Audio restored with Diffio. Diffio processed the original archive recording to reduce noise and produce a cleaner listening version; the original stays available.
Speech quality score (model-estimated, SCOREQ): before 3.21 → restored 4.62
Use the player's Original switch to compare.How Diffio restores old speech recordings
Yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, we did not get very far. That was altogether the fault of your lecturer. But nonetheless, we did spend our time dealing with some very basic concepts. First of all, in the lecture period, we tried to cover those principles on which we can enter and be maintained in the great fellowship with God that is the family of God. And then in the discussion time, you may remember, we were enticed into dealing somewhat with the subject matter of today.
What John means by his term the world. That he is so constantly putting against, contrasting with his concept of the family of God. Now we have managed, uh, thus to get ourselves somewhat out of phase, but that won't matter much at all. It seems to me that we can clear that up if today we content ourselves with completing what I have called Movement Two. Tomorrow studying Movement, uh, sorry, Movement One today, tomorrow studying Movement Two.
and then on Friday we shall look at Movement three. Our time is not lost if today we take particular care to help one another really to understand as far as we may what John means by this term, the world. We shall meet it again very prominently, both in movement two and in movement three, and therefore it is important for our understanding of the family of God that we shall understand as clearly as we may what John means by the world. And if we manage to get some clearer grasp of these basic concepts in this epistle, then of course we can fill in the detail on other occasions.
Now this morning, therefore, we come to our first emphasis, and that is the family of God in chapter two verses twelve to fourteen where John talks to us, or talks rather to the members of the family, calling them little children or young men or fathers. I want us to notice, to start with, how very carefully John arranges his material in this section of his letter. Yesterday we noticed, when we were dealing with the principles upon which we may enter the great fellowship of God, how careful John was to balance his statements, placing at the beginning of the paragraph his emphasis on the importance of where we walk.
Then at the end of the paragraph, placing a like emphasis on the importance of how we walk. And we tried to see yesterday how it important it is that we understand both those concepts and keep them in balance. We shall find a similar tray in his writing now in our section today. The passage on the family written to the sundry members of the family in verses twelve to fourteen has in front of it, from verses seven to eleven a long and strong exhortation that we are to love one another.
John talks about a commandment that in one sense is not new, and yet in another sense is new. And it is clear to see that that commandment is a commandment that we must love one another. Then he goes on to talk to the children, the young men, and the fathers in the family, verses twelve to fourteen. And then coming to verse fifteen, you notice he has the opposite commandment. Love not, love not the world. We are to love one another. We are not to love the world.
So what he is going to say to us about the family of God lies in this context about our love, our affections, and we are to see to it that our affections are properly balanced. We are to love the family of God. We are not to love the world. It is easy sometimes to get that order in reverse. For loving the family of God is not always so easy as you might think. In fact, if you have managed to love the Christian brothers, is it such a supernatural thing, says John in chapter three, that it is clear evidence that you have been born of God.
We must be realistic, eh, in our appraisal of these things. The love of the family of God is some not not some natural thing. It is a divinely implanted ability, and if you love the brethren, as John puts it, it is evidence that you have passed from death unto life. It is not so easy always when you get to know them very closely to love the Christian brothers and sisters. But we are to love them. Whereas, because we are in ourselves fallen creatures, it is sometimes very easy, if one may talk for- for another, to love the world with all its attractiveness superficially taken.
And we are to be advised that we are not to love the world. This is going to be, therefore, a matter of keeping our affections, our love in proper balance. And then look again how John ties this paragraph together. He says in verse eight that this commandment that we love one another is a new commandment, which thing is true in Christ and in us, because the darkness is passing away and the true light already shines. John uses a delightful metaphor for what the coming of Christ has meant.
The older partial ages of God's revelation are passing. For us who know the Savior, the darkness of our unregenerate days is passing. And the more we grasp the wonder of what God has done and learn to love one another as Christ has loved us, we find the very new age, the glorious eternal age, already beginning to dawn in our lives, and landscape after landscape is opened up under this new light, and we begin to peer into eternity itself and begin to see that we already have eternal life and are already beginning to exploit its ever increasing possibilities.
