Sermon Tone Analysis

*1 John 2:1-2*

{{{"

/1 //My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.

But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

2 //He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world./

}}}

!

A Review of the Three False Claims

Last week we looked at three false claims regarding sin.

Let’s review them briefly.

/FALSE CLAIM #1/: Sin does not affect my fellowship with God (v. 6).

John’s response is, yes, sin does prevent my fellowship with God, but fellowship can be restored if we walk in the light because the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.

So fellowship with God is not possible because of sin.

But sin has a remedy, namely, the blood of Jesus, which is effective for those who “walk in the light.”

Walking in the light cannot mean “living without sin” or else there would be no need for us to be cleansed from sin as the verse says.

I’m suggesting that “walking in the light” means actively pursuing holiness by the grace of God and in the power of the Holy Spirit.

And last week we said that this active pursuit is a community effort.

/FALSE CLAIM #2/: I used to sin, but I have overcome it and I sin no longer; I have become sinless (v.

8).

John’s response is, No, you can never completely eradicate sin in any area of your life, but if you will confess your sin, God will faithfully and justly forgive your sin and cleanse you from all unrighteousness.

True confession is more than just admitting that something is true.

Confession must move us out of the sphere of darkness and get us walking in the light.

We suggested that confession includes repentance, or it is not really an agreement that somethings is wrong.

/FALSE CLAIM #3/: I have never sinned (v.

10).

John’s response is that such a claim in effect calls God a liar.

God says that we have all sinned.

All three false claims have to do with the denial that sin is a problem in one’s life.

So what should we do about this problem we have with sin?

I think John’s response in this passage to that question is basically this: We must fight for our fellowship with God by recognizing the problem that sin is for us and by clinging to the only remedy that God has provided for us.

!

We must fight for our fellowship with God

I say we must fight for our fellowship with God in order to stress once again that the battle against sin is an active battle for the Christian, not a passive one.

Notice the grammar that John uses at the beginning of chapter 2.

He refers to his audience as my little children.

It is a term of endearment and intimacy.

And he switches from the first person plural (“we”) to the first person singular (“I”).

The effect is that John wants to address his readers pastorally, and he doesn’t want them to miss the personal appeal in light of his responses to the false claims being made by some.

In other words, John wants his readers and us to understand the seriousness of sin.

Its damaging effects cannot be overstated.

John then tells us why he brought up these false claims regarding sin in the lives of believers: “I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.”

The goal of what he has written up to this point is preventative.

He does not want us to say, “If it is impossible for me to completely eradicate sin from my life, then why worry about it at all?”

He wants us to think, “If sin is so damaging to my fellowship with God, then I will go to whatever lengths necessary to avoid it.”

John does not want us to be careless toward sin.

He points us to the plea of Jesus in John 5:14: “Go and sin no more.”

This means that we can have victory over sin.

We can make real progress in our sanctification.

That is, we can stop any sin in our lives.

No sin in the Christian is invincible.

There is no legitimate excuse for our sin, for there is always a way to escape its temptation (1 Cor.

10:13).

The proper response of every Christian toward sin is to fight for our fellowship with God by actively resisting every kind of sin in our lives.

!

We must recognize the problem that sin is for us

But how does this admonition to not sin make you feel?

We already know that we cannot say, “I sin no longer.”

So John has already warned us about the temptation to believe that we can completely eradicate sin from our lives.

In other words, when John says I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin, we have to respond with something like, “But I know that I will blow it.”

That’s why John responds with “But if anyone does sin we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

Here I want to deal with two questions.

First, what is meant by an advocate?

Second, how badly do we need one?

!!

We need help.

The word /advocate/ used here simply means “one who is called to someone’s aid.”

Hence it means a mediator or an intercessor or simply a helper.[1]

The word occurs only in John’s writings and only four other times, all in John’s Gospel and every time in reference to the Holy Spirit, (though the word also applies to Jesus by implication in John 14:16).

The Holy Spirit is said to be a “Helper” in that he replaces the physical absence of Jesus to prevent the disciples from being left alone (John 14:16).

As their Helper, the Holy Spirit would continue to teach the disciples and to remind them of the things that Jesus had said to them (John 14:26).

“The characteristic function” of the Helper is seen in John 15:26 and John 16:7-11 where the Holy Spirit assists the disciples in giving testimony about Jesus in a hostile world.[2]

But here in 1 John we find that it is Jesus who is the “helper.”

And here the word is translated advocate.

The English translation comes from the Latin word, but rarely does the Greek word refer to a lawyer or an attorney.

Most would say that there is a strong legal context in view here so the word is appropriately translated advocate and means “counsel for the defense.”[3]

But there are two reasons why I think that is not the best way to understand the word in this text.

First, because this passage is referring to believers, we no longer have need of legal defense.

Notice that Jesus is our advocate with the Father.

But we are related to God as his children and no longer under the condemnation of a righteous judge.[4]

This is not intended to soften the seriousness of our sin; fellowship with God is always destroyed by sin.

And we are still in need of forgiveness.

But the Father is a lover of his children, and we can be assured that he will always forgive us when we confess them (1 John 1:9).

The second reason why we should not view Jesus as our lawyer but as our Helper or intercessor or mediator is because Jesus does not try to persuade the Father to forgive us because he thinks we are not really guilty.

He is not trying to find some loophole in the law.

“We have nothing that we can plead before God to gain us forgiveness for our sins.”

Rather, “Jesus Christ . . .

enters his plea for us.”[5]

In other words, Jesus “helps” us when we sin by supplying for us the righteousness that we have failed to achieve.

No lawyer or advocate does that.

So when the Scripture says that when we sin we have an “advocate with the Father” it means that we have someone who keeps us in fellowship with God by supplying the righteousness we have violated.

As Romans 8:34 tells us, No one can condemn us because Jesus who died and was raised on our behalf “is at the right hand of God” interceding for us.

In this sense, Jesus is our Helper.

He does for us what we cannot do for ourselves, keeping us in fellowship with God.

!! We need help at all times.

So how badly do we need the advocacy or help or intercession of Jesus on our behalf?

Answer: as often as we sin.

And how often might that be?

Now we’ve come back to the false claims of chapter one.

It might be easier than we think to believe we can eradicate sin from our lives.

One popular author writes:

“Are you ready for a maverick thought?

Once we truly grasp the freedom grace brings, we can spend lengthy periods of our lives without sinning or feeling ashamed.

Yes we can!

And why not?

Why should sin gain the mastery over us?

Who says we cannot help but yield to it?

How unbiblical!

You see, most of us are so programmed to sin that we wait for it to happen.”[6]

The author stops short of saying that we can live the rest of our lives without sinning.