1 John 5:1-21

Teacher: Rusty Kennedy
​Series: 1 John

Rusty's Notes

1 JOHN 5
1 Everyone (universal invitation) who believes that Jesus is the Christ (Messiah; the heart of the problem for the false teachers) has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father also loves the one born of him.

• Jesus or other believers?
• This encapsulates John’s arguments thus far.
• John has repeatedly said that all who obey God’s commands (1 John 3:23) are born of God.
• These commands are to believe in Jesus and love fellow Christians.
• Those who believe in Jesus love the Father and consequently love His children.

2 This is how we know that we love God’s children (reality test… reality show): when we love God and obey his commands.

• Not sentimentally but action.

3 For this is what love for God is: to keep his commands. And his commands are not a burden,

• Love goes both ways: we obey & His commands are good for us.
• Old Covenant – The Law formed the basis of the relationship between God and man.
•  New Covenant – The law flows out of the relationship between God and man.
• Skittles Illustration
• John’s problem with the false teachers is that they either had no rules (antinomian) or too many rules (legalists).
• Christmas vs Xmas
• The Old Covenant law was burdensome because it could never be kept perfectly.
• But in the New Covenant, God has rigged the system.
• He has made the commandments centered on Christ.
• This does not mean that there is not crossover between the Old and New Covenants.
• The crossover is the nature and character of God, not every specific law.
• Therefore, in the New Covenant, we express the character of God who lives within us as opposed to following external laws.

4 because everyone who has been born of God conquers the world.

• Human society acting apart/independent from God

This is the victory that has conquered the world: our faith.

• Overcome=Nikos- Nike – goddess of victory
• Believers are on a specific trajectory that cannot be stopped.
• God will carry our salvation to completion.
• We can fail to experience the beauty of the New Covenant to some degree if we choose to live law-based lives.
• But this does not remove us from the path that we are on.
• Our faith has overcome the world.

 
THE CERTAINTY OF GOD’S TESTIMONY
5 Who is the one who conquers the world but the one who believes (trusts) that Jesus is the Son of God?

• The Gospel is simple: We need to believe that Jesus is the Son of God to be saved.
• This means we do not need to perform for God for salvation.
• We experience transformation through faith in Jesus.

6 Jesus Christ—he is the one who came by water and blood, not by water only, but by water and by blood.

• He experienced a life-giving birth and a death-killing death. Not only birth from the womb, but baptismal birth of his ministry and sacrificial death – The Message)
• There are two views of this.
• John could be speaking of Jesus’ water baptism and his crucifixion.
• However, another view is preferable.
• John is likely speaking of Christ’s physical birth being born of flesh and water.
• This makes sense in light of John arguments against the Gnostic belief that Jesus was only spirit and lacked physicality.
• Jesus was born of both a woman and the Spirit.
• Therefore, Christ is both fully man and fully God at the same time.
• This means that God’s divinity is compatible with our humanity, and our humanity is compatible with his divinity.
• This is why the Gnostic rejection of Christ’s humanity is so problematic.

And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth.

• John 16:7-15 -Nevertheless, I am telling you the truth. It is for your benefit that I go away, because if I don’t go away the Counselor will not come to you. If I go, I will send him to you. 8 When he comes, he will convict the world about sin, righteousness, and judgment: 9 About sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 about righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will no longer see me; 11 and about judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.
• “I still have many things to tell you, but you can’t bear them now. 13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth. For he will not speak on his own, but he will speak whatever he hears. He will also declare to you what is to come. 14 He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to you. 15 Everything the Father has is mine. This is why I told you that he takes from what is mine and will declare it to you.[1]
    1) Reveals the Gospel/Truth
    2) Convicts the world of sin
    3) Leads to Christ
    4) Baptizes into Christ
    5) Forms Christ in us
• I… as your pastor… am not responsible for you!

7 For there are three that testify:, 8 the Spirit (the dove at Jesus’ baptism), the water (the actual immersion), and the blood (the crucifixion) —and these three are in agreement. 9 If we accept human testimony (the false teachers), God’s testimony is greater, because it is God’s testimony that he has given about his Son.

• Matthew 3:17 - And a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased.”[2]

10 The one who believes in the Son of God has this testimony within himself (the internal Spirit or the Gospel of Truth).

• We often worry about having more faith and needing to somehow keep our faith alive.
• And yet God has poured His testimony into our hearts.
• We know God at the cores of our beings and nothing can interrupt this.

The one who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed

• Personal indictment on those who are unredeemed – How is one redeemed? Belief

in the testimony God has given about his Son. 11 And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.

• God’s testimony is that all who believe have eternal life.
• This means that we can’t lose our salvation.
• We may feel like we lost our salvation, but our salvation is not based on our emotions.
• Our salvation is based on God’s testimony.
• There is no eternal life apart from Christ.
• Salvation is not a ticket to heaven or a thing: Salvation is the Son of God.
• If we have the Person of Christ living within us, then we have salvation.

