1st john overview...safety, certainty and Fullness of joy.
The writer is John the apostle, who also wrote the gospel bearing the same name and also two short epistles and the book of the Revelation. He writes to the family of God, characterising all who are “born again” as members of the same family. He writes in terms of endearment and the sevenfold expression “Dear children” pervades the letter; 2 v1, 2 v12, 3 v7, 3 v18, 4 v4, 5 v21. This familial description of God’s people could be translated “darlings” or “little born-ones”. Terms like “born of God”, “brethren”, “beloved” give the epistle a loving tender flavour. Throughout the letter he gives four reasons for writing to them, and around these he arranges his material.
• Chapter 1 v4 To promote joy amongst all the family.
• Chapter 2 v1 To prevent sin from becoming a habit.
• Chapter 2 v26 To protect the young from seducers.
• Chapter 5 v13 To instil confidence in the hearts of all who believe.
The language of the letter is that of certainty; The word “know” occurs 25 times; “perceive” 15 times; “confidence” 3 times. Where there is uncertainty there exists fear, agnosticism, and apologetic testimony. John’s message is that Christianity is not apologetic but dogmatic. It is a dogmatic assertion of things that we know to be the truth. This certainty is twofold, as stated in chapter 5 v20 a) That Christianity is true and b) That Christians have eternal life.
The epistle is one of the experience of the Christian life, rather than the doctrine or the status of the Christian. Broadly speaking the focus is on fellowship in chapters 1-2. This can be broken, but provision is made for it’s maintenance leading to fullness of joy.
In chapters 3-5 the emphasis is on relationship which can never be broken, but which makes demands on those who are the children of God. Note in this section the repetition of the phrase “born of God” (2 v29; 3 v9; 4 v7; 5 v1v4v18). He gives pointers to the reality of faith leading to full assurance.
For John there are no “grey areas”, only what is true or untrue. We are either in darkness or in the light; it is Christ or antichrist; we are either sons of God or sons of the devil; we follow the promptings of the Spirit of God or the spirit of the world; we either practise evil or we practise good; we either love the brethren or we hate them; we either have eternal life or we don’t. Throughout this powerful letter he gives indicators of the reality of faith which he presents in moral, spiritual, and practical terms. Not for John a mere profession of faith but the solid, visible evidence of it, no room for doubt, or uncertainty, only knowledge (and growing knowledge at that) of spiritual realities. All the apostles are united in their writings that salvation does not only change the destiny, but also the life. In these days of “easy-believism” it is well that communicators of Divine truth follow their example. John’s letters are the death knell to sham Christianity and mock religion. Any profession of faith which does not issue in the reproduction of the character of God in our lives is false. In any bible portion the principal truth is the revelation of the Godhead and this letter is no exception.
• He is the eternal life chapter 1 v2; 5 v12; 5 v20
• He is light chapter 1 v5; 1 v7
• He is the propitiation for sins chapter 2 v2
• He is righteous chapter 2 v1; 2 v29; 3 v7
• He is pure chapter 3 v3; 3 v5
• He is love chapter 4 v7; 4 v8
• He is truth chapter 5 v6; 5 v1
As He is so should we be! Also throughout the letter he provides a series of tests for us of the reality of our faith in God, by use of the phrases “Hereby we/ye know...”; “Herein is..”; “By this we know...” 2 v3, 3 v16, 3 v19, 3 v24, 4 v2, 4 v10, 4 v13, 4 v17, 5 v2.
1st john chapter 1......fullness of joy
It is often missed, but the burden of John’s writings is to establish the joy of God’s people. The allusion to the vine in John chapter 15(the fruit of which is wine, the symbol of joy) culminates in two results...the glory of God the Father(verse 8); and the fullness of joy of the believer(verse 11). He continues this theme here in chapter 1 v4, in terms of unbroken fellowship, “..these things i write unto you that your joy may be full”. then in the 2nd epistle v4 “I rejoiced greatly that I found thy children walking in truth”; again in the 3rd epistle v4 “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth”; and who can forget that John who recorded the first sign at the wedding at Cana IN Galilee, completes his writings with the great joyous occasion of the marriage of the Lamb in Revelation 19 v7, the glory of the bride as she descends from heaven, and images of eternal bliss. Christianity is characterised by the world as miserable, instead it is the one true path to real joy.
