[SPEAKER_00]: You are listening to audio from Citizens Church located in Plano, Texas for more information about this ministry or to give to this ministry Please visit citizenschurch.com.
[SPEAKER_01]: Good morning.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you have a Bible turned to First John, Chapter 2
[SPEAKER_01]: As you're turning there, if you are new to citizens, if you're visiting us, welcome, my name's Jayman.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm one of the pastors here, and we're honored that you are here at church with us.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you are here and you call citizens home, I love you, and it's good to see you.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is our third week in the letter of first John.
[SPEAKER_01]: And as Jenny read, you've probably got a sense that there's a lot of scripture that we're covering.
[SPEAKER_01]: This morning, we will not be able to get to all of it, but I want to do something.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want to dive right in.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I want to do that by considering two verses that sound very similar to one another that really book in this section.
[SPEAKER_01]: It'll be on the screen behind me.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's first John 2, 1, and first John 2, 12.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what it says.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pay attention to what's similar and pay attention to what's different.
[SPEAKER_01]: My little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: First 12, I'm writing to you little children because your sins are forgiven for his namesake.
[SPEAKER_01]: They're almost identical verses.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what's similar.
[SPEAKER_01]: The way he named them, the way he addresses them is similar.
[SPEAKER_01]: He calls them little children.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not patronizing them.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you remember about John, this is the follower of Jesus, the disciple whom Jesus loved.
[SPEAKER_01]: He starts this letter by saying what we have heard, what we have seen, what we have touched because he did all those things.
[SPEAKER_01]: He heard Jesus teach and he saw Jesus and he touched Jesus, he saw him as he died, he embraced his resurrected body, he was there when Jesus ascended into heaven.
[SPEAKER_01]: All of that happened when John was in his 20s or 30s and now he's in his 80s and he hasn't gotten over it.
[SPEAKER_01]: and he writes to this church that he loves.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's pasturing this church.
[SPEAKER_01]: And old age is not made John hardhearted and grumpy.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not a get off my lawn kind of old.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's tinder.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he uses this phrase throughout the letter to address the church, little children.
[SPEAKER_01]: Other translations, your translation.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you don't have the SV, it might say dear children.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he's saying that because everyone's younger than him.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he's also saying that, mostly saying that, because he loves them.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it says this.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am writing.
[SPEAKER_01]: My little children, my dear children, I'm writing.
[SPEAKER_01]: He ever get a text from a friend and it just says, call me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Can we talk?
[SPEAKER_01]: They text you and say, hey, could we meet up soon?
[SPEAKER_01]: And some of you, when you get that text, you're just like a positive person.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you think, oh, wow, they must have really good news to share, or they bought me an early birthday present or something like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: A lot of us, when we get that text, we think they're mad.
[SPEAKER_01]: What did I do?
[SPEAKER_01]: Something's wrong.
[SPEAKER_01]: I maybe I forgot their birthday.
[SPEAKER_01]: My dad texted me a few weeks ago and he just said, call me.
[SPEAKER_01]: And my first thought was, I'm grounded.
[SPEAKER_01]: He can't even do that anymore, but that's still what I thought.
[SPEAKER_01]: You get the what?
[SPEAKER_01]: When somebody says, you know, call me, you get the what?
[SPEAKER_01]: Can we talk, but you don't get the why?
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't get the why do you want to talk?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, John throughout the letter, he doesn't do that to us.
[SPEAKER_01]: Over and again, he gives the why.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then he'll restate the why.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so he says, throughout the letter, I'm writing to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the reason I'm saying the things that I'm saying.
[SPEAKER_01]: He'll pause for this kind of clarity throughout his letter.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's why we're having this conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what I hope comes from it.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's the same address, dear children, little children.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in the same Y statement, I'm writing, so that you may not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: First one.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because your sins are forgiven, verse 12.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do not sin, your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you, he's right, I want you to live a life of costly obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to rest in forgiveness that you can't forfeit.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you hear this in the verses in between, you hear these two voices,
[SPEAKER_01]: You have an advocate in Jesus, that's verse two.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever doesn't keep his commands is a liar, that's verse four.
[SPEAKER_01]: This commandment is true in him, and it's true in you, that's verse eight.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever hates his brother is in darkness, that's verse 11.
