Turn to 1 John, chapter 2. 1 John, chapter 2. We'll pick
back up in verse 6 and 7 and down through 14. Now, last week, we looked at Christ, our Advocate. We have, he says in here in verse
1 of this chapter, my little children. I like the way John
writes that. He says, My little children,
these things write unto you that you sin not. And if any man sin,
we have an advocate. It's not over with. It's not
over with. And if any man sin, we have an
advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He's
the propitiation for our sins. He's the mercy seat. He's the
sin offering. He's all we need. Jesus Christ Himself is all I
need. And we are told how we are to
walk even as He walked. It does not say, and I know this,
I know we are sinners saved by the grace of God, but I like
the way the Word of God gives us no excuses. He says walk even
as He walked. He doesn't say try to walk, make
an attempt at it. He says do it. Walk even as he
walked. And then he says in verse 7,
Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, no new message. This
is not a new message. But an old commandment, an old
message which you had from the beginning, the old commandment
The old message is the word which ye have heard from the beginning. What I have written unto you
is not new, but is from the beginning. The gospel that we preach is
not a new gospel. It's not a modern gospel. It's
the old message. That's why he's saying it's the
old message. The person of Christ that we preach, his offices is
not new. This is not new. To love one
another. is not a new message. No, that
was given to Adam. Love is not a new commandment.
It's not a new doctrine. You know, the gospel is called,
in Revelation 14, the gospel is called the everlasting gospel. It's the everlasting gospel.
The gospel was around before God created the heavens and the
earth. The everlasting gospel. When Adam failed, You ever notice when Adam fell,
it says they heard the voice of God walking in the garden
in the cool of the day? Calm. It wasn't lightning and
thunder and earthquake. That says so much to me of how
God has taken care of all of this, all of our salvation, this
whole thing. When Adam fell, he rebelled against
God. And all creation fell with Him.
We all fell in Adam. We all became rebels. We all
became God-haters. God comes into His garden walking
in the cool of the day. Calm, cool, quiet. Not this storm and lightning
and fire. Why did not God kill them on
the spot? Why did He not kill that rebel
on the spot? Well, you know the answer. You've
been well taught. He already provided the Savior. He's already
taken care of all this. He's already taken care of it.
Then he says in verse 8, again, a new commandment I write to
you, which thing is true. Now, listen, I like this verse.
This really stood out to me this week. Which thing is true in
Him and in you? Whatever is true in Christ, whatever
is real in Christ, is true and real in you. That's what he's
saying. He said, because the darkness
is past and the true light now shining. Now he says here a new
commandment, not commandments. He says a new commandment. This
new commandment is no more and no less than the old commandment,
the old message revealed in a new light. Christ came into this world and
He revealed the love of the Father. And He revealed what it is to
love your neighbor as yourself. He revealed that when He came. Love one another, He said, as
I have loved you. Look over in John 13. Over in John 13. This is our
Lord. We see it in a new light. We
see it exemplified by Him. He exemplified this love that
he's speaking of. He says in verse 34 of John 13,
a new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another. That's all he has to give, isn't
it? If you love one another, in Scripture that fulfills the
whole law. If you really love one another,
you'll seek the best, just like you do your children. You seek
the best for your children. If you love one another, as I
have loved you, oh, that we could love one another as our Lord
has loved us. As I have loved you, that ye
also love one another. And by this, by this love, shall
all men know that you are my disciples. You belong to me.
You're my children. This is how you know the children
of God, really. We can say many things. John
says that back over in 1 John. If a man say, we can say a lot
of things. Talk is cheap. Talk doesn't cost
anything. It's the walk that costs. By this shall all men know you're
my disciples, if you have love one to another. It doesn't say
if you believe the doctrine of election. If you believe in predestination. If you believe in particular.