The darkness is passing away. But if that is true, as we learn in Christ to love one another, notice what else is true in verses fifteen and sixteen, John says, love not the world. And I think to myself, why should I not love the world? Has John perhaps grown old and bebearded and no longer pulsating with the love of, uh, with the energies of youth? And he's grown a little bit sour. Why should I not love the world? There are so many attractive things therein. And one of the reasons he gives us, if you notice in verse seventeen, is this: don't love the world, because the world is passing away.
Sad world. And all the love that is spent on it will perish. Now there are expositors who feel that verses twelve to fourteen that talk about the family of God are by way of being a digression in which John turns aside from what he has been talking about temporarily to talk at some length about the family of God. I find it perhaps more compelling to think that far from being a digression from his theme, it is an integral part of what he is saying.
And that surely we can see in the first place from this very fact. Another reason he gives us why we should not love the world is this: for all that is in the world is not of the Father, so much so that if any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. But then look what he has said to us at the end of verse thirteen. I have written to you, little children, because you know the Father. Why, of course. If we are to think of the family of God, central to the family of God is the Father.
And central in the heart and affections of all the members of the family of God is the love of the Father for his children, and the love of the children for their Father. What kind of a family could it possibly be in which the members had lost their love of the Father? It is exceedingly relevant, therefore, and practical when John warns us, don't you love the world? Because you cannot love the world and simultaneously be loving the Father. No more deadly, destructive element in the family of God could there be than this loving the world.
Obviously then, the, uh, verses that talked of the family, verses twelve, thirteen, and fourteen, are very closely related to what follows. I am going to suggest this morning that they are also related to what precedes them. Because as we think of the family today, we shall be thinking of what it is that makes it a family and what holds it together as a family. We are to love one another. We shall then think of what would disrupt it and destroy it as a family. Love not the world.
Now then, just let us for a moment briefly look at verses seven to eleven. We need not spend so very long on them. Beloved, no new commandment I write to you, but an old commandment which you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard. We cannot necessarily tell why John was moved to make that remark. Perhaps there were some who thought that John's insistence on this love one for the other in the practical terms in which he insists on it was somehow a fanatical extension of Christianity, some new, novel, innovating idea, some extreme.
Any rate, John stays to, uh, uh, emphasize that the command to love, in that sense, is no new thing. It is the command that comes from the time of our Lord, from the very beginning of his earthly ministry, and he taught us that we were to love one another. Sure enough, according to John's Gospel, chapter thirteen, when he gave that commandment, it was a new commandment. Behold, a new commandment I write unto you, that you love one another. By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.
Then it was new. But by the time John was writing to these Christians, this was old. This was original, this was basic Christianity. There was nothing novel about it. This was not some new extreme, some development. This is basic and authentic Christianity, no new commandment. We cannot say, therefore, yes, mm, I am a Christian, but I'm not interested in these new developments, this hothouse Christianity stuff, and all loving one another, and so forth and so on.
If we do not love one another, then we haven't even begun Christianity. On the other hand, he says it is a new commandment. For now, John is thinking of the coming of the new age in Jesus Christ our Lord. It is not that God had not spoken before. John doesn't imply that the true light had, that the light of God had never shone in this world before. Of course it had. God had spoken at different times and in different manners to the fathers by the prophets.
But now a new age had dawned, because the very Son of God had come. The true light now shines. That phrase does not mean that all other light before this was false. It does mean that it was partial. Take an example, if you care, of the way the New Testament speaks of these things. Yesterday we were looking at the tabernacle, which God commanded Israel to make. It was authentic. God commanded it. God used it to reveal various things about himself to the Israelites.
He used it as the basis and means of real fellowship that he had with them, and they with him. But now the New Testament comments that nowadays we don't have a literal sanctuary like that. That belonged to our childhood days. Nowadays we worship God in the true sanctuary. That is the real grown up adult thing, which is a spiritual sanctuary, the true sanctuary which the Lord pitched and not man. And in this sense, we are privileged indeed to be living in this age.
