Here, turn your Bibles to the
book of 2 John. That's where our lesson will
be from this morning. 2 John. Before we begin, let's
bow in prayer. Our Father, which art in heaven,
holy, reverend, is your matchless name. How thankful we are that
you are God alone. God ruling and reigning, always
accomplishing your will and your purpose. Father, we're thankful. Thankful for this world that's
this beautiful creation that you've given us to live in all
the countless many blessings of this life you so freely bestowed
upon us. Father, we're thankful. And especially
how thankful we are for the Lord Jesus Christ. How we thank you
for the unspeakable gift. Of your darling son. Sent to
put away the sin of his people. To redeem us, to deliver us from
the curse of the law. And how we pray that this morning,
as you've given us another opportunity to meet together and to worship,
Father, we pray you would enable us to worship you in spirit and
in truth. Let the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ be exalted and magnified. Enable me, Father, by the power
of your spirit to clearly, simply proclaim the gospel of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Bless your word to the hearts
of your people and for your glory, we pray. What we pray for ourselves
here in our class, we pray for our children's classes. Father,
that you would bless in a special way. We're thankful for the teachers
that you've given to us, thankful for our children. Father, we
pray you'd bless our teachers, that you'd bless our children
as they listen. Give them a ready mind and a heart that would receive
and believe your word. Father, we pray for those who
are sick and hurting need you especially. You have blessed
us beyond measure, but still in this flesh, we are a poor
and a needy people. We need you every hour, every
second. Without thee, we can do nothing.
Father, bless and heal according to the riches of your mercy and
grace, we pray. It's in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ, for his glory, we pray, amen. All right, this
book of 2 John, this letter, is addressed to a woman. John
addresses it unto the elect lady. Now, some of the old writers
feel like that John is addressing this to a church, calling the
church a lady. But I don't think that's so.
I think he did write this to a particular woman. And it ought
not surprise us that one of the apostles would write an inspired
letter to a woman. We know certainly women are not
second-class citizens in the kingdom of God. Throughout Scripture,
there are many prominent women, prominent in God's grace. There's
Ruth, Lydia, Lois, Eunice, Mary Martha, the Syrophoenician woman.
These women were all such obvious recipients of God's grace. And
then when our Savior rose again, the first people he appeared
to were women. So let's look at these. I want us to look at
the first six verses and see some of the things that John
wrote to this dear lady. He says the elder unto the elect
lady and her children, whom I love in the truth, and not I only,
but also all they that have known the truth for the truth sake,
which dwelt in us and shall be with us forever. Grace be with
you, mercy and peace from God, the father and from the Lord
Jesus Christ, the son of the father in truth and love. I rejoice
greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth as we have received
a commandment from the father. And now I beseech thee, lady,
not as though I wrote a new commandment unto thee, but that which we've
had from the beginning, that we love one another. This is
love that we walk after his commandments. This is the commandment that
as you have heard from the beginning, you should walk in it. And I
hope you notice how often in those six verses, the words truth
and love were mentioned. They were mentioned often and
I didn't bother to count them, but just in those six verses,
those two words are used often And that's why I've titled the
lesson this morning, Love and Truth. Truth and love always
go together. Brother Henry called truth and
love, noble and natural companions that cannot be separated either
in heaven or on earth. So I want us to look at these
two noble companions, truth and love. First, let's look at truth. Webster's defines truth as an
actual state of matter. Something that conforms to reality
and something that is a verified, indisputable fact. That's true. Well, God's truth is the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's what he told his disciples.
I'm the way, I am the truth, and I'm the life. The law came
by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Grace and
truth and justice can only be found in Christ. He is the truth
of God. Our Lord told his disciples,
you should know the truth and the truth shall make you free.
Well, that truth is Christ. He's the one who makes his people
free. Really, if you go back and read
these first four verses and substitute the name Christ in the place
of truth, you get a pretty good meaning of these verses. Let's
look at it. The elder unto the elect lady
and her children, whom I love in Christ. And not I only, but
also all they that have known Christ. For Christ's sake, which
dwelleth in us, and shall be with us forever. Grace be with
you, mercy and peace from God the Father, and from the Lord
Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in Christ, in love. I rejoice greatly that I found
of thy children walking in Christ, as we've received commandment
from the Father. That's a pretty good understanding,
we read it that way, of truth. because the Lord Jesus Christ
is truth. And you notice John doesn't talk
about truths, does he? He talks about truth because
there's just one truth. It's the truth of Christ, the
truth of his gospel. Now there's just one truth. There's
many different parts of that truth, but there's just one truth
that all points back to Christ. There's the truth of man, who
man is. And we see that truth when we
see Christ. Man is fallen in Adam. In Adam,
we fell from life to death. We fell from holiness to sin. In Adam, now that's an indisputable
fact. That conforms to reality, doesn't
it? All you got to do is look at yourself, that conforms to
reality. That's an indisputable fact.
