Death into Life | 1 John 3:11-15

All right, tonight we are in 1 John chapter three, so please turn in your

Bibbles there. And so last time we covered,

I believe, verse four through verse nine, where we talked about a number of different things.

And so I wanna kinda lay the context. We talk about this word all the time. The context is all the surrounding verses around the particular word, verse, or phrase that we wanna learn more about.

Context is king. If you're not reading something in context, then you're taking it out of context, and you can kinda use it any way that you want.

You can kinda make the Bible say whatever you want when you take verses out of context. So we're always trying to continue the flow of John's writing.

That's why we always review what fellowship is, why God is light, and in Him there's no darkness at all, what it means to be the children of God, what spiritual maturity looks like.

We've talked about a number of different things. And we've been talking about how the gospel of grace is different than legalism and licentiousness.

Those are distortions of the gospel that Antichrist are going to teach. Antichrist oppose the true teaching.

They do not possess the anointing or the Holy Spirit within us. So all these are very key in our review and understanding the context.

So chapter three kinda begins with the children of God and being encouraged that we will be like Christ at His coming.

So does anybody remember the phrase that says at His coming, what John is referring to?

Any takers out there? The second coming of Christ. The second coming of Christ, you're absolutely right.

So if there's a second coming, that means that there was a first coming. Someone help me out.

What are some key things that happened in Jesus' first coming? Avery. He preached the word,

He was persecuted for it. That's really good. He died on the cross.

He also resurrected three days later and He ascended into heaven at the right hand of the

Father, showing how He is our perfect high priest. He's not only the sacrifice, but the priests in the

Old Testament, they'd have a sacrifice in the Holy of Holies and leave. Jesus sat down, because He's perfect.

Really neat. So a lot of things happened at Jesus' first coming. He lived that perfect, sinless life and then died on Calvary.

And so a lot of that is so important to understanding the gospel.

But what's also a part of the gospel is our blessed hope. The things that we look forward to.

Christianity isn't just about the past, what Jesus did, what the Old Testament predicted would happen.

Those things are wonderful, but there's many more things to come. And so what are some things that are gonna happen at Jesus' second coming?

Ooh, we don't talk about this quite as much, do we? Aaron. At His second coming, He will take those who are children of God and leave those who are basically not.

That's the basic idea of it. Sure. He's gonna essentially separate the sheep from the goats, the elect from the non -elect, those who are forgiven and those who have died in their sin, and they're gonna be held accountable for their sin.

So that's really good. You got this great white throne judgment. Here's an interesting question. So believers will be judged, just not based on our sin.

We're gonna be judged on our faithfulness and our obedience, and we get rewards.

Now, when I was studying this many years ago, I thought that was weird. I was like, I thought it was by grace, not by our works and rewards.

And the idea is we're justified by grace through faith. But one day, we're gonna be rewarded based on our faithfulness in light of receiving the grace of God.

But we will eventually receive a crown, and then we put it right back at the feet of Jesus. So I'm like, oh, it goes full circle.

And so it kind of encourages me to live as Christ, to work for a reward one day, because ultimately,

I'm gonna put that back at the feet to worship King Jesus. Isn't that cool? Like, to me, that's where it belongs.

And so that's the imagery that we see in Revelation. So like Aaron was saying, believers and unbelievers are gonna be judged, right?

What else is gonna happen at his second coming? When is the second coming going to happen?

Trick question. We don't really know, we just know it's soon. I love that.

We don't know when. And it could be soon as far as we know. Every generation has felt that, the idea that it could happen at any moment.

So we gotta be ready. We gotta live as though it could happen any day. But also, the second coming is going to happen at the end of history.

Think about this. Remember, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth? That's the beginning point. And so all of history is going to a particular event, like it's working towards something.

It's just not just happening randomly to no end. No, there's a particular goal and view, and it's working towards the second coming of Jesus.

So we know he returns at the end of history, just don't know when that's gonna be. So isn't that neat?

Then, Jesus is going to restore all things. And you may say, what do you mean by that?

Well, all of creation is tainted by sin. This is an effect of the fall that we read about back in Genesis 3.

Not only was man cursed, right, we have a sin nature, but all of creation has been subjected to futility.

It's decaying. Things that we experience in this world, that wasn't the condition it was in the garden with Adam and Eve before sin.

So when Jesus returns, he's going to judge the living and the dead. He is going to resurrect believers with bodies fit for eternity to rule and reign with him.

Unbelievers will have eternal bodies fit for eternal punishment. And he's gonna restore this sin -cursed world with a new heavens and a new earth.

Isn't that neat? So you know, we talk about, oh, I wanna go to heaven one day. Absolutely. But that's not actually our end destination.

That's maybe where we currently go when we die. But Jesus is going to return and take all the saints with him back to restore this earth.