No, if you love one another. That's how they'll know. That
if you love one another, this new commandment, I tell you this,
I got it just down. It was new to me when I found
it out. It wasn't new, but it was new to me when I found it
out. But how did He love us? I just
read that love one another as I have loved you. Sincerely. How did our Lord love us? Sincerely. He could not love me more. You
know, I could love you more. You could love me more. The Lord
Jesus Christ couldn't love me anymore, and he loves me. Couldn't
do it. Couldn't do it. Sincerely, the Pharisee pretended
to love God, and he pretended to love his neighbor. I tell you, the only one that
the self-righteous man loves is himself. That's who he loves. He loves himself. Our Lord said,
They draw near me with their lips, but their heart is far
from me. And then secondly, he loved us
sacrificially. Now that's love, isn't it? It's one thing to say, I love
you. But when you really love someone, let's say like a husband
truly loves his wife, you know how he proves it? He provides
for her. He takes care of all of her needs.
He sees to it that she lacks nothing. Sacrificially, he goes
and works long hours. He'll do whatever he has to do.
Legally, he does whatever he has to do and works however long
he has to work to provide for his wife he loves and his children,
if he has any children. That's how Christ loved us. He
loved us sacrificially. He took the wrath of God Almighty
on himself for us, for his children. He gave his all. I could give
more. I could give myself and what
I have more. I could give more of it. And
you could too. Christ couldn't give any more.
He gave all He had. Every ounce of it. He gave His
all. Having loved His own, which were
in the world, He loved them, it says, to the end. I could
probably be, and I'm sure I probably could be, broken. I could suffer
enough to where I'd probably deny for Peter. Peter didn't
even suffer when he denied the Lord. But our Lord suffered the
wrath of God and not one time denied us. Not one time. He couldn't love us anymore.
Couldn't do it. He held nothing back. He held
nothing back. Then how can we say This being
so, how can we say we love God? How can we say that and hate
the brother, and hate our brother? Well, Jonathan, how can that
be so? And what he's teaching here,
it cannot be so. It cannot be so. Whether it's
a brother in Adam or a brother in Christ. Because I have them
both ways. I have them both ways. We've
had some people stop in here beggars. I've been here and I've
had conversations with two or three of them in here. I came down here once and nobody
was here and a couple of them came down. Well, there go us
by the grace of God. You believe that? That's so. That's so. A believer loves all
men. He can't help it. He cannot help
it. And this new commandment To love
this new message, which is not new, it's just newly revealed
in a better light since Christ has come. This new commandment
is true in Christ. It's real. And it's true in those
who are in Christ. It's real in you. The love of
God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. It's there. It's real. It's genuine. It's
not a put on like the Pharisees. It's real. This is not something
a person can work up. You can't work up love. You can't
just make yourself love somebody. It's either there or it's not
there. If Christ is in you, and you
are in Him, then you possess. Now listen.
You possess what He possesses. What's in him, what's in him
is in you. What's in him? Love. God is love,
the scripture says. What he possesses, you possess.
As he is, so are we in this world. And he says in verse 8, the darkness
is past and the true light now shineth. The darkness of the
ceremonies, the ceremonial law, he said, is past. It's gone.
We now understand it. Don't you understand the Passover
lamb now? Do you understand the ceremonies, the tabernacle and
the high priesthood and all the shedding of the blood? We understand
that now. He said that darkness is past.
And the darkness of our ignorance is passing away. It's past and
it's passing. Every time I learn something,
more out of the Word of God, the darkness is passing. It's
passing. And one day, one day, there'll
be no darkness at all. In our understanding, there'll
be no darkness. In our love to God, there'll
be no darkness. It'll be passed. It'll be gone.
And here's why it's passing. Because we've been taught of
God. He says, all thy children shall be taught of God. God will
take them and personally teach them. And what better teacher
can you have than God Himself? I promise you this, if He teaches
you, you'll learn the lesson. You know, I've been taught a
lot of lessons over my life that I can't even remember. But if
God teaches you, you'll remember it. You'll retain it. You've
been taught of God and the true light of Christ now shineth.
Christ said, I am come a light into the world. Christ has come, Scripture says,
and given us an understanding. We understand the gospel. We
understand how God saves sinners. We understand this. We understand
now who God is. You don't see any pictures on
these walls, do you? You don't see the idols and religious paraphernalia. You don't see none of that stuff.
