First John

Confessing Jesus

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: I John 4:12-15, Confessing Jesus

Genre: Sermon

Lesson: 11 of 16

Track: #11

Year:

Dictation Name: RR308F11

[Unknown Speaker] Oh come let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our maker for He is our God and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand. Let us pray.

Our most good and gracious God and heavenly Father we come before You in humility acknowledging the so-great salvation that we have only because of Your grace and the blood of Jesus Christ Your Son, our Savior. We ask now for wisdom to understand Your word as we look at it and study it. We acknowledge that it is only through our understanding of Your word that we can have any understanding of reality, reality as it emanates from Your eternal throne. Help us not to be side tracked by the sin, the evil, the rebellion we that we see around us in the world, but help us to overcome through the power of Your Spirit within us, that works in us, both to will and to do Your good pleasure. Encourage us as individuals in our walk in the faith, encourage us as families covenanted before You, we pray that You would encourage us in our vocations. We pray that You would encourage us by helping us to see areas of revival that will grow until knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord. We pray that You would help us not to focus on the sin around us, but on Your power and the Power of Your Spirit which is greater than anything that the evil mind of man might imagine. We ask for Your blessing on this time together, we pray that You would bless believers everywhere who gather together in truth in Your name. We pray that You would encourage us in the knowledge that there are people throughout the world who gather together and who truly profess Your Lordship over their lives, and we pray that You would encourage especially those who are suffering persecution and hardship because they name the name of Christ. Bless them and bless the efforts of all those who even as we speak seek to relieve their distress and ease their suffering. We ask this all in the name of Christ our Savior’s name, amen.

Our scripture this morning is I John, chapter 4, verses 12-15. I John, chapter 4, verses 12-15; the title of this morning’s sermon will be Confessing Jesus. I John, chapter 4, beginning at verse 12.

“12 No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us.

13 Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit.

14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.

15 Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.”

[Rushdoony] As we have seen, New Testament Greek has three words for love, unlike English and other modern languages. Of these two are used, the one that is not used is “eros” referring to sexual love. Phileo, referring to human love, is used; but rarely in popular usage was agape used, which we encounter very strongly in John’s letter and in the New Testament. Agape means that this is a supernatural love, a love that is grace, a love that transcends anything we normally know.

Now in this text we have another word used that is used in a different sense then we normally do use it. In the 13th verse “13 Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit.” Know, well we know a lot of things, but there are some things in the spiritual realm we cannot know as we do the times tables, or the inside of our house, or our job. “Hereby know we that we dwell in Him, and He in us, because He hath given us of His Spirit.” The Bible speaks thus of a knowledge that is beyond the ordinary knowledge that we have. We know that 2 +2 = 4, 3+2=5, and so on. But when it comes to knowing God we know someone who is far beyond our ability to even imagine or to conceive. He is so great that we cannot describe Him, and yet we know Him truly. Every word the Bible says about Him is true. We see God in Jesus Christ, but God is so much more than anything we know, he’s beyond our imagination to conceive of, and yet we know that everything the Bible tells us about God is true. He is consistent with Himself

Now we may know someone here in this world, and know them fairly well, and yet be surprised at times by the things he says and does, we have not known him totally. But there are no surprises in our knowledge of God. The knowledge of Him is greater than we can ever fathom, and yet there is nothing that is contradictory in God’s being. So that if we live in heaven ten million years and continually learn more about God we will not have exhausted Him. We are told very clearly “No man hath seen God at any time” He is beyond our understanding an beyond our vision. We know God in Christ, He is truly revealed, but not totally.

“If we love one another God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfect in us.” This is an unusual statement, what John does is go from seeing God to how we can know God in one another. We can see Him and those who believe in Him, and we can know Him truly. “Hereby know we that we dwell in Him and He in us, because He hath given us of His Spirit.” Now we’re told a little more about our knowledge of God, it is not merely an intellectual matter. Our knowledge of our husband, our wife, is not merely an intellectual matter, we know one another by what we experience one another; and we know God by His faithfulness, His total self-consistency in Christ, in Himself, and in His Spirit. So God is fully knowable, while not totally knowable. We can know God when we read His word, we know that it is true, but there is so much more of God’s love or of His judgment, or of His care, that we can fathom. So we can never have an exhaustive love or knowledge of God, He is to great for us.

