God’s Witness & Gift of Eternal Life | 1 John 5:10-12

1 John 5:10-12 and the Witness of God in His Son

Let's turn together in our Bibles to 1st John chapter 5. In 1st John chapter 5, I'm going to read verses 10 through 12 today. 1st John 5 verses 10 through 12, God's Word says, The one who believes in the Son of God has this witness in himself.

The one who does not believe, God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the witness which God has borne witness about his Son. And the witness is this, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.

He who has the Son has a life. He who does not have the Son does not have that life.

Amen.

So, we're going to keep plowing through this passage, which is clearly still focusing on God's witness and God's witnesses. On through verses 11 and 12 as well. And previously we saw that the witness of God, the witness of God the Father, is that He has borne witness about His Son.

He has borne witness about His Son, past tense, with the water of Christ's baptism and the blood of Christ's death, like we saw. And that the witness, the testimony, is all the same. They all agree. The testimony of the Spirit of Truth, of God the Father, and of His Son, Jesus Christ, includes the message of eternal life.

That's what verses 11 and 12 are unpacking for us. And to wrap up verse 10 from last week, I want to read a helpful comment here from Gordon Clark. And he says this, This testimony is in us because, and in the sense that, we know and believe it.

And that's what it says in verse 10. The one who believes in the Son of God has this witness in himself. The one who does not believe, God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the witness which God has borne witness about His Son.

And then you see the words witness pointing to the word that we get martyr from. And the one who believes, hopisteon, that phrase that the Apostle very frequently uses throughout his writings. So there is a clear emphasis here in this passage.

We know and believe it. There is indeed a difference, a great difference, between knowing or understanding the words of Matthew 3 .17, which says, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased, and believing them, believing that God spoke them and that therefore they are true.

There is no other way in which we can have a testimony in ourselves. Is this not what the very verse clearly says? Very clearly says, he who believes ipso facto, by the very fact itself, has the witness in himself because he believes it in his mind to be true.

In his heart, it is by means of this belief. Take note of that. By means of our belief that we are justified, pardoned, acquitted and accepted at God's bar of justice, at his judgment, at his throne of justice.

Verse 10 strongly emphasizes belief. He who believes, he who does not believe, has not believed the witness, the testimony of God. And likewise, to reject God's witness is to reject God himself and make him out to be a liar, which is impossible because God cannot lie.

There is no distinction then between the words of God and God himself in Scripture. None. In the teaching of Christ of God, they are equated as the same. They are one and the same. Now, this brings us to one of the most fundamentally important lessons of the Bible in which many who don't understand the Reformed faith or Calvinism or the doctrines of grace they tend to misunderstand or misrepresent what we believe.

And that is the teaching that God uses means. God uses means. That's one of the most important teachings of the Bible. According to the Reformed Confessions, such as the Westminster and London Baptist Confessions, chapter 5, section 3, which is of providence, of God's providence, says this, God in his ordinary, in his ordinary providence.

What does that mean? And that means in his upholding, directing, organizing and governing, predestining all creatures and things, all of them, all creatures and things, everything that happens with all creatures and things.

In his ordinary providence of these things, God makes use of means. He makes use of means, yet is free to work outside, above and against them at his pleasure. So God uses means. Now, what does that mean?

What does it mean that God uses means? In other words, he uses his creation. He uses his creatures to accomplish his own will. Much like in Genesis 50, where Joseph was discovered to be the brother of his brothers.

And he said, you meant it for evil, but God did what? God purposed it for good. Because he took the sins of Joseph's brothers to deliver him over to death and to bondage. So that eventually God would use him and raise him up to be Pharaoh's right hand man.

And deliver his own people, including his brothers, from death and starvation. And ultimately from Pharaoh, the tyranny of Pharaoh. So this is what God does. This is how God works. He has a purpose for all things, even for evil.

And sin. God makes good purpose out of all of it. There's no surprises with God, and he does not play dice with us or with anything. All of God's counsel shall stand, declaring the end from the beginning, like Isaiah powerfully says.

So he will accomplish all his good purpose. That's really what providence is about. God's providence is the unfolding of God's purpose in time, in history. It's all been laid out before God's eternal purpose in mind and will.

