Gooding, David: 7 – The Duty of the Children of God

Now we come to our session this afternoon, and we should remind ourselves of exactly where we have come to. So, at the risk of tiring you, but repetition is a way of getting things in, isn't it? We have been considering how this epistle is made up of three major movements, each of them beginning with a manifestation, one of the eternal life, two of the Son of God and of the children of God, and three of the love of God in his Son and in his people. And each of those movements ending with a warning. The first one, a warning against false Christs. The second one, a warning against false spirits. The third one, a warning against false gods. And then we have reminded ourselves from time to time that in each of those three movements, we have the family of God contrasted with the world. And in each movement, we have something extra added to what we are taught about the family of God, and similarly in each movement, something extra added in God's characterization of the world. And in our present movement, which is movement two, we are thinking of the family of God, of its origin of its life, and therefore of its character. The children are of God. They have his life, they have his nature within them. Similarly, we thought this morning of the world and its origin, the origin of its way of life, its thought, eh, and its motivations. They are, says John, of the evil one. And then he points out that you can tell which are which because each member of those two families has and will from time to time exhibit family likeness. Which, uh, prompts me now to spend just a few seconds, and I'm sure you'll permit me so to do, making an observation in the Gospel of John. You will notice how frequently, in the course of our study, we have had to refer to the Gospel of John, and in particular to chapter eight of that gospel, where this question of the family likeness recurs. John the Apostle shows himself a very diligent student of his master, and it is an interesting and profitable study to trace the ideas that you find expressed by John in his epistle to what he learned of the Lord as recorded in his gospel. On this matter, then, of the family and how each member sh- uh, shows the features, the family likeness, let me just remind you of this interesting fact, that in the gospel by John, there are a number of stories in which women are prominent, which stories are not told us, or told us in such detail, but very often not told us at all, by the other three evangelists. And if you have not noticed this fact and have not pondered its implications, just let me steal a second or two to point out that these stories here in the Gospel of John, in which women are prominent, have something, of course, in common. They are stories of relationship. It is easy to see, for instance, that the story in chapter four is of a woman, and the relationship between her and the man she was living with was not a true relationship. The woman in chapter eight had been unfaithful to her relationship. In chapters eleven and twelve, there's Mary and Martha at the death and then the resurrection of their brother. Death had divided them, parted the relationship, and our Lord restored it. And in chapter nineteen, Mary, the mother of Jesus, and other women too, at the death of her son. We'll find also in the course of these stories that we have frequent reference to the fact of the new relationship that Christ creates. Starts off, of course, with the story of, uh, Mary, the mother of Jesus, at the wedding, which occasion he said to her, woman, what have I to do with thee? Question of relationship. And weddings, as we know, of course, are times for the official formation of that great new relationship, which is the marriage of man and woman. And the last story in the gospel, the story of Mary Magdalene in the garden, is the occasion for our Lord's announce- announcement of a wonderful new relationship. Said he to Mary, uh, go and tell my brethren this and that, and say to them, I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. So that his Father has become ours because of this new relationship that he has brought about between us and himself. And all sorts of things begin to spring to mind when you take these simple stories in which the women are prominent, you put them together as a bunch, and you ask what they have in common and wherein they differ and show their special characteristics. And of course, the one that today interests us very particularly is this story in chapter eight. It's the chapter in which our Lord eventually had to tell his hearers, some of them, you are not of God, you are of your father, the devil. It is interesting, therefore, that this chapter is introduced by the story of a woman taken in adultery. It was a literal case of literal adultery. But of course, the effect of that particular sin is that sometimes children are born, and they have the likeness not of their legal father, but of the actual father. And the likeness to their actual