1 John 2:26-3:3 - Abide In Him

These are some of the most beautiful verses in all the Bible. They speak of the end game, the object for which God has saved us. We who fell in Adam are being made back into the image of Christ. We do not yet know what that will be like, but we look forward to the consummation of this great work of redemption when he appears for the second time. At the moment we will be like him. What a wonderful thing!

But before we get to that wonderful promise in the first two verses of chapter three, John has some ground to cover with his readers. There are the secessionists to deal with—the heretics. They are actively seeking to lead his readers astray. So John gives them reassurances, talking about an anointing. What does he mean by that? And how does he segue into the second coming of Christ?



All of this and more is covered in this bible study. I hope you will take the time to listen. Just click the link below. God bless you.


Click here: 1 John 2:26-3:3 - Abide In Him


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1 John 2:18-25 - Antichrists

With verse 18 of chapter two we begin a new section in this epistle, though it is based upon the previous section and ties into it. In this new section we discover a couple of new themes. The first is the last hour. John states emphatically that it is the last hour already. The end times were inaugurated at the advent, the first advent, of Jesus.

The second theme is the concept of Antichrist. John has much to say about this theme, but he speaks of it in plural form—antichrists. He is going to define them and call them out.



The third theme is that of perseverance. Perseverance is the proof of possession. John has much to say about perseverance in the faith, something which includes both a perseverance in the Church as well as a perseverance in the apostolic teaching.

And the fourth theme is the anointing. What is the anointing and what does it guarantee for us as believers? All this and more is covered in these eight verses. I hope you will take the time to listen. At the link below you will find an MP3 recording of the bible study we had that covered this passage of scripture. Just click and stream or download for later listening. God bless.

Click here: 1 John 2:18-25 - Antichrists


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1 John 2:12-17 - Do Not Love the World

These are some tough verses, verses I’ve struggled with in the past, verses that often get abused and used as a pretext to support all manner of religious regulations and prohibitions. In spite of their ill use, they are a part of God’s word and had a genuine purpose in the mind of John when he wrote them. Our job is to find that intent and then apply that to ourselves. What was John saying to his original readers and what is God saying to you and to me. These are actually some wonderful verses of encouragement for beleaguered believers living in a dying world.

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.—1 John 2:15-17

We are living in a dying world and John’s words here are encouragement, wisdom, and warning. But what exactly does he mean? How are they applied? I explain all this and more in this bible study we did on this passage a few weeks back. What does it mean to love the world and how do I avoid it? Click on the link below and give it a listen.





Click here: 1 John 2:12-17 - Do Not Love the World



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1 John 2:7-11 - The Not-So-New Commandment

John writes in his epistle of a commandment which is not new, but on the other hand is new. It is as old as law itself and yet at the same time it is new. That law is love.

In this bible study we dig into these five verses and find more than just a reminder that we are supposed to love each other. What we find is a biblical theology. What we find is an explanation of what is wrong with the world, along with the good news of what Christ has done to make it right again.



Here’s an excerpt:

“And just as today, the dominant characteristics of the world are sin, darkness, and hate, so one day soon this will be a world completely flooded by obedience, light, and love. And Jesus was the invasion of all three. This is why the world hated him and rejected him. And this is why he will conquer.”

We live in a world ruled by hatred and we have been called out of it by love, and that is why love is to manifest itself in all our relationships in this world now. We live in the light and we are to walk as children of light.

Below you will find the audio recording of the bible study we had on these verses. These studies are informal and presented in a small group setting. I hope you will take the time to listen and that it will be a blessing to you. Just click the link below.


Click here: 1 John 2:7-11 - The Not-So-New Commandment


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1 John 2:1-2 Propitiation Part 1

The extent of the atonement is a controversial topic within the evangelical community, though not within the reformed tradition. What the reformed tradition focuses on is not so much the question of ‘for whom did Christ die,’ but rather ‘what did he do for them?’ This passage of Scripture touches on both and we make the case that the former question can only be answered properly once we obtain the answer to the latter.

What I did in this bible study is try to put into the context of the book (1 John) what John is saying in these two verses. It took two lessons to cover. In this first one we connect verse 1 to the arguments John is making at the end of chapter 1 and then we talk about such concepts as antinomianism and what John means when he says that we have an Advocate with the Father. Will we sin as Christians? Is that okay? What happens when we do? Has God made provision for this? Do we have someone to help us?



Then we begin to take a look at the word ‘propitiation,’ how it was used in the Greek language, how it was used elsewhere in the Bible, and how it is onnected to the Old Testament. We end by discussing the holy place and the day of atonement, otherwise known as Yom Kippur. How did that point to Christ and what does it have to teach us about what Christ did at the cross?

Two-thirds of the way through this study we ran into some technical difficulties with the audio so you may notice a change in background noise during a quotation from one of the Psalms. As a whole you should be fine, however, and I hope you will take the time to listen. Just click the link below.


Click here: 1 John 2:1-2 - Propitiation Part 1


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1 John 1:8-10 - Faithful and Just

True Christian fellowship begins in fellowship with God, but includes fellowship with other believers within the Church. John expresses it this way: "If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another." This walking in the light does not mean sinless perfection, for John goes on to say, "and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin." What it does mean is that our fellowship is tied to the gospel of what Jesus has done for us and it is recognizable as a life lived in repentance and faith--in community.

Church is for sinners. But it is for repentant sinners who by God’s grace are now believers. We welcome sinners. But we must never excuse, ignore, or dismiss anything the Bible names as sin. When it is encountered it must be declared as such and repented of. We must not fall prey to the temptation to ignore, dismiss, or redefine sin to fit our culture.