12 The one who has the Son has life. The one who does not have the Son of God does not have life.

• John 17:3 - This is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and the one you have sent—Jesus Christ.[3]
• One cannot be in fellowship with the Father without personal faith in the Son![4]

13 I have written these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.

• Assurance of salvation
• 1. Believers have eternal life.

14 This is the confidence (boldness or freedom) we have before him: If we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

• John is not talking about naming and claiming in prayer.
• He is not concerned with material items or health and wealth.
• To the contrary, God gives us according to His will.
• God’s will is not an ambiguous concept.
• He desires for us to believe in Jesus and express Jesus.
• Therefore, God’s will is ultimately a person who is our salvation and our eternal life.
• If we ask God for salvation, He will deliver it to us in Christ and come to live within us.

15 And if we know that he hears whatever we ask, we know that we have what we have asked of him.

• 2. God hears believer’s prayers
• 3. God answers believer’s prayers
• Psalm 37:4 - Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you your heart’s desires.[5]

16 If anyone sees a fellow believer committing a sin that doesn’t lead to death, he should ask, and God will give life

• abundant life… not referring to eternal life.

to him—to those who commit sin that doesn’t lead to death. There is sin that leads to death.

• John is speaking of the unbelief in Jesus.
• God will not forgive unbelief because salvation is tied to the person and work of Jesus Christ.
• Consequently, John states that we are not to pray for people to believe because God will not make someone believe.
• He does not force His union but rather stands at the door and knocks.

I am not saying he should pray about that. 17 All unrighteousness is sin, and there is sin that doesn’t lead to death.

• 2 Peter 2:1-10 - There were indeed false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, and will bring swift destruction on themselves. 2 Many will follow their depraved ways, and the way of truth will be maligned because of them. 3 They will exploit you in their greed with made-up stories. Their condemnation, pronounced long ago, is not idle, and their destruction does not sleep.
• For if God didn’t spare the angels who sinned but cast them into hell and delivered them in chains of utter darkness to be kept for judgment; 5 and if he didn’t spare the ancient world, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others, when he brought the flood on the world of the ungodly; 6 and if he reduced the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes and condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is coming to the ungodly;, 7 and if he rescued righteous Lot, distressed by the depraved behavior of the immoral 8 (for as that righteous man lived among them day by day, his righteous soul was tormented by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)--9 then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, 10 especially those who follow the polluting desires of the flesh and despise authority.[6]
• John could be referring to sins that deal with:
    1) Fellowship with God
    2) Fellowship with other believers
    3) Fellowship with the world

 
CONCLUSION
18 We know that everyone who has been born of God

• 4. Believers are born of God
• All who believe in Jesus are born again.
• Therefore, while believers can still make mistakes they will not be characterized by these sins.
• We are no longer compatible with sin which means we cannot perpetually celebrate and continue in sin.

does not sin, (continue in the practice of sin) but the one who is born of God keeps him, (Christ sustains us) and the evil one does not touch him (cannot condemn). 19 We know that we are of God,

• 5. Believers are of God

and the whole world is under the sway of the evil one.

• Satan controls the entire world.
• However, he does not hold control over believers.
• All who believe in Jesus have been delivered from the power of the evil one. [7]

20 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know the true one.

• 6. Believers know the Messiah has come and given us understanding

We are in the true one—that is, in his Son, Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.

• 7. Believers know the True One – Either the Father or the Son

21 Little children, guard yourselves from idols.[8]

• sin… false teachers.

 
Assurance has become a denominational issue
1. John Calvin based assurance on God’s election. He said that we can never be certain in this life.
2. John Wesley based assurance on religious experience. He believed that we have the ability to live above known sin.
3. Roman Catholics and the Church of Christ base assurance on an authoritative Church. The group to which one belongs is the key to assurance.
4.      Most evangelicals base assurance on the promises of the Bible, linked to the fruit of the Spirit in the life of the believer (cf. Gal. 5:22–23).[9]

[1] Christian Standard Bible. 2020. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.
[2] Christian Standard Bible. 2020. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.
[3] Christian Standard Bible. 2020. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.
[4] Utley, R. J. D. (1999). Vol. Volume 4: The Beloved Disciple's Memoirs and Letters: The Gospel of John, I, II, and III John. Study Guide Commentary Series (238). Marshall, Texas: Bible Lessons International.
[5] Christian Standard Bible. 2020. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.
[6] Christian Standard Bible. 2020. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.
[7] Farley, Andrew. www.BibleCommentary.com. 1 John 5.
[8] Christian Standard Bible. 2020. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.
[9] Utley, R. J. D. (1999). Vol. Volume 4: The Beloved Disciple's Memoirs and Letters: The Gospel of John, I, II, and III John. Study Guide Commentary Series (239). Marshall, Texas: Bible Lessons International.