If you would, please turn back
to 1 John. Again, chapter two. I'm going to endeavor to actually
carry on with what I said I started with, the overview of this book. As I've said, and I will continue
to say, 1 John is a book about knowledge. It's about knowing. and believers know. It's that
simple. Our Lord did not leave us ignorant.
He gave us his word, and he has opened our understanding, he
has promised to do that. It's a book, it's specific about
the knowledge of the believer about God, about Christ, and
about his spirit. You will not find a lot of science
in the book of 1 John, but there is a treasure of knowledge. Science is never the point. The worldly knowledge is never
the point. The knowledge of God is what
John is relating to us here. Now you may see in this book
a lot of psychology because here John reveals what the believer
knows and what the believer knows in himself and what the believer
knows in others who don't believe. Because the point of 1 John is
for the true believer to know God and to actually know that
he knows God. We know that we know him. That was 1 John chapter two. We know that we know him. That's verse three of John chapter
two. If Jesus Christ, the truth, is
in you, the hope of glory, if his love is shed abroad in your
heart, you know him. And because you know him, you
will know the things of the spirit of God. His spirit will see to
it. We've been given that promise
by Jesus Christ himself. There's a question asked in the
scripture. Who maketh thee to differ? Well, the answer's God. God's the only one that makes
the believer to differ from the unbeliever. God's the only one
that imparts life where there was only death. In John here,
we find out a little bit about how we are different. We know him. The world doesn't
know him. John's playing. John calls a liar a liar. And he calls a believer a believer. Yes, we can know that we know
him. And we can be confident that
he which began a good work in you will perform it unto the
day of Jesus Christ. The next thing I wanna look at is 1 John 2 and verse 18. I'm
trying not to take too long on most of these. Little children,
it is the last time. And as ye have heard, that Antichrist
shall come, and even now there are many Antichrists, whereby
we know that it is the last time. How is this shown to us? Look
at the next verse, verse 19. They went out from us, but they
were not of us. For if they had been of us, they
would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that
they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. Many antichrists are come, and
they went out from us. Verse 20, but ye have an unction
from the Holy One, and ye know all things. I have not written
unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know
it. And no lie is of the truth. who is a liar, but he that denieth
that Jesus is the Christ, he is antichrist, that denieth the
Father and the Son. They went out from us because
they were not of us. How much more simple could that
be put? You understand, John, I think probably
the longest word in this book is the word righteousness. You
don't see great sweeping themes of justification, sanctification,
those big words. No, John just says, if somebody's
a liar, he says they're a liar. If he said they went out from
us, it's because they were not of us. Because had they been
of us, they would have no doubt continued. Why? Jesus Christ said, if ye
continue in my word, then, Are ye my disciples indeed? He sees to it that his people
continue. We know that we know him. And if you don't know him, you'll
leave. We've seen it in this little
place. This assembly, This gathering
of people, we've been gathering, what, 30 years? Hereabouts together? We've seen more people leave
than are here right now, once you put all those people together.
And yet, you've been here the whole time. Mason's been here
the whole time. Mason, y'all were here before
I came. What's the difference? Well,
it's he that maketh thee to differ. If you know him, you will follow
him. It's got nothing to do with us,
no matter what people say. They may say, because I don't
like the way Walter preaches, or I don't like the way Joe preaches,
and he didn't say that right, or he said something wrong, which
it could very well be. I have said things wrongly before,
incorrectly, and I apologize, but that was a mistake. I hope
it wasn't an error. I don't want to be an error,
but I know sometimes I am. But I certainly don't want to
make mistakes, even though I do. But here's the thing, I've heard
other preachers make mistakes, but I'm still here too. I'm not leaving Christ because
a man makes a mistake. And if you're gonna leave Christ
because man made a mistake, you don't know Christ. And that's
what happens when you leave this assembly. Now I'm not talking
about people getting transferred or having to live somewhere else
or go somewhere else to hear the gospel. But if you're going
home to pout, okay. Just say it for what it is. John
did. We stay because he has given
it to us to stay. We know the truth. We know God,
we know Jesus Christ, and we know his Holy Spirit because
we know him. This is a statement by the Apostle
John about why we stay and why they leave. And what's the difference? We know that we know him. He
is all the difference. And here's the thing, what they
won't tell you when they leave. They have somewhere else to go. You understand? I don't have anywhere else to
go. I don't have anywhere else to
go. I don't know anywhere else where the gospel's preached,
whether I'm preaching it or not. I was coming here for years when
I wasn't preaching. But I came to hear the word of
God preached by Walter and by Earl. And you know why I stayed? Because
I love to hear the gospel preached. I love to hear Christ extolled. I can't go that way. I can't
go to another place and hear Christ's sovereign grace preached. I have been there. They've got somewhere else to
go. There is nowhere else to go for those who know him. And
there's no reason to leave if his gospel's preached. 1 John 2 and verse 29. If ye know that he is righteous,
ye know that everyone that doeth righteousness is born of him. Isn't that a statement? Everyone that continues. Continuing is righteousness.