“14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.” That’s a remarkable statement, how do we know God? Well we can know Him truly when we know Jesus Christ. We don’t know Him exhaustively but we know what Jesus Christ was, what He is, what He did when He came here, how He died for us on the cross to redeem us from our sins. So we know Him truly, we do not know Jesus exhaustively but we know Him better than we know our husband, or wife, or children, because it is always consistent knowledge. Now our husband, or wife, or children, can surprise us, there are things about them we don’t know, they are capable of change, of sin, of reversing themselves. But God is totally self-consistent so that while it is true, we can never know God fully, absolutely, we can always know Him truly. We know Him through His word, we know Him through His Son, and by His Spirit, and there is no contradiction in any of this so that every fact is consistent with every other. While what we know about our husband or wife may be contradicted tomorrow by something they say or do, because they do not have that total, self-consistency, none of us have it this side of heaven.

“14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.” We have this magnificent knowledge of God. Oh we don’t know Him exhaustively, but we know Him truly. He sent His Son to be our Savior, to die on the cross, in what has been described as the most horrible form of execution. It was developed by the Roman’s, they did everything to see what form of execution they could develop that would have the maximum amount of suffering, and they finally came upon crucifixion. The agony and the pain of it was worse than any other, and it was slow. Normally it took three days for a person to die when crucified. Our Lord died in one day because he’d been kept awake all night being beaten so that the blood was pouring out of His back, and the amount of blood He had lost made it difficult for Him to carry the cross all the way to Golgotha. But because the Sabbath was coming the other two who were being crucified were, to satisfy the High Priest, executed just before sundown. Normally they stayed on the cross until they died. And the Roman’s were proud that they had developed the most fearful kind of execution known to mankind. Well, Jesus Christ was the one who came and endured the agony of the cross to redeem us.

“15 Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.” How do we know God? By dwelling in Him through Faith; it isn’t the kind of knowledge that comes with learning the times table, it’s the kind of knowledge that comes with life, knowing fully, thoroughly, totally, from having experienced something. Of having gone, for example, through a fearful experience with someone and you know what they are, and you found out what you were in the process. Well, with Christ we have gone through death, we have died to ourselves and are alive in Him, and because of this God dwelleth in us, and we in God. This is a knowledge that produces a great deal of difference in us. You can know a great deal about a subject. I lived eight and a half years among Indians, three years among Chinese, that didn’t make me (even though I came to know both very well) either Chinese or Indian.

But we become Christians, members of Jesus Christ through faith because we live in Him and with Him, and all our life therefore is comprehended by Jesus Christ. And so we confess Jesus Christ to be our Lord, that is the magnificence of what John is talking about. This is not mere head knowledge, it is a total knowledge with all our being. We know God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, we live in Them and They in Us, and we know the world to be a different place because of that knowledge. We know that we have a different kind of destiny, no matter how much the world hates us or attacks us, we have a knowledge that is given by God, a knowledge that is a part of our being.

As you get older it’s easy to forget many things, things you learned in the early grades. After all, at 84 I’m surprised at things I’ve forgotten, and the things that I remember. But those are not important things. What I cannot forget because it is so much a part of my total being, is who Jesus Christ is, and what He has done for me.

And so John, having spoken of the fact that our love of God is a special kind of love, agape, that it comes from Him, it isn’t anything normal or human, now says our knowledge of Jesus Christ and of God the Father is similar, it is something supernatural. People living next to us may have no inkling of that kind of knowledge. They may be more intelligent, better educated than we are, but we know something that comes from God, and therefore we cannot lose it, and we have therefore the remarkable fact of having this love of God, agape, which is a love not because of what we are but because of what God is, and we are capable now of showing that same kind of love towards others. And so too we have a knowledge that is very, very different from text book knowledge, it is a knowledge of God - Father, Son, and Holy Ghost that is impossible for the world to have; but by God’s grace we have it.

So John in his letter is telling us what privileged people we are because we are Christians, this is why it is much more than a letter about love, it’s a letter about God the Son, and we His people. Let us pray.

Our Father we give thanks unto Thee for this Thy word, we thank Thee that from beginning to end Thou art mindful of us and doth surround us with Thy love and Thy care. Bless us this day and always, in Christ’s name, amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson?

Well if there are no questions, let us conclude with prayer.

Our Father we rejoice in Thy word, we thank Thee for all the marvelous things it tells us about Thee and about us. Give us grace to conform ourselves to Thee, to Thy kingdom and Thy word. And now go in peace, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost bless you and keep you, guide and protect you, this day and always, amen.