1 John 4:1-4:6
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
There are things in the bible that are easier then others to understand
Loving my family and friends is pretty clear and tangible
How to handle money, how to be saved, how to fight sin
But if we are honest there is some strange stuff in there that is hard to understand
It is hard for me
Who are the Nephillim from Genesis 6? no idea
How did a bread product appear every morning for 40 years to feed Israel in the desert?
Not an easy one to grab hold of and just go with
The Trinity is like that
We believe in a Triune God, the father the son and the holy spirit
Father and son we can get hold of but theres that wild card holy spirit?
Anyone else here have to pump the breaks when we get to that part?
The beauty of what we are looking at today is that we get to gain some clarity on one of the hardest parts of reality of us to understand
We aren’t left in the dark we are told a-lot about the third person of the trinity and the world around us we don’t see
1 John 4:1-6 is an incredible place to see what we don’t see and the hope we have because of our God
We are going to see 2 things: What We Don’t See and the Truth is the Hope We Long For
What We Don’t See
What We Don’t See
Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
This is how you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming; even now it is already in the world.
Here is some very freeing news that you may have never heard
It is ok to hear something in church or from someone who calls themselves a christian and doubt
it is ok to not be sure and not understand
A disciple of Jesus who is writing a book of the bible tells you it is ok to not understand what you hear sometimes
And what is even better is that he is giving us the clear way to figure it out
I said last week even this is the place to ask questions and if I don’t know the answer we will follow what John says and find the answer
This is so encouraging because it is weird out there in church with so called church people
Morgan was at a mega church women's event and when she described part of the night I got second hand anxiety
There was a time set aside for people who had a word for someone in the room to go up to the person and tell them
If you don’t know what that awkward christian squirreliness is it is when somone believes God himself has told them to tell you something
I have had the awful pleasure of people giving me a word on several memorable occasions
It is ok to not understand or be sure if someones word from God is real or not
John is saying it is actually a good thing to feel doubt and feel unsure
Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
What John is dealing with is church people going up to the baby believers he loves and telling them they have a new word God has given them and they need to hear it
And it is happening today all over the place
I told the experience I had a couple weeks ago at tractor supply with the guy in the parking lot
He asked me some ill-timed but ok questions…have you accepted Jesus are your sins covered by His blood…terrible job reading the room but ok questions…then he asked if i had been baptized in the spirit…thats when the testing of what he said happened for me
A few years ago I would have sat in my truck and doubted if I was saved because I could say I had the first 2 but not the extra baptism
I would have felt insecure in my faith
But i knew to test it against what God has said
I remembered what the bible says about knowing I am a follower of Jesus
If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
I have done that and I know what that man was selling was garbage
You will have those moments of a word from someone and because they are dressed up with God told me we can doubt our assurance
John is telling us how to know and it is the reality of what we don’t see
This can be the hard stuff of the bible for us but because it is hard doesn’t make it untrue
You have an enemy of your soul....and he has friends
He would love you to make him a cartoon character with red tights and a pitchfork but thats not reality
He and His friends are dressed as sheep Jesus says in Matthew 7 but are really wolves
And they have a message to take you from God
They sell you messages that take you from the hope of the gospel
They use charismatic “pastors” to play on your emotions to lure you away from what your heart truly needs
And there are more of them then those who love you to tell you the truth..
John says so at the end of verse 1....many have gone out into the world
So doubt is a good thing and we get to learn how to spot a wolf through his sheeps clothing
Like i did in my truck i took it to what God has really said in His own words…i went to the bible and I have god’s people to bounce the messages off of
That is why I want you to ask honest questions here
So we can be assured what we preach here is the truth we long for in a world of competing “spiritual voices”
And I have something more and Immeasurable …one of those hard things to understand…the Holy Spirit
This is how you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming; even now it is already in the world.
Here we go what on earth is the spirit of God, who is that and what does he do, and what does he have to do with assurance and hope in a broken world of lies and cancer and hard unseen Tuesdays?
First he is the person who affirms that Jesus was a real man, fully God, come to save us, die on a roman cross and rise from the dead
Jesus says in John 15:26
“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.
The message of the Holy Spirit the capital H helper in John will testify to the truth of Jesus and all He has said and done
The spirit of anyones message that doesn’t do that is not for your good but to take your hope
He is the spirit of truth and all other messages are a lie to hurt you
So first the holy spirit empowers us to tell us the truth from the bible about Jesus
But wait theres more ....
Creation tells us the amazing work of the spirit to bring us life
Here is how the trinity…a hard thing i get it, works together as equals
In creation it was the initiative of the father to overflow in love to explode in creation.
It was the word of the Son that was the power to create the canvas and paint the masterpiece
And it was the Holy Spirit who made it come alive with the breathe of life
The holy spirit is the vivifier of all that is lifeless
it is the same in the rescue mission of salvation…and new creation
it was the initiative of the father, the obedience of the son, and the holy spirit who led Jesus, and breathed life into His dead body to raise him from the grave
So what does this hard topic have to do with us today?
