1 John 3:7-11 (Teaching)

[0:00] Good morning. Good morning. We'll be back in 1 John chapter 3 this morning. Y'all can tell my voice is quite a bit better than it was last week.

[0:17] I appreciate y'all's prayers and ask you continue to do so. I'm not coughing nearly as much and I'm in pretty good shape this morning.

[0:30] Hopefully that'll last. Last week in 1 John chapter 3, I'm not horribly mistaken. We covered the first six verses and I really didn't want to cut it off, but I did where we did because it was the best cutting place I could think of at the time.

[0:51] Last week we covered the first six verses and I said, it begins with behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us.

[1:05] It's been a little bit of time talking about that. John goes on to talk about a couple of other things, talking about how we are the sons of God, even though we are currently, presently, if we're saved the sons of God, it still doesn't appear to us what we shall be.

[1:30] That's a pretty massive thought to wrap our minds around. He goes on down in the scripture a little bit.

[1:43] We talked about verse 4, whosoever commits a sin transgresseth also into law, for sin is the transgression of the law. Then verse 6, if I'm not mistaken, where we cut off whosoever abideth in him, then we cut off whosoever hath not seen him, neither known him.

[2:07] We talked about that last week and we spoke about it this week because it continues on in the coming verses. This doesn't mean that we don't sin anymore once we get saved.

[2:24] It doesn't mean that we are made perfect in these bodies. There's a perfect one dwelling on the inside of us in form of the Holy Spirit.

[2:36] Yes, and he cannot commit sin. It's not that he does not commit sin. He cannot commit sin. It's impossible for God to commit sin, whether it be through the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit.

[2:51] God cannot sin. If God could sin, he wouldn't be God. He cannot sin. I preached a message about that one time, about the temptations of Jesus Christ.

[3:09] The three temptations that we're familiar with. When he was driven into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit, he was tempted of Satan. Satan tempted him those three times.

[3:21] Of course, we know that the Lord retorted Satan with Scripture. He wasn't tempting Jesus to see if he would sin.

[3:32] Satan knew Jesus wouldn't sin, but he was tempting him nonetheless. If though Satan's been around longer than you or I, either one. The Bible says the Word of God has forever settled in heaven.

[3:46] Satan knew that Jesus couldn't sin, but he tempted him nonetheless. There was no chance whatsoever that Jesus would have given him to any of those temptations because he could not sin.

[4:02] He cannot sin. The Bible says here in 1 John 3 that if we abiding, or it says, whosoever abideth in him, sinners not.

[4:16] That doesn't mean that we abiding him and then don't abiding him 50 or 100 times throughout the day. When we're not abiding in him, that's when we sin. No folks, we abiding him.

[4:28] We're born again. If we're saved, we're abiding in him constantly. He is abiding within us constantly. It's a perpetual thing.

[4:39] So we'll pick up in verse 7, 1 John 3. He says, little children, let no man deceive you. He that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous.

[4:53] So it begins with little children, let no man deceive you. That throws a red flag up to me that John is aware of some deceivers coming into the church. Some people that are maybe manipulative.

[5:06] Or just outright evil people coming in, trying to convince people of another gospel. Trying to convince people of something else other than what John has been or will be writing to these people.

[5:22] They come into the congregations and he's warning them. Little children, let no man deceive you. Paul said, if any man or any angel preaches another gospel to you, let him be a curse.

[5:35] And it's the same gospel that John preached, the same gospel that Paul preached, the same gospel that Jesus Christ himself preached. It's a gospel of repentance and belief in the Son of God.

[5:49] That's the gospel that we need to concentrate on. But he says, let no man deceive you. Little children, let no man deceive you. He that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous.

[6:02] So he that doeth righteousness is righteous. John here is not making a distinction between righteousness and religion per se.

[6:17] He's actually tying the two of them together. If we take into consideration the previous verse, whoever has not seen him, neither known him.

[6:32] If we consider that in that context and we read that he that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous, he's not differing the two of them.

[6:45] When I say he's not differing righteousness and religion, he's tying them together much the same way that James did. He said, faith without works is dead being alone. He said, show me that faith without that works, I'll show you my faith by my works, James did.

[7:01] So works and faith, works and religion, if you'd rather phrase it like that, they go hand in hand. And you cannot be saved without some kind of work.