All I am is a sinner. That's the truth of man. Man
is ruined in sin and man has no way to make himself not sinful.
He has no way to get rid of his sin. That's the truth of man.
Then there's the truth of God. The truth of who God is. We see
that in Christ Jesus. God's sovereign. He always does
his will. God's omnipresent. He's everywhere
all at one time. God's eternal. God doesn't have
a beginning or ending. He's eternal and because God's
eternal, he never changes. God is holy and he's just. Everything God does is right.
It's holy and it's just. He can't do anything unholy or
unjust. God said he will by no means
clear the guilty because that would be unjust. But this is
also true. God is love. God is gracious. He's merciful. He longs suffering
to sinners. Well, sounds like those attributes
are opposites, doesn't it? How can those attributes ever
line up? How can they ever mesh together? Well, they can mesh
together because God is also wisdom. Only God can provide
salvation that's both just and gracious. Only God can provide
a salvation that's both holy and merciful to sinners. If God's
going to save sinners, not only does all his attributes have
to be satisfied, really all of his attributes have to be exalted. He's going to save a sinner.
Truth says the sinner must die. The soul that sinneth, it shall
die. So truth says the sinner must die. But love says let the
sinner live. Truth says the sinner must be
condemned. But love says let that sinner
go free. Well, what's the answer? How can both of those things
be true at the same time? Christ. Christ is the answer
to every important question. The Lord Jesus Christ satisfies
both truth and love. Christ satisfies both God's justice
and God's mercy. Mercy and truth can only meet
together, can only kiss and be friends in the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ satisfies God's truth.
He satisfies God's justice by dying as a substitute for his
people. God's justice is satisfied because Christ was made guilty
of that sin and then he died to put that sin away. And because
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Father can cry, deliver him from
going down to the pit. I found a ransom. I've provided
the ransom that enables me to be both just and justified. Only
in Christ can God be just be true, be true to his character
in every way and still justify the ungodly. Christ answers the
truth and justice of God. Christ satisfies God's love.
He satisfies God's love by saving the people that God loved by
his substitutionary death for them. Truth and love meet together
in Christ. Christ was punished for the sin
of the people that God loves and he saved them in truth, in
justice. The greatest illustration man
will ever see of truth and love is seen at Calvary. The truth
and love met in Christ at the cross. That's the truth of who
God is and how God saves sinners. Then there's the truth of how
sinners are made righteous. The Father made Him, made Christ,
sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him. That's an indisputable fact.
That's how God makes sinners righteous. Look at 1 John chapter
5. There's a truth of faith. Every
saved person has faith in Christ. They believe Christ. 1 John 5
verse 10. He that believeth on the Son
of God hath a witness in himself. He that believeth not God hath
made him a liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave
of his son. And this is the record that God has given to us eternal
life. And this life is in his son.
He that hath the son hath life. And he that hath not the son
of God hath not life. That's truth. That's an indisputable,
undeniable fact. He that hath the son, he that
believeth on Christ has life. And whoever doesn't believe him
doesn't have life. They're dead. And in our text, there are several
other parts of the truth that I want us to look at. First of
all, there's the truth of election. John wrote this letter unto the
elect lady. This letter is written to a woman
who had been greatly blessed with God, greatly blessed. She's
an elect lady. Almighty God chose this woman
to salvation. He set his love upon her before
he ever created anything. And in time, he gave her faith
in Christ. This is a blessed woman. And
John knew she was elect because she gave evidence of that by
walking in faith, by walking in the truth. Just like Abraham
and Rahab, this woman walked in the truth. That's how John
knew that she was one of the elect. Now, election is a very
important part of the truth. There cannot be any salvation
without God's election unto salvation. We'd never choose to be saved.
We'd never choose Christ left our own will. God had to choose
a people to save or nobody'd be saved. That's just truth.