So then, this is a very important teaching that many misunderstand. But it's one of the fundamental teachings of Scripture. God even uses means, such as the decisions of us humans, good and bad. All of them.

He uses means, choices, actions to witness to himself, to his son, to his truth, to the truth. Much like the water, the blood, the message of eternal life in his son. The water baptism of Christ. The blood sacrifice and death of Christ on the cross.

This is also why the one who believes, the one who believes in the Son of God, has this witness in himself. Why? Because it is the means. It is by means of this message of the Son that is internalized in ourselves by faith.

By faith, by understanding and agreeing with it, with the message, by believing it to be true. That we ourselves have eternal life, the grace and gift of eternal life in his son, Jesus Christ. The Gospel.

That's the message of the Gospel. It's the same thing. However, there is in fact a more pointed question that we should ask here. And I like how Gordon Clark puts this in his book, What Do Presbyterians Believe?

It's a very good commentary on the Westminster Confession. He says, does God ever accomplish his purpose without means or apart from means or some means or other? In other words, does he ever accomplish his will apart from means ordinarily?

And Clark continues, perhaps in two, perhaps in two of God's actions, he uses no means at all. He doesn't use means or mediums, something else besides himself to accomplish his purpose. He continues, in creating the world from nothing, ex nihilo, creating the world from nothing, there were no means to use.

God used his own power by the word of his power, like Hebrew says. He used no other means in creating the universe. Universe means one verse by his word. Let there be, let there be, let there be. And there was there were no means to use in creation.

Also, in continuing to uphold. In existence, the universe in its entirety, there could be no means in him. What does Paul say? In him. In who? In him. We live and move and exist. We have our being, right?

There could be no means, but these two actions are not to be classified as his ordinary providence. And so we may continue to wonder whether the words without, above, or against, in the section that I read on the confession, is a mistake in the confession.

Why is Clark saying this? Because the simple fact of the matter is that God ordinarily uses means. Extraordinarily, he does not use means, like creation, like in upholding the universe. And think about whether there's other circumstances in which God does not use means, but acts directly without means or a medium of some kind.

But God ordinarily uses means. God often uses means. God usually uses means. In fact, God almost always uses means. And this is what many people fail to understand, especially those who are not Reformed or Calvinist in their doctrine.

Because they often say, well, that would mean that we have no wills. We don't make choices because God already predetermined them. It's like, no, just because God predetermines our choices doesn't mean that we don't make them ourselves.

God ordains everything, including the means of secondary causes and means. So it's not like he goes against, he does violence to the will of the creature, like the confession also explains. No, God ordains all of it, including the desires.

All of our choices, our sins, everything, it's already been predetermined in such a way that we still make our own decisions and choices and sins and are still responsible for them. That's the majesty and glory of God in his providence, such that nothing is outside of his control.

Everything has been predetermined in his foreknowledge and forecounsel. And yet we still make decisions ourselves because we ourselves have wills to choose and to not choose. The problem is that we cannot choose God or what is good when we are fallen in Adam.

We are sinners. That's what the Bible repeatedly says. That's why in this passage we just read that the witness of God is that he has given us. He had to give us eternal life. We couldn't have done anything to earn it or receive it, which we will see further on shortly.

So then, does Clark overstate his case here that there was only two cases where God supernaturally and directly acted apart from means? Are there any other situations that we can think of where God acts directly without means and without mediation?

There's one important case that would probably qualify where God acts directly. And we read it earlier in John chapter three in a previous message, because God acts unilaterally, directly in our regeneration.

When he regenerates our spirits and renews our spirit and causes us to desire him and believe his truth, the gospel, his word, God supernaturally does it by the washing of regeneration. Regeneration is a supernatural act.

We do not cooperate with God to be regenerated. Contrary to what Arminians say or sinners just say or people who say that we have to make the choice ourselves. Apart from God's regenerating power, people will say you have to believe in order to be born again.

That's completely backwards. How can you believe when you were dead spiritually in your trespasses and sins? If you're dead, you cannot do anything. Spiritually speaking, that is why God has to rebirth us spiritually, change our nature to cause us to believe and to obey him and to worship him and to believe him, to agree with his gospel.