And continuing is not of you. I spoke last week, we are kept
by the power of God through faith, and that's the gift of God, it's
not of yourselves. Until his day. Without him, there
is no righteousness. Because he alone is righteous,
and he alone is righteousness, and any righteousness that I
have, any righteousness that you have, is in him. and him
alone. And God's people know that. How do you start it out? In the
first chapter. We know our sin, and we know our sins. It says, if we walk in the light,
as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another in
the blood of Christ. His son cleanses us from all
sin. Believers walk in the light,
but believers have in them darkness still. Now, right now. Understand, the believer walks,
he'll stray into darkness, he'll be tempted by darkness, he'll
be blinded by darkness sometimes, but that is not where he lives. We abide in Christ. And the blood of Christ has cleansed
us from all sin. The blood of Christ shall cleanse
us from all sin. In him we are righteous. Because right now, all of my
righteousness are still filthy rags. Right now. Not just later. Not just in the past. Right now,
the only righteousness I have is his. The only righteousness
that I can possibly do is what he has put in me both to will
and to do of his good pleasure. If you know that he is righteous,
you know that everyone that doeth righteousness is born of him. Any righteousness. Any righteousness,
all righteousness comes from God. None of it comes from man. No matter how nice, no matter
how good, no matter how noble we think it is, true righteousness
only comes from God and God alone. First John chapter three and
verse two. Well, I preached on this just
a while back. Verse one, behold what manner of love the Father
hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of
God. Therefore the world knoweth us not because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know
that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall
see him as he is. We know this. Our Lord is coming
again. And our Lord has promised that
even if we die, we're gonna get a new body. If we live, we're
gonna get a new body. But he's coming, he's coming.
That's what manner of love this is. We know he's coming again,
and we know we will be like him, and we know we're gonna see him. What did Job say? With my own
eyes. In my flesh I shall see God,
whom I'm gonna see for myself and not another. That's what
John's talking about here. He's coming. Verse five of 1
John 3, and ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins,
and in him is no sin. You know why he came. Believers
know why he came. The world doesn't know why he
came. The world still doesn't know why he came. They've got
this book just as well as you and I do. And they read this
book, and some of them study this book, and still, you'll
hear the wildest things about why Jesus Christ came. Well,
the angel told Joseph, call his name Jesus, for he shall save
his people from their sins. And what does John write here?
and ye know that he was manifested, made known to take away our sins,
and in him was no sin. You know why he put that in there?
Because if there was sin in him, he couldn't take ours away. It's
gotta be a perfect sacrifice. That's what all those Old Testament
sacrifices pointed toward, but none of them were perfect. No,
not a one of them was perfect. Even the ones when fire came
down and consumed it up, that wasn't a perfect sacrifice, because
that was an accursed animal that died. This was the perfect, only
begotten Son of God, and He was manifested to take away our sins,
and in Him was no sin, is no sin, never will be any sin. And
guess what? He did take away our sins. He took them away. There you
go. Behold, what manner of love God's
laid upon us. He sent his son to take our sins
upon himself, to be made sin and take away all our sins. That's
the manner of love, the true manner of love. First John, verse
three and verse 14, it says, we know, we know. that we have passed from death
unto life because we love the brethren. He that loveth not
his brother abideth in death. Whosoever hateth his brother
is a murderer, and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life
abiding in him. Now just to be clear, we don't
pass from death unto life because we love the brethren. We know that we pass from death
unto life in that we love the brother. Verse 19 says this, 1 John. And hereby we know that we are
of the truth and shall assure our hearts before him. We know
we've passed from death unto life because we love the brother.