[7:14] You may not be a preacher, you may not be a teacher, you may not do evangelism on the streets or whatever the case is. You may not do those things, but God, if he has saved you, he has saved you for a purpose.

[7:29] He has consecrated you and he has sanctified you. He has set you apart from the world to do a work and do a service of some kind for him.

[7:40] And that work should be done to the righteousness of God. It should be done to the glory of God. And these works, if we're saying and we're doing the work that God has put in our life for us to do, it will be seen as righteousness, it will be counted as righteousness.

[7:58] But their first work of righteousness, the first work of righteousness any of us should have ever done would be believing on God, believing in the Son Jesus Christ.

[8:09] The Bible says Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness. We have to believe God, we have to believe the Bible. And then the other righteousnesses will be added to that.

[8:24] The He that doeth righteousness is righteousness even as He is righteousness, even as who? Even as Jesus, even as one of the previous verse that we're abiding in, He is abiding in us.

[8:37] If we do righteousness, then we are righteous even as He is righteousness. Well, how does all this tie together here?

[8:48] We know that Jesus Christ is righteous. We know that from the Scriptures, remember, John is writing the Scriptures to the first and second generation believers here.

[9:04] They didn't have the New Testament, he's writing the New Testament to them. Probably unbeknownst to him that it would ever become Scripture. But he says that we are righteous.

[9:15] If we do righteousness, we are righteous even as He, even as Christ is righteous. How was Christ righteous? Well, Christ just is righteousness, yes, we can say that beyond any doubt.

[9:29] But how was He righteous? How, in this context, how would that be explained better? Christ lived a life of total obedience unto the Father.

[9:41] That was the righteousness that John, I believe, would be getting at in this verse here. He says, He that doeth righteousness is righteous even as He is righteous.

[9:53] If we take the righteousness of Christ and we say, well, Christ in all of His righteousness, He healed blind people. He unstopped deaf ears. He healed lepers. He done this and He done that.

[10:05] And I can't do that. Am I truly righteous? Folks, if we can't do that, that doesn't mean that we're not righteous. But how can we be righteous as Christ was and is righteous?

[10:18] We can do it by living an obedient life to the Scriptures and living an obedient life unto God, unto our Maker, unto the one that consecrated and sanctified us.

[10:31] And that's the best example of doing righteousness that we can do. And I can promise you, I promise you, and John gets into that in the next few verses, I promise you, if you live righteously and you live an obedient life unto God, the world will want to hate your guts for it.

[10:49] The world will look at you, they will make fun of you, they will say this and they will say that, about you and about your life and about your walk, the world will hate you.

[11:01] If that happens, but Jesus give us warning about that in the Gospel, didn't He say, you should be hated of all men for my name's sake. And He also said, if the world hates you, know that it hated me firmly.

[11:13] They don't hate us because of who we are. They hate us because of whom we're associated with. I went over that last week as well. They hate us because they hate Jesus Christ. That's why they hate us.

[11:26] Verse 8, He that committed sin is of the devil, for the devil sineth from the beginning. For this purpose, the Son of God was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil.

[11:40] He that committed sin is of the devil. Folks, I've heard it often and I agree that context, when you're reading scripture, context is everything.

[11:51] Context is everything when you're reading the scriptures. I can go to the book of Ecclesiastes right now and justify all kinds of sin, reading things out of context.

[12:02] Book of Ecclesiastes, it's very easy to do that in it until you get to the 12th chapter. And that's when we realize that's not the case and that's not what Solomon was getting at, was justifying sin.

[12:17] Context is everything. The second most important thing is tenses. When we're reading scripture, we've got to pay attention to the tenses, whether it's past, whether it's present, whether it's future, whether it's in the perfect tense or it's not.

[12:33] These are very important. Context is everything, yes, but I believe personally tenses comes in a very close second to that. He that committed sin is of the devil.

[12:44] This word committed, this is in the present perfect tense, meaning that it's perpetual, meaning that it's someone who lives a life of constant sin. We talked about that last week when we talked about verse 6 and when we talked about, he that abideth in him, abideth in Christ.

[13:03] It says he that committed sin is of the devil, talking of someone who constantly sins. For the devil, seneth from the beginning. Notice that word, seneth. That's also present perfect tense.