And this was so important. The early church understood this
so clearly. The early church referred to
each other. They referred to believers. They
called each other the elect. The elect. In scripture, saved
people are only called believers two times. But many, many, many
times they're called the elect. This is an important part of
the truth. Election is truth. And it's a loving truth, a loving
truth. We are elect in God's electing
love. God didn't choose us because
there was anything good in us. He didn't choose a people because
we would ever do anything good or we would be worthy of him
choosing us. No, just the opposite. But God
chose a people he loved because God is love. That's truth and
love. And God showered his love upon
this woman, this dear lady. She's one of God's elect. And
you know what? She had a sister, God saved too. God was gracious to her sister.
She had a sister who was one of the elect. Look at verse 13.
The children of thy elect sister. Greek deity. God saved her. She
saved one of her sisters. And what's more, God was gracious
to this woman's children. He elected her children too.
Verse four. John says, I rejoice greatly
that I found of thy children walking in truth. Her children
gave evidence of their election and their faith by walking in
the truth. Their mother undoubtedly brought
them to hear the gospel. She taught them the scriptures
and God saved them. And they gave evidence of that.
They walked in the truth just like their mother did, just like
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Rahab. They walked in the truth. This is a blessed woman. Every
parent in here, your heart gets caught in your throat when you
read that. Maybe God do that for my children. Maybe God do
that for our children. I've said this before in the
10 o'clock hour, the most important thing going on in this building
is those three classes. That we're teaching our children,
that we're teaching them the scriptures, that we're pointing
them to Christ. Because that's what God uses
to save his people. If God save our children, God's
answered our every prayer. He's answered every prayer of
a parent, at least certainly our most important prayer, that
God save our children. Look at Psalm 113. This woman,
this elect lady was a mother. Nothing will make a believing
mother more happy than to see God save her children. Psalm
113, verse nine. He maketh a barren woman to keep
house and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise ye the Lord. Now every woman is spiritually
barren. We can't give birth to spiritually
alive children, spiritually saved children. Oh, but God makes that
barren woman a joyful mother of children when he saves them
by his grace. That's what he did for this woman.
Oh, she's such a blessed woman. God blessed her greatly. But
I'll tell you who else this was a great blessing to, a great
joy to. The elder John. They tell me, everybody I've
read on this says John's probably 100 years old at this time. Not
only is he an elder in the church, he's up there in years, he's
an elder. And nothing brings a pastor, an elder like John,
more great joy than to see God save his people all by his grace. That's the pastor's every prayer
for people. that God would save him by his
grace, that God would bless his word and save his people by his
grace. There's no salvation without
this truth. God's electing one. Then there's
the truth of the new man who's in every believer. John says,
for the truth's sake, which dwelleth in us. Now the new man who's
born of God is born of the spirit of God, the spirit of Christ.
And that man dwells in us, dwells in a believer. In the exact same
way the old man dwells in this flesh, the new man dwells in
the heart of a believer. The spirit dwells in the heart.
Many times in scripture, that new man is called Christ in us.
Here, John calls it truth, for the truth's sake, truth which
dwelt in us. But many times in scripture, it's called Christ
in us. That's what the Apostle Paul
called our hope of eternal life. Christ in you, the hope of glory. There is no salvation without
the new man being born in us and dwelling in us. That's the
truth. Then there's this truth, the truth of salvation that can
never be lost at the end of verse two, and shall be with us forever. This new man, Christ in us, will
be with his people, will be in his people forever. He'll never
leave or forsake his people. I know people love to debate
this. Can a person be saved and then lose their salvation? Anybody
who thinks that is a legalist. That's all there is to it. We
can lose our salvation if we've earned it by our good works,
right? If I earn my salvation by my good works and I can lose
it by my bad works. If I can earn my salvation by
my decision, someday I might lose my salvation because I make
a decision not to. But if Christ saved us by his
purpose, by his grace, then we can never lose that salvation
because he never changes. That's the truth. Someone who's
saved can never lose their salvation. Then verse three, there's a truth
of grace. John says, grace be with you.
Now grace is God giving us what we do not deserve. So salvation,
has to be all of grace. That's the truth. That's an indisputable
fact. Salvation has to be all of grace
from beginning to end. It's all of grace. Where does
salvation begin? It began with God's election.
Scripture calls it the election of grace. God chose a people,
not because we deserved it, No, God chose a sinful people who
didn't deserve it. That's what grace is. God chose
the people in spite of who we are. God chose the people because
of who He is. Because God is love. He chose
sinners to save. Salvation began with the election
of grace. Then there's redeeming grace.
How is it that we're saved from our sin? Because Christ died
for us. Not because we deserved it. No. We deserve to die because of
our sin, but Christ took the place of his people. He died
to redeem us from our sin. Now, brethren, that's grace.
