Word of Salvation – Vol.42 No.2 – January 1997

 

Finding Certainty in Jesus’ Footsteps

 

Sermon by Rev J. Westendorp on 1John 2:3-6

Scripture Readings: John 1:35-51 & 1John 1:8–2:6

Suggested Hymns:

BoW 27; 416; 119b; 510

 

Congregation,

Introduction:

There is a beautiful balance in I John – John avoids two problems we often face.

On the one hand – the teaching of perfectionism.
Christians are ‘saints’… they have the power of the Holy Spirit.
That means they can live victorious Christian lives.
God says we ought to be perfect and He wouldn’t say that if we can’t be.  ‘Ought’ implies ‘can’.
            I have met people who actually claimed they have arrived at that point.
            John says: Rubbish!
            If we claim to be without sin we deceive ourselves. (Chap.1)

On the other hand – the defeatist attitude of other Christians.
They put all the emphasis on man’s total depravity.
Christians will always be sinners come what may.
Sin is just part and parcel of this life anyway.
After all we’re all human.  And to be human is to be fallible… to fail.
            We often meet people with a defeatist attitude to sin; who put up with it.
            Again John says:  Rubbish!
            No one who lives in God keeps on sinning. (Chap.3)

Both of those positions are wrong – the truth lies somewhere between these two extremes.  John has no time perfectionism… but not for a defeatist Christian living in sin either.  He tackles both these wrong attitudes in this letter.

A]        ASSURANCE ABOUT KNOWING GOD.

1.         Our text the apostle deals with a closely related issue: KNOWING GOD.

In fact- not just knowing God… but knowing that we know God.

In other words: certainty about our knowledge of God… assurance about our relationship with Him.

Not surprisingly that is relevant for both the perfectionist and the defeatist.
            The perfectionist says:  I’ve arrived!
            He tends to base his assurance on the standard He has reached.
                        Of course I am sure that I know God!
                        I can see the result of it in my life… in my victory over sin.
            The defeatist Christian says:  I’ll never get there!
                        He is full of uncertainty because all he sees is his sin.
                        I’ll never be sure that I know God.
                        I’m too much of a sinner for God to have anything to do with me.

John spends a lot of time on our relationship with God… and the basis for that.

In chap. 1 – he speaks several times of us having ‘fellowship with God’.

In our text he talks about knowing God.
And he assumes it is not only possible to know God… but possible to know that we know God.  In other words to have absolute assurance about that.

Many Christians struggle with that… how can I be certain that I know God?

And then we’re not talking about a casual sort of nodding acquaintance with God.  But knowing Him in an intimate relationship.
In fact, note progression in our text:
            Vs.3:  we know Him…
            Vs.5: we are in Him…
            Vs.6: we live in Him…!
How can we be sure we know God that way?

2.         That is a relevant issue that John now wants to deal with.

That issue became an even more pressing in the light of opening words of chapter 2.  There we have some wonderful teaching about the work of Jesus for us.

At the end of chap. 1John dealt with the perfectionist position.
If we claim to be without sin we deceive ourselves.
But he didn’t want people left hanging in mid-air with their sinlessness.
So to make sure they didn’t despair he zeroed in on the gospel.
And he brought out two beautiful truths.
  First that whenever we do sin we have Jesus praying for us in heaven.
  Second that He made the perfect sacrifice – also for those sins we still fall into.

But that only opens up further the questions about our assurance.
Okay, Jesus is like a Defence Attorney in heaven.
            But how do I know that Jesus actually does that for me?
And fine… His death was the great atoning sacrifice.
            But does that really apply to me too?

Is certainty possible?
   And John says: Yes it is!
      But the big question is: how?
How can I know that I’m a Christian?  How can I have absolute certainty?
John confidently shows us not only that we can know… but how we can know.

3.         It’s helpful to consider the wider context of the times John lived in… and his society.

Helpful… because wrong answers were being given to the question: How can we be sure?  And sometimes today the same wrong answers are still being given.

The first wrong answer came from Greek culture.
Greek thinking dominated John’s world.
It prided itself on its intellectual ability… on it’s great thinkers – Plato… Socrates…!
Reason… thought… had the answer to everything.
The influence of those famous Greek philosophers was still strongly felt.
So people claimed you could know God by intellectual reasoning.