[13:14] He's constantly sinned. He sinned from the beginning. He's sinned in the past. He's still sinning today and he'll sin on into the future. This is the present perfect tense that we're talking about for the devil, seneth from the beginning.

[13:29] He that committed sin is of the devil. People look at that and I've heard it said myself. People say John was being awfully harsh. John wasn't being like Jesus Christ.

[13:40] John wasn't being loving. Jesus Christ called some people, himself called some people the children of the devil. So why can't John do it? It's the truth and it's the truth of Scripture.

[13:52] Jesus told some people, told the Pharisees one time he said, you'll cross the sea, search him for one proselyte. You'll go all around the sea, looking for one proselyte, one convert to come and follow you.

[14:07] And when you do find him, he's twofold more the child of hell than you are. These are the words of Jesus, nothing's words of me. It's what Jesus said. And so it's not harsh, it's truth.

[14:19] What's the old saying that we know? The truth hurts and it does. The truth of this Bible broke my heart and it hurt bad before I was saved.

[14:30] When I was under conviction, this Bible, which is truth, God, which is truth, Jesus Christ, which is the way and the truth in the life. It broke my heart and it hurt, the truth does hurt.

[14:43] So John is not being rash and he's not being unloving and he's not being uncrossed like. He's being very much like Christ and saying that he that committed sin is on the devil.

[14:57] But remember, this is present perfect tense that we're committed. He that committed sin, constantly sin, wakes up thinking about sin, goes throughout the day thinking about sin, lays down his head at night, thinking about sin, constantly sin is on their heart and on their mind.

[15:13] This type of person is of the devil. For the devil, sin is from the beginning. For this purpose, the Son of God was manifested. Well, hang on a second, back up in verse five, it says, you know that he was manifested to take away our sins and in him is no sin.

[15:29] So why was Jesus manifested? We got two different things here and two different verses. Folks, you're next two different things. John tying it all together. Verse five, he says, you know that he was manifested to take away our sins and in him is no sin.

[15:44] Verse eight, for this purpose, the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. So if we compare verse five and verse eight, he was manifest to take away our sins.

[15:56] And verse eight, he was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. What did John just say in verse eight? That the devil's sin is from the beginning.

[16:08] And anyone that commits a sin, present perfect tense, is of the devil. And Jesus Christ was manifested to take away those sins. And in taking away those sins, he is destroying the works of the devil.

[16:21] It's not two different things that Christ is doing here. He's doing one thing in two different actions. He's destroying the works of the devil and that he takes away our sins when we are saved.

[16:35] He not only takes them away, folks, he washes us clean of our sins. And praise God for him washes us clean. He makes us new. He makes us whole. He makes us pure. He makes us righteous.

[16:47] He makes us all of these things. And this is the work of Christ that we can be called all these things. That we can be called the sons of God. So for this purpose, to some God was manifested that he got destroyed the works of the devil.

[17:05] Verse nine, whosoever is born of God does not commit sin, for his sin or seed remain within him. And he cannot sin because he is born of God.

[17:17] And we'll reiterate. Tense is very important. It's very important. Whosoever is born of God is his present. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin, does not commit sin.

[17:30] That's the present perfect. Whosoever is presently born of God does not commit sin. That's not his present perfect means we don't live the life of perpetual sin.

[17:44] We don't live a life of continual sin. In fact, we live a life that is quite the opposite of that, which is quite the opposite of the world. We look at the world and we might listen to the news or read the paper or read on Facebook, however you get your media.

[18:03] And we read about the murders. We read about the rapes. We read about the child abuse. We read about the spousal abuse. And we look at these things and we say, my goodness, that person is just full of the devil.

[18:18] I've heard that so many times. And that's not a lie. That's true. That's the truth. All these things are sinful. People go on a killing spree.

[18:29] We read about dobatics or alcoholics or whatever the case is and we hear all these stories and we think that person is just full of the devil. I'm glad I ain't like that.

[18:40] Be careful. It's a very pharaceutical attitude to have. I'm glad I'm not like that because at one time you were. At one time you were just like that. You might not have ever touched a drop of alcohol in your life, but you were full of the devil and you were full of sin.

[18:54] And that's all you were full of. Folks, we still sin. We still got sin in our lives. We still got sin in our bodies. We still got sin in our minds. We still sin.

[19:06] Even as born again children of God, whosoever is present tense, born of God, does not commit sin. Present perfect tense. We don't live that life. We live a life contrary to that.