[SPEAKER_01]: And what it can feel like is it can feel like those are two competing voices.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are voices that disagree with one another.
[SPEAKER_01]: You see this kind of thing throughout the new testament.
[SPEAKER_01]: You are saved by grace through faith, that's Paul.
[SPEAKER_01]: Faith without works is dead, that's James.
[SPEAKER_01]: All that the Father has given to me will come to me and I won't drive any of them away.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some will say to me Lord, Lord, and I'll say depart for me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I never knew you.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's also Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm writing so that you may not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm writing because your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've got this call to costly obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you have this assurance of complete forgiveness.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so maybe I could just ask a question.
[SPEAKER_01]: Which one do you need to hear?
[SPEAKER_01]: You should take your sin seriously, and you should obey Jesus in ways that cost you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should rest in grace for your sin because you have forgiveness and Christ that you can't forfeit, which one do you need?
[SPEAKER_01]: Which one do you need in this moment this morning?
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what it can feel like.
[SPEAKER_01]: Even in me asking the question like that, it can feel like we're caught in between them.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'll speak for me, maybe this is true for you too.
[SPEAKER_01]: I read passages like this and I consider the tension that at least the felt tension of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I envision these two commands as like guardrails of Christianity,
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm following Jesus on this road and I don't want to run off the road on either side and so on one side you've got this guardrail of grace and that guardrail of grace says your sins are forgiven and it's there to keep me from falling off into despair and crippling doubt and on the other side is this guardrail of obedience and the commands of God and it says do not sin and that guardrail is there to keep me from falling off into like a long season of unrepentance and rebellion and maybe that's not entirely wrong.
[SPEAKER_01]: But where that leaves many of us is it leaves us with a unhappy Christian life that's just lived in the middle.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I'm forgiven, but I'm not as forgiven as I need to be, so I will obey just in case.
[SPEAKER_01]: I shouldn't sin, but I'm already forgiven, so I'll tolerate little sin just because.
[SPEAKER_01]: So our life with Jesus stays in this middle ground of not being as obedient as we should be, while also not believing that we're as loved as we are.
[SPEAKER_01]: So here at this way, forgiveness of sin is not permission to sin, and the command do not sin doesn't cancel the grace that's ours when we do sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: These are not competing voices.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe to illustrate another way, maybe some of you grew up in a home of conflicting parenting styles.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like maybe you had one parent who was super strict and one parent who was super lenient in those parenting styles clashed and the kids felt caught in between, maybe you felt caught in between.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not what this is.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not the strict side of God, clashing with the kind side of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are not competing parenting styles in the heart of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I don't understand anything unless I illustrate it.
[SPEAKER_01]: So this is not just to keep you engaged.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is to help me understand.
[SPEAKER_01]: My daughter will make these bracelets.
[SPEAKER_01]: and she'll take these two strands of different colors or three strands of different colors and then she'll braid them together and when they're braided together, they make one piece of jewelry and together, they make something beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a strand throughout the letter of John, this strand of assurance and we see it in this verse, your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then there's a strand of obedience in the letter.
[SPEAKER_01]: We see it in this verse, do not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: And what God wants to do is you want to braid those together in your life to make something beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I want to trace them.
[SPEAKER_01]: throughout this passage, so that we see both as a work of grace in your life to make you whole and righteous and lovely.
[SPEAKER_01]: Which one do you need to hear?
[SPEAKER_01]: If I can answer for you, both, brothers and sisters, I'm preaching this sermon so that you do not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: Brothers and sisters, I'm preaching this sermon because your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: Brothers and sisters, those aren't two different sermons.
[SPEAKER_01]: First one,
[SPEAKER_01]: My little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: But if anyone does sin, here's this strand of assurance that he's going to start to thread.
[SPEAKER_01]: If anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is the perpetuation for our sins and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm writing so you don't sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you're going to sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: In fact, he's already said, Mike preached on this did such a beautiful job last week.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you claim to have no sin, you're lying.
[SPEAKER_01]: So when you sin, John says, Jesus is two things.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus is your advocate, and he's your perpetuation.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he writes that to Christians.
[SPEAKER_01]: So just so that we don't miss this, see something.