That's why Clark said earlier, there is a great vast chasm of a difference between simply understanding the gospel or the truth and actually agreeing with it. Because the natural man does not believe it, even though he may understand it.

In order to agree with it, to be true, you have to be born again first, because the natural man doesn't want the truth of God. He is fallen, wretched, naked, blind, and dead in sin, in Adam and in his nature, his corrupted nature, fallen nature.

Regeneration is all and exclusively God's power then. Let's go back a few verses earlier in 1 John, 1 John 5, 1 and 4. It's very clear there. You have to contradict scripture in order to say that regeneration has to come after you believe.

It doesn't make any sense. Verse 1 says, Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God exclusively, and past tense, beforehand, prior to believing. And everyone who loves the one who gives new birth loves also the one who what?

He restates it. Who has been born of him also. Verse 4, for everything that has been born of God exclusively, and apart from anything, or anyone else, or any other means, overcomes the world. And this is the overcoming that has overcome the world.

Our faith. It is the Word of God. Our faith. Which, consequently, is also a gift, like verse 11 and 12 say. Turn with me now to the Gospel of John, chapter 1. Chapter 1, verse 12. In the Gospel of John, chapter 1, verse 12, it's one of the clearest teachings from John, the Apostle's other writing, exactly who does what.

Exactly who does what. The Gospel of John, chapter 1, verse 12. But as many as received him, to them he gave, he gave. He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in his name, who were born, born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man.

In other words, nor of the will of any other means. But of who? Of God alone, you might add. But of God alone, solely, exclusively, apart from any other means, any other causes. It is God alone who makes us born again.

Alone. And this brings me to a very excellent work in the history of the church written, penned by Luther himself. It's called The Bondage of the Will. I highly commend that work to you all. It is one of my favorite books, in which he thunderously refutes Erasmus, the Armenian Roman Catholic priest, regarding this very issue of the will.

Because Erasmus tried to defend free will, and Luther responded very powerfully, very cogently, that there is no such thing as free will. The will is enslaved. That's what Jesus said. He who commits sin is a slave of sin.

Either you are a slave of sin, or of righteousness. We're all slaves. We're all in bondage to something. Either sin, and our sin nature, the flesh, or God's renewed righteousness, that he is actively working in us to conform us to the image of a son.

And therefore, in slavery to righteousness. To now seek to desire him, and to be convicted of disobeying him, and of sinning. And of, therefore, mortifying our flesh. That's so important. And Luther brilliantly sets this up.

He says, you know, this is one of the most fundamental questions that we need to ask. Because you have to know, what are you capable of? God commands us to believe. He commands us to be perfect. He commands all these things.

But are we capable? We have to ask ourselves, we have to back up and ask ourselves those things first. That's why he says, count the cost. You have to count the cost. What is demanded and required of us, and are we capable of doing it?

And that's what Luther sets out to prove biblically. Scripturally, we cannot do anything good that God commands, apart from his divine, direct, exclusive, supernatural intervention in our lives.

Amen.

Propitiation, Justification by Faith Alone, and Christ as the Only Mediator

That is God's sovereign power and grace. Now, what about propitiation? What about that? What about God's work of propitiation, of satisfying or appeasing his wrath, his divine wrath, through the atonement of his son, Jesus Christ?

Was that a direct act of God, apart from any mediation? Well, let's ask ourselves, how did Jesus die? What was he killed on? He was crucified. He was crucified, right? Like I've read previously from Romans 3 .21 and on.

But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been manifested, has appeared, in visible form, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, by his word, the word of God written, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ.

For all those who believe, it's the means. And that's what sola fide is all about. That's what the Protestant doctrine of justification by faith alone. It's by means of faith alone, in Christ alone. Because God gives us the faith, and through that faith, he justifies his elect, his people.

It is through the gift of faith. Just like 1 John says, the grace, the gift that he has given us of eternal life.

How?

Because all who believe in Christ, there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a what? As a merit, as something earned, as something that we had to do?

No, as a gift by his grace alone, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God displayed publicly as a what? As a propitiation, a satisfaction, an appeasement of his wrath, in his blood, through faith.

It's given to us, transferred to us, through faith. Through faith, apart from works, like he says later on in other places, several times, for a demonstration of his righteousness, because in the forbearance of God, he passed over the sins previously committed, for the demonstration of his righteousness in the present time, so that he would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Amen.