He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. You know who
the example was right before this, don't you? Verse 12, not
his cane that slew his brother. If you hate your brother, you're
a murderer. Now John's talking about the family of God here. If you hate your brother, you're
a murderer. And no murderer has life. That's how serious this love
of the brethren is. And if it's not in you, and you
say it's in you, you're a liar. And what, the truth's not in
you. John just lays it flat out. But we know these things. We
know these things. We know we are of the truth. How? Verse 18, before verse 19. My little children, let us not
love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And hereby we know that we are
of the truth. John, all throughout this book
you'll find him say, if we say, or if someone says. You know
what he's talking about? He's talking about hypocrites.
Jesus Christ talked about those that were, they honoreth me with
their lips. But what'd he say? Their hearts
are far from me. Yeah, they're as far from, the
east is from the west. They're as far as death and life are
apart. I will tell you this, John doesn't
say you have to like all your brethren, he just says you gotta
love them. I said it last week, sometimes up close I'm not the
most lovable person. I'm more lovable from a distance
than I am up close, some days. But here's the thing, even some
people that I don't necessarily get along with, that I don't
actually like that much, I do like them, but I like them better
from a distance. When they talk about the gospel,
I rejoice. When they talk about Jesus Christ,
and they're talking about the same Jesus Christ, the same Lord
that I'm talking about, I can rejoice and I'm happy that they
know him. And yes, that's the love of God
shed abroad in my heart. And if you feel the same way,
that's the love of God shed abroad in your heart. We're pretty unlovable as a whole,
if you really wanna know the truth about it. If you really
wanna get down to where we live, there's a reason that sometimes
police officers have problems. It's because they get to see
the human race at its worst element a lot of times. They get to see
when people have died, people have been killed, people have
been murdered, they have to deal with the people who did the killing,
they have to deal with the people who are affected by the killing.
And when you see, I mean, right now we're all wearing our church
clothes, such as they are. We're all here, we're all clean,
we're all happy. We're glad to be here. But when man is at his
lowest point, he is very unlovable. But we love the brethren anyway,
whether they're up or whether they're down. Why? Because of
him. Because of him. The love of God. And I spoke a little bit about
this, 1 John 3 verse 23. And this is his commandment,
that we should believe on the name of his son Jesus Christ
and love one another as he gave us commandment. And I went back
to John chapter 14 and 15, 16, I'm not gonna do that today.
And he that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him and he in him
and hereby we know that he abideth in us by the spirit which he
has given us. I didn't point this out last
time. I'm gonna point it out this time. It says we should keep his commandments. And when John says this in verse
23, and this is his commandment, it says it singular. You wanna
know why? Because then he tells us two
things. What'd he say? that we should believe on the
name of his son Jesus Christ and love one another. But he
says this is one commandment. And then in verse 24 he says
there are two commandments. You know why? You can't separate
the two. You can't love the brethren unless
you believe Jesus Christ, not true love. and you can't believe Jesus Christ
without loving his brethren. He goes on to say that emphatically
later on. You can't separate these commandments. Here's where I wanted to get.
First John, chapter four, verse one. Beloved, believe not every spirit
But try the spirits, because many false prophets are gone
out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of
God. Every spirit that confesseth
that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. How simple is that? How hard
is that? First things first. Beloved,
believe not every spirit. Now, he makes it very clear that
these spirits are messengers. Because many false prophets are
gone out in the world. Believe not every spirit. John's
very clear, these false prophets, false preachers, there's many
of them. Don't believe everything you
hear. Don't believe every one you hear. Listen to what is said. I don't have a problem with that.
Please apply that rule to me. You can apply it to Walter. You
can be like the Bereans. Search the scriptures. See that
these things are so. We're not making up anything
here. All we're trying to do and endeavor
to do is to teach the truth of God as it is in his word. And understand this please, there
are many, many, many false preachers. I know this might go out on the
television. And I'm gonna tell you a fact right here. There
are more false teachers than there are true teachers. Guess what? There always has
been. Couple of the best examples. I had to look this up Walter,
I'd forgotten the guy's name, Micaiah, or Micaiah. He was one prophet. Jehoshaphat
called for all the prophets to talk. to see whether I should
go forth with this fella to war. And there were 400 other prophets
that all said, oh yes, go, you're gonna have a great time. You'll
be great and successful. And they hunted down Micaiah
because he didn't want to come. And Jehoshaphat said, there's
only one left, it's Micaiah, and he hates me, I hate him.