[19:18] We do our best not to sin. We ask God to help us not to sin. We ask God to forgive us of our sin. We ask God to guide us in your way. Guide us on the straight and narrow path. Guide us in your law.

[19:30] David in the Psalms, he praised God for the law. He praised God for his statutes. He praised God for all these things. And we should praise God for the same.

[19:42] We are all part of the word of God. But we do not live a life of continual sin. Like we once did. In fact, sin, once we're born again, sin should break our heart when we do it.

[19:56] But it should also drive us to God. To be forgiven of that. I'm not saying for a fresh coating, or a fresh cleansing of the blood of Jesus Christ, that was given when we were born again.

[20:12] I'm saying that sin, because of the inward man, the one that dwells inside, because of the Holy Ghost of God living on the inside of every born again believer, because he is there, it grieves him when we sin.

[20:27] Because it grieves him, it should grieve us. And that grievance should drive us to the arms of the Father who saved us from the very day that we receive salvation.

[20:38] And we know that we can go to him. We know that we can go to him. And we know that he's a forgiving God, because he's already forgiven us of our sins.

[20:49] But we shouldn't continue in sin. We shouldn't continue in sin. For the devil, or I'm sorry, verse 9, for his seed remained in him.

[21:02] Back up to the beginning of verse 9. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin. For his seed remained in him. He gives us the what? Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin.

[21:14] And he gives us the why? For his seed remained in him. For his seed remained in him. For God's seed, for the Holy Spirit, it remained in him.

[21:28] Once again, this is present perfect tense. Tense is very important. It constantly remains in him. And I believe I've brought it up here before, and I'll bring it up again.

[21:39] I can't believe the people that believe that they're saved and lost 20 times throughout the course of a day. And there's people out there like that.

[21:51] There's people out there that think that the slightest little little thing that they do is going to put them in hell. And folks, if that was the case, I mean, God wouldn't have time for y'all because he'd be with me all the time.

[22:08] And you should be able to say the same thing about yourself, that God wouldn't have time for anybody else because he'd be forgiving you all day long.

[22:19] And I thought he is a forgiving God, and I thank God that he is. But he says that whoever is born of God does not commit sin. For his seed remained in him.

[22:30] Present perfect tense constantly. His seed constantly is in us. It is perpetually in us. It is forever in us. His seed remained in him.

[22:41] That's the why. And he cannot sin because he is born of God. This is not saying that we cannot sin, period. It is not saying that we are made perfect such as Jesus Christ at the moment of our conversion.

[22:57] That's not what John is getting at here. He is saying, and he cannot sin because he is born of God. The phrase cannot sin, well, does not commit sin and cannot sin are both in the same tense.

[23:17] We've already been over those tensets. And it's talking about a constant sin. It's not talking about period. It's talking about a constant sin.

[23:28] If we're born again, we do our best to live and abide by the moral law of God that he has given us to do and praise God.

[23:39] The Holy Spirit abides within us to guide us on that path, to guide us into that life, to guide us into be soft and to guide us into being the light that God has called us to be.

[23:52] So folks, there are people. There are subdenominations, I won't say denominations, but there are subdenominations that teach the cause of this verse and a couple of others within this same book, First John, that once we're saved, we don't sin anymore.

[24:12] And folks, that's contrary description. Yes, we sin and John realized that we sin even after conversion, even after we're born again. So when you hear somebody, and it's bound to happen, if you never have, it's bound to happen.

[24:26] When you hear somebody say, well, I ain't sinned since I got born again. Folks, that's contrary to what the rest of Scripture says. So that's not what John is getting at here.

[24:38] Verse 10, In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil, whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.

[24:52] So in this, in what? Well, Binsar's a period in our English translations at the end of the previous verse, at the end of verse 9.

[25:03] In this, the children of God are manifest, he's referring to what he's about to say. He says, in this, the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil.

[25:15] Then there's a colon there in our English translations. Not in the original text, there was no punctuation in the original Greek text. But in our English translations, that's how it reads.

[25:28] So he says, in this, the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil. And he says, whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.

[25:39] He says, in these two things, in this, and these two things that he just listed, are the children of God manifest, and the children of the devil.

[25:50] It shows who the children of God are, and it shows who the children of the devil are, in those two things that he just listed. He says, whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God.