So this is our inheritance. One of the Beatitudes are blessed are the peacemakers for they shall inherit the earth.

They will be sons of God. They will know God. And this is ultimately where we end back up, but with a new world order, with Jesus being the one and only king.

So those are a few things that John is alluding to. Look back at verse 28 of chapter two.

He's encouraging his audience. Now little children abide in him so that when he appears, we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.

And so if you look at chapter three, verse two, beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared, but we know that when he appears, second coming, we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is.

Jesus resurrected bodily, glorified. That is a picture of what we are gonna look like one day in glory.

Isn't that awesome? Y 'all probably gotten hurt, gotten sick before. None of that, no more weeping, no more crying, no more hurts, no more pains, new bodies.

And Jesus is the perfect example of that when he resurrected. That's a part of our blessed hope.

Those are things that we long to look forward to. The apostle Paul says to live is Christ, but to die is gain.

We have such a wonderful future. We have an inheritance that is ours now, but we don't get the full benefits of it until life after next.

So John is talking about a number of these things to encourage his audience. And so we also talked about verse four.

Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness, sin is lawlessness.

I like the word lawbreaker because I don't want people to have the wrong idea that oh, I sin, I just kinda messed up.

I chose a less favorable way of living than the way God wants. No, sin is to break

God's law. And so remember 1 John chapter one says the person that says they have no sin, they're a liar.

So we're all in the same boat. We've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Sin is breaking God's law.

But we talked about the word practice. Do y 'all remember? Do y 'all remember us talking about the word practice?

Someone help me out with that word. What's a good way of understanding the word practice? JD? Repetitively doing something.

Okay, that's really good. Repetitively doing something. What's another aspect of the word practice?

Doing something because you like it. Okay, because you like it. What do y 'all think about diligently planning to do something repetitive that you like?

Kind of morphing all those together. A lot of us that practice sports love it.

Those that love music plan to practice it because you love it. And so to me, this is the exact way we should look at those who practice sin.

Habitually, repetitively, they love it. Unbelievers that are walking in the dark and are enemies of God, they love sin.

They long to do it. They plan for it. They do it over and over and over again. What does it mean for believers to practice righteousness?

Since we're using the word practice, we practice righteousness. We're not gonna do it perfectly, but we wanna do it.

We plan to do it. And ultimately, we wanna glorify God in our lives. So we at least long to be obedient, repetitively over and over and over again.

And it's gonna take work. It's gonna take thought. It's gonna take planning, just like with sports and things.

And the reason why the child of God does that is because we have a different heart. That's what we wanna do. First John is gonna tell us that his commandments are not burdensome.

But are we gonna do it perfectly? No. We still have this flesh. We're still warring against sin.

But we're not gonna be left in our sin, right? We have a transformed heart. We had the Holy Spirit dwelling in us.

And so even in the midst of spiritual warfare, John's gonna tell us that he who is in you, the

Holy Spirit, is greater than he who is in the world. Who do you think he who is in the world is referring to?

Give you another hint. The whole world lies in the power of the evil one. Who's that?

Satan. You're gonna say it like this, Satan. Look with me at verse 10. By this it is evident who are the children of God and who are the children of the devil.

So John is talking about there's two groups of people. In fact, look with me back at verse eight.

Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning.

You all remember we kind of gave a flyover view of Satan, the devil, remember?

Does anybody remember his name? Scripture calls him before he was a fallen angel. Lucifer is what's found in the

King James Bible, the good old King Jimmy. Does anybody have one of those translations? Oh, that a boy.

So it could be rendered dawn of the morning. It's just a name for an angelic being. You know what

I mean? So I like the name Lucifer. We all know who we're talking about here. And it says that pride found itself in Lucifer's heart internally.

He wanted to be like God. He was a covering or anointed cherub. We don't know exactly what that means.

I liked what Avery said last time. Perhaps he was second in command to the most high.

He's created, but he might have been the archangel of them all. We don't know. But he had some level of preeminence where he felt that pride and he wanted to be worshiped.

And so ultimately, God cast him out of heaven and apparently gave him authority over the earth.

And scripture tells us that there's a hierarchy, principalities of power. So you got the ranks in the military, different commanders of chief and whatnot.

It's kind of what it looks like in the angelic realm as well. You got Michael, the archangel, and you got these different classes.

True for fallen angels. Satan is kind of the lead authority and you got different powers.

And so we use the term spiritual warfare a lot as Christians. What does that mean?

Aaron. War against sin. War against sin. That's good. I feel like that's also like a mental state of things.

Like you're always being tempted. Temptation's always coming at you and you're just having to fight that. Absolutely.

Does anybody else want to add to that? When we're talking about spiritual warfare, it could be a lot of different things.

Warring against sin, warring against temptations that are mental, like JD's saying. Last week, we talked about how we can't see angels.

