1 John 1¶
Overview:¶
Theme: Love. Key Words: Love (x46), Know (x42), Sin (x28), World (x23), Life (x15), Abide (x12).
Key Verse: 4:7-8 Love comes from God. It's used constantly in society, but love is a Christian revelation of who God is. A lot of us in society are unconscious Christian in that way.
Chapters 1-2: God is light. Chapters 3-4: God is Love. Chapter 5: God is Life.
Purpose: 1. To refute the heresy of Gnosticism born out of apostate Judaism and corrupt Paganism. 1. John is ridding of the Gnostic idea of dualism supposing a cosmic battle betwen darkness and light. 2. To exhort the believer concerning his relationship to God, the brethen, the world, and sin. 1. How do we get rid of sin? Confessing our sin and repenting of it so God can cleanse it. 3. To show that the true knowledge of God involves a personal relationship with Him. 1. Knowing God is the goal of the Christian life.
Message: 1. If we truly know God and are in fellowship with him, then we will not love the world. 1. If you love the world, you do not love God. John is mystical but NOT mushy. Friendship with the world nullifies friendship with God. 2. If the believer abides in life he will not live in sin. 1. Believer lives and move in light. We do not continue to practice and live in sin.
theosu¶
v.3¶
We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.
v.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.
We would have expected John to say, “We have fellowship with God.” That is true, but already in the idea of walking together with God in the light. John wants to make it clear that fellow Christians who walk in the light enjoy fellowship with each other. This leads to an important idea: if we do not have fellowship with one another, then one party or both parties are not walking in the light. Two Christians who are in right relationship with God will also naturally be in right relationship with each other.
We can be cleansed, by the blood of Jesus, from all sin. The sin we inherited from Adam, the sin we committed as kids, the sins of our growing up; sins against our father, against our mother, against our brother and sister; sins against our husbands or wives, against our children; sins against our employers or our employees, sins against our friends and our enemies; lying, stealing, cheating, adultery, swearing, drugs, booze, promiscuity, murder; sins that haunt us every day, sins we didn’t even know we did – all sin can be cleansed by the blood of Jesus.
enduringword¶
The author is combating the heresy that boasts of knowledge of and communion with God but neglects fellowship with other Christians. True fellowship with God comes through other people; fellowship with them is the proof of fellowship with God.
barker¶
See more in family#Maclaren on 1 John 1 7 1John1 v 7.
v.9¶
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
Our sins are not forgiven because we confess... However, confession is still vital to maintain relationship with God, and this is the context John speaks from. As God convicts us of sin that is hindering our fellowship with Him, we must confess it and receive forgiveness and cleansing for our relationship with God to continue without hindrance.
enduringword¶
v.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.
“No man was ever kept out of God’s kingdom for his confessed badness; many are for their supposed goodness.” (Trapp)