That's a gift we did not deserve, but God gives it to us because
God is love. That's truth and love, redeeming
his people from their sin. Then there's regenerating grace,
God the Holy Spirit coming and giving life to the dead. That's
grace. There's calling grace. God calls
his people to Christ. And when he calls, we come, don't
we? That's grace. Then there's keeping grace. God
keeps his people to the end. If we reach the end of this life,
and just like the brethren we read about in the book of Hebrews,
these all died in faith. If we can add our name to that
list, there's only one reason for it. It's God's grace. I want to tell you, if you believe
now, you're going to die in grace. Or die in faith, because God
has keeping grace from beginning to end. Salvation is of grace. That's an indisputable fact.
Then there's a truth of mercy for sinners. John says, grace
be unto you and mercy. Now mercy is God not giving us
what we do deserve. Why doesn't just God give us
what we deserve? We talked about that a minute ago. Why does God,
a just God, not give us what we deserve? Because he gave Christ
our substitute what we deserve. That's the only way a sinner
can be saved in justice and truth. There can't be any salvation
without mercy. God's mercy for a miserable sinner. Then there's a truth of peace
with God. Grace be with you, mercy and peace. Oh, this is
some necessary peace. Man's at war with God because
of our sin. And we're at war because we started
it. You and me, we declared war on God right along with Adam.
In Adam, we declared war on God. Brethren, we started war. We
can't win. We picked a fight we cannot win. And the only way
there can be peace with God, there's just one way. It's through
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. He made peace for us. through
the blood of His cross. And peace in the blood of Christ
is a two-way street. First, the blood of Christ removed
the sin that made God angry. God's at peace. There's no reason
for Him to be angry anymore. The blood of Christ removed the
sin of His people. But then second, the blood of
Christ sprinkled on the heart of a sinner gives us a new nature
that loves God, that desires God, that will surrender to God,
and there's peace. How many times we hear Brother
Henry say, stack your arms, put down your shotgun. That's what
happens when the blood of Christ is applied to our, we lay down
our arms, we put up our shotgun and we surrender to God and there's
peace. Now this is truth, an indisputable
fact. Salvation always brings peace
with God, always. Then there's the truth of the
deity of Christ. And this is something that the
apostles were so insistent upon, the deity of Christ. In verse
three, John says, grace be with you, mercy and peace from God,
the father. Now, almost no one in the world
would have any dispute with John if he'd put a period there after
father, but he put a comma from God, the father and from the
Lord Jesus Christ, the son of the father in truth and love. Jesus is God. Now, can you imagine? We're going to look at these
verses later, but John says in verse seven, for many deceivers
are entered into the world who confess not that Jesus Christ
has come in the flesh. Can you imagine how the Apostle
John hated that, that teaching that Jesus Christ did not come
in the flesh? This is the beloved disciple,
the disciple of love, who leaned on the Savior's breast. He knew
Christ came in the flesh. But more than just coming in
the flesh, when we talk about Christ coming in the flesh, it
means that he did what he came to do because he's God and God
cannot fail. Jesus of Nazareth is God. He's the only manifestation of
God you and I'll ever see. He's equal with the Father every
way, because he's got the exact same nature. Our Lord said, I
and my father are one. They've got the same nature.
Was the father holy? Of course he is. Then so is Jesus,
because he's the son of God. He's got the same nature. Is
the father eternal? Of course he is. And so is Jesus,
because he's one with the father. Look at John chapter three. I
love this verse. Is the father omnipresent? Is
the father everywhere all at one time? Well, of course he
is. He's God. Then so is Jesus because he's
God. John 3 verse 13. You know this
story, the conversation between our Lord and Nicodemus and just
kind of get the picture of these two men stand there talking in
verse 13. This is our Lord speaking. And
no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven,
even the son of man, which was in heaven." No, he says, which
is in heaven. And if Nicodemus really heard
what our Lord said, he just... This man standing here talking
to Nicodemus, standing here in the flesh on earth. is in heaven
at that very moment because he's omnipresent. Jesus is God. And that very one who sits on
the throne in glory right now is omnipresent. He's in our midst. Two or three are gathered together
in my name, there am I in the midst of you. Jesus is God. He's omnipresent. And that's
very important, that Jesus is God. Because only God can satisfy
God. Only God can be what God requires. But this is also true. A man
has to be the representative of other men. Only a man can
represent men. So what did God do? God became
a man, in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus of Nazareth
is God. There's no salvation without
the Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man. He's both God and man. He's got the 100% nature of God
and 100% the nature of man in one person. He's the God-man.