Not all the time. Sometimes they take the form of a serpent, like we read in Genesis chapter three.

There are angels in the Old Testament that took on a human form. Not that they were humans, but they took on a form to where Abraham could see them.

And so I'm saying there seems to, nothing in scripture telling us that they've stopped being able to do that.

We read about demonic possession in the Bible. That's spiritual warfare.

Seems like angels are able to war against Christians, maybe not being able to come internally and possess a

Christian because we have the Holy Spirit, but they can attack Christians. Seemed like in Paul's letter to the

Corinthians, he talked about how one of Satan's messengers were just coming at him hard and it was just a thorn in his side.

And so I think that's the best way. If you are saved, if you have the Holy Spirit, I do not think demons can possess you, but they can oppress you.

They can come at you externally with temptation, with accusations.

I don't really think that means they can whisper in your ear or plant thoughts per se, but I will say this. There's an element of mystery with spirits because they're not material.

They can't be seen. We have a spirit. We have a soul. So I don't know that correspondence there of what that influence like with the mental state.

I don't know. There's a level of mystery there, but all of that is spiritual warfare. There's a war between holy angels and fallen angels that we can't see.

And remember we talked about last time, it's not like Michael can take, Michael the archangel can take a sword and pierce a fallen angel and they're like, all right, and then just kind of walk away.

Like I don't understand because they're not dying, but they are at war. And y 'all remember we talked about at the end of Hebrews chapter one, holy angels are ministering spirits.

So God sends them to do certain tasks, whether to give messages to like Mary and Joseph, other people in the

Old Testament. And remember what they would start out by saying, fear not, because they probably look scary and they probably sounded scary, but they are messengers.

Remember I think, I don't think we necessarily have one guardian angel.

I think all the holy angels guard the saints. I looked it up last week. Matthew 18 refers to my children's angels.

I believe Jesus is speaking. And the idea is the angels are meant to be there for Christians, which is really neat.

A lot of that is mysterious. Think about this. There's a lot of things we don't know about angels and angels don't understand us.

They're looking at us, scratching their heads too. Like that's a curious bunch. And yes we are. So I want us to be thinking about spiritual warfare.

Yes, we are responsible for our own sin, war against the flesh, but there's also that spiritual realm that we can't see.

And so that's important. You see back in verse eight, the reason the son of God, Jesus, appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

Isn't that awesome? As Christ is redeeming humanity, restoring all things, he's undoing the curse that Satan kind of kickstarted from the very beginning.

So let's continue to look at the context into verse 11 of chapter three.

For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain who was of the evil one and murdered his brother.

And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother's righteous. Do not be surprised brothers that the world hates you.

We know that we have passed out of death into life because we love our brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death.

Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.

By this we know, love, that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.

If anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his ear against him, how does

God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth.

By this we know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him for whenever our heart condemns us,

God is greater than our heart and he knows everything. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God.

And whatever we ask from him because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him, and this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his son

Jesus Christ and love one another just as he has commanded us. Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God and God in him.

And by this we know that he abides in us by the spirit whom he has given us.

So let's start over at verse 11. For by this the message that you have heard from the beginning that we should love one another.

Okay, so there's a few things that come to mind that John, John's on repeat mode because doesn't this sound familiar, right?

He says, for this is the message that you have heard from the beginning. Now look back at 1

John 1, 1. I believe this is exactly the same truth that he is reminding us of.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life.

I believe John is bringing back up the beginning of the gospel that Jesus preached.

Remember, he said we have seen with our eyes, we have touched with our hands, we were there, baby. We got to see the perfection of God.

In him there is light and no darkness at all. He's talking about everything that he saw in the person of Jesus.

And so he says, that message, this gospel message found in Jesus and what he proclaimed from the beginning of his ministry, that we should love one another.

Now, earlier in chapter two, we talked about an old commandment and a new commandment.

Someone help me out, that sounds confusing. How can there be an old commandment but also a new commandment, do y 'all remember?

I'm getting some shaking heads of no. Aaron? So, wasn't it like, wasn't the commandment put

God first? Isn't that the first commandment but also the new commandment? Very close.

I think what you're alluding to is the first commandment is love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And the second is like it, and this is where I'm getting at, to love your neighbor as yourself.

That's the old commandment. Look back with me at chapter two and verse seven. Beloved, I'm writing to you no new commandment but an old commandment.

And then in verse eight, and at the same time, it is a new commandment that I'm writing to you. Lauren, do you remember how to reconcile those two ideas of how it's an old commandment but it's also a new commandment?

It was an add -on to like the old commandment. Like not an addition but at the same time it is an addition.

Sure, there's something new and fresh about the new commandment. Do you remember, J .D.?

The new, I remember the old one, love your neighbor as yourself. But I'm trying to, wasn't it love, something like love everybody?