We understand who God is. God is spirit. God is spirit. We do not worship Him with trinkets
and things that we make. We worship God from the heart.
We worship God in spirit and truth. We understand who God is. He's
come and given us an understanding. We understand what we are too,
don't we? Oh, there was a time we didn't think we were that
bad, really. We still have a hard time thinking sometimes. But we really didn't. But now
we know. Now we know. We know if it was not for the
grace of God, we'd be... We'd be as bad as we could be.
We'd be as bad as we could be. I've watched a program on TV
the other day. It's been a few weeks ago. It's
about this prison. They had this man locked up 24-7.
He's out one hour a day. And then when they took him out,
they had him chained. They even had a mask on his back.
I mean, this guy was... And I thought that, and I thought
that truly now could be any one of us. And I thought how sad it is that
you have to be locked up, that a person has to be locked up
from society. Caged like an animal. That's
human nature. Every now and then God lets human
nature, He lets it have its own reign. He lets it have some rule. He lets it, why? To show us who
we are. That man walked out of there
like an animal, caged, chained, the mask to keep him from biting
the guards. I was just, I was just my soul. I thought that's
human nature. We understand what we are by
nature. And we understand how God can be just and justify us
through the Lord Jesus Christ, through His blood and His righteousness.
We understand that. We understand how God loves us
in His Son. We understand something of it.
There's a lot we can't comprehend. You can't comprehend the love
of God. It passes all understanding. We are children of light. We
do not live in darkness anymore. We don't live in darkness. No,
we don't. Now, he that saith he is in the light, he's illuminated
by the Holy Spirit, he's born of God, that God has saved him,
that he believes Christ, that he looks to Christ, that he hopes
in Christ, that Christ is all his hope, and he hates his brother. John said, that man is in darkness.
He said, I'm not going to placate this guy. He's in darkness. Even, he said, until now. Look
over in Matthew chapter 5. Here's this commandment our Lord
has given us. Over in Matthew chapter 5. Listen
to this. Matthew 5. Look in verse 43. Our Lord says, ye have heard
that it hath been said that thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate
thine enemy. Well, he didn't get that from God. But I say
unto you, love your enemies. God did. Were we not enemies
in our minds by wicked works? That's what Scripture says. Love
your enemies. Bless them that curse you. Do
good to them that hate you. and pray for them which despitefully
use you and persecute you." Our Lord did. Go read John 17. I pray for them,
Father. We were this way. He prayed for
us. "...that ye may be the children
of your Father which is in heaven. For he maketh his Son to rise
on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just
and on the unjust, God does that. If you love them which love you,
what reward have you? Do not even the publicans the
same? Do not even the worst of men do the same? And if you salute
your brethren only, what do you more than others? Do not even
the publicans the same? Be ye therefore perfect. Be ye
mature, grown up in Christ, even as your Father which is in heaven
is perfect. Be ye perfect as he is perfect. He said, the hate of man's brother,
that man's in darkness even until now. Don't be fooled by it. That's
what he's saying. Don't be fooled by it. Now listen, he's saying
this too. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of
God, is not in that man. It says in Scripture that he
shed abroad Love of God in our hearts, the Holy Spirit has shed
abroad the love of God in our hearts. Now if a man hates his
brother, he says, the Holy Spirit's not in him. He doesn't know Christ. He doesn't know him. He does
not understand the gospel. That man is in darkness, spiritual
darkness. He's like the five, you remember
the story of the five foolish virgins? There was ten virgins. There's five foolish ones that
took no oil in the lamp. Five of them had oil in the lamp.