Today there are many people who think they know God.
And they think that, because they’ve figured out there has to be Someone up there.
Interestingly, today many top scientists are again believing in God.
Reasoning scientifically they conclude some intelligent being put all this together.
We become certain about knowing God through our intellect and reason.

There was a second wrong answer that came from religion.
John’s society was a very religious society.
There flourished at the time what was called the ‘mystery religions’.
These ancient mystery religions had a lot of ceremony and ritual.
Exciting stuff… with drama and special effect lighting.
The aim of it all was to know God through emotional experiences.

Today many people say that we ultimately know God through emotional experiences.
Certainty about your relationship with God comes only through ecstatic tongue speaking.
Sure you need the Bible but you find your ultimate certainty in emotional highs.
Special experiences… or exciting worship – like a religious drug… get high on Jesus.
It’s in this way that we become really certain about knowing God.

B]        LINKED TO OBEDIENCE TO GOD’S LAW.

1.         Notice John’s answer to the question:  How can we be sure we know God?

He links certainty about knowing God to obedience to God’s commandments.

Many people would find that strange.
Assurance of salvation… certainty about our relationship with God….!
And it’s linked to the Ten Commandments… to the law of God.
Absurd…. how can the law make us certain?

But think about it… John is putting the emphasis on what God has revealed.
He is saying: Assurance comes by Revelation… not by reason.
  Certainty comes through God’s revealed law… not through the emotions.

But why then mention specifically the commandments?
Because there God has revealed His character… His being.
There He has shown us that we are to relate to Him as the Holy God.
The God who made a moral universe and who makes moral demands of us.

That’s where reason and emotion show their most glaring weaknesses.
Reason may lead someone to conclude that God exists.
            But it does not necessarily produce an upright and moral believer.
            The Greeks were great thinkers who reasoned that there had to be a God.
            But their pagan life-style left a lot to be desired.

Emotions may lead someone to an assurance that there has to be a God.
            But it doesn’t in itself make people more moral in their behaviour.
            Those in the ancient mystery religions felt their rituals gave them certainty.
            But they were pagan to the core, with prostitution a vital part of the rituals.

2.         John says: This is how we know that we have come to know Him… if we obey His commandments.

Do you want assurance that you really are a Christian?
Well, it is found in a special experience alright…
            But not the experience of some calculations that went through your brain.
            And not the experience of some mind blowing emotional event.
                        But the experience of your ongoing obedience to the will of God.

That doesn’t mean of course that we Christians have to discard intellectual effort.
            Christianity has enough material for intellectual effort to last you a life time.
It doesn’t mean either that Christians can just disregard their emotions.
            Christianity offers us a marvellous framework of emotional experiences.

But the point is that our certainty is not linked to either our intellect or our emotions.  Here in the God-inspired Scriptures… assurance is linked to obedience.

But we must understand this correctly.
These two are not linked as though obedience was a test to be passed.
And only when we pass the test of obedience do we then have assurance.
Then we would never have assurance.
            Because we still sin.
            Every day again we break those commandments of God.

Rather the commandments show the shape of the life that knows God.

John is saying:  This is what a Christian life looks like… a life that knows God…
It’s shape is determined by obedience to God’s commandments.
And so our relationship with God deepens as we strive for obedience to God’s will.

3.         Just to make sure we get the point the apostle puts it negatively.

He says: It’s no good just saying, I know God while the obedience is missing.
A person like that is really identifying with Satan the father of lies.

The man who says, ‘I know Him,’ but does not do what He commands is a liar… the truth is not in him.

Someone like that may claim to have certainty… but it is false certainty.
Because true certainty is found in obedience to the Father.

What John is fighting against is what people often call hypocrisy.

Where people say they are Christians but don’t live like Christians.
It’s as though people like that have the theory but not the practice.
            Imagine a carpenter’s apprentice going to TAFE college to learn the theory.
            But that’s all he ever does.
            He learns about power tools… and varieties of timber.
            He studies various kinds of joints and how to fit off doors.
            But he never ever does anything… never touches a hammer or nails.
            He would be the most useless carpenter you could get.