Close. Remember when Jesus washed the disciples' feet? He said, the world will know that you are my disciples by your love for one another.

So it's, so love your neighbor as yourself is an appeal to say every image bearer of God, you're to love him.

Remember the whole parable of the Good Samaritan? Who's our neighbor? Anyone in need.

Any image bearer that comes into your life, you show them the love of God, right? But the problem is the law kills, meaning we can't fulfill the law perfectly.

So when you read love your neighbor as yourself, we're talking about a perfect love that we cannot do.

Therefore Jesus comes and perfectly fulfills the old commandment. But as he's fulfilling it, it's a new command because we're getting to see what perfection actually looks like.

Old Testament saints, they're reading Leviticus 19, 18 saying I'm gonna try, but you better believe we're gonna have to offer sacrifices year after year because we can't do it perfectly.

And so now we have a new commandment to say, walk in the light, follow after Christ, look to him, and we can actually do it because we have the

Holy Spirit. Isn't that awesome? So that's what's kind of jam -packed in verse 11 in chapter three.

For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.

Verse 12, very interesting. We're making a reference to the Old Testament here. He says, we should not be like Cain who was of the evil one and murdered his brother.

And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother's righteous. Okay, someone help me out.

What's the whole deal with Cain? Does anybody remember? Avery? Cain was, so was

Abel, and Cain offered a sacrifice and Abel's was more poison to God's eye because he did it faithfully, and then

Cain got jealous, so he talked to him and then eventually killed him. The jealous sibling.

Some people speculate that Cain and Abel were twins because there's no duration of time in between their birth.

We don't know that. The voices are getting louder, Avery. So I tell you what, turn with me.

Let's go to Genesis chapter four and look at this account a little bit more at depth. Genesis chapter four, look with me at verse two.

So I want us to think about Cain, and remember, John is using Cain to illustrate the world's hatred for God, the world's love for sin, okay?

So that's who we're seeing a picture of here with Cain, and who all was here when we were studying through Hebrews 11?

Abel was in the hall of faith, right? I believe he was the first one in verse four.

So think about that. We're gonna kind of compare and contrast what Abel did and what Cain did.

So verse two. So, and again, Eve bore, okay, look with me at verse one.

Now Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and saying, I have gotten a man with the help of the

Lord. And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain was a worker of the ground.

In the course of time, Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel also brought his firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions.

And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering, he had no regard.

So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry, and why has your face fallen?

If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.

Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it. Cain spoke to Abel, his brother, and when they were in the field,

Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, where is

Abel, your brother? He said, I do not know, am I my brother's keeper? And the

Lord said, what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground, and now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand.

When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.

All right, someone help me. What are some details that happened in this account? Kendi? They weren't twins,

I would say that, because she knew, so Adam, yeah,

Adam knew his wife Eve. She conceived and bore Cain, so Cain was born first.

She said again, and so. So, I'm with you. The text doesn't say they're twins, but twins aren't born instantaneous, right?

One comes before, and the argument is there's no duration of, like, long duration of time, and so people have speculated, maybe they were twins.

But you're right to point out the text doesn't necessarily say that. That's good. What else do we get in this account?

Kendi? Grew up, and then he, Cain grew up, the ground?

Mm -hmm, yep, verse three, it says, over a course of time, they grew up, like you said. Cain brought to the

Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. Abel also brought the firstborn of his flock, and then it tells us that the

Lord had regard for Abel and did not have regard for Cain's offering.

So why is that? Somebody help me out. Why did God have regard, saw that it was favorable and commendable with Abel's offering, but not

Cain's? One was done from the heart, and one was just done because he had to. 100%. In fact, my footnote, when it says the

Lord had regard for Abel, I take to mean God sees the heart. God tests the heart.

In fact, if we cross -reference this with Hebrews 11, verse four, Abel, by faith, offered a more acceptable sacrifice to God.

So he's exactly right. This is an issue of the heart.

Abel had a righteous heart that we know is regenerated by the Holy Spirit. Therefore, the acts that he was doing was pleasing to God in obedience.

What does that tell us about Cain? J .D.? It's kind of like me having to mow my lawn, me voluntarily doing it, or me just doing it because my dad told me

I had to do it. That's good. It's kind of what you brought us back to the definition of practice before.

You asked us for the first time, and I remember Josiah 2 .0 saying, because my mom makes me come here.

But... This is a good point, because even Christians that wanna please God doesn't mean we're always gonna want to in the moment, but we may do it anyway.

Go ahead. But anyhow, but Cain, however, was just doing what, I guess, what he had to do, just the average, okay,

I'm just gonna offer my offering up to God and just carry on with, I guess, what

I want to do. That's kind of his tone towards me. Yeah, I loved how you tied it back to 1

John 3, like whatever Cain was doing, he was practicing sin. Whether, this is where it's interesting, because we don't really know.