Because he never prophesied any good for me. And guess what,
he didn't prophesy any good for him that time either. But there
were 400 prophets who lied to one prophet who told the truth.
Get used to those numbers. I don't know how many false preachers
there are around us. All I know is there's way too
many. The next, I'll give you another example, Elijah. It was
Elijah on one side and 450 prophets of Baal. on the other. And you know who
told the truth? Well, it wasn't the 450 prophets
of Baal. One man. What's John saying? Because many false prophets are
gone out in the world. They're still there. Oh, the
tone's changed. The trimmings have changed. but
their message hasn't changed. Their message is man first, God
maybe, or God second, at best. How do you know if someone is
of God? What do they say about Jesus of Nazareth? Here's the question. Who is come
in the flesh? The Spirit of God? The Holy Spirit
confesses, professes, that Jesus, who is the Christ, the Messiah,
is come in the flesh. And by that I mean every word
of this Old Testament and New. That Jesus, this Jesus here,
the Messiah, the Redeemer, the Lord of hosts is his name, the
eternal son, has come in the flesh. And those who say that and mean
it are of God. Jesus Christ is God manifest
in the flesh. He is both God and man, and it
doesn't matter what men say. Because I'm gonna tell you, well,
I'm gonna show you a few of them. and he was sent by the Father
to save his people from their sins and he redeemed every single
child of God. Every one that the Father gave
him before the foundation of the world, he redeemed while
he was here. We preach Jesus Christ and him
crucified. because he did save his people
from their sins and he is now seated on the right hand of the
majesty on high. And he is making intercession
for his people. So here's the negative. What
do those say who are not of God? Simply put, they'll say anything. And they say everything. But
I'm gonna tell you something, I heard some things yesterday
that I didn't believe somebody would be stupid enough to say.
And I mean that seriously. They say, and I heard it from
somebody's own lips on a recording, Jesus was man until God touched
him and put the spirit of the living God in him and that's
encouraging today. No, I'm here to tell you, that's
not encouraging, that's blasphemy. That's blasphemy today and that's
blasphemy every day. And I don't care who says it. I heard him say, Jesus is not
the only begotten son of God. Yeah, that's what I thought too.
Y'all are looking at me like I'm crazy. That's a good thing. Because you gotta be crazy, stupid
and unlearned to say something like that. I'm afraid that man's a liar.
And the woman who was sitting there listening to him, agreeing
with him, she's a liar too. Because John 1.14, John 1.18,
John 3.16, John 3, 18, Hebrews 11, 17, and
1 John 4, 9 say explicitly that Jesus Christ is the only begotten
Son of God. But they're out there saying
different. They're not confessing what? What did John put? They're not confessing that Jesus
is the Christ. I don't, I don't understand, well, I do
understand. I do understand. We are the sons and daughters
of God right now. And the scripture does say we
are begotten of God. But that doesn't make us equal
with Christ. He's the only begotten son of God. He's the eternal
son. A child was born, yes, Jesus
was born, but the son was given. The son is eternal. He's the
one who made this planet. He was with God and he was God. And there wasn't anything made
without him. So to say he was just a man till
God touched him with a, people are crazy. People are crazy. I heard a fella say this. This
is the last one, I'm gonna quit because this is crazy enough
as it is. And here's where it lies, okay? This is what he said. Adam, in the garden, in the garden,
Adam was God manifest in the flesh. And I'm gonna tell you something.
These are preachers that say this. They pass themselves off as true
preachers, they pass themselves off as prophets, and they pass
themselves off as Bible teachers. They are false prophets, deceitful
workers, and they are denying God, the Holy Spirit, and they
are denying Jesus Christ. Beloved, believe not every spirit. And here's the thing, the world
has given these people who say these things millions of dollars. And I mean that literally, millions
of dollars. One of them's got two or three
airplanes, jet airplanes. They live in big multi-million
dollar mansions. Evidently, heresy is big business. And it is. It is. Why does this happen? Look at
John, first John four and verse five. They are of the world. Therefore speak they of the world. And the world heareth them. And the world loveth them and
hateth you. That's where it is. John is giving us an assurance
of knowledge, but John is also warning us of what's out there. There are many false prophets.