[SPEAKER_01]: Forgiveness of sin is not just for your pre-conversion sins.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's also for our post-conversion sense.
[SPEAKER_01]: How many of you came to face as a child, 13 or under?
[SPEAKER_01]: How many of you?
[SPEAKER_01]: The Lord saved me some time in between five and 12.
[SPEAKER_01]: Tim, I'm not sure exactly when.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes I'm in between, then God saved me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what that means when I share my testimony.
[SPEAKER_01]: Most of my sins are post-conversion sense.
[SPEAKER_01]: The worst things I've done in my entire life, I've done as a Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've done as a Christian, the biggest lies I've told, the longest stretches of under-pintance, unrighteous sin, self-righteous sin, most people like lean towards one or the other, I'm great at both, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I've been the younger brother of Luke 15, I've been the older brother of Luke 15, and I've done all of that as a Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I don't know how long you've been a Christian, maybe your story is one of those beautiful stories where so much of the egregious sin of your life was all pre-conversion.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what's true for everybody, as a Christian, you will sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: And praise God, there's forgiveness, not just for your pre-conversion sins, but there's forgiveness for the sins that you commit even as a follower of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: John describes it this way.
[SPEAKER_01]: He calls Jesus our advocate and our perpetuation.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus' advocacy is what Tim Keller calls the other half of our salvation.
[SPEAKER_01]: And here's what he means.
[SPEAKER_01]: John says Jesus Christ is the righteous one.
[SPEAKER_01]: He had no sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus is completely faithful in life.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's no secrets, no scandal, no idols, no lust, no pride, no lies, only and always perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: He did whatever human should do all the time.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the righteous one,
[SPEAKER_01]: doubt on the cross for your sin, and doubt on the cross for my sin, and he rose and victory over sin and death, and that's what Jesus did in the past.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the past half of salvation.
[SPEAKER_01]: The other half is what Jesus is doing in the present.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know where Jesus is right now?
[SPEAKER_01]: He's at the right hand of the Father.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you know what Jesus is doing right now?
[SPEAKER_01]: He's defending you.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's pleading your case.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the last time you sinned, Jesus was your advocate before the Father.
[SPEAKER_01]: The next time you sinned, Jesus will be your advocate before the Father.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what an advocate does.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have an accuser.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's the enemy.
[SPEAKER_01]: His name's Satan, and Satan means accuser.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you have an advocate, his name's Jesus, and stronger than the enemy's accusation is the righteous one's advocacy on your behalf.
[SPEAKER_01]: And here's the case he makes.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not asking for mercy.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is so helpful, that feels wrong to say out loud, but it's true.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not asking for mercy.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what he's not doing when you sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not saying before the Father, would you please just give them one more chance?
[SPEAKER_01]: I know they messed up, but there's good in them.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's really hard to see, but be patient, and it'll come out.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not doing that when we sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not asking for mercy.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know what he's asking for?
[SPEAKER_01]: Just this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because he's the perpetuation for our sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't use that word.
[SPEAKER_01]: You didn't use it yesterday.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're not gonna use it today.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe tomorrow, if you're in Bible class, you'll use this word.
[SPEAKER_01]: Propetiation isn't an explicitly Christian word.
[SPEAKER_01]: In the first century, if you believe in the Greco-Roman gods and goddesses, like the ones you may be read about in school or something, how it worked is you don't know what mood those gods are in.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know what they like, you don't know what they dislike, and so what you would do is like if you were gonna get on a boat and cross the sea, well, what if the sea God is mad at you?
[SPEAKER_01]: What if you did something that angered him?
[SPEAKER_01]: What he could do is when you get in your boat, he gets into storm to punish you.
[SPEAKER_01]: So,
[SPEAKER_01]: You didn't want that to happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: So to keep him from being angry with you, you would offer an animal sacrifice.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it was an animal sacrifice that was meant to change the mood of the God or God is.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if they're mad at me, they see the sacrifice and now they're happy with me.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when I get in the boat, it'll be smooth sailing.
[SPEAKER_01]: That kind of sacrifice had a name.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you want to guess what the name is for that sacrifice?
[SPEAKER_01]: Propeciation, thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: It would propitiate the God.