We know what Cain did was not pleasing to God, ultimately because his heart wasn't right. He may have been doing externally the right acts, or he might not have been.

In fact, I read a commentary that speculated maybe God prescribed animal sacrifices, which that's exactly what

Abel did. Cain did not, and you notice later he kills his brother, almost to say, okay,

God, there's your blood sacrifice, which is awful, but you could see the malicious intent, and so that's where I wanna move into, is so yes,

Cain kind of represents the person that practices sin. Sin is, number one, it's the act of disobeying

God's law, the letter of the law, but it stems from the heart.

Does that make sense? So you can't say, I'm being obedient because I'm doing the right actions, therefore

God must be pleased with me. Well, God wants your heart to be trusting in him. Whatever is not done in faith is sin.

So it's not just your actions that matter to God, but also your what? Your heart.

Your love and giving him honor and reverence and to the glory of God.

Whatever you do, whether you eat, whether you drink, whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. That's what the

Christian desires to do. So let's continue to look at, look with me at verse five, okay, because I wanted to drive this point home that practicing sin flows out of a corrupt heart.

So verse five, but for Cain and his offering, he had no regard. God looked at Cain's heart, you could say, and was displeased.

So Cain was very angry and his face fell. And so I'm just wanting you to see the seed of murder starts there.

Jesus tells us that whoever looks with lust has committed adultery in their heart without even doing the very act, correcting the

Pharisee's interpretation of thou shall not commit adultery. But whoever is angry with his brother is a murderer from the heart.

So this is the thing we have to recognize is God is interested in our heart.

Without faith, it is impossible to please God. You may externally do all the right things.

You maybe have been baptized. You maybe go to church. You maybe read your Bible. But if your heart's not in it, if you're not doing this to the glory of God, it's like filthy rags.

It's all sin before God. Now before other people, they may say, man, that person's really got all this stuff down.

But God looks at the heart. So look with me at verse six. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry?

And why is your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted?

And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must overcome it.

Verse eight says, Cain spoke to Abel, his brother, and when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother and killed him.

So y 'all remember back in 1 John chapter three, verse 10, there's two types of children in the world.

Y 'all remember? Aaron? Children of God and children of wrath. That is true.

Which children of wrath are also children of the? Death. So, I'm wanting you to see something.

There is spiritual warfare going on with Cain. Scripture tells us that Satan is the murderer from the beginning.

Guess what, this was the first murder in Scripture. So Satan is prowling around like a raven, a roaring lion here.

He's in the background. We've even seen in chapter three, he's there with Adam and Eve. So there's an element to spiritual warfare that we always have to be alert.

Satan is going to tempt the saints. He's going to accuse the saints. Now, do I know what that necessarily means in detail?

No, I don't think Satan's necessarily in this room. I don't know that, but I imagine he's not.

He can't be everywhere at once. He can't be tempting everyone, but he can use the kingdom of darkness. So I'm wanting to make the point back in verse seven.

He says, if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door, almost like sin is ready to pounce.

Satan is there. The kingdom of darkness is there to tempt you, to cause you to fall, to cause you to stumble.

Whether that's Satan, don't know, but there is some type of spiritual warfare that is there.

And then you got our flesh. That's constantly leading us into temptation as well, okay?

So if you would, turn back with me to 1 John chapter three. I want that to be in our minds as we look at these verses, because this is what

John's audience would have had in mind when he mentioned Cain. So look back with me at verse 12 in chapter three.

We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one, spiritual warfare, and murdered his brother.

And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil, and his brother's righteous.

Now I love the point that JD made earlier. Abel's sacrifice was from a heart of faith, trusting in God and what he said to do, relationally.

It's the exact opposite with Cain. He did evil deeds that flowed from an evil heart.

And that's the heart that Satan's ready to sift like wheat. Right, remember the parable of the sower?

The birds come in and pick up that gospel seed? Spiritual warfare. All right, let's continue on.

Verse 13, do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. Now this is a really important truth, because when you sign up to be a

Christian, I'm using that language very loosely, like when you really give your life to Christ, when you're trusting in Jesus, do you think the world's gonna pat you on the back and say, that's just so awesome?

What do you think? Absolutely. Okay, I got one absolutely.

Anybody else have a totally different thought? Aaron? On a more serious note, maybe the kind people that are just kind to everybody, but ultimately no.

Ultimately no? Why is that? Can I get any help out there?

Lauren? I don't remember the reference to the verse, but it was the verse that said, they,

I think it was John, John 1, they who are in the world do not know me. That is an excellent point.

John 1. And then later in John 15, Jesus explicitly tells the apostles, hey, the world first hated me, guess what, they're gonna also hate you.