We should remember the words of the Lord Jesus to his disciples, blessed are your eyes, blessed are your ears, for kings and prophets desired to see the things that you see and never saw them, and to hear the things that you hear and never heard them. Think of what you know. Great kings and prophets look forward to the coming of God's son and saw it dimly. You are in the age that has seen him come and know him. Great kings and prophets like David approach God in that old tabernacle, and the best they could do is to stand outside and look to a God who remained distant, hidden behind the curtain of the veil.
Had you said to King David, King David, your majesty, that was a delightful number that you wrote the other day. You know, we've got it, uh, in fact, it's most popular with us nowadays. We have it on in our house all the time. You know, that number you wrote about forgiveness. Blessed is the man whose sins are forgiven, whose iniquity is. It goes to our hearts, David. We were thinking, David, suppose you were in his palace in all those centuries ago. We were thinking, David, what if you got your harp and came along with us, and we went into the holiest of all in the temple and had a praise session together and sang your psalm?
David would have gone white round the cheeks. Enter the holiest of all? Of course not. You can't come into the holiest of all. And the great King David had to stand outside. Blessed are your eyes, says Christ, for the things that you see, and your ears for the things that you hear. Things that prophets and kings never saw or heard. For you live in the age when the Son of God is come, and the true light now shines. And you are admitted into the very holiest of all of God's family and heart.
So we are to love one another. And in these verses seven to eleven, John not only encourages us to love one another, but points out that he who does not love is in the darkness even until now, verse nine. That is, he is not a true Christian at all. And then he points out the fearful consequences of abiding in the dark. He that hateth his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and knows not whither he goeth, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
He stumbles on, driven by his urge of hatred, not knowing where it will lead, with no true ultimate sense of purpose. With that, John now comes to address the family. And as I say, I am inclined to take these words very simply as John, so to speak, interrupting himself, if you like, to tell his fellow believers why it is that he is writing these things. Now, you must know that there are one or two practical and technical difficulties with these verses.
First of all, there is the curious phenomenon that John appears to repeat himself. First of all, he says, I write unto you, children, fathers, young men, and then he says it all over again with very little change. I have written unto you, children, fathers, and young men. Why did he put it twice? Some commentators imagine that he was elderly, sat down at his desk and began to write, I write unto you, little children, I write unto you, uh, fathers, I write unto you, young men. And in came the postman or something, or the milkman, and he got interrupted. And when he had finished his business, he came back and where was I, and wrote it again and didn't realize he has repeated himself.
That kind of nonsense is not worthy to be mentioned in the same breath as the question of divine inspiration, is it? Then why did he repeat himself? Well, at first sight, as I say, there are one or two practical difficulties. Just let me remind you of them. Here they are. The difficulty is that, um... First of all, and primarily, that he seems to have got the various stages of growth muddled up, or at least not in logical order.
He starts with little children, then proceeds to fathers, and then to young men each time. And logic would suggest to us, uh, that he should have put it little children, young men, and fathers, or fathers, young men, and little children, and had them either in logical ascending or descending order. And then there is the curious fact that when he talks to the little children, the first time round he uses a Greek word, teknia. And when he talks the second time round to the little children, he uses a different word, Greek word, paidia.
Both of them mean little children. So why does he, um, uh, have that strange order? Well, if you care to, you can, uh, solve that problem, and, uh, from the larger context, make yourself out a series that, um, uh, is more logical, at least as far as the stages of growth is concerned. You do it, if you want to, by noticing that in verse twelve the term little children, teknia, is a general term, not now, uh, referring to the new converts within the family of God, but the term that John as an elderly apostle uses for all the people of God to whom he writes, calling them my little children in his affectionate grandfatherly fashion, a general term.
And then there to notice that lower down in that chapter, he comes back to using that term teknia, and now little children in verse twenty eight. And that is a general term. Then on this theory, we may notice that in verse, uh, thirteen we can find the three stages of growth in logical order. I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him that is from the beginning.
I write unto you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. Then we shall have to do a little manipulating. Many manuscripts at that point have a past tense, I wrote unto you. But not all manuscripts have the past tense at that stage. Some of them still have the present tense, and if we like to follow those textual variants, we can come up with the present tense, I write unto you, little children. And now we notice that the word is not teknia, as it was in the general term. The word now is paidia.