So too it’s possible for you to memorise lots of doctrines about God…
To call yourself a Christian… and to say that you know God.
But if there is no obedience to God’s commands people will call you a hypocrite.

John goes further… he calls you a liar.
Because the shape of truly Christian life is marked out by obedience to the law of God.

C]        AND IS A ‘WALKING AS JESUS WALKED’.

1.         Assurance is linked to obedience.

John puts this whole matter another way in verse 6.

Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus walked.
So assurance is found in the way of obedience to God’s commandments.
But that certainty is now linked to walking as Jesus walked.

And then John makes the strongest possible connection.
There is now a MUST involved… a sense of obligation lies behind it.
You just cannot claim to live in God if you don’t walk the way Jesus walked.

In some ways this seems to raise the stakes.
Haven’t we just made the whole thing a lot more difficult?
Who of us can now still have assurance about being a Christian?
When we linked assurance to obeying God’s law we admitted we still break the law.
            Now we link certainty to the perfect, sinless life of Jesus.
            Who of us can possibly measure up?  Surely this is beyond us.
            No… for two reasons!

First because John has already knocked perfectionism on the head.
This same Jesus we are to imitate is also our Defense Attorney and Atoning Sacrifice.
He is the answer to ongoing sin in our lives.

Secondly it helps us understand what obeying God’s commandments really means.
Obedience is not just for the sake of sticking to a rigid code.
Rather it is living in relationship with Jesus… walking as He walked.
God doesn’t just want obedience to a set of rules… He wants people to imitate His Son.
            Just as in family we don’t make rules for the sake of having rules.
            We have them to help us form harmonious relationships.

2.         Assurance then comes in the way of walking as Jesus walked… imitating Him.

But let’s just make sure we understand this the right way.

Imitating Jesus is an idea that has been badly misused.
Sometimes people ask in certain situations: What would Jesus do?
            And then they have some idea in their mind that determines their actions.
            From their own subjective reasoning they answer the question:  What would Jesus do?

Let me give you an example I read about recently.
One of the largest churches in the US was debating the ordaining of practising homosexuals.
One minister got up and said: we should follow the example of Jesus.  Fine!
But then this clergy-person added:  Jesus never spoke out against homosexuality.
It is absurd to separate Jesus from the rest of the Bible.

Notice that there is a progression in John’s thought.
First he talks about obedience to God’s commands.
Secondly he talks about obeying His Word.
And now thirdly, walking as Jesus walked.
            IOW those three belong together.
            You cannot play God’s commands off against walking as Jesus walked.
            There is no contest between them.

In fact… ask yourself:  how did Jesus walk?
Did He not come to fulfil ever last detail of the law of God?
Was it not His great goal to live His whole life by the Word of God?
So that in obedience He said to satan over and over:  It is written…!
In fact His obedience to the Father’s word and commandments was an obedience unto death.
And now we are called to imitate His life-style.

3.         This is actually nothing less than the way of discipleship.

In a sense John is saying: If you know God then you are a disciple of Jesus.
                                    And as a disciple of Jesus you are called to imitate Him.
                                    Like Andrew and Peter… to follow in His footsteps.
                                    Do that and grow in your assurance of truly knowing God.

Let me close by saying that today the church needs a greater emphasis on this truth.
In part because we often look for assurance of our relationship with God in the wrong place.
We look for it in special experiences.
We look for it in the working of our own mind.

And we don’t look for it anywhere near enough in an obedient life-style.
We need a renewed emphasis on holy living… obedient living… walking as Jesus walked.
Then we would have far fewer Christians with doubts about their eternal salvation.

But there is another reason why we need a greater emphasis on this teaching.
That is for the sake of the lost… those on the road to a godless eternity.
Too often others can’t see Jesus in us.

We are too often indistinguishable from unbelievers all around us.
People see in us the same hunger for worldly possessions.
They see in us too often the same problems… the same selfishness… the same anger.

Strive to live as a disciple of Jesus.
  Do that so that you might be the more certain of your faith.
  Do that so that others too might want to be like Jesus.

Amen.