But you're exactly right. Jesus came to the world, the world did not know him. And that's incredible.

I mean, we literally cannot conceive of a greater love than what's modeled in Jesus Christ.

He laid his life down for his enemies. We hated him, why he did this.

But by his grace, he transformed our heart and we realized that he's laying his life down for the sheep.

There is a purpose. Jesus is a perfect savior who cannot fail to save to the uttermost.

So I think that's what John is really driving at in verse 13. Do not be surprised brothers that the world hates you.

Why? Because the world first hated Jesus. Verse 14, we know that we have passed out of death into life because we love the brothers and sisters, whoever does not love abides in death.

Now, I have this phrase underlined, we have passed out of death into life. What do y 'all think that's referring to?

We've passed from death into life, because I've never been dead before.

So how have I passed from death to life? Spiritually, you've passed from death to life.

This is so important. Our heart's been transformed. Our heart was once a heart of stone. We were children of wrath, like JD said, a child of the devil, but things are different now.

The Holy Spirit has regenerated our heart. Was a heart of stone, now it's beating. It's a heart of flesh and now desires the things of God.

And so we've passed from that dead state into now spiritually alive in Christ.

But remember we were talking about at his coming? This is not just a spiritual reality.

But one day, we will be raised to life with new bodies.

Because what it means to be human is we are both body and soul, right? This is material, but this isn't the real me.

The real me is what's on the inside, the spirit. You know what I mean? And that's what's going to exist eternally with Christ or apart from Christ.

And then Christ will give us bodies fit for eternity. So I just wanted us to really think about this.

We know there is a certainty that Christians have and it's not a perfect certainty.

It's not a certainty that we always have because remember, sin's gonna creep into our lives. That peace is gonna fade a little bit.

That joy is gonna fade a little bit when sin comes in. But we have the promises of God that he who began that good work in you sees it to completion.

When the righteous judge of the earth declares a person just and no longer condemned, nothing in all of creation can separate us.

Remember the phrase, who can bring a charge against God's elect? Jesus is our advocate.

The Holy Spirit is our advocate. No one can pluck us out of his hand. We know as the children of God that we have everlasting life that cannot be taken away from us.

And it burdens me a little bit to say there are many probably well -meaning Christians, might just be professing

Christians, but that believe you can lose your salvation. It just breaks my heart because I'm thinking the more you study who

God is, ain't no way, if you've tasted that grace, that mercy, something you don't deserve, then you can be confident that nothing is gonna possibly rip you out of the

Savior's grasp. It's wonderful. Remember in Ephesians chapter one, we've been studying,

Pastor Nathan's been preaching through, we've been sealed with the Holy Spirit unto the day of redemption.

You know what I mean? Only God could break that seal and it would go against his character to do so.

God cannot lie. God is the God of truth. As children, we know we have passed from death to life.

This means we have eternal life. I think that's what he goes on to say. Look with me in verse 15.

Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.

And so that's what it means to pass from death to life, to have everlasting life in Christ. Let me ask y 'all this question.

How would you describe eternal life to somebody? That might be a hard question.

Any takers? Bum, bum, bum.

You're like, uh, life that never ends? Okay, I like that answer. I know y 'all are thinking it.

Y 'all don't have to turn there, but Jesus actually gives us a understanding of what eternal life is.

This may sound familiar. John 17, verse three, Jesus says, and this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true

God, and Jesus Christ, whom you've sent. So what does it mean that, what does it mean to know the true

God? Does it mean to only know facts about him? No, something much deeper, to have a relationship with him.

Is that what you're gonna say, Aaron? Personally know him. I love that, personally know him, right?

You know your parents, but you don't just know facts about them. You know them relationally.

Now pay attention to this again. And this is eternal life, that they know the only true

God, and the Savior that was sent by the Father, the only Son. That's eternal life, so think about it.

Eternal life doesn't just start when you pass from this life to the next, when you die.

But it starts the moment you put your faith in Christ. You can know him relationally.

And I think about it very practically. We can know his will for our life. We can actually hear the words of Christ, how his powerful, breathed, living word.

You know what I mean? It's the scripture. That's how we can test the spirits, to know Antichrist versus someone who has the anointing of the

Holy Spirit and is teaching us truth. Y 'all may say, how can I really know what the apologetic dog is teaching me to be true?

Test it. I don't know everything. In fact, I cannot wait for the day of like, Grandma, are you sure that that's right because of this?

I promise you, I will think through it with you. And I may have to say, hey, maybe

I've been wrong on this. And to me, that's a good thing to show you that I'm another person.

I do not possess all knowledge. Now, I believe that I have the Holy Spirit guiding me into all truth through the word, but this is collective.

This is fellowship. This is koinonia. We're doing this together. So yes, let me test your feeble human mind.