Five of them did. They were called five foolish
virgins. That's what this man's like. He claims to have all these
things and he has none of them. He has none of them. He that
loves his brother, and verse 10, now he that loves his brother
abideth in the light. He dwells in the light. He lives
in the light. The man who really loves his
brother has a real kinship with him. He wants the best for him, as Paul did for the Jews. Over
there in Romans 9, he said, I could wish myself a curse from Christ
for my brethren, for those Jews, according to the flesh. That's what he wants. That's
what love produces. That's what mature, mature love produces. You want the best. Not just for
your family, but for all men. You want all men to know if you
could just hear this message. If you could just hear this message
and what I hear, if you could just hear it. Every time he went
into a synagogue, we'll see that this morning, he was pressed
in spirit. It's like he said, listen to
me. Listen to me. I'm telling you
the truth. This is real. That's the heart of a believer.
That's the heart of God's children. He abides in the light. He's
a new creation in the Lord Jesus Christ. That man abides in the
Lord Jesus Christ. And Christ, who is the light,
dwells in him. I don't know how to explain. You
know, we're not we're not in the business of explaining. We
are not in the business of explaining the gospel. We proclaim the gospel.
But I tell you this, God The Lord Jesus Christ, who is God,
is in every one of His children. He's in you. And He's not in
you just by head knowledge. He's in you. Where do you think
that love comes from? Where do you think that motivation
comes from? It comes from Him, who's in you. Christ is that new man, that new man
that's in you. You're that new man, Christ's
that new man, and that's how you're one. That's how you're
one. One of the greatest evidences
of Christ in you is this. It's your love for the brethren.
It is your love for one another. Because that comes from the Lord
Jesus Christ. By this shall all men know you're
my disciples if you have love one to another. But he that hates
his brother That's a strong word, isn't it? But that's exactly
what he's talking about. Not just has a disagreement with
him. We have disagreements. But he that hates, despises,
doesn't want to see him, doesn't want to be around him, does not
enjoy this fellowship. He that hateth his brother is
in darkness, spiritual darkness, and he walks in darkness even
though he doesn't know it. He doesn't even know it. Doesn't
even realize. You think those Pharisees realized
that? Those Pharisees, they thought they were in the light. They
thought they were the ones who were right. All along walking
in darkness. And he knows not where he's going.
Because that darkness had blinded his eyes. John reminds us here again that
no matter what a person says. Doesn't matter what a person
says. If love is absent, if it's absent,
it's because the Lord Jesus Christ is absent. And His whole walk,
His whole course of life, no matter how outwardly He may look
good, is in darkness. If the light in thee be darkness,
He said, how great is that darkness. Look over in 1 Corinthians chapter
13. Let's look at this again. Look at these first three verses
here in 1 Corinthians 13. Paul says, Though I speak with
the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become
a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And you can take that
word and say, and have not Christ. And though I have the gift of
prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though
I have all faith so that I can remove mountains and have not
love, I'm nothing. I'm absolutely nothing. I tell you this, if you husbands could do all
this, and have not love to your wife,
it would be as nothing. You wives know this, don't you?
It would be nothing. If your husband could remove mountains,
if your husband could speak with the greatest oratory, and he
didn't love you, it would be nothing. You'd say, man, I hate
to go home. You'd hate having to go home. And though I bestow all my goods
to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned as
a martyr, and have not love, it profits me nothing." It's
useless. It's over with. That's what he's saying. Now
he says, I write unto you little children, all God's children. But I like the way he started
out here with the little children, don't you? I do. He's speaking
on our level. He includes here all of God's
children. I write to you this commandment to love one another.
No matter what others may say, or what they may do, how they
may treat other people, we are to love one another. Love, the
Scripture says, covers a multitude of sins. Aren't you glad God
hasn't revealed your sins to everybody? Aren't you glad God
has not revealed your thoughts this day? He's covered, covered
a multitude of sins. There's so many things I'm glad
it's not revealed. Love covers a multitude of sins. Love, the Scripture says, hideth
the matter. When you hear someone just blasting
somebody else, you can be sure they don't love that person. Love covers a multitude of sins.
And this is the best way to instruct the children. Isn't this the
best way to raise up your own children? I tell you, the best
way to instruct your children to exercise love at all times. Exhaust love first. I taught you in your home, A
lot of you have small children now, young children. The best
thing you can teach them is to love each other. And boy, you
hope that when they grow up, they do. Teach them to love one
another. Love at all times one another.