[SPEAKER_01]: It would turn their anger into favor.
[SPEAKER_01]: And John says, Jesus himself is the perpetuation for our sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now God's anger is not arbitrary.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not like the Greco-Roman gods and goddesses because he's real and he's not emotionally unhealthy.
[SPEAKER_01]: His anger is the righteous response to sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: And yet, and yet, even though it's his anger and it's a righteous response to sin, he's the one.
[SPEAKER_01]: who himself makes a way for his own anger to be turned from us.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Father sends the Son.
[SPEAKER_01]: He provides the sacrifice that we might know that even in our sin, we do not live under his anger but under his pleasure.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because the death of Jesus perpetuated the wrath of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: So what the Father says to the Son, it is baptism.
[SPEAKER_01]: He also says about you, even when you sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is my beloved child and who I'm well pleased.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's the definti makes.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is what does Jesus argue when he argues on your behalf?
[SPEAKER_01]: What is the case he makes when he makes his defense?
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the content of his advocacy.
[SPEAKER_01]: When my favorite commentator is a theologian in Mary and Thompson, she says his intercession is the continual application of his death to our salvation, meaning before the right hand of the Father right now, Jesus speaks and he says over and over and over again, my death has covered their sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's what I mean when I say that God that he asked for justice not mercy, not because the sin you commit is in a big deal but because the sin you commit has already been paid for.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of us have a heart, some of us have a hard time because we don't believe God is that merciful.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, do you believe he's that just?
[SPEAKER_01]: because on the cross, it was his justice that was satisfied.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you're a Christian to punish you for your sin, would not simply violate his mercy, would violate his justice.
[SPEAKER_01]: Your pre-Christian and post-conversion sins, past, present, and future have all been nailed to the cross of Jesus Christ, and Jesus the Christ, the righteous one, is making that case about you right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, God is not the God of 2nd chances.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not because the 2nd chance is not enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: I burned up my second chance a long time ago.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have needed way more than just one more shot at living a godly life.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so God gives more than just more chances.
[SPEAKER_01]: He gives an advocate.
[SPEAKER_01]: As Hebrews says, a great high priest who forever lives to make intercession for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if the question is, when will I run out of chances?
[SPEAKER_01]: We're in trouble, but the question is not, when will I run out of chances?
[SPEAKER_01]: The question is, when will my Savior stop speaking?
[SPEAKER_01]: Never.
[SPEAKER_01]: He forever lives to make intercession for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Martin Lloyd Jones preached the sermon on this passage and he said at this way it's long but it's worth our time.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's not only the perpetuating sacrifice but the perpetuation itself.
[SPEAKER_01]: Everything that is necessary to reconcile the sinner with God is in Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is prophet.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is priest.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is king.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is the sacrifice.
[SPEAKER_01]: We need nothing else.
[SPEAKER_01]: We need no one else.
[SPEAKER_01]: He himself is the perpetuation.
[SPEAKER_01]: When Satan, your adversary, comes and tries to drive you to the depth of despair and rejection, because you've fallen into sin, turn upon him and say, I have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he is the perpetuation not only of my sin, but of the sins of the whole world.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am accepted by God.
[SPEAKER_01]: The fellowship is restored, and I continue upon my way.
[SPEAKER_01]: Praise God.
[SPEAKER_01]: I write to you, dear children,
[SPEAKER_01]: because your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: Your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: We verse three.
[SPEAKER_01]: And by this we know that we have come to know Him if we keep His commandments.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever says I know him, but does not keep his commandments as a liar.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected by this way may know that we're in him, whoever says he abides in him on to walk in the same way in which he walked.
[SPEAKER_01]: Beloved, I'm writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning.
[SPEAKER_01]: The old commandment is the word that you've heard.
[SPEAKER_01]: At the same time, it's a new commitment that I'm writing to you which is true in him and in you because the darkness is passing away in the true light is already shining.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever says he's in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever loves his brother abides in the light and in him there's no cause for stumbling, but whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where he's going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, there's not just this in that passage, but most of this, the emphasis of that is on obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the strand of obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: We could sum it up by saying, my children, I'm writing to you so that you may not sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're obedience matters.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think we could rightly lean into the message of this verse, and say, if there is no obedience to God,
[SPEAKER_01]: There is no relationship with God.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot of scripture.