Land on me. Okay, so would it be right to say that it's kind of a conversation whenever we go to him in prayer, that's how we speak to him and this is how he speaks to us back, like kind of a...

100%, yes, it's like a conversation. Now, how good of a conversation would it be, human to human, if Aaron, you were talking for hours and hours and hours and Liberty never said anything?

Is that a very good conversation between y 'all? Yeah, does that sound like a good conversation,

Liberty, if you did not contribute anything? No, it's not a very good friendship if it's one -sided.

So here's where I'm getting at. What if someone says, oh, I pray to God all the time.

I tell him everything that's going on in my life, but when it comes to his word, I don't really read it.

What kind of relationship is that? I got a thumbs down from JD. And check this out, it's even worse than that because God knows all of our needs before we ask for any of them.

He knows all things. Do you think you should spend more time listening to him rather than telling him all the things that you think things should be different?

Point is, you need both. I'm saying if you were to emphasize one, we need to learn from him.

There's nothing we could possibly tell God for him to learn. Prayer does not change

God, but prayer changes who, JD? Changes us. Changes us, God knows everything.

In the Sermon on the Mount, he tells us to pray and yet he knows all the things that we need. So prayer is relational.

It's us speaking to God. And then how does God speak back to us, Aaron? Through his word.

Through his word. And I think another important aspect for our fellowship with God is also fellowship with the saints.

What do you think, how'd I do with my feeble mind? That's pretty good, except - Terrible. It's pretty good.

Your mind is still pretty feeble. It is, it is. Man, y 'all don't hold back.

Y 'all keep me on my toes. I appreciate that. There are some people that say that they are all knowing in some religions, so we're just making sure.

Yeah, thank you, thank you. Okay, so as we wind down, what's something practically we can take away from this evening?

I'll tell you, for starters, verse 14, I loved us. We know that we have passed out of death into life.

And then he says, because we love the brothers. What are some practical things that we touched on that you're gonna take with you when we leave tonight?

Love your brother. Okay. Why? Because you need to, or else you'll be a murderer.

Okay, and you're right. Because look, I think that's so true. You got the world principle that cannot love, and then those patterns of practicing sin is gonna happen.

They can only sin. The world, the mind of the flesh is perpetually at enmity and war with God.

Right, you're either a friend of the world and an enemy of God, or you are a child of God and an enemy to the world.

Can't serve two masters. So I'm just saying there's an element that Avery is spot on. What's something else we take away,

Aaron? That, again, spiritual warfare is not just us warring against sin.

It's also dealing with the spirits around us that will either help us or benefit us, the angels or the demons.

That's a really good point. Holy angels, they are messengers sent to minister to us in ways that we may not even know.

They may be guarding us from other spiritual warfare. Right, fallen angels. But then you got the dynamic that Satan, the king of darkness, is coming at us.

And I love how James sums that up. It says, submit to God. Invest in your relationship with God.

That's how you're gonna resist the devil and he'll flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.

What about over here on this side of the room? What are some things that we take away from this passage? And you can't say they took your answer.

Any thoughts? Lauren? I did take the audio thing today.

The sin is lawlessness. And he was giving me the definition of sin and how it wasn't just that he didn't make a choice to sin.

It was doing anything outside of faith. So sin is lawlessness.

We learn that that means our actions, the letter of the law, do not murder.

But we're also learning that sin is also a heart issue. Cain's sin did not start the moment that he killed his brother.

But he was angry with his brother. Sin was crouching at the door and he did not overcome it.

But we see that he was a child of the devil. Was that kind of along the lines of what you were talking? What about you,

Ayla? You're like, oh, I knew it. I was next. I just think it's crazy how no matter what you pray about,

God already knows what you're gonna say. So does that mean we shouldn't pray if he already knows?

So then why should we pray if he already knows? Trick question. What do you think, JD? Because it helps us.

Yeah, so prayer doesn't change God, it changes us. It molds our hearts to conform to God's unchanging will.

Check this out. We pray together as believers, so it changes all of us, brings us closer in unity.

I love it. I think it's James 5. It says, we even confess our sins to one another, I think in a very prayerful context, so that we may be healed, because prayer changes us.

It unites us all together more and more in alignment to his will. But I loved how you said, because a lot of people,

I'm telling you, they will almost treat prayer as rubbing a genie lamp, trying to get

God to answer their wishes. It's like, they miss the fact that prayer is relational.

Prayer is very powerful, as it is working. The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous person avails much, because we are in sweet fellowship with God.

Anybody else? Did I see a hand? No? Yes? Earlier today, I just had a question about angels.

It wasn't really important. Lay it on me. I probably won't know the answer, but we'll test it out. So whenever Jesus comes back, will he kill all the fallen angels?

Kill? So scripture actually tells us this in Matthew 25, and Revelation 20, 21, 22.