This is the best teaching we can give. To love. To love. Love
one another. Love will keep young converts
from doing many hurtful things, especially to each other. Listen. Doctrine of itself, doctrine
of itself won't keep you from hurting anybody.
But love will. Love will. Love will keep you from hurting
your brother. Love will not flaunt itself. Doctrine only will. Love will suffer long. Love will
suffer long. It puts up with a lot. Doctrine
only won't. Those Pharisees believed. They
believed election. Paul believed election. Paul
believed particular redemption. But he hated God's people. But
now look at him. Look at him through the book
of Acts. We'll go through the book of Acts. He is being whipped and beat
and thrown in prison. And he goes right back to the
same place and preaches Christ to them again, hoping, hoping
that God will save some of them. Doctrine only won't do it, but
love will. And then he says, I write unto you, little children,
because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake. I like
the way he doesn't complicate that. Nothing motivates the heart of
God's children to love like knowing they are forgiven for Christ's
sake. And he leaves it at that. He says, little children, you
all love one another. as God has loved you and forgiven
you for His Son's sake. For Christ's sake. Here's what He does here. I'll
wind this down. The first thing He does is make
them focus on the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Take your eyes off the situation.
Take your eyes and your mind and your heart off of these things.
Scripture says, set your affection on things above where Christ
sits at God's right hand. If our affections are set on
Christ, I'm thinking the natural response will be love. It'll
be love. Because you'll be overwhelmed
with the fact that He loves you. I write to you, fathers, because
you have known Him from the beginning through the years of being instructed
out of His Word and by His Spirit and by experience. We've grown
up in Him. There are children in Christ,
young men in Christ, and fathers in Christ. Those who have grown
up in Him. And we always need a word of
instruction at any age. You take the youngest person
here to the oldest person here. And we all need instructions.
There's never a time that I don't need to be instructed. There
was a time I was a know-it-all. I was about 16. I'm glad there's no teenagers in
here. But I was a know-it-all. My parents
could not teach me anything because I thought I knew it. But as I've
gotten older, I realize I don't know much at all. I don't know
much at all. And I need to be instructed.
If the Lord lets me live to be 80, 90 years old, I need to be
instructed. And he says in verse 13, young
men, because you've overcome the wicked one. Do you ever notice
who fights the battle for this country? young men, 18, 19, 20 year old,
protect this country. They are in the hardship. They are out there in the war
zone. I mean, they are taking the heat
of the battle. And here we sit comfortably. Here we sit comfortably. And that's the way it is usually
in the ministry. God calls out the men and He
has young men. And they're the ones who are
out there in front of the battle. He says, charge! Guess who goes
charging? Those young men. They go right
across the line and fight. That's why he says here, you've
overcome the wicked one. He writes to instruct and encourage
young men because that's one of the most difficult times of
life. The world wants your youth. The
world wants your energy. This is what it wants. It wants
your attractiveness. They like to hire young, attractive
men and women, in sales especially. They want to hire that attractiveness. Youth is easily fooled. It is. That's why these are sending
those young men into battle, those old men. Those old men
say, you're out of your mind. They are hiding over there in
the foxholes. It used to just astound me when I'd watch these
Civil War things, and they'd just line up and shoot each other
until the last one was standing. I thought, that's not courage.
Somebody ought to shoot that general. Well, anyway. H.R. says, young men, young men,
you've overcome the wicked one. You're fighting the battle. You're
right in there. And I write to you, little children,
because you've known the Father." As the Lord said to Peter, He
said, feed my lambs and feed my sheep. Little children don't
know much, do they? They don't know much. But I tell
you what they do know, their Father. And because of the spirit
of adoption that you have in you, you cry, I am the Father. That's why He says, I write to
you, little children, This, you've known the Father. You know who
the Father is. And it repeats this to the fathers and young
men, so to impress upon them the importance of following Christ
and loving the brethren and continuing in the faith. Here's the lesson. Here's the lesson that you love
one another and all will be well. Okay.