There are two sections to this first chapter:
Verses 1-4 A manifestation Verses 5-10 A message
First a manifestation of Divine life; next a message of Divine light.. The one is privilege, the other is responsibility, and the two must go together. Christ is the manifestation of Divine life and He is the message of Divine light
Verses 1-4 A manifestation of Divine life “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon. and our hands have handled of (or concerning) the word of life...”. A strange way to describe the Lord, come in flesh, yet not so strange, for John is using this to convey that there is nothing like this one in all the earth, no one to whom He can be compared. If he had said “He”, it could be construed that here is another good man, prophet, or holy man. By using the neutral, “that”, he is expressing to us that this one has no equal, no rival. Nothing like this has ever been seen, it is unique and uniquely wonderful. We saw it, we heard it, we contemplated it, we even touched it! What we saw, heard, studied and touched was nothing less than the manifestation of another kind of life, Divine life, life eternal, that came to us directly from the Father. We came to know Him as the “word of life”. This title of Christ as “the Word” is unique to the writings of John, and refers to Christ as the communicator, the revealer of God. God has revealed Himself in many ways but Christ is the supreme revelation. John is careful to spell out the historical facts; He came from the eternal glory and was manifested to us.
He was “...with the Father...” pros that is face to face with the Father, living as one in perfect harmony, possessing all the attributes of Deity (John 1 v1, 1 v14, 1 v18).
He was “..manifested unto us”. The eternal, inaudible, invisible, inscrutable, and intangible God, we witnessed Him, we discerned Him, and we report Him to you, that you may share in this revelation of God in Jesus Christ. There are five different levels of fellowship indicated here which describe perfectly the workings of the spiritual family, almost an exposition of the Greek word koinonia. This refers to a very close living relationship, some scholars say it is best understood of “Siamese twins” who share the same life support, it is that close. The five levels are a) the Father with the Son....”He was with the Father”; b) The apostles with the Father and the Son...”truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ”; c) The apostles with us “..that ye also may have fellowship with us”; d) The saints with the Father and the Son (implicit in verse 3); e) The saints with each other “We have fellowship one with another,”( verse 7). And so we see the perfect triangle of fellowship; the Godhead, the apostles and the children of the Father. In John’s terms then the experience of Christianity is dependent on ongoing fellowship with God and with His apostles through whom He gave His instructions. The first named purpose of his writing is to enable them to experience fullness of joy in their lives. This joy comes from unbroken fellowship with God, and adherence to apostolic teaching.
Verses 5-10 A message of Divine light “This then is the message that we have heard of Him and declare unto you that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all”. The preposition “of” is apo and the emphasis is that the message came not only in word but in deed. He was the embodiment of what is meant by “God is light”. What we witnessed was absolute purity of words and deeds without even the slightest shadow of darkness. Note the change in the Divine title from the Father to God. The “Father” suggests nearness, “God” emphasises transcendence. “God is light..”, what a truth is this!! He is not a light, light is not God(as some idolaters imagine), He is the essence of all that is light, all that is light comes from Him, whether physical(1st Timothy 6 v16), or moral (John 1 v14). In John’s writings light and darkness are characterised as good or evil. Everything that is not God or of God is moral darkness and they are forever divided. He adds as if to emphasise “and in Him is no darkness at all”. Not the slightest aura of darkness about God, no hidden agenda, no double talk, no guile, no deception, no change, nothing shady about God. He is pure light unmixed with evil and is the source of all that is light. What the light of the sun is to the earth, so is God to the soul of man. Light emanates from one source and pervades the entire globe; light dispels all darkness; light exposes things which are hidden; light energises all life whether human animal or plant; so in the realm of the soul. Translated into holiness it means the absence of all that is evil, and the presence of all that is right.
One has said “Not for John the philosophers quill, he uses the surgeon’s scalpel”. Exposing the light of God to human hypocrisy, he develops three areas of false profession as he traces things that are incompatible with fellowship with God; v6 “if we say”...v8 “if we say”...v10 “if we say”. Christianity is not a matter of what we say but of what we do. Hodge writes in his book on “Fellowship”, “It would be difficult to find any single passage so crucial or fundamental to daily Christian living than 1st John 1 vv5-10”.