Now, God displayed Christ, his son, publicly.

How?

Was it not through the human means of the cross, and of the crucifixion? He was delivered over to sinful men, like the Scriptures say. It was prophesied that he would be delivered over, handed over to sinful men, despised and rejected of men.

By human means, God would orchestrate the most vile, wicked sin on the planet ever committed. Treason against the Son. False accusation against the Son of God. The God-Man. God used that to pardon us from all our sin and our guilt.

By grace alone. That is the power only an omnipotent, all-powerful God can do that. Only he can orchestrate that. Without violating the will of anyone. Everybody who did what they did, they did by their decisions and wills.

God isn't puppeting everybody around as if they had no wills.

No.

God orchestrates it all. He causes it all to happen, but he uses everyone's wills and choices in such a way that even though they commit their own sin, God uses it for his glory and even ultimately for our forgiveness.

So in a sense, yes, God uses human means to propitiate and satisfy his wrath on Christ, but in another sense, that propitiatory work was solely the work of God because only God could accomplish it through his Son, Jesus Christ.

And through the Spirit of God. So, amen and hallelujah to God's glory and power and grace. God the Father bore witness to his Son by publicly displaying him on the human Roman erected cross as a public testimony and witness.

The blood, the water, the blood and the Spirit. The blood and as a proof and satisfaction of his divine justice. His divine justice. I love how Gordon Clark breaks this down a little bit further for us to help get a better grip on this because it's such an important teaching that we understand.

Where does God, how does God interact with man? Where do our decisions stop? How far do we go? How far does God go? Where does that, how does that all work together? Clark says, God controls the wills of men.

This does not mean that violence was done to the will of the creatures. Again, like the confession, our confession states. It was not as if the men wanted to adopt Ahithophel's plans and were forced to follow Hushai against their own desires.

That's what 2 Samuel talks about regarding King David. They did it out of their own will. They did it because they wanted to. Their psychological processes issued in a desire to follow Hushai's plans.

They wanted to, but it must be noted that God established psychological processes just as he established physical processes. This ties in with the next phrase of our confession in chapter 3, which is of God's decree, which says this.

Nor is the liberty of contingency of second causes, meaning such as human wills or decisions or actions taken away. They're not taken away. They are rather, in fact, established by God's sovereign decree.

The decision that the men of Israel made was not in opposition to any of those physical, psychological, mental processes, nor even without them. It was by means of them. It was by those means that God established such processes for what?

For the purpose of accomplishing his will, for unfolding his will. That's his providence. He does not arrange things or control history apart from secondary causes or means. He does not. By definition, history is the unfolding of means, historical means, natural processes, physical processes, psychological processes, mental processes.

All of it is secondary to God. To mention other examples, God decreed to bring the children of Israel out of Egypt, but they had to do the walking themselves. God didn't walk for them, just like God doesn't believe for us, even though he causes us to believe.

He gives us the desire and causes us to believe, to choose him. But we must believe ourselves. God does not believe for us. We decide because God gives us that choice, just like Scripture repeatedly tells us in 1 John and throughout.

They had to do the walking themselves. Even the walking, what does Paul say again? In Acts, in him we do everything. We live, we move, our very existence is contingent upon God keeping us alive.

Everything.

If God wanted to, he could end us instantly. He could end us. Apart from his sustaining power to uphold everything, we're nothing.

We're dead, we're nothing.

We cannot live, we cannot move, we cannot have our being. So, everyone, sinners included, depend on God. And that is the cosmic treason that Sproul talks about. The cosmic treason of the unbeliever is that he doesn't even recognize or refuses to acknowledge that reality.

That apart from God, he has nothing, has nothing, can do nothing. What did Jesus say again? Apart from me, you can do everything. Apart from me, you can do nothing of your own selves. Even believe, which sounds simple, right?

Because we live in such an Armenian self-God, self-empowerment society. Well, I can do whatever I want. No, you can't. The Bible says the opposite. You can't. There's a sense in which you can do whatever you want, that all you do is whatever you want, but all you want is sin, apart from God's grace.

