The Earth is the Lords   

 

I JOHN

Updated: August 6, 2007

.....handling the word of life........


    [C]2000-07 by Richard L Zorek

  • I John 1:1: "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 the Word of life"John is making it clear that the "word of life" is something that can be known and experienced by people. "Word" within the Greek world of thought carries in it the sense of meaning, reason, purpose of it all. "Word" carries the senss of authority, disclosure, decisions, and action. Word is powerful, and because of it not only do things happen, but disclosure of the will and character of God takes place (As in, "God said let their be light..."). When God speaks, we meet Him. By His word He creates, By His word he is know, by His word He judges, forgives and fulfills.

  • I John 1:2: "(For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the father, and manifested unto us.") Christianity has its theoretical explanations but it is more than a theory of religion; it is an experience of life. It must be something so definite that we can bear witness to it. Why do movies have such a hold on the public and churches are losing their grasp? Because motion picture producers, writers and directors take the unreal and impossible and make them real, whereas the modern day preacher makes the real and seemingly impossible, unreal."

  • I John 1:3: "That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ." Fellowship is much more than companionship or comradeship. It means the community of thought and interest. It means a state of unity and harmony. It implies what was true in the Garden of Eden when man's experience of God was intimate and immediate. It is a mutual "entering into" of one another's experience. The original state of man's relation to God is restored by Christian experience. It is found in fellowship. We are at one with each other. It means sharing our common experience of etrenal life. When we exchange what we know of Chrust we are having fellowship. This can be the most enriching experience of life, producing a bond of affection more endearing than blood relationship.

  • I John1: 4: We write this to make our joy complete. When we look at the core of the cosmos we are met by the Living God who creates, who speaks for Himself, who has surprised us by knowing our names. When this surprise sinks in, then the joyous fellowship begins.
  • 1 John 1:5: This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. John uses the word "light" interchangeably with the word "truth."
  • I John 1:7: But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. How you communicate with your fellow Christains is indicative of how your walk with God is. Be honest. be real.
  • I John 1:8: If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If anyone believes he is sinless, he is wrong and not thinking rightly.
  • I John 1:9: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. His promise to forgive if we confess....admit that we have sinned.
  • I John 1:10: If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives. His word says all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. If we deny that, then we make Him a liar.
  • I John 2:3: "And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments." People who have encountered God increase in their obedience quotient. When the Spirit fell at Pentecost, the crowd cried out, "What must we do?" The Holy Spirit maked us witnesses in word and deed. Paul never mentions passivity as a fruit of the Spirit! Works are both a testimony to our conscience and to the world. Wherever the Great Awakening erupted, orphanages, hospitals, and schools followed. In the end, the only way to know if our experience is from God is the fruit such experiences produce for the glory of God.
  • I John 2:4: He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments., is a liar, and the truth is not in him If you really get to know God, you will want to obey him. It is not a command, but a response.
  • I John 2:9: He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now The interesting point about this is that the person says he is "in the light." he may actually believe he is in the light. But, if he hates his brother, it is not so.
  • I John 2:11: But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness; he does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded him. A man who hates his brother will stumble or seem to wander in circles......as in the darkness.
  • I John 2: 15: Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the father is not in him. Love for the world pushes out the love of God and the love of God pushes out the world. You cannot love both.
  • I John 2:17a: And the world passes away and the lust of it, Why invest in a stock that is worthless? Or climb aboard a ship that we know is going to sink? Setting your hopes upon it will lead to misery. If you lust the world, it will pass away and take you with it.
  • I John 3:1: How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. If they did not know the father, they will not recognize the kids.

  • I John 3:4: "Whosoever commiteth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law. Whoever practices sin is hamartia(i.e., is habitual in his sinning) also practices iniquity, anomian (lawlessness). Hamartha" means missing the mark; we are aiming in the right direction, but are faulty and carless. Anomia means against the law, anti-law. The unregenerate do not direct their lives at God's law word as their standard: their goal is the opposite direction. They are antilaw because they are anti-God. They hate God and therefore they hate his law. The godly man is not sinless, but his sinning is not based on a war against God and His law but is a failure morally to meet the standard he knows God requires of him. He aims at the mark, but he misses. Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of the law of God (Westminster Shorter Catechism). Sin is disobedience to God and rebellion against Him and His law. Man's great dilemma is not his "human condition," but his sin. Sinful man usually wants to deflect attention away from his real dilemma. So he blames his ignorance, his finitude, and his environment. This is why political (and theological) liberals usually support gun control and prison systems. They believe that man's real problem is outside man, and if he can change his circumstances, he can solve all his problems. Man must be changed internally (his sin must be dealt with) if he expects to change his circumstances.

  • 5But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin.
  • I John 3:6: No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him. Practices sin.
  • I John 3:8: Christ was manifested to destroy the works of Satan. We stand with Christ and fight for Him or we place ourselves in Satan's camp.
  • I John 3:15: Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer; and you know that no murder has eternal life abiding in him If its in the mind...its in the heart. Possible the only thing that would keep it from happening is convenenience or lack of it.

  • I John 3:16-18: This is how we know what love is: jesus Christ ;aid dopwn hislife for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the loveof God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth "Today, if I had to answer the question: "Where is God when it hurst?" in a single sentence, I woul dmake that senetnce another question: "Where is the church when it hurts?" We form the frontline of God's response to the suffering world." Philip Yancey.

  • I John 3:21: "Beloved if our heart condemn us not, then we have confidence toward God," If we live right before God, our heart should not condemn us.
  • I John 4: 1: Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. There are many spirits which "feel" or seem right. They are not. Quite deceptive.

  • I John 4:5: They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. The world does not see the wisdom of the cross. To them it is foolishness.

  • I John 4:7: Love is of God; and everyone that loves is begotten of God, and knows God. He that loves not knows not God; for God is love. "Agape" is of God....for God is "Agape." Agape love, regardless of the object to which it is directed, is participation in the life of God.

  • I John 4:12: No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. Gods love is not complete without us?
  • I John 4:13: "Here is the proof that we dwell in Him and He in us: He has imparted his Spirit to us." The fact that I know the Holy Spirit dwells in me is my assurance that I am a Christian. The fruit, of which, is that I love one another.
  • I John 4:18: Perfect loves cast out all fear." When you truly know that He loves you, you can enter into all difficulties in life.
  • I John 5:4: "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." Our Lord's birth marks the intensification of the war of the ages. It is a bitter and ugly war, but our Lord cannot lose. We should expect troubles, opposition, and hatred, but also victory. Rejoice, therefore!
  • I John: 5:10: Anyone who believes in the Son of God has this testimony in his heart. Anyone who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar, because he has not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. Of all the ugly sins that provoked God's wrath, it was their unbelief that angered God.
  • I John 5:12: "He that hath not the Son of God hath not life." Life is not a property of the flesh but of God, who by His grace gives us life. Life must be lived on God's terms, according to His laws, and in His grace. thus, life is a gift, not an attribute.

  • 13I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.
  • I John 5:14: This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. the key, being, that is is according to His will.
  • I John 5:17: All unrighteousness is sin." A much broader definition of sin. Basically, if any action is wrong...it is sin.
  • I John 5:21: Dear children, keep yourselves from idols. An interesting way to end the letter.

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