The first of these is in verses 6-7 “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness we lie and do not the truth...”. This is the sin of reducing God to our level. God is light, and if we walk (live our lives) in darkness yet maintain we have fellowship with God, we demean Him, we lie and do not the truth, we cannot have fellowship with the God of intrinsic light and walk in darkness. However, lest any should be discouragement when they fall into sin,(as everyone does), he supplies the correction, “...if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin”. There is no thought here of sinless perfection but of remedial action to master sin in our lives. Clearly fellowship with God is broken by sin in our lives, while the relationship can never be broken. Fellowship is restored by the abiding value of the blood of His Son. We need the constant cleansing of the blood and evidence of restored fellowship is to have ongoing fellowship with one another. When we are right with God we will be right with each other. In the next part he will take this a step further.
Next “If we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us...” verses 8-9. This is the sin of exalting ourselves to God’s level. Only He has no sin, if we claim sinless perfection we place ourselves on a par with God. Such a claim calls into question the status of such, and cannot be supported in reality. However “..if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. The notion that we have no inherent sin is a denial of the fall and human history defies such a notion. The fact is the world is full of sins and sinners and only confession(not denial) of that will cleanse us from it’s defilement. Confession means “to speak the same thing”, that is to call sin, sin, as God calls it, to say the same as God about it. God has made it clear in His word the nature of sin in the world in it’s many evil expressions, and the way of cleansing is to agree with Him about it. Confession of sins should be a regular exercise for the believer, (as it is the starting point for the sinner). “He is faithful(to His word) and just(in the sight of God) to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. Sin has a defiling effect upon us and breaks fellowship and only this way is it restored. The psalmist, ever conscious of inward defilement, prayed in Psalm 19 v12 “..cleanse thou me from secret faults”. We need more of this soul cleansing.
Then verse 10 “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us”. This is the worst of the three false claims, it is the claim to be superior to God. Bringing God down to our level(v6), exalting ourselves to His level(v8), now claiming superiority over Him(v10)! Constable writes “The false claim here is that the sin we have committed is not really sin. This is a most serious charge; it casts aside God’s revelation of sin and makes man the authority for what is sin and what is not sin. This claim says that God is wrong in His judgment of men and therefore a liar and they have dismissed His word as invalid”. This delusion puts man above God and makes man the arbiter of all moral judgment. What arrogance from puny, mortal, self-righteous man!!
The God who has saved us, and is now our Father, is a God of untarnishable light and fellowship with Him carries conditions. There is no greater need for our ongoing fellowship with Him than to keep short accounts with Him, involving confession and cleansing as we walk with Him day by day.
The writer is John the apostle, who also wrote the gospel bearing the same name and also two short epistles and the book of the Revelation. He writes to the family of God, characterising all who are “born again” as members of the same family. He writes in terms of endearment and the sevenfold expression “Dear children” pervades the letter; 2 v1, 2 v12, 3 v7, 3 v18, 4 v4, 5 v21. This familial description of God’s people could be translated “darlings” or “little born-ones”. Terms like “born of God”, “brethren”, “beloved” give the epistle a loving tender flavour. Throughout the letter he gives four reasons for writing to them, and around these he arranges his material.
• Chapter 1 v4 To promote joy amongst all the family.
• Chapter 2 v1 To prevent sin from becoming a habit.
• Chapter 2 v26 To protect the young from seducers.
• Chapter 5 v13 To instil confidence in the hearts of all who believe.
The language of the letter is that of certainty; The word “know” occurs 25 times; “perceive” 15 times; “confidence” 3 times. Where there is uncertainty there exists fear, agnosticism, and apologetic testimony. John’s message is that Christianity is not apologetic but dogmatic. It is a dogmatic assertion of things that we know to be the truth. This certainty is twofold, as stated in chapter 5 v20 a) That Christianity is true and b) That Christians have eternal life.
The epistle is one of the experience of the Christian life, rather than the doctrine or the status of the Christian. Broadly speaking the focus is on fellowship in chapters 1-2. This can be broken, but provision is made for it’s maintenance leading to fullness of joy.
In chapters 3-5 the emphasis is on relationship which can never be broken, but which makes demands on those who are the children of God. Note in this section the repetition of the phrase “born of God” (2 v29; 3 v9; 4 v7; 5 v1v4v18). He gives pointers to the reality of faith leading to full assurance.