We are part of that new creation and it come only through the message of the spirit of truth
We need new life breathed into us because left to ourselves we are co-conspirators with the enemy to deny Jesus and crown ourselves
One author says “naturally we love and desire other things - ourselves especially. Not Him who is the source of life. That is the real problem. False messages play on that and tell us to follow our hearts to ultimately do what we want.
Our hearts do not naturally desire God. It is easy to follow a message that plays to that part of us.
But we have the ultimate help John says ....a new spirit inside of us
When we repent and believe the third person of trinity goes to work
The spirit teaches us to know the voice of God by opening our once blind eyes to see the truth of the gospel…and give us discernment when a message sounds off
The Holy Spirit becomes the oxygen believers need for moment by moment life and when a message denys His truth it chokes out the life in us instead of giving
The Holy Spirits personal presence in us means his work us to bring us into the intimate relationship he enjoys with the Father and Jesus so we are grieved when we follow a message that breaks that closeness we share
This is whats amazing about God the Spirit …once he gives us new life he doesn’t move on. He does what he has always done. He vivifies new life and makes it blossom and grow.
That is who the helper the advocate the counselor all names for Him is
In the face of competing messages from a different spirit he confirms the real and is grieved when we believe the lies
He exists to affirm and grow in us the gospel that changes everything
He tells us in all things to hope in Jesus
To remember the truth of Jesus and never move on from the hope we have in Him
Every other message is against the hope of jesus
The most pervasive today is the message of a useful Jesus to get what you want anyway
it is offering an attractive lie of some kind but it always promises and can never deliver
It is against the truth of Jesus…anti christ and anti you
that is the spirit of the message when you peel back the shiny packaging and it is all over this country and city
That is why John warns us this isn’t out there somewhere its at churches with thousands of attenders in Greenville right now
1 John 4:3 This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming; even now it is already in the world.
They will never deliver the hope you long for
The Truth Is The Hope We Long For
The Truth Is The Hope We Long For
You are from God, little children, and you have conquered them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world. Therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Anyone who knows God listens to us; anyone who is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of deception.
Completely unrelated trivia fact the greek word for conquer or over come in this passage is Nikao which is where Nike got its name…your welcome
But back the the point at hand as quickly as I can with the time we have left
its not just that one spirit is right and one is wrong
It is all about the fact that one is breathing the life you long for and the other will always leave you empty
One spirit alone can give you the truth to breathe life in to our dead lives and a broken world
No other spirit can vivify a masterpiece of new life
Everyone is selling hope in a broken world
Every message is selling you something about how life is found
And the war of the messages is for your heart
It is a war for hope
Paul Tripp says of all of us: From the smallest concerns to the grandest ones, our lives are shaped, directed, motivated, and frustrated by hope. Everyone hopes. Everyone hooks their hope to something or someone. Everyone hopes their hope will come through for them. No one ever purposely hopes in what is hopeless. Everyone longs for hope that is sure. Everyone gets up in the morning motivated by hope of some kind or paralyzed by hopelessness of some kind.
We are hope seekers at our core because life isn’t how it’s supposed to be.
it is our desires that drive our actions…and the voices we listen too
that is why wolves in sheeps clothing selling a message centered on you is so attractive
that is why John says verse 5 They are from the world. Therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them.
Because it makes me the definer of what hope and hapiness should be
If we are honest we know we never deliver on what we promise ourselves
The truth is the only thing that delivers on what Paul Tripp just said…it is the only hope that is sure
“The radical, life-reshaping truth is that ultimately true, lasting, and secure hope is a person — the Lord Almighty.”
All other messages that deny that hope is found in the real Jesus will never deliver on what they promise
when life is hard the competing voices seem to get louder
They lie that the message of truth you believed at first isn’t coming through that you believed the wrong way to hapiness
Tripp again: The message is consistent — God is not working to deliver to you your personal definition of happiness. If you’re on that agenda page, you are going to be disappointed with God, and you are going to wonder if he loves you. God is after something better: your holiness — that is, the final completion of his redemptive work in you, which includes deep and abiding happiness in him.
The Bible warns us that if our hope disappoints us, it’s because our hope rests on the wrong object. There is only one place to look for hope that is secure, no matter what.
The story of God’s truth is the story of hope shattered and the tenacious war of salvation to restore that hope
Look at hope of the true message all over the bible
Israel, put your hope in the Lord.
For there is faithful love with the Lord,
and with him is redemption in abundance.
but the Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him,
in those who hope in his steadfast love.
For I know the plans I have for you”—this is the Lord’s declaration—“plans for your well-being, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.
I say, “The Lord is my portion,
therefore I will put my hope in him.”
And listen to all of this passage come together from the words of Paul to the church in Rome....
This hope will not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
The truth is the hope we long for in a world where dark days seem so tenacious
that is why John makes sure we know verse 4
You are from God, little children, and you have conquered them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.
Hard days and tears and sin and fear and insecurity seem so tenacious
But the very truth of the Gospel puts in display that our great God is even more tenacious to win this war then what breaks our hearts
One of my favorite quotes shows the hope we have in the truth of Jesus is more tenacious then the darkness
Brokenness and sin are stubborn, but not as stubborn as the grace of God and not half so persistent, not half so ready to suffer to win its way
Hope in the truth dear friends lets pray