[SPEAKER_01]: The rest of the letter is going to return to so much of this.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I won't say all that there is to say now, but I do want to lean in to a few verses.
[SPEAKER_01]: By this, we know that we've come to know him if we keep his commandments.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever says I know him, but does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, we need to define the word no.
[SPEAKER_01]: John has already done that.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, knowing God is the same as fellowship with God.
[SPEAKER_01]: So by knowing God, he's not talking about getting the facts, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: He isn't saying, do you know things about God?
[SPEAKER_01]: Like the way that you know things about somebody in history or the way that you know things about your favorite athlete or the way that you know things about an influencer, you follow on social media.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are people that you can recite things about, but you don't have a relationship with.
[SPEAKER_01]: Satan knows a lot of facts about God.
[SPEAKER_01]: Judas knew a lot of facts about God.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus says there are some who call me Lord, Lord, because they know that's my name, but I don't know them.
[SPEAKER_01]: The false teachers who left this church, they knew a lot of facts about God and John in the next passage is about to call them the Antichrist, which I don't know if you know this, but that's not good.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a way to know facts about God without actually knowing God.
[SPEAKER_01]: How do you know which one you are?
[SPEAKER_01]: How do you know if you just know facts about God?
[SPEAKER_01]: Even if this is your first day in church, you know things about God.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've heard enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've heard enough truth spoken about God.
[SPEAKER_01]: Where you could say, yeah, I think that's true about God.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know that fact about God.
[SPEAKER_01]: So how do you know if you're just someone who knows God in a distant, I know about God kind of way, versus somebody who knows God as and I have fellowship with God, we're in relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the answer.
[SPEAKER_01]: By this, we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we could ask a good question.
[SPEAKER_01]: We could ask, okay, well, what about forgiveness?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, what about all the things we just, you know, advocacy and perpetuation and all that I thought were saved by grace?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, we are.
[SPEAKER_01]: See how there are some helpful words about this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Obedience isn't how we come to know Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: But it is how we know we've come to know Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: It isn't the basis for our relationship with God, but the evidence of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: It doesn't unlock it, but it flows from it.
[SPEAKER_01]: So John is assuming that even in the lives of us flawed believers, there is, in fact, obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: So obedience is not the means of salvation, but obedience is evidence of salvation.
[SPEAKER_01]: So to just let the question lay over us is there obedience to the commands of God in your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you take your sins seriously?
[SPEAKER_01]: If you think, I don't know, you pick it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whatever chunk of time feels like a fair chunk of time to you, a year, a couple years.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you think about that and evaluate your life, are you trending in that span of time towards moral obedience?
[SPEAKER_01]: Are you trending towards greater prayerfulness, more communion with God, more love of others?
[SPEAKER_01]: And as I'm asking this question, I think the most important question to ask is, do you care?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you care?
[SPEAKER_01]: First five, helps us, whoever keeps his word in him, truly the love of God is perfected.
[SPEAKER_01]: By this we may know that we are in Him, whoever says He abides in Him on to walk in the same way in which He walked.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot of commandments in Scripture, and so even as I'm asking the question and you're thinking about the commands of God, sometimes it's like, okay, well, I'm okay at keeping these.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not great at keeping these, which ones really matter.
[SPEAKER_01]: John simplifies it by personalizing it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whoever abides in Him on to walk as He walked.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, who's He?
[SPEAKER_01]: Come, it's always the right answer.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus, yep.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we can understand this way.
[SPEAKER_01]: By this, we know we have come to know him if we are becoming like him for becoming like Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the beauty of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the beauty of change in the Christian life.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't simply get rules to adhere to.
[SPEAKER_01]: We get a person to conform to.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's why we've pushed all of our chips in here at Citizens to say that the point of Christianity is Christ's likeness.
[SPEAKER_01]: Christ's likeness is the will of God for the people of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: He has forgiven your sin, not to leave you in sin, but to change you so that over time with tons of grace, we are learning to think and love and feel and act like Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so hear me, please hear me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I cannot as a preacher of the word in good conscience, I cannot pull the Bible's punches.