For John there are no “grey areas”, only what is true or untrue. We are either in darkness or in the light; it is Christ or antichrist; we are either sons of God or sons of the devil; we follow the promptings of the Spirit of God or the spirit of the world; we either practise evil or we practise good; we either love the brethren or we hate them; we either have eternal life or we don’t. Throughout this powerful letter he gives indicators of the reality of faith which he presents in moral, spiritual, and practical terms. Not for John a mere profession of faith but the solid, visible evidence of it, no room for doubt, or uncertainty, only knowledge (and growing knowledge at that) of spiritual realities. All the apostles are united in their writings that salvation does not only change the destiny, but also the life. In these days of “easy-believism” it is well that communicators of Divine truth follow their example. John’s letters are the death knell to sham Christianity and mock religion. Any profession of faith which does not issue in the reproduction of the character of God in our lives is false. In any bible portion the principal truth is the revelation of the Godhead and this letter is no exception.
• He is the eternal life chapter 1 v2; 5 v12; 5 v20
• He is light chapter 1 v5; 1 v7
• He is the propitiation for sins chapter 2 v2
• He is righteous chapter 2 v1; 2 v29; 3 v7
• He is pure chapter 3 v3; 3 v5
• He is love chapter 4 v7; 4 v8
• He is truth chapter 5 v6; 5 v1
As He is so should we be! Also throughout the letter he provides a series of tests for us of the reality of our faith in God, by use of the phrases “Hereby we/ye know...”; “Herein is..”; “By this we know...” 2 v3, 3 v16, 3 v19, 3 v24, 4 v2, 4 v10, 4 v13, 4 v17, 5 v2.
1st john chapter 1......fullness of joy
It is often missed, but the burden of John’s writings is to establish the joy of God’s people. The allusion to the vine in John chapter 15(the fruit of which is wine, the symbol of joy) culminates in two results...the glory of God the Father(verse 8); and the fullness of joy of the believer(verse 11). He continues this theme here in chapter 1 v4, in terms of unbroken fellowship, “..these things i write unto you that your joy may be full”. then in the 2nd epistle v4 “I rejoiced greatly that I found thy children walking in truth”; again in the 3rd epistle v4 “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth”; and who can forget that John who recorded the first sign at the wedding at Cana IN Galilee, completes his writings with the great joyous occasion of the marriage of the Lamb in Revelation 19 v7, the glory of the bride as she descends from heaven, and images of eternal bliss. Christianity is characterised by the world as miserable, instead it is the one true path to real joy.
There are two sections to this first chapter:
Verses 1-4 A manifestation Verses 5-10 A message
First a manifestation of Divine life; next a message of Divine light.. The one is privilege, the other is responsibility, and the two must go together. Christ is the manifestation of Divine life and He is the message of Divine light
Verses 1-4 A manifestation of Divine life “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon. and our hands have handled of (or concerning) the word of life...”. A strange way to describe the Lord, come in flesh, yet not so strange, for John is using this to convey that there is nothing like this one in all the earth, no one to whom He can be compared. If he had said “He”, it could be construed that here is another good man, prophet, or holy man. By using the neutral, “that”, he is expressing to us that this one has no equal, no rival. Nothing like this has ever been seen, it is unique and uniquely wonderful. We saw it, we heard it, we contemplated it, we even touched it! What we saw, heard, studied and touched was nothing less than the manifestation of another kind of life, Divine life, life eternal, that came to us directly from the Father. We came to know Him as the “word of life”. This title of Christ as “the Word” is unique to the writings of John, and refers to Christ as the communicator, the revealer of God. God has revealed Himself in many ways but Christ is the supreme revelation. John is careful to spell out the historical facts; He came from the eternal glory and was manifested to us.
He was “...with the Father...” pros that is face to face with the Father, living as one in perfect harmony, possessing all the attributes of Deity (John 1 v1, 1 v14, 1 v18).
He was “..manifested unto us”. The eternal, inaudible, invisible, inscrutable, and intangible God, we witnessed Him, we discerned Him, and we report Him to you, that you may share in this revelation of God in Jesus Christ. There are five different levels of fellowship indicated here which describe perfectly the workings of the spiritual family, almost an exposition of the Greek word koinonia. This refers to a very close living relationship, some scholars say it is best understood of “Siamese twins” who share the same life support, it is that close. The five levels are a) the Father with the Son....”He was with the Father”; b) The apostles with the Father and the Son...”truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ”; c) The apostles with us “..that ye also may have fellowship with us”; d) The saints with the Father and the Son (implicit in verse 3); e) The saints with each other “We have fellowship one with another,”( verse 7). And so we see the perfect triangle of fellowship; the Godhead, the apostles and the children of the Father. In John’s terms then the experience of Christianity is dependent on ongoing fellowship with God and with His apostles through whom He gave His instructions. The first named purpose of his writing is to enable them to experience fullness of joy in their lives. This joy comes from unbroken fellowship with God, and adherence to apostolic teaching.