[26:02] Well, folks, to flip side of that coin, and be manifested whom the children of God are, would have to be whosoever doeth righteousness, it are the children of God, or is the child of God.

[26:15] And then he says, neither he that loveth not his brother. If that's the ones that are the children of the devil, the flip side of that coin would have to be, he that loves his brother is a child of God.

[26:27] They that love their brother are the children of God. And that's what John is getting at in this verse of Scripture here. So whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.

[26:42] Folks, we're called to righteousness. We're called to righteousness in Jesus Christ. We have already covered righteousness a little bit this morning. But we are called to that righteousness, and we are called to be righteous.

[26:58] And every time I teach on righteousness, I won't say every time, but most times, I like to bring up a fact, a biblical fact, that three times in the Bible, righteousness is plural.

[27:16] It is only brought up three times in Scripture. The plural form of righteousness. All three of those times, it's talking about the righteousness of man.

[27:29] Never once has the righteousness of God made plural, but the righteousness of man has done so three times. In the book of Isaiah, we hear it quoted all the time, and we hear it quoted as, Our righteousness is this filthy rags.

[27:45] It's actually, you flip over and read it for yourself. Our righteousness is, Our righteousness is this filthy rags. It's plural. It's talking about the righteousness of man.

[27:56] There's only one true righteousness, period. There's only one true righteousness in the Bible, and that's the righteousness of God.

[28:07] We are called to that righteousness, and we are called to be righteous, just as Jesus Christ is. We're called right here in the third chapter, a first John to be righteous, even as Christ was and is righteous.

[28:23] So, whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God. If they're not constantly, once again, we're intense as here, and I hate to make an English lesson out of a Sunday school lesson, intense is very important.

[28:39] Whosoever doeth not righteousness, that's present perfect, meaning, once again, it's constant, it's constant, there's no end to it. Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loatheth not his brother.

[28:54] Loatheth not his brother, that's also present perfect tense. So, doing righteousness and loving our brother is a constant thing. I mean, y'all got brothers and sisters in Christ, that you love them, but you don't particularly like them.

[29:09] I think all of us could probably say that. But, you know, the Bible teaches that if at all possible, we get along with all men, whatever's within us, we need to get along with all men.

[29:28] But whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loatheth not his brother. For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.

[29:39] This is the message that you heard from the beginning, from the very beginning of this whole shebang, we would say, nowadays, but also at the beginning of this letter, John began with that.

[29:54] And John, I told you all since we've been going through it first, John, it's well documented in church history that in John's latter years, that's basically all he preached was for people to love one another, for brethren to love the brethren.

[30:11] And he would call them little children all the time. And I said, it's well documented in church history, that was the case. For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.

[30:23] So, if we couple that with verse 10, the end of verse 10, neither he that loatheth not his brother, this is the children of the devil, he's talking about there. And he says, for this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.

[30:39] And on end of 1 John, here, in fact, on end of this same passage of scripture here that we're in, we learned that we know we've passed from death unto life because we love the brethren.

[30:56] That's one of the evidences of salvation. That's one of a few very good evidences that are in the scripture that we have, that we are saved if we love the brethren.

[31:13] There's some yes, but I get along with better than I do others. But there's a lot of people that I will say, I'm not saying that they're not saved.

[31:24] I'm not saying they haven't been born again, but I don't like this of that, or I don't like that about them. There's people that can say that about me, and I'm sure there are people that say that about me, but I still love them.

[31:38] But it's not just the brethren that we're to love. We, as born-again children of God, we're commanded in the scriptures to love everyone, not just the brethren, not just those that we go to church with, not just those that we assemble with.

[31:54] We're commanded to love everyone. Cross showed love to everyone, even to the Pharisees. People read how Cross talked to the Pharisees and the scribes, and people like that, and they'll say, well, that didn't sound very loving.

[32:12] That was extremely loving, because Cross was calling them out, and they're seeing it. He was pinpointing their sin, telling them what it was, and Cross preached a constant gospel of repentance as well.

[32:28] So tell him, him tell them folks about their sins. That was very loving of Cross, and we're to love the world just as Christ, just as Christ showed love to the world.

[32:41] We'll end right there this morning. We've got a few minutes. We'll get into the rest. I'll hopefully finish off that chapter next week. Anybody got any questions or comments?