[SPEAKER_01]: if you do not care at all, about the commands of Christ.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you don't care at all about becoming like Jesus, I'm not talking about needing grace, but if you have lived years of life, where there is nothing in you that wants to obey God, and nothing in you that wants to become like Jesus, then you are not a Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're not a Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I don't like saying that.
[SPEAKER_01]: but it would dishonor the Word of God, and it would be unloving to you to try and soften a truth that has actually meant to break your heart heart and call you to repentance.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I don't keep His commandments, if I don't care about keeping His commandments.
[SPEAKER_01]: If forgiveness of sin, the idea of forgiveness of sin, the invitation of forgiveness of sin, if it hasn't colted in me, cultivated in me, a heart that does not want to sin, or at least a heart that wants to want to not sin, then I should have no assurance that I know him.
[SPEAKER_01]: I might know facts about God, but I don't know God.
[SPEAKER_01]: I might recite things about him, but I've never actually met him.
[SPEAKER_01]: I may go to church, but I don't know Christ.
[SPEAKER_01]: And remember what we said about this book, this book will not give false assurance.
[SPEAKER_01]: It will not patch you on the back and say you're doing okay, if you're not doing okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: It will not call you to comfort if it needs to call you to repentance.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I say I'm a Christian, but I do not keep the commands of Christ, I am a liar.
[SPEAKER_01]: And here's the challenge in this moment.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know how many people that applies to in this room.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it's a few, maybe it's more than that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it's no one.
[SPEAKER_01]: God knows, I don't, I'm just a guy.
[SPEAKER_01]: But what can happen, and you even feel, you probably even feel now, just the tension of the threads in this passage, to hear about the advocacy felt really good, to hear about the commands is like,
[SPEAKER_01]: What can happen in the heart of the Christians is that because the Christian heart is tinder to God, because the Christian heart is sensitive to the word of God, because the Christian heart hears this passage, and it doesn't take a ton of persuasion, it doesn't take a ton of giftedness on my end, it doesn't take a ton of convincing on my end, the Christian heart hears this passage, and you immediately start to evaluate your life and consider your life before the Lord, and here's what can happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: We hear whoever says I don't know him, whoever says I know him and doesn't keep his commandments as a liar, and many of us think, oh, that has to be me, I'm a liar.
[SPEAKER_01]: This isn't real.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have everyone fooled.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not a Christian, because you can think of the last sin you committed or you can think of the commandment that you perpetually disobey and What happens is is the hard truth That was meant for a few hard hearts Can crush the heart that is actually already been softened by faith and so let me say this plainly and it's not to rescue us from the tension This passage was not written to Christians to make Christians a phrase that they're not Christians
[SPEAKER_01]: After this section in 1214, I wish we had more time for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: It speaks to different groups.
[SPEAKER_01]: It speaks to fathers and young men and little children.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are different ages of spiritual maturity.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says to older Christians, what he calls fathers.
[SPEAKER_01]: He speaks to older men and women and says, you know God.
[SPEAKER_01]: What you believe from the beginning, you know God.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when the world around you has changed, the character of God and the good news of the gospel has not changed.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then he says to younger Christians, he says, you have overcome the evil one.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're strong.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then he speaks to all of them and he says your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: What he doesn't write is he doesn't write and say you're good and you know you're good because you've never broken a command.
[SPEAKER_01]: Again, it's not competing parenting styles in the heart of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not God saying over here, you have an advocate and you're loved and you've overcome the evil one and then over here, but you better obey because I'm still a little bit mad and you don't, if you don't completely obey, then you can't call yourself a Christian and so I imagine the majority of the remedy I'm just trying to think honestly and trying to humbly pastor the people in front of me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I imagine the majority of the room striving to keep the commands of Christ struggling to obey and you're trying to find yourself in all this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let me just offer a few things as I think about how to help us hold these two.
[SPEAKER_01]: How is it that the two strands braid together into something that's beautiful in our life?
[SPEAKER_01]: Christian, when you think about your life with Jesus, you think about your commandment keeping your obedience from you here, by this we have come to know Him if we keep His commandments.
[SPEAKER_01]: You need to hear this.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not all or nothing.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not I am either completely obedient or I'm completely depraved and lost.