And this time presumably, so the theory goes, being used of these, uh, youngest in the stages of growth, and they are in descending order, fathers, young men, and little children. And then as we move on in verse thirteen uh, following another series of stages of growth, I wrote to you, fathers, because... I wrote to you, young men, because... Only now, according to this theory, you will have to be prepared for a lot of verses to come in address to the young men.
I write, I wrote unto you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one, love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. And that long exhortation in verses fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen, therefore addressed to the young men. And then you come to verse eighteen, little children once more, which is the Greek word paideia, as above. You will have to suppose here that John has slightly broken his formula. Instead of saying, I write unto you, or I wrote unto you, little children, because it is the last hour.
He says in verse eighteen, little children, it is the last hour, and Antichrist comes. And says in verse twenty one for the first time to them now, I wrote unto you not because you do not know the truth, but because you do know the truth. So that his formula is somewhat disrupted, but is there. He once more is saying, I, uh, little children, uh, uh, I did not write unto you, I because I wrote unto you because. I simply mentioned that as a matter of interest, because when people come to study what John has to say about the family, this is one of the major difficulties that they run up against, how to understand these terms.
If you like that scheme, not everyone does, of course, but if you like that scheme, uh, you will, of course, see this, that this matter of the family is integrated into all that surrounds it. But you don't have to be convinced of that scheme in order to see surely, as I have argued earlier, that in writing these things about loving one another and not loving the world, John has in mind the family of God. Let's think of them. First of all, the first series.
He says, I write unto you, little children. Let's suppose that that means the people of God in general. I write unto you, little children. Because your sins have been forgiven you for his name's sake. In other words, he has been saying, look, love one another. And then he stops to say, do you know why I'm writing that to you? Why do I write that to you? Love one another, and lay such important stress upon this loving of one another.
I am writing this to you because your sins have been forgiven you for his name's sake. How did you get into the fellowship? How do you manage to remain in this great fellowship? Why he has earlier told them that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. That is how we got into the fellowship. That is how we remain in the fellowship. So I take myself, and I say to myself, I am in this great fellowship, in this great family of God, because my sins have been forgiven, not for my own namesake, but for the namesake of Christ.
My brother here is in the fellowship because his sins have been forgiven for the value of the name of Christ. Now let me see what happens. Suppose I refuse to love my brother. Suppose I refuse to forgive him when he sins against me. What am I doing? The man's sins have been forgiven him for the sake of the name of Christ, and I refuse to forgive him? Then I am denying the value of the name of Christ.
It doesn't weigh enough with me. In order for me to be willing to forgive my brother, I want that name to be valid for my sake, so that my sins can be forgiven for his name's sake and I be received into the family and fellowship. But I am not prepared for that name to avail for my brother to the extent that I am prepared to forgive the man's sins for Christ's name's sake. But then if I take that attitude, the whole partnership becomes impossible, and I destroy the very basis upon which I myself could be received and retained in the family.
I'm writing to you, fathers. Why do I write to you? Love one another. Because you have known him that is from the beginning. What has that got to do with it? Well, John has just used that phrase in a slightly different connection. He has told us this commandment, love one another, is not something new. This is not some novelty, some innovation, some fanaticism. This is original, authentic Christianity. It goes back to the earthly ministry of our Lord Jesus. Now he tells us something further.
It comes from the un- eternal and unchanging character of God. Him who is from the beginning, who is that? Some people think it is the Lord Jesus. Looked at as the one who was from all eternity. Other people feel it is God the Father, again looked at from all eternity. It doesn't matter really which one you take it to be. The point at issue is this, that in that eternal life that was with the Father and manifested to us in the earthly ministry of our Lord.
We have the telling out of the heart of the eternal. This is what God is really like. Yes, it is true that in the coming of the Lord Jesus, a new age has opened up. We have the full revelation of God, the true light now shines. But pray consider, that doesn't mean that God has changed, and in these last few centuries has grown a little bit more kindly. God always was like this.