(8) If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 

He is saying something more than “we are lying to ourselves,” though it includes that. He is saying that if we deny our sin we are not in Christ at all--or Christ is not in us, because Jesus is the personification of the truth.

1 John 1:8 destroys the idea of attaining sinless perfection in this life, for what John’s opponents are most likely asserting is not that they've never sinned, but that they've reached a place where they no longer do.

Now, do you see the paradox in the verse? If we claim perfect holiness Christ is obviously not in us and we do not know him. If we admit our sin, Christ is in us. And the Holy Spirit is in us. Because the truth is in us. In the face of holiness our sin becomes more clear and evident. The fact is we are sinful. The closer we are in fellowship with Father and Son and Holy Spirit the more obvious to us that becomes--the more we feel it.

What did John say in verse 6?

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.

Faith and repentance in community. These are what epitomize the life of the genuine believer. Not denial of sin but confession of it.

(9) If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 

This is the alternative to denying our sin. To confess means more than just admitting that we have sinned. It means agreeing with God about our sin. It means laying it before him and seeking forgiveness.

And we will find forgiveness when we do so. That forgiveness is grounded in his eternal, unchanging character. He is faithful and just . . .

What does it mean, though, that he is faithful and just (righteous) to forgive our sins? You'll have to listen to the audio to get the rest. Just click the link below and a new window will open up in your browser where you can stream the audio recording or download it for later listening. It looks like not all of it recorded, but hopefully what's available will be a blessing to you.

Click here: 1 John 1:8-10 - Faithful and Just


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1 John 1:5-7 - Walking In The Light

“Religion, as the Apostle John conceived it, consists of two things: true knowledge of God, and fellowship with God and with each other in that knowledge. To fellowship with God in His Son Jesus Christ, the writer has summoned his readers (vers. 3, 4). For such communion the facts of the Gospel have laid the foundation. To establish and perfect His communion with men is the end of all the disclosures which the Father has made of Himself to us “from the beginning”; to realize this communion is “eternal life.”--George G. Findlay

That was George Findlay's introductory paragraph to this passage and it is fitting. Jesus has come, in part at least, to restore fellowship between us and God. He has come to bring us back into the fellowship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And John is calling us to 'walk in the light as he is in the light.' But what does that mean?



Christians do not walk in darkness. We walk in the light. And we have fellowship with one another in that light. But what does it all mean? What does this 'light' metaphor signify? What does it imply? All of these and more we discussed in this Bible study (our second in this letter) and I hope you will take a few minutes and listen. Just click the link below and may God bless you.


Click here: 1 John 1:5-7 - Walking In The Light


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1 John 1:1-4 - Fellowship In The Life Eternal

We begin our study of 1 John with an overview of the entire letter followed by a close look at the prologue which is found in the first four verses. This First Epistle of John is both a polemic and an encouragement. It is written against a group of false teachers and their false teaching about the nature of Jesus Christ and it is written for the encouragement of a group of believers who have remained faithful to the apostolic teaching in spite of it all.

In these first four verses John comes out on the offensive, attacking the false teaching by affirming the true teaching on the humanity of Christ in his incarnation. Although the controversy that provoked this letter is an old one, there is a lot of relevance for our day in what John writes and why. The letter has much to say to us about the nature of controversy and how and when it should be dealt with.



John also has much to teach about our fellowship with Jesus and with the Father and with each other and how that fellowship is related to our acceptance of the truth about Jesus Christ.

The audio recording for this Bible study is found at the link below. I hope you will take the time to click and listen and that your faith will be increased as your spiritual walk is strengthened by your growing in the knowledge of the Lord. God bless you.


Click here: 1 John 1:1-4 - Fellowship In The Life Eternal


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God Became Flesh - A Christmas Sermon

Many wonderful passages in the Bible came about as a result of controversy. The Epistle to the Galatians, for example (quite possibly the first New Testament book that was written) came about as a result of controversy. Think of a wonderful passage like this one:

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.--Galatians 4:4-5

Were it not for controversy that verse would not have been written. The same is true for our text this morning. The First Epistle of John came about through controversy. Written toward the end of the first century, the writer (who does not name himself in the book at all, but whom tradition names John the Apostle) is writing because of error which has crept into the Church.

The error he addresses was an early form of Gnosticism known by the name of Docetism. It was the idea that Jesus had not really come in the flesh, but that he had been some sort of spirit-being. The reason for this divergence was because of the influence of Greek thinking in Christian circles. It was believed by many Greek thinkers that everything physical or material was inherently bad and that only that which was spiritual was good--because the 'spiritual', to them, was a higher mode of being than the 'physical.'

When this thinking infiltrated the Church it manifested itself in this way: people began to deny the humanity of Christ. He wasn't really human, you see, because that would have made him physical and material and that was bad. He must have been just a spirit-being who only appeared in human form, but wasn't actually human.

John saw this as an insidious error that, in effect, destroyed the heart of the gospel. God indeed became human, he affirmed. God took on flesh. God was manifest in the flesh. We apostles are witnesses of these things. Theologians call this concept--that God became flesh--the Incarnation of Christ.

The Incarnation is what Christmas is all about. John wrote in his gospel:

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.--John 1:14

Below you will find a link to the sermon I preached on Christmas morning about the Incarnation. The text was 1 John 1:1-4. I hope you will listen and rejoice in the good news that God became flesh one dark night two millennia ago that he might save us from our sin.



Click here:  1 John 1:1-4 -- God Became Flesh



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