Verses 5-10 A message of Divine light “This then is the message that we have heard of Him and declare unto you that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all”. The preposition “of” is apo and the emphasis is that the message came not only in word but in deed. He was the embodiment of what is meant by “God is light”. What we witnessed was absolute purity of words and deeds without even the slightest shadow of darkness. Note the change in the Divine title from the Father to God. The “Father” suggests nearness, “God” emphasises transcendence. “God is light..”, what a truth is this!! He is not a light, light is not God(as some idolaters imagine), He is the essence of all that is light, all that is light comes from Him, whether physical(1st Timothy 6 v16), or moral (John 1 v14). In John’s writings light and darkness are characterised as good or evil. Everything that is not God or of God is moral darkness and they are forever divided. He adds as if to emphasise “and in Him is no darkness at all”. Not the slightest aura of darkness about God, no hidden agenda, no double talk, no guile, no deception, no change, nothing shady about God. He is pure light unmixed with evil and is the source of all that is light. What the light of the sun is to the earth, so is God to the soul of man. Light emanates from one source and pervades the entire globe; light dispels all darkness; light exposes things which are hidden; light energises all life whether human animal or plant; so in the realm of the soul. Translated into holiness it means the absence of all that is evil, and the presence of all that is right.
One has said “Not for John the philosophers quill, he uses the surgeon’s scalpel”. Exposing the light of God to human hypocrisy, he develops three areas of false profession as he traces things that are incompatible with fellowship with God; v6 “if we say”...v8 “if we say”...v10 “if we say”. Christianity is not a matter of what we say but of what we do. Hodge writes in his book on “Fellowship”, “It would be difficult to find any single passage so crucial or fundamental to daily Christian living than 1st John 1 vv5-10”.
The first of these is in verses 6-7 “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness we lie and do not the truth...”. This is the sin of reducing God to our level. God is light, and if we walk (live our lives) in darkness yet maintain we have fellowship with God, we demean Him, we lie and do not the truth, we cannot have fellowship with the God of intrinsic light and walk in darkness. However, lest any should be discouragement when they fall into sin,(as everyone does), he supplies the correction, “...if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin”. There is no thought here of sinless perfection but of remedial action to master sin in our lives. Clearly fellowship with God is broken by sin in our lives, while the relationship can never be broken. Fellowship is restored by the abiding value of the blood of His Son. We need the constant cleansing of the blood and evidence of restored fellowship is to have ongoing fellowship with one another. When we are right with God we will be right with each other. In the next part he will take this a step further.
Next “If we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us...” verses 8-9. This is the sin of exalting ourselves to God’s level. Only He has no sin, if we claim sinless perfection we place ourselves on a par with God. Such a claim calls into question the status of such, and cannot be supported in reality. However “..if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. The notion that we have no inherent sin is a denial of the fall and human history defies such a notion. The fact is the world is full of sins and sinners and only confession(not denial) of that will cleanse us from it’s defilement. Confession means “to speak the same thing”, that is to call sin, sin, as God calls it, to say the same as God about it. God has made it clear in His word the nature of sin in the world in it’s many evil expressions, and the way of cleansing is to agree with Him about it. Confession of sins should be a regular exercise for the believer, (as it is the starting point for the sinner). “He is faithful(to His word) and just(in the sight of God) to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. Sin has a defiling effect upon us and breaks fellowship and only this way is it restored. The psalmist, ever conscious of inward defilement, prayed in Psalm 19 v12 “..cleanse thou me from secret faults”. We need more of this soul cleansing.
Then verse 10 “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us”. This is the worst of the three false claims, it is the claim to be superior to God. Bringing God down to our level(v6), exalting ourselves to His level(v8), now claiming superiority over Him(v10)! Constable writes “The false claim here is that the sin we have committed is not really sin. This is a most serious charge; it casts aside God’s revelation of sin and makes man the authority for what is sin and what is not sin. This claim says that God is wrong in His judgment of men and therefore a liar and they have dismissed His word as invalid”. This delusion puts man above God and makes man the arbiter of all moral judgment. What arrogance from puny, mortal, self-righteous man!!
The God who has saved us, and is now our Father, is a God of untarnishable light and fellowship with Him carries conditions. There is no greater need for our ongoing fellowship with Him than to keep short accounts with Him, involving confession and cleansing as we walk with Him day by day.
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