No, he will not kill the angels, because they are timeless beings, like we are.

They will exist into eternity. But guess where Satan and all the fallen angels go? Lake of fire.

Lake of fire. They get dumped in there. And check this out. Yeah, they get dumped. Yeah. They get kissed.

Bam! It's like WWE style. Now, this is how I think of this. I think of hell like a bullseye, with different rings.

And the inner core is the worst spot. And that's where Satan and the angels and all false teachers, think about this, false antichrist, are gonna be there right there in the worst part of hell.

Now, there's rings, and I think, it's hard for me to fathom, because even the most outer ring in hell, to me, is just unfathomable, and I would not wanna be there.

But scripture does seem to indicate that there's different degrees of punishment. For those that were given more knowledge about the truth, they will receive a worse punishment.

That's why James 3, 1 says, let not many of you be teachers, because you will be judged more strictly.

The idea is, if you're a false teacher, you are playing with the fires of hell.

You know what I mean? Does that make sense though, Avery? That's their ultimate destiny, is the lake of fire.

And all of those that die in their sin. Aaron. Here's a little curious question.

If God talks to us through his word, when we go to him in prayer, will it always be like that?

Like, when he takes us up to heaven, will he use his word to even just speak to us? Avery.

Great question, no. God's word in the scripture, this is meant for a time period of redemptive history.

So at his coming, at his second coming, so many scriptures that will tell us we will be like him.

Revelation talks about we will see Jesus face to face. So our relationship will not be veiled with just this word, but it'll be the incarnate word for all eternal

Jesus. We will be in face to face relationship. We'll no longer see through a glass dimly, but we will have a level of perfection and glory being able to see

Jesus. Now I've thrown this out there. Will we see the Father or the Holy Spirit?

I don't know. You wanna know my guess? Probably not. Because God is always gonna be the creator and we will always be a part of his creation.

Even a glorified creation. So there's gonna be this infinite chasm that we'll never be able to exhaustively know

God. I don't know that. What I do rest in is we'll be able to live eternally with Jesus face to face.

We live by faith now, but that faith will be turned into sight, scripture tells us.

Another curious question. What happens to God's word after he comes the second time?

That's a good question, because what you're saying is like, what about the Bible? Is that what you're saying? What happens to it, what happens with it?

I know it's means is for this redemptive era in history, but what happens to it whenever it's finished?

I will say this. First Peter quoting Isaiah, I think it's 40, talks about the word of God remains forever.

The flower fades, the grass withers away, but the word of God remains forever.

I don't think that means that a Bible will be glowing. Everybody be like, oh yeah, remember the

Bible that we had on earth. But I think what that means is, so this is God's written word.

Jesus is the eternal word. Remember in the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was

God. So I think that's the principle, the word of God. Truth is everlasting.

So I don't really see a Bible for eternity like in a glass case to look at and observe.

I don't know. But when Christ returns to restore all things, I mean, we will be with him face to face.

We won't need this anymore. You know what I mean? So I tend to think that it's gonna be a thing of the past.

What do you think? Does that sound like maybe I landed on something? Sounded interesting.

Any other questions out there? Y 'all are a curious bunch. I really think asking questions is key because when you read the scripture and you don't have questions,

I've noticed with myself, I didn't read it very well. Yeah, there's something wrong. How can

I understand unless someone guides me? I mean, that's kind of the principle. We need to have questions. So questions are a good thing.

I have a question. Yes. So whenever we die, do we go to heaven and wait for judgment day?

Or what happens until judgment day? Excellent question. I believe we asked this question a couple weeks ago or Delaney did.

So theologians refer to heaven now as this intermediate state to be absent with our body is to be present with the

Lord. John 14, Jesus says, I'm going to leave you not as orphans, but I'm gonna go prepare a place for you.

And it talks about God's house, many dwelling places. So I believe this is probably the most consistent theory that I've heard is yes, we go to heaven now.

Our body goes into the ground, decays. Our spirit goes to be with the Lord. I don't think that means

I'm confident. It doesn't mean we become an angel. We don't receive wings no matter what the Hallmark movies tell us.

But we are who we are. We just get to go be with the Lord in heaven. But that's not our end destiny.

And like you said, we are going to return with Christ when he judges all things and restores all things.

So yeah, when you say, yeah, I wanna go to heaven one day, just know that we long to be a part of the new heavens and new earth where heaven comes to earth for eternity.

What do you think? Pretty incredible, because that makes me think we will be doing similar tasks that we're doing here and now eternally.

But it won't be by the sweat of our brow. We won't need food to continue to sustain our existence.

It'll be for just pure joy. What do you think, Kennedy? Got the thumbs up.

All right, got the golf clap from Avery. So I guess that means we're good to go, woo. All right, let me close out with a word of prayer.