It is of his unchanging nature that he is love. And it tells us, not only is this authentic Christianity, it tells us something glorious about the family of God. Key to the family, at the very heart of the family, is this relationship of love that comes from the unchanging character of God. You have known him that is from the beginning, says John.
That is a wonderful comfort to our hearts, isn't it? For to know God in all his eternity, his unchanging character, that is to have eternal life already. To form a relationship with one who is eternal and unchanging is to have a relationship that will never cease, is to have a life that is eternal. If you came to me... a- a- and said, uh, do you know Winston Churchill? I should say, which Winston Churchill are you talking about?
And you say, you know, that great war leader in past English history. Do you know him? I would say that's a very funny way of talking. Winston Churchill is dead. I did know him once, but I don't know, I mean, the man is dead now. If you go to God this very moment and say, God, did you know Abraham? God won't say to you, what do you mean? Abraham's dead now. God is more likely to say to you, what do you mean, did I know him? I do know him. I am the God of Abraham.
I am eternal and unchanging. And when I entered into a relationship with Abraham, that was eternal life begun for Abraham, for I change not. It's not a question with God, did he know Abraham? He does know Abraham. And to enter into the family of God is to come to know him that is from the very beginning the unchanging God. Now put it, uh, uh, uh, alongside this next thing. I'm writing to you, young men, he says, because you have overcome the evil one.
John doesn't pause to s- say at that very moment what exactly that implies, you have overcome the evil one. Is he talking of their conversion? That they have overcome all the efforts of the evil one to prevent them trusting the Savior and entering this great fellowship of God. Or is he talking of their practical victory as Christians against the evil one? In what sense? Why, because it is no secret John is about to tell us in chapter three, that the evil one it is who inspires hatred.
Cain, we are to learn, murdered his brother Abel. He hated his brother Abel. And where did that hatred come from? Cain was of that evil one and slew his brother. It is the purpose of that evil one to make the family of God impossible, or where it has been set up to disrupt it. And I have written unto you, young men, and I'm, I'm sorry, I am writing unto you, young men, telling you to love one another, because you are aware of Satan's wiles, always trying to disrupt the family of God, and you have overcome him.
That ought to be true of us all, didn't it? But how often, alas, it isn't. We get so easily deceived. There's some cause or other, uh, uh, comes up, and before we know where we are, we are slaughtering our brothers, right and left. And we think we do God's work. When Satan laughs, he's got us helping to destroy our brothers and sisters. We need to be awake to his wiles and deceits, and to overcome him. But if John has thus far been thinking about his original exhortation, we are to love one another, and giving the believers their reasons why he writes this to them.
For myself, I think that when he repeats these things now and says, I wrote to you, that is, when you get this letter, you will find I have written to you, I have written to you these things. He is now going to give in advance the reasons why he warns the family of God not to love the world. Why shouldn't we love the world? Well, I'm telling you in advance, John is saying. First of all, don't you love the world? For little children, I write unto you because you have known the Father.
Have you known the Father? Really known him? And come to love him? In an ordinary human family, because of all the disciplines that have to go on, I suppose, and because of the imperfections of life, it is very easy for a child to lose love for its parents, is it not? And find the world outside far more attractive than its parents, for all sorts of reasons.
It is the fact that our great enemy has sown in the hearts of men and women all sorts of slanders about the Father. So men and women find God a terrible bore. And sometimes the old poison lingers on in our veins, doesn't it, as believers? Wonder what it will be like in heaven, having conversed with the Lord Jesus and with the Father. What will it be like? What will they talk about when you get to heaven? Did I hear you say I hope they won't start talking about Leviticus? Because I find that bit a bore.
Oh. Why if God opened heaven and spoke to us this very moment, would he not speak what he has spoken in his word? What is God like? What is his conversation like? What is the Father like? If one may confess for another, there lingers on in our veins the old poison sometimes that God is a frightful bore. John is writing this, love not the world, says he, you have known the Father.