father can give them away, can it not? Thus it happened at the spiritual level to the men about the Lord Jesus. They came claiming that their father was God and Abraham was their father. In actual fact, their behavior bore the family likeness of an altogether different father, and our Lord had to say, you are of your father the devil. Forgive me for snatching those few moments, but I thought it might interest us. And with that, we come again to the contents of chapter, uh, of movement two. And you remember this morning we saw that there were three parts to the movement, in which our profession to be sons and children of God is to be tested, in the first place, by righteous behavior. Now, in our second topic here this afternoon, uh, our profession to be children of God is to be tested by our love for one another. Let us turn to our chapter then and begin by noticing how John emphasizes this matter. Look at chapter three, if you will, verse eleven: For this is the message which you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. This is the message, we should love one another. Now, verse twenty three, towards the end of the paragraph, and this is his commandment that we should believe in the name of his son Jesus Christ and love one another. So does John bracket the whole paragraph together. This is the message, this is the commandment, and both of them tell us that we are to love one another. Now let's do a brief survey of the contents of this second, uh, uh, paragraph, before we get down to it in detail. This paragraph that tells us of our duty to love one another. In verses eleven to twelve, love, says John, is the mark that distinguishes the child of God from the child of the devil. And then in verses thirteen to fifteen, love, says John, is the evidence that we have been truly born again, that we do have this new life, the life of God. And then in verses sixteen to eighteen, he gives us what is the mark of true love, citing us the example of the Lord Jesus who laid down his life for us, and telling us that we have a duty to lay our lives down for our brothers and sisters. The mark, then, and example of true love. And then in verses nineteen to twenty two, he informs us that love, genuine loving, can be a source of confidence before God, and a source of confidence in our prayers to God. And finally, as he comes to verses twenty three to twenty and twenty four, he puts love in its bigger context and talks of faith. This is his command that we should believe faith and love. And love will mean keeping the commandments, that is obedience. Faith, love, and obedience, that holy trilogy. The secret of our abiding in God and the evidence of his abiding in us. With that, let's come briefly through those, uh, uh, five parts to the second paragraph. Verses eleven to twelve. Love the distinguishing mark. This is the message he says that you heard from the very beginning. This is basic Christianity. This is not some super duper course for the spiritually advanced. This is basic Christianity, that we should love one another. Not as Cain was of that evil one and slew his brother. And with that we have a terrible warning. For Cain was no atheist, nor even agnostic. Cain, on this occasion, was busily involved in his religious activities, offering his sacrifice before God. But though he came outwardly religious, he was, says John, of that evil one, the evidence being that he slew his brother. And why did he slay him, says John? He slew him because his own works were evil and his brothers righteous. We notice that in the gospel, our Lord makes the same remark about himself. John's gospel, chapter seven, his brothers say to the Lord Jesus, with the worldly wisdom given to them, they said, look here, old fellow, if you want to start a new religion, they didn't believe him, but they had some advice. If you want to start a new religion, they said, it's no good staying around in this one-eyed show up here in Nazareth. You want to go down to Jerusalem, man, and do some miracles and get on TV and show all your disciples what you can do and, and have a bit of public relations and all that and start a new religion in a big way. You'll never start one up here. Why don't you stay in this one-eyed show of Nazareth? Go down to Jerusalem, that the world may see your miracles and believe. And our Lord's reply was, gentlemen, you don't know what you're talking about, actually. You see, you go up to Jerusalem. I'm not going up to Jerusalem just yet, anyway. Because you see, you don't have any problem, gentlemen. The world doesn't hate you, but me it hates. Because I testify of it that its deeds are evil. John chapter three reminds us what happened historically when the Lord came. For when the Lord, who is the true light of the world, came into the world, he didn't come to a world that was hitherto irreligious. He came to his own, and they had been exceedingly religious. And there were some people who in their religion had been sincere and seeking to do the will of God, the Marthas and the Marys