[SPEAKER_01]: If it was all or nothing, John wouldn't have just told us about provision for our sin as Christians.
[SPEAKER_01]: In the advocacy of Jesus for our sin as Christians, he knows more important than that God knows that we still need grace for sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not all or nothing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Same Albury says that this way and I just cannot get over how helpful this is.
[SPEAKER_01]: praise God.
[SPEAKER_01]: If that quote doesn't mean anything to you, it's because you haven't tried to obey.
[SPEAKER_01]: Obedience doesn't have to be perfect to be real.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's tease it up.
[SPEAKER_01]: You started a Bible reading plan because you're like, this year, I'm really going to read through the Bible.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not going to do that thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I did last year where I stopped reading, you distracted, and then you stopped reading it, and you got distracted.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, the desire to read the Bible is obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: And even though it's not perfect, it's real.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's real.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm fighting to love this person in my life and they're just so hard to love and in the bitterness.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes it's even rage that I feel.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have to over and again entrust that to Christ and I feel like I'm confessing the same thing over and again, that obedience is real, even if it's not perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm trying to disciple these kids, the Lord's given me, and I'm so often distracted, and they so often see the worst of me, and I have to confess that to God, and I have to apologize to them, and I'm just stumbling forward as a dad, and I'm just stumbling forward as a mom, trying to point these kids to Jesus, that's obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not perfect, but just because it's not perfect, doesn't mean it's not real.
[SPEAKER_01]: However, you would name this in your life, whatever sin struggle you'd name, whatever commitment that's hard to keep, where you have the ways that you're trying to honor Jesus, you're trying to become like Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you have the ways that you keep running into your own flesh and your weakness and your sinful desires.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not perfect, but just because it's not perfect, doesn't mean it's not real.
[SPEAKER_01]: As weak as it is, would you imagine with me who you would be without Jesus?
[SPEAKER_01]: So don't ignore the sin.
[SPEAKER_01]: And don't dismiss the obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: It doesn't have to be perfect to be real.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not all or nothing.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then know this, this has been especially on my heart this week.
[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't find the perfect words for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of this didn't come together the way I'd hoped.
[SPEAKER_01]: But a life of obedience is worth it.
[SPEAKER_01]: The commands of God are for your good.
[SPEAKER_01]: The invitation to become like Jesus is for your good.
[SPEAKER_01]: The command to obey should not scare us.
[SPEAKER_01]: God's commands are not against us, they are for us.
[SPEAKER_01]: God, look at me, Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: God has a vision for your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: His vision for who his grace in your life, his commitment in your life, his advocacy in your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: He has a vision for how all that ties together to make you a beautiful person, to make you a person that looks more... No, you're not gonna be perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, you're not gonna be perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: You will never be who you will be when Jesus returns, but you don't have to be who you were before you met him.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he'll use this in your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the kindness of God to give these commands.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's why it's not two different sermons.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not two different sermons because the same grace that saves is also the grace that changes.
[SPEAKER_01]: God loves us and because he loves us, he will make us holy and righteous and lovely.
[SPEAKER_01]: My grandmother passed away last Friday.
[SPEAKER_01]: She was 84 years old.
[SPEAKER_01]: We thought, you know, we thought we had more time with her, her health just declined really quickly after Christmas.
[SPEAKER_01]: Death is awful.
[SPEAKER_01]: Death is our enemy.
[SPEAKER_01]: What we don't do around here is cold comfort, like in Lawson and Suffering.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't offer platitudes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Death isn't a friend.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's no positive spend to put on death.
[SPEAKER_01]: Death is awful.
[SPEAKER_01]: But for the Christian, death wins the battle, but Jesus has won the war.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so we don't grieve as those who have no hope.
[SPEAKER_01]: My grandmother loved Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: My grandmother and my grandfather were saved together in 1977 at a marriage conference.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this past week we had our funeral and if you'd been here there, here's what you would have heard.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was just beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: My sister stood up and she said, Grandmom never missed an opportunity to talk about Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: And my brother stood up, and he said, she was one of the most sincere worshipers I've ever met.
[SPEAKER_01]: I told people she was fervent in prayer.
[SPEAKER_01]: People called her a prayer warrior.
