is quite helpful as he describes his own struggle with sin.

He says; “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do…I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing… in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind…”

For all believers, until we die, there will always be a battle between our sinful natures and the spirit of Jesus living in us. The world will always seek to lure us away from walking with God.

But like Paul we should acknowledge our weaknesses and failures to God and confess them, and then with the help of the Holy Spirit seek to resist and overcome them. 

In his letter to the Galatians Paul urges us to walk by the Spirit, so that we will not gratify the desires of the flesh. As we submit ourselves to Christ and seek to follow him he helps us overcome the desire to sin.

The other part to avoiding sin is not feeding areas where we know we are weak and allowing ourselves to be tempted.

For instance, if a person is tempted by gambling, they should try to avoid walking past betting shops or going on gambling websites. 

As soon as they do this, they have put themselves in a position which invites them to succumb to temptation.

Sin is a bit like a fire - in that a fire needs to be fed in order to keep burning. If you stop feeding a fire it will eventually die out.

If we stop feeding an area of weakness, the urge to sin in that area will also die down.

Why is sin so important for John? Well, because he cares deeply for his little children as he addresses his readers and he knows how harmful and debilitating sin can be to our walk with God.

Sin grieves God because it is bad for us and allows darkness into our lives.

If we continue to sin, we can give the devil a foothold in our lives and before long we can find what was a little guilty pleasure that we thought wouldn’t do any harm, becoming an addiction that is hard to break.

And as we allow darkness into our lives its hardly surprising if our lives become darker and God feels distant; our peace disappears and is replaced by anxiety; and joy goes out of the window and is replaced by heaviness.

Sin also hampers our fruitfulness as Christians. It makes us feel guilty and then we feel unworthy to serve God. 

Satan encourages this cycle of sin followed by feelings of unworthiness and guilt and we end up convinced that God can’t use us because we keep tripping up.

Sin can also destroy our witness as Christians. Someone may have been impacted by our faith in God – but rudeness or harsh words or even coarse joking can rapidly lower their estimation of us. 

Ultimately John says in verse 10 that our lives and actions reveal whether our faith is genuine or not. 

And in particular the love we demonstrate for our brothers and sisters – other members of God’s family.

He is repeating in effect what Jesus said when he told his disciples that people could be recognised by the fruit they bear; that every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.

So, to summarise briefly the gist of what I think John is saying in this passage – As Christians we are God’s children – hugely loved and valued by God – and we have an amazing inheritance both now and one day in heaven.

The hope of this inheritance should motivate us to live holy lives and to seek with the help of God’s spirit who lives in us, to resist sin and temptation as God changes us into the likeness of Jesus.

Ultimately our lives and the love we show for our brothers and sisters in Christ reveal whether we truly are children of God.

I’d like to close as usual with a time of quiet reflection and prayer where you can share with God anything I’ve said this morning which may resonate with you or perhaps challenge you.

So, let’s pray quietly for a few moments and share what’s on our hearts with our loving heavenly Father.