and the Lazaruses and the Johns and the Peters and the Nathaniels. And when the light of this world came, they came to the light that their deeds might be made manifest that they were wrought in God. And as they listened to the Savior, welcomed him and the salvation that he had to offer him. There were other folks that ostensibly and outwardly were equally religious before Jesus Christ came. When the true light came, they came near enough for him to shine on them, and then they rejected it completely. Why? Because he exposed them that their deeds were evil. And in spite of much of their Pharisaic legalism, their hearts, he said, were like a sepulcher, whited on the outside and corrupt of dead men's bones inside. You can imagine how they hated him, can you not? There is nothing perhaps on earth so bitter as a religious spirit that has been now exposed as not being true to God. It will easily turn into hatred and into persecution. We are not to be like that. We are to love one another. And now John goes on to talk about love as the evidence of life. We mustn't be surprised, he says, if the world hates us. We know that we have passed out of death unto life because we love the brothers. How is it that love of our fellow Christians is such a sure and necessary indicator that we have this new life? Well, ladies and gentlemen, for the simple reason that this life that comes from God loves, and it loves because it is life. God hates death. You'll remember one of the occasions on which it is recorded of our blessed Lord that he wept was when he came to the tomb of Lazarus, and he said, roll away the stone. And Martha pleaded, she said, Lord, don't do that. You know what ha- uh, what, what will have happened to the corpse in four days of summer heat. Don't do that. Jesus wept. Yes, he knew he was about to raise Lazarus from the dead, but the sight of his dear friend Lazarus there in corruption and stinking. What a sorry thing death is to him who is life incarnate, who is the living God. And love ever promotes life. And anything that is the opposite hatred, or even lack of love, belongs to the opposite darkness and clamminess of death, corruption, and a grave. He who loves not, who loves not, notice this is the negative, he who loves not is still, says John, abideth in death. He's never come out of it. He's not yet converted. But the man that is converted, has been born again, will love. It is inherent in his life. The man who positively goes on to hate, he not only doesn't love, but he positively hates. He is a murderer, for the basic nature of hatred is that it would murder if he'd got the chance. It destroys life. Watch hatred at work in a community and see if it doesn't destroy people emotionally and spiritually and physically, it is of the evil one. So love then, love of the brothers is a mark of having been born again. But here, just let me interject an observation, lest we get carried away in sentimentality. What does it mean to love the brothers? You will notice, won't you, that here the test is not that we love men in general, but we love the brothers. There is a special difficulty, ladies and gentlemen, in loving the brothers. And the more you get to know them, forgive me for saying it, the more difficult you'll find it to love them. Because God has not chosen the wise and the powerful and the beautiful necessarily. Uh, well, I'm not necessarily commenting upon you, you look very wise to me, but still. God says he hasn't necessarily chosen them at all. He's chosen the broken and the humble. We must therefore be on our guard against misinterpreting the Lord Jesus. For instance, he told, did he not, a famous parable of the sheep and the goats, and told us that when the king sits upon the throne of his glory, he will dismiss the goats because they failed, uh, to love and visit and clothe and feed one of the least of these. And in as much as you haven't done it to them, you haven't done it to me, says he. But if you have done it to them, then you've done it to me. The world outside takes those words and applies them to everybody indiscriminately. Give your money to the poor, whoever the poor is, and you're giving it to Christ. That is not necessarily so, ladies and gentlemen. Our Lord was saying, let me quote him, in as much as you did it unto one of these my brothers, you have done it unto me. Which raises the question, who are his brothers? When the world loves its own, it isn't necessarily loving the brothers of Messiah. For all I know, Caiaphas the high priest was quite liberal at his dinner parties. But brothers of Messiah. Well, first of all, he didn't accept that Jesus was the Messiah to start with. And as for those nasty little Nazarenes that got on soap boxes or orange boxes on the street corner and started preaching, we'd really have wrung their throats, their necks. When he stands at last before the king, and the king said, why didn't you visit my brothers in prison? Why didn't you visit me when I was in prison? Well, I say we didn't, we, we, we, we, we didn't