There can be no salvation without that truth. Now that's the truth. That's who Christ is. Truth,
though, is always in love. Here's our second word, love.
True. Christ is true. And Christ is
love. We won't take the time to to
read it, but just like we read these first four verses and put
the name of Christ in for truth. Sometime this afternoon, you
can read Second Corinthians 13. You can put the name of Christ
in wherever you see the word charity and you'll get a very
good meaning of that chapter because Christ is true and he
is love. All the father's love is in Christ. All of it. So if the Father loves
you and me, He's got to love us in Christ because all of His
love is in Christ. And when God loves His people,
He loves them in truth, doesn't He? It's not just words. It's not just saying it doesn't
mean it. No, He loves His people in truth. Well, who is true? Christ. So He loves His, the
Father loves His people in Christ. And all of God's love for his
people has to be in Christ. It has to be. Because even God's
love is not unconditional. Our love's not unconditional.
We love our children. There's a condition of that.
They came from our bodies. There's something to that. Even
God's love's not unconditional. Now, don't get me wrong. You
and I don't have to meet any conditions in order for God to
love us. Christ did. Christ did. God could not love
a sinner if Christ did not die for us, wash us from our sins
and make us righteous in Him. That would be impossible for
God to love us if Christ didn't take away our sin because God's
holy. God is truth. He loves his people
in truth. Love and truth have to go together. They have to. And we need to
remember that. I want to be true. when I preach.
I want to be true to God's word. I want to be true to the character
of God. God's not going to use a lie to save anybody. God's
not going to use a lie to feed his people. I'm all how I want
to preach in truth. I study very carefully so that
I can preach in truth and not tell you something that's not
so. But truth, this truth alone, truth without love, truth without
compassion, would be cold, would be hard, and would be damaging. But love without truth would
be an emotion that's detrimental to people. Love without truth would knock
the foundation out from under truth and make it not so. And
I'll give you an example. You see this so often. Here's
a man. He's been convicted. He's been
caught. He's red-handed. It's an indisputable fact. He
is a mass murderer. It's an indisputable fact. And
here's his mother at the courthouse, tears streaming down her face,
telling the judge, don't punish him. He's a good boy. You know,
I love him so much. Well, good chance. That's why
he's in the shape he's in. She loved him so much, she never
could stand to discipline him, see him suffer if she disciplined
him, and he just got worse and worse and worse, so now he's
in front of the judge. That's a love without truth. That's
ungoverned love, and it's detrimental to people. That's not God's love. That is not God's love. That
is not the love that we preach to people. God loves his people
in truth. So you know what he did? He put
the sin of his people away in truth. In truth, he punished
their sin fully in the person of their substitute so that their
salvation sure. Justice can never call it back
because it's perfect. Truth and love must go together. You can't say you hate these
truths and say you love God. Both of those things cannot be
true. We can't say, oh, I love God, but I hate his wholly just
character. You can't say, oh, I love God,
but I hate his sovereignty. You can't say that. If you love
God, you love his sovereignty. If you love God, you love the
fact that he's wholly unjust. You can't say you love God and
then turn around and say you hate the truth that God saves
whom he will and damns who he will. You can't say that. You
can't say that you love God, but you then say, well, I believe
Christ died for everybody to give everybody a chance to be
saved. You can't say that because that's liking the love of God,
but hating the justice, the truth of God. But if God has been pleased
to reveal himself to you, you know Christ in truth and you
love him in truth. You love everything about him.
And how can I know Do I love Christ in truth? Can I know that? You can look at verse six. And
this is love that we walk after his commandments. This is the
commandment that as you have heard from the beginning, you
should walk in it. If you love Christ, you walk
in his commandment. Now, this is not talking about
the commandment of the law. If you love Christ, you know
he already kept the law for you. He already fulfilled it. And
you would not insult him by trying to keep the law too. I mean,
you wouldn't insult Christ by trying to redo the work he's
already finished. Now, if you love Christ, you
walk in his commandment to walk by faith, not by sight. If you
love Christ, you walk in this commandment. You walk through
this world looking to Christ, trusting him. If you love Christ,
you walk in his commandment to love your brethren, to love others.
And here's another way, you know, do I really love Christ in truth
or not. If you love Christ in truth,
you wouldn't change one thing about it. That's how that's how
we know we love him. Truth in love. Henry was right
there. Noble companions are Lord.