Welcome to our first post for Sunday School at Bethel Hill. Hope you enjoy the lesson.
Bro. PJ
Lesson #5: Assurance of Our Salvation (Page 33)
Lesson Text: 1 John 3:11-24 [Christ like love for the
brethren is
evidence that we have been born again]
Introduction
As
John writes this letter he wants his readers to have no doubt about their
salvation. He begins in Chapter 1 with an introduction to Christ as “That which
was from the beginning… the Word of Life:”. Then in verse 3 John says the
things that he saw and heard from Christ he is now going to share so that they
too can have fellowship with (1st) “Us” {Like minded people who have
placed their faith in the finished work of Jesus as what God the Father
required for salvation.} (2nd) “with the Father” {The idea here is
that sin separates man from God. God is Holy and is offended by sin – He cannot
indulge in it nor condone it. By the authority of God’s Word all mankind are
sinners thus separated from God.
Romans
3:10 “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:”
Romans
3:12 “For all have sinned, and
come short of the glory of God;”
Romans 5:12 “Wherefore,
as by one man(Adam) sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all
men, for that all have sinned.”
Because ALL HAVE SINNED, and because THERE
IS NONE RIGHTEOUS something must be done about sin in order for any person
to have the fellowship John was writing about. The way God has chosen to deal
with man’s sin is through His Son Jesus Christ, thus Christ had to die in our
place for “the wages of sin is death”.} (3rd) “with His Son, Jesus
Christ” {Fellowship means communion, or a close association- intimacy. Jesus as
God in the flesh gives us something to look at and desire to be like. Ephesians
4:13, speaking of the Spiritual gifting
of believers, tell us what we ought to be looking for in ourselves – “Till we
all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God,
unto a perfect (spiritually complete) man, unto the measure of the stature of
the fullness of Christ:”
So
what does it mean to have fellowship with Christ? We must partner with Him, go
into business with Him if you will. His enterprises are to be our enterprises.
We are to share mutual interests, devotion and activities. His mission should
be our mission, His goals and plans our goals and plans. We should love what He
loves, desire what He desires. The idea is for us to become just like Jesus
that we would have the mind of Christ to lead and guide us through this life.
Then
in verse 4 John ties our fellowship with Christ to our joy. (1 John 1:4) “And
these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.”) The idea here is
that it is impossible to have full joy in life without having a full assurance
of your salvation. If one never knows they are resting fully in Christ there
will always be a longing, a void, that will hinder their ability to feel secure;
stealing their peace and joy. Near the end of this letter John writes “These
things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that
ye may KNOW that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on
the name of the Son of God.” Keep in mind from our previous lessons some of the
“tests” of our salvation John has already written about.
Do
we walk in the light? 1 John 1:7
Do
we confess our sin? Vs 9
Do
we keep His commandments? 2:3
Do
we love our brother? Vs 10
Do
we love this present world? Vs 15
Do
we practice righteousness? Vs 29
Do
we purify ourselves? 3:3
Do
we abide in Him? Vs 6
In this lesson we will attempt to examine three more ways
by which our salvation is confirmed (1st)
Our Love for the brethren (2nd) answered prayer (3rd) the
Holy Spirits work in our hearts.
1: The Assurance of Love
(Verses 11 – 14)
Here
John begins providing the ground work for his concluding statement found in
verse 10. “In this the children of God
are manifest, and the children of the devil:
whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God,
neither he that loveth not his brother.” Thus is the reverse is those who do
righteousness and loveth his brother are evidences that they are children of
God. He reminds us that this idea of
brotherly love is not something new but rather is from the very beginning. He illustrates this by way of Cain’s murder
of Abel as an example of the different behaviors of evil and
righteousness. Hebrews 11:4 tells us
that “By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by
which he obtained witness that he was righteous.” God called Abel righteous because of his
actions. Don’t let this turn your mind
towards “works” for salvation. Salvation
has always been by grace through faith not of works. (Eph. 2:8-9). Look again at Hebrews 11:4. “By faith”, Abel took the word of God at face
value. He did what God asked of him
because he believed Him. Abel’s
righteousness is only demonstrated through obedience. Cain on the other hand according to John “was
of that wicked one”.
Let’s
take just a moment and look at the account of Cain and Abel and their
sacrifice. (Gen. 4:1-16) Within this
account there are several points that need to be considered. Both were brothers of the same parents thus
we can conclude they had received the same instructions pertaining to
acceptable sacrifices. Both came to God
in acts of worship with a sacrifice. The
problem lay in what was offered.
Apparently Cain’s sacrifice was contrary to God’s specified rules for
the type or kind of sacrifice to be offered.
Now consider their offerings:
Cain “of the fruit of the ground” (vs. 3) and Abel “of the firstlings of
his flock and of the fat thereof”. (vs. 4)
For some insight on this, look at Hebrews 9:22. “And almost all things are by law purged with
blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission”.
God
in His mercy gave Cain an opportunity to go back and offer according to His
specifications, yet Cain chose to get mad rather than get right. (vs.
5-7). When Cain saw that God accepted
Abel’s sacrifice but rejected his, he became angry, and killed his bother. Reality
is that Cain was mad at God but acted out on Gods representative. Cain demonstrated
his spiritual and ethical relationship to Satan when he did that. So back to John chapter 3, in verse 8 John
wrote “He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the
beginning.” Then verse 12, speaking of
Cain’s sinful actions, it says that he was of that wicked one” connecting Cain’s
evil heart and actions to its ultimate source, Satan.
From
this portion of scripture, we can see these things about Cain.
·
who is his spiritual father—the evil one
·
what were his actions—he slew his brother
·
why did he do it—because his own works were
evil.
Bottom
line is Cain failed his brotherly love test.
Had Cain loved Abel as God loves us, the thought of killing his brother
would have never entered his mind. Then
in verse 13 John says in light of Cain’s action, don’t be surprised that the
world hates you. The world hated Jesus and
hate Christians for the same reason Cain hated Abel, our righteous acts expose the disobedience
and unrighteousness of unbelievers.
By
looking at actions and behaviors, we learn a lot about the spiritual condition
of a person. In verse 14, John tells us
that we know that we have
passed from death into life. Once again,
according to the authority of the Word of God, we can know with absolute
certainty that we are saved. The idea of
this word “passed” means to pass from one state or condition to another. Our natural state is that of being
spiritually dead in our trespasses and sin (Eph. 2:1) In light of this, mans greatest need is to
pass from this natural state of death into the state or condition of the
living. This can only happen when that
person is reborn in spirit and receives life from God. Here John is viewing life and death as
opposite spiritual conditions that we refer to as saved and lost. John’s conclusion is that we know that we are
saved because we habitually practice love for our fellow believers, but the
flip side of that coin is that if you do not have that constant love for your
brother, that person remains in the state or condition of death.
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