Have we really known the Father? In all his love and attractiveness and glory and wonder. And we are to be warned, don't you love the world? For all that is in the world is not of the Father. You cannot love the world and the Father simultaneously. You'll find I've written this to you, fathers, he says, because, and he simply repeats what he says before, you have known him that is from the beginning. That is the eternal. I'm now going to tell you, says John, don't you love the world?
Why not? Because the world is passing away. We have, so to speak, so much love to spend, have we not? We shall spend it on this or that. We would be wise men and women to spend our love on that which lasts. Listen to Peter exhorting his fellow believers to love one another. Seeing you have purified your souls by obeying the truth, he says, now love one another from a pure heart fervently.
And I say to Peter, but Peter, do you know my Christian brethren, Peter? And you tell me to love them. I find the world far more attractive, Peter, to be frank. Why should I love my brethren and not love the world? Well, says Peter, you'll see, all flesh is as grass, and the glory thereof like the flower of the field, it perishes. But the word of God abides forever, and this is the word of God, by which means you have been begotten again. Every member of the family of God is begotten of God and lasts eternally.
The world passes away. The love we spend upon God and the family of God abides eternally. The love we misspend on what John calls the world is lost. I've written unto you, young men, because you are strong. And now John adds two further things, that the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one. I want to suggest that in that phrase, John is helping us understand again what he means by the world.
Yesterday we used the analog- You see, he loves keeping people down. He loves tantalizing them with all sorts of the beautiful things and then telling them you mustn't have them. God all over. Said Eve, but you know, he's warned us that if we eat of that tree, we shall die. Oh, nonsense, Fiddlesticks, said Satan. Die? Of course you won't die. You'll rise in God's universe.
You'll really begin to live. Look at that tree. And Eve looked at it, and she saw that it was good to look at, and good for food, and desirable to make one wise. There you are, said Satan. That's life, my dear. Physical satisfaction, good for food. Aesthetic satisfaction, good to look at. Intellectual satisfaction, desirable to make one wise. That's life, said Satan. And what a big lie it was, for he had ruled out the word of God and Eve's relationship with the Father through his word.
So that while these things were lovely, of course they were lovely, but now they were put before Eve as opposed to God, to be enjoyed apart from God, to be made an end in themselves, and not a means for fellowship with God. So did this thing that God calls the world begin. You mustn't think of it as a whole host of nasty, horrible, lurid things. You should rather think of it as all the delightful things, but now seen apart from God.
Have you ever noticed a young lady who's just been engaged? Your secretary, for instance, when she comes the first morning, she hands you the coffee, dear soul, and somehow handles it a little bit difficult to hold, and it's this hand, isn't it? It manages to come around like this. Of course you notice it, and you say, oh, what a splendid ring. May I have a look at it? What is it? Two amethysts, one pearl, or three diamonds, or what have you? Oh, isn't that a splendid ring? And you admire the ring for a moment, for the ring's sake. Of course so. Then you say, and who is the fortunate young man?
What would you think if the girl replied, what do you mean, young man? Well, the young man behind the ring. Young man, there isn't any young man. Oh, oh, sorry. I thought it was an engagement ring, sorry. Oh, well, it is a nice ring. Yes, it's a beautiful ring. That changes it, doesn't it? The ring is still a beautiful thing in itself, but it's lost all its meaning. And what would you think of a society, a society that held engagement rings up to young men and wi- young women, denying the whole business of marriage or love, that engagement rings became a thing in themselves for their own sake.
Some such, but even bigger tragedy has fallen on our world. The lovely things that God has made, but Satan has taken them and in men's mind divorced them from thee, Father. They become an end in themselves. They lose their significance to the point where if you make them an end in themselves and love it, you cannot be simultaneously loving the Father. So did Satan come... and tempt our Lord. First with physical satisfaction, turn these stones into bread, and then when other and more spiritual things, to get fame by flinging himself off the temple, to have the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, but all without and in disobedience to the Father.
And Christ overcame him how? By the Word of God. No, Satan, he says, it stands written. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. What is the engagement ring without the lover behind it? What is the whole of life's experience without the Father?
And it is his word that binds us to the Father. That, ladies and gentlemen, is how I read this great passage on the family of God in the context in which it was written.