This is one of the most fundamental lessons, beloved, in Scripture that is so often, it's very important to rightly distinguish and to balance out in these, it's commonly called God's sovereignty and man's responsibility.

And this often ties into the problem of evil. How do we reconcile evil with God, a good sovereign God? Well, it's because the answer is actually very simple. It's because God ordained all things, including the wicked, for the day of doom, for His purpose.

It's for His good purpose. Now, is God the author of sin? No, He's not. God does not sin. Sinners sin. God is not a sinner. But God is ultimately responsible. He takes full responsibility for causing sin to happen.

How?

Because either He will glorify and save and justify and sanctify and glorify you by forgiving you in Christ, or He will pour out His heavenly, eternal wrath of justice on you for all eternity. He's going to take responsibility for sin, either through His Son, and through you believing, or through His wrath to the praise of His glorious justice.

Like the Confession beautifully says, either to the praise of His glorious grace, to the believing, or to the praise of His glorious justice and wrath displayed for eternity for the unbelieving. Black and white.

Amen?

That's what it boils down to. And God, likewise, then, continuing what 1 John says in this passage, God, likewise, uses means to bear witness. He uses means to bear witness. He uses persons. He uses angelic beings.

He uses things, events, actions, works, the works of Christ, the blood of Christ, the crucifixion, the baptism through John the Baptist, which was another means of the water that bears witness to the truth of the Son, that He is God and man, that He is who He says He is, that He is the Messiah, the Christ, and the only Savior of the believing ones.

God uses means to bear witness about the truth of His Son, and His words, and His doctrine, which He commands us to do what to? To listen to Him.

Amen?

Listen to Him. And about His witness of eternal life, which is in who, beloved? In His Son. 1 John 5, 11. And you can only get this proper understanding from the Reformed tradition. You have to acknowledge and forsake all your pride.

And, you know, the poem, the famous poem that I've quoted before, I am the captain of my fate, of my soul. I am the architect of my soul, the captain of my fate. That Invictus poem that they teach little elementary school kids.

It's a lie. It's a lie. Because apart from God, we are nothing. Not only can we not do anything good, we can do nothing. We are nothing. So it's no surprise that several in the Reformed faith have expressed this doctrine very clearly according to Scripture.

One of the Princeton theologians back in his day was Charles Hodge. He said this in his commentary on Romans. He who purposes the end, purposes also the means to the end. The secondary causes. And he brings about the end.

How?

By securing the use of the means. It's not apart from means. That's like what Islam teaches. It's more fatalistic where, you know, God is going to do whatever, regardless of whatever you do. That's not what we teach.

That's not what the Bible teaches. God is going to accomplish all his purpose by means of all other human, creaturely actions, decisions, and causes. That's how he accomplishes it. By those means. In other words, by means of those means.

Not apart from them. And, Hodge continues, when rational agents, thinking agents, are concerned, he secures the use of means by rational considerations presented to their minds. They agree to do something in their mind.

They make a will. That's their will. Making a decision to do something, or to agree to do something, or to agree to something. Like the Gospel. He secures these rational considerations presented to their minds, and rendered effectual by his grace.

He causes them to happen by his grace, when the end contemplated is a good one.

Amen?

So then, beloved, let's go back to 1 John 5, 10 -12. Let's recap this passage, and see what the Apostle is drawing out here for us, when he says, that the witness of God is this. The witness of God is this.

In 1 John 5, verse 10. Let me back up to verse 10 first. I'm sorry. Yeah, let me read verse 10 again. The one who believes in the Son of God has this witness in himself. The one who does not believe,.

Remember,.

God has made him, who does not believe God, has made God a liar. Because he has not believed in the witness, which God has borne witness about his Son. Including that threefold witness of the Spirit, the water, the blood, and so on.

And to add to that, in addition to that threefold witness, the witness of God is also this.

Verse 11.

That God gave us eternal life. He gave it to us. And this life eternal is in who? His Son. Exclusively. That's why Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, the life. The only way, the only truth, the only life.

Categorically, no one whatsoever can come to the Father except through me. The Son. His Son. His monogamous Son. His unique Son. This life is in His Son alone. Now we start to see why the Reformation picked up on the word alone, and soul, and sola, so much.