Most of them don't go as far as this trash I just read, but
all of those were million dollar people. Big mega churches. You know, I mean, it looks like
a basketball stadium. 20, 30,000 people in there, it
looks like. Maybe it's only five or 10, I
don't know. I can't count that high when I'm looking on TV.
And I'm not gonna try. But they'll go there and they'll
give their money to these people. There was, there was, no, I ain't
gonna go into that. There was a guy shuffling his
feet through their money on the steps. below the pulpit. I'm blessing this money. I'm
blessing your money, blessing your seed. For filthy lucre's
sake. They make merchandise of people. They say they're sheep, but they're
wolves. They're wolves. And it's not even good sheep's
clothing, Walter. They're in sheep's clothing,
but it's not good. Because you know that guy shuffling his feet
through that money back and forth, blessing, excuse me, blessing
all that money, he didn't give none of it back. He kept it all. The world hears them. So what
are we supposed to do because of this? Preach the gospel. We are of God, he that knoweth
God, heareth us. He that is not of God, heareth
not us. Hereby know we the spirit of
truth and the spirit of error. That's verse six. And I like
this first statement. We are of God, he that knoweth
God, heareth us. Because that's a proof both ways.
It's a proof. that you are of God if the ones
who know God will hear you. And it's a proof for those who
hear that they know God if they hear those who preach God. I don't know if that made any
sense, but it made sense to me. Believers are of God. And believers
are the only ones who can say that they are of God. Those that
know God hear those that are of God. Because those that are of God
speak of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit as they truly
are revealed in this word. They preach his gospel, his message. We preach Christ crucified to
the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness. And
we preach him crucified resurrected, ascended, seated, and successful. That's the part that the world
always leaves out. See, he's successful. He's successful. He has saved his people from
their sins. He is bringing in his sheep that are not of this
fold. Every single one of them. And
not a bit of this salvation is dependent upon our cooperation. Not like the others preach. Oh, God needs you. God needs
you to be saved. God needs you to be holy. God
needs you to give money. That's usually where it ends
up, the giving money part. We know the spirit of truth and
the spirit We know both. The world only
knows the spirit of error, and they have mistaken it for the
spirit of truth. These people, a lot of them are
sincere. I'm not talking about the preachers now, because I'm
pretty sure most of them know they're lying. I don't mean to
be wrong, and there are some sincere people out there preaching.
heresy and blasphemy. But it's still the spirit of
error. They don't know they're deceived if they're deceived. They are teachers and listeners with itching ears. Like I told you before, people
that leave, they got places to go. I don't have anywhere else
to go. Evil men and seducers, I do know
this, evil men and seducers are waxing worse and worse. And they shall wax worse and
worse. Hereby know we that we dwell
in him and he in us because he hath given us of his spirit.
That's John four and verse 13. What's it say before that? Verse
12, no man has seen God at any time. If we love one another,
God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know
we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given
us of his spirit. He has promised to never, never
leave you and never, never forsake you. Why? He's in you, the hope of glory. We know that we know him and
his spirit lives in us. Here in his love, our love, made
perfect that we may have boldness in the day of judgment, this
is verse 17, because as he is, so are we in this world. As he is, so are we in this world
in his sight. There is no fear in love, but
perfect love casteth out fear because fear hath torment. He
that feareth is not made perfect in love. Verse 19, we love him
because he first loved us. Do you know him? Do you love
him? If you do love him, it's because
he first loved you. It's amazing. God loves the unlovable. That's us. God saves the ungodly. God pardons
the unrighteous. God grants grace to the unwilling. Behold what manner of love the
Father has bestowed upon us, unworthy creatures. We only love him because he first
loved us. We only know him because he reveals
himself to us. We only believe Him because He
gives us life and faith. And He works in us both to will
and to do of His good pleasure. And guess what? That includes
believing Him. That includes trusting Him. That includes loving
Him. All gifts, good gifts, perfect
gifts, come down from Him. And I'm gonna tell you something,
grace and faith and believing God is a perfect gift. We're
not perfect, but his gift is. We know him. That's the grace
of God. Our Heavenly Father, we're thankful
for this time and this place. Most of all, for your son, our
Lord Jesus Christ, who came and gave himself a ransom for many. He was bruised, bloodied, beaten
for our transgressions, for our iniquities, and by his stripes,
we are healed. Thank you, Lord. In Christ's
name, we do pray.