[SPEAKER_01]: The person in my life who prays from me most is my mom.
[SPEAKER_01]: The person right next to that was my grandma.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mentioned that to my dad.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, dad, I think grandma prayed for me more than anyone except mom.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I thought he might push back.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he was like, no, I pray for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's like, no, that's true.
[SPEAKER_01]: She didn't.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was her.
[SPEAKER_01]: She prayed for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: My dad led the service, my dad led the service for his mother-in-law.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he said about her, she had the courage of Esther, the mind of Paul and the heart of Mary.
[SPEAKER_01]: My uncle said she taught him how to love sacrificially.
[SPEAKER_01]: My daughter read her great grandmother's favorite song, Psalm 121.
[SPEAKER_01]: And at the front of the church, instead of a normal picture of her, there is this huge picture of her Bible laying open in her hands.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: The way she was honored was beautiful because the life that she lived was worthy of honor, like friends, friends, friends.
[SPEAKER_01]: To live a life where three generations of your family stand and testify to your Christ-like character.
[SPEAKER_01]: Can you imagine?
[SPEAKER_01]: where the thing visible at your service is not your face, but your Bible.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then she was not famous.
[SPEAKER_01]: She had no social media.
[SPEAKER_01]: She was not rich.
[SPEAKER_01]: Few people know her name, but her great granddaughter knows your favorite song.
[SPEAKER_01]: An IASP.
[SPEAKER_01]: IASPIRE to live a life that warrants that kind of funeral.
[SPEAKER_01]: I do.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know, it's true in 1977, her sins were forgiven, and every day of her life her Savior was her advocate.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when she sinned every time he spoke about her word, and she walked in the ways of Jesus, she kept the commands of Christ.
[SPEAKER_01]: Her obedience wasn't perfect, but it was real.
[SPEAKER_01]: because the love of God both saved her and changed her.
[SPEAKER_01]: And as I've processed that and sat with these verses, it just strikes me what strikes me is that the forgiving grace of Jesus and the changing grace of Jesus will actually make us into people who live consequential lives and leave behind a godly eulogy.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't need to apologize for the commands of God because they're hard to keep.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm zealous for us to remember that His commands are for our good.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus does not command that we become like Him because He wants to spoil our fun and restrict our life, but because He wants to change us into the kind of people who leave a legacy of faithfulness and generational blessing.
[SPEAKER_01]: A people who are remembered as those whose hands are on his word and whose mouths are quick to pray and whose hearts are full of love for Jesus and for others.
[SPEAKER_01]: God is speaking to you now and saying your sins are forgiven and God is speaking to you now and saying do not sin and both of those words are spoken and love because your God loves you.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you're God wants to make you whole and righteous and like his son and lovely.
[SPEAKER_01]: Father, we need you, we need you.
[SPEAKER_01]: This morning, the way God, I just believe that what your spirit wants to do, Holy Spirit, believe that what you want to do is you want to take these two threads, use them in our life to make us look more like Jesus, that we would be confidence in forgiveness when we sin,
[SPEAKER_01]: that we would find your word, lovely, that we would find your commands, not as the opposite of your grace, but as an extension of your grace.
[SPEAKER_01]: So beloved, would you just pray?
[SPEAKER_01]: Your sins are forgiven.
[SPEAKER_01]: Your obedience matters, would you just ask God how he would have you responded to that?
[SPEAKER_01]: What, what a sad thing it would be if we just lived all of our Christian life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not as obedient as we could be while also not believing where his loved as we are.
[SPEAKER_01]: confess, ask for help, whatever it is that has been spoken this morning that is lending through your ears to your heart, would you just turn that into prayer with your God?
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, God.
[SPEAKER_01]: I thank you, God, for the grace that looks at a life.
[SPEAKER_01]: It doesn't offer more and more and more chances, but the grace it looks at a life.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's sacrifice that is sufficient.
[SPEAKER_01]: an intercessor who never stops speaking.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think you got for the grace that can take sinful people imperfect people and lead them towards a life
[SPEAKER_01]: We're an honorable eulogy can be spoken now.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: We need you, Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is all about you, Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: We want to walk in the ways of our advocate, Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_01]: Help us.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.