believe you were the Messiah, you see. And we didn't recognize in those people brothers of the Messiah. No, indeed not. The question, therefore, is not do we naturally love pleasant people. We are strictly talking in this context of loving Christ's brothers. And to do that will demand, of course, that we be born again. Only so shall we follow- discover within us the ability to love the brothers of the Lord Jesus. Now then, just look at, uh, verses sixteen to eighteen. They're not difficult to understand, are they? They're difficult to do, maybe. The mark of true love, he laid down his life for us, literally, physically, spiritually. And therefore, it puts upon us a bounden duty. We ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. We cannot, by so doing, atone for them, can we? In his atoning sufferings, our Lord stands alone and unique, but he calls upon us to follow him, and in our love and service of our brothers and sisters, to be prepared to lay down our lives. Could call us, of course, to the mission field and to who knows what diseases and early deaths. Um, more difficult perhaps. Says John, our Lord laid down his life for us, but let's now take the means of life. For he says, you'll see in verse seventeen, whoso has this world's goods. I don't know how your translation has it, but that word in Greek that is translated goods literally means in Greek the means of life. And whoso has the means of life, faced with a brother who, who's in need and finds in himself, because he's a believer, a certain, uh, desire to help him, and then withdraws because it's going to cost too much. How does the love of God dwell in him? If I won't give my means of life, then with what credibility would I claim that I would freely lay down my physical life? Oh brothers, he said, let's not love in word, but in deed and in truth. And then he comes to a delightful thing that shows us his pastoral heart. Love, a source of confidence before God and in our prayers. John is a wise pastor, and he knows in his own experience, as in the experience of others, that there come times in the heart of genuine, godly, devoted believers. When sometimes there wells up within them a sense of failure, and doubts creep in. Middle life is a very fertile ground for them. And the wondering, and am I truly a believer? Look what I've gone and done now. Does that mean that I'm an old imposter? Have I got eternal life? If our hearts condemn us, says John, you know, when that happens, and now he gives us some very practical advice, then one of the things that can reassure our hearts before the Lord is, well, has there been any evidence in your life that you have loved the brothers? Oh, you say, yes, I don't feel much of a b- uh, much of a Christian myself, but yes, my brothers in Christ. Ah, happy man, happy woman. If there's been evidence in your life, yes, yes, yes, and not just talk, but real devoted self-sacrifice for my brothers and sisters, for the Lord's sake. Yes, and that can serve to give you confidence before the Lord. If our hearts condemn us, we have to remember that God is greater than our hearts and knows all things. For myself, brethren, I read that not as a threat, but as an encouragement. For I too have to take my place with Peter, and should the Lord ask me three times, lovest thou me? Then I should have to, uh, stammer out, well, Lord. I'd like to say I do, but then what about all the inconsistencies? But Lord, you know all things. Thou knowest that I love thee. Love, a source, not the only one, a source of confidence in the presence of God, before God, when our hearts get full of doubts and begin to condemn us. And a basis, a certain basis of confidence in prayer, for if our hearts don't condemn us and we ask, we have the things that we ask of him. My sis- brothers and sisters, it is obvious, isn't it? That if I come to God and ask, and I expect God to give me something, but when my brother comes to me in his need and asks, and I refuse to give him anything, I'm going to be in a little trouble with the Father, am I not? When I come expecting him to answer my prayers, if I haven't listened to the prayers and requests of my brothers and sisters in their need. And finally, in our talk of loving, let's notice the sanity with which John ends. Loving to be true loving has to be part of a trilogy of faith. This is the commandment that we believe of faith in, and that we love one another as he has given us commandment. Faith, doctrinal correctness, love, and obedience. These are, says John, the secret of our abiding in God. They are simultaneously the evidence that he abides in us. And there I want to leave it. I wouldn't le- uh, want it to go unnoticed, however, that I'm stopping five minutes short of my time. I have in times past erred by my own fault, my grievous fault, and stolen from the discussion groups time that properly belonged to them. And now in repentance, I begin to make a small amend. Perhaps, who knows, it will improve later on, but I did like to give you five minutes extra now.