Because so many times God says, I alone save. Salvation belongs to who, beloved? To the Lord. Alone. It's all of God's grace and glory. Such that He alone gets the glory, ultimately. And that glory that He gives to us is by virtue of His grace.

So that even when He exalts us and glorifies us, and makes us partakers of the divine nature, it's all because of His grace. His glorious grace. Like His word says, through faith. Through faith.

Amen?

Now, He who has the Son has the life. Verse 12. He who does not have the Son of God, does not have that same life. That eternal life. It's black and white. Either you do, or you don't. Either you have the Son, or you don't.

But even here, notice, I can't overstate this. This powerful gospel promise. God's particular divine witness, in verse 11, is that this witness is also God's gift of eternal life. For us. It's His gift.

His witness is also His divine gift to us. The witness of eternal life, that message of eternal life, is also a witness in itself. And it bears witness in our spirit, because it changes us. It makes us born again.

It renews us. It sanctifies us. It bears witness all throughout our lives. What an amazing privilege to be children of God. That's what it means to be children of God. You don't decide that yourself, because you don't want it, apart from God's grace and gift.

What does He say? What does He say, beloved? In verse 11, the witness of God is this, that God gave us. Gave us eternal life. And this life is in His Son.

Amen.

The Wages of Sin and the Gift of Eternal Life in Christ

Now, Romans 6. I could read so many passages. I could spend a whole series on this gift of eternal life. But just to point out a few. Romans 6 .23. Memory verse, right? For the wages of sin is what? It's death.

It's death in every way. Physical death. Eternal death. It leads ultimately to eternal death. But the what? The gracious gift of God is what, beloved? Is eternal life.

In whom?

Jesus, Christ Jesus, our Lord. Our Kurios.

Our Lord.

Amen.

It is in Christ our Lord. It says the same thing. The same exact thing. The apostles all taught the same thing. The same message. There wasn't competing Christianity with the apostles. One apostle taught this and the other apostle taught no.

This is nonsense. They all teach the same thing. Same message. You have the Son, you have eternal life. You don't have the Son, you don't have eternal life. And it is a gift by grace alone. Sola Fide.

Sola Gratia. Grace alone. Faith alone. Christ alone. It is in His Son alone. No one else. No other mediator. Did you get that? No other means. No other mediator. Apart from the man, Christ Jesus. No other means did God provide for our salvation.

None.

Even as the book of Acts very exclusively.

States.

In Acts 4 chapter 12. The black and white gospel. This is the black and white gospel, beloved. I think I'm going to put that in a shirt.

And.

That's the biblical gospel. It's the black and white gospel. Why? Because there is salvation in no one.

Else.

For there is no other name. No other means. No other mediator under heaven that has been given among notice the word again, given. Given among men by which we must be saved. By which we can be saved. None other but Christ the Son.

Amen.

Ephesians 2, 8 -10. Another memory verse. For by what you have been saved, beloved? By grace you have been saved. Through what? Through faith alone. And this is not of yourselves. That's what alone means.

That's why it's, again, the Reformation slogans. It's through faith alone, not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. All of our salvation is the gift of God. Not of works.

Not of.

Ourselves. Not of the will of the flesh. Not of the will of man. Not of any other means but the grace, the gift of grace and of faith of believing the gospel of eternal life in His Son. The one and only Son.

Christ alone. Not of works so that no one may boast. So that no one may take credit. So that no one may claim that He had something to do with it. For we are His workmanship. We are His creation. We are His vessel that He molded for grace.

Created in Christ Jesus. In Him. United to Him by faith. For what? For the purpose of good works. Which God did what? God prepared beforehand. He predestined them. Speaking of God's providence,.

Beloved,.

In God's sovereign predestinating providence, He prepared all of our good works beforehand. Even all the sins too. All of that has been predetermined. There is no guessing with God. God predetermined it all.

And that should give us great comfort because God has glorified Himself in choosing to save us and preserve us to the very end. Nobody else can have this assurance. Unless you have a sovereign God.

Who.

Saves us and glorifies us and preserves us by His means. Not our own, but by His means of grace. Of grace. That's why the reformers used that phrase. They are means. Yes, they are means. The Lord's Supper, baptism, faith.