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Bro. Otis Fisher
Myron, you and I are the only ones here. I'm just going to talk to you. I'll ask you all of the questions. The others are here to listen. I had you move up so I could at least see the outline of your face.
Fourth chapter of 1 John. We've come to a very difficult section of scripture here in the fourth chapter. One of the reasons is that we're dealing with the spirit world, which none of us know a whole lot about.
The second reason is that we're in the devil's territory. Usually he will pinch some baby or someone who caused some kind of disturbance. It's amazing how he works. This is a very important passage, but there's a danger of going off the deep end here and becoming rather fanatical.
I don't want to do that. I believe that there is an abnormal preoccupation with the occult on the part of many Christians today. And that's the most dangerous thing. But we do need to know what the Bible teaches about it.
In the first six verses of the chapter, John gives a warning against false teachers, false prophets. He gives us this warning just after he has established the fact that we've been given the spirit of God.
We've been given an anointing to understand God. Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Stop believing every spirit.
Now, we're told to try these. Yes. Well, how do you go about that? Absolutely. That's right. Never test the spirit by asking the person talking. Far too often they'll tell you just what you want to hear.
You're not any better off. But listen. Listen to what they're saying. The little words will betray them. Now, they don't think it's betraying, but it is. And your spirit, if you're a child of God, your spirit will tell you.
I've never seen an angel. I've never had a visit from one. I think we need to put the emphasis on the ministry of the Holy Spirit in our hearts and lives. Now, not only are there good angels who serve God, but there are also fallen angels.
They, too, are called spirits. The gospel speaks a great deal of the fact that in Christ's day there were many unclean spirits. Demonism is getting rampant today. It's being helped by all of the TV shows.
It does not mean that we should love them. It may be the man that's most dangerous, as dangerous as a rattlesnake, because he may be teaching a false doctrine. And if you do not know doctrine, you can be led astray, because they do it in such a sly, conniving way, well-versed in the use of the language.
Now, you may carry the big Bible under his arm, but that doesn't make him the right spirit. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God.
Beware of church fads and spiritual humbuggery. There's lots of that today. You cannot be a Christian and deny the virgin birth. Simple matter. The airwaves are full of people that deny the virgin birth.
Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. Now, how are we to distinguish? Jesus tells us. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. This is where it all begins, in Bethlehem.
Jesus was born in Bethlehem. And it begins there with his incarnation. Did Jesus exist, but did Jesus exist before his birth? All right. I wanted the difference. Jesus did exist, but not as Jesus. He was the Son of God.
Always has been. Always will be. But he was incarnated in Bethlehem. Calvary and the garden tomb are meaningless unless he is who he claims to be. He is the God-man. I cannot explain that, can you? We accept the fact that he is, absolutely, without doubt.
But to explain God-man, I cannot. I can say the words. I can believe it. But I cannot explain it. The way that you can determine false teacher is that they will deny the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ.
It does not mean that they do not talk nice about him. They talk about his remarkable youth. He was that and a superior child. He was that. He was born into this world. He was that. They say that he was a religious genius and that he was intoxicated with God.
They say that he probably had a greater knowledge of God than any other man. He was a superstar. They can say a lot of nice things about him. But ask them if he was God manifest in the flesh. That is where you lose them.
Right. What do they not say by saying what they say? It is no easy task. Now, you cannot determine within yourself. Listen to your spirit. We are dealing with spirit now. John speaks of the word in his gospel.
Myron, what is a word? You use them all the time. Give me a definition of a word. All right. That is right, but that does not mean much to me. Get it down on a language that I understand.
A word is a thought that can be transferred from one person to another.
All right. You are getting awfully, awfully close. The word brought the mind of God to the mind of man. It is a vehicle. That was Jesus. That is why he was called the word. He brought the mind of God down to the mind of man.
That is why he had to be God-man. He was the Lord, and he created all things. And he became flesh. Where? Where did he become flesh? All right. Yonder in Bethlehem at the incarnation. When you deny the incarnation, the deity of Christ, then you deny his work upon the cross because it all rests upon him.
The false teachers attempt to tear him down by complimenting him. Can you do that? That is the way they treat many today in many circles. But he is who he claimed to be, God of very God. John is meeting head-on with the early heresy of Gnosticism, one of the branches of which said that Christ came upon Jesus at his baptism and left him at the cross.
Have you ever heard that? What? I have heard that. Okay. Very popular belief. The word of God says that babe in Bethlehem was no more a remarkable babe, that his death upon the cross was not an ordinary death, and that when he rose from the dead, he rose from the dead, that his death on the cross was not ordinary, that his birth was not ordinary, that he came back from the dead, the Son, the eternal Son of God came out of eternity, the Ancient of Days.
But the child, his humanity, was conceived in the virgin's womb. He came forth yonder in Bethlehem where a few shepherds and wise men came to worship him. He was more than just a gifted child. He was a precious prince of peace who made peace by the blood of his cross.
The important thing for us to note is that this is the mark of whether a man is a false prophet or not. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. Let's find out what a person believes about Jesus Christ. That's important and very important.
Verse 3. And every spirit that confesses not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of antichrist whereof ye came and even now already is in the world. Antichrist is in the world.
Now, anti means one of two things. What are they? All right. All right. It means in place of or against. Those antichrists in the world today are what? Which one of those? Right. John is the only writer who mentions the antichrist, and he does so here in his epistles.
As we saw in Chapter 2, anti can mean one of two things. It can either mean against or instead of. That is an imitation. We have that idea presented in Scripture. The Lord Jesus said, For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ.
In other words, they imitated him. Antichrist is used, therefore, in the sense of pretending to be Christ. And the other meaning is against. Ye know of God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.
Now, who do we have in the world?
I read this, and I had this area in the first chapter of Chapter 2, which is the world left of left and left of the eyes of the five lights. So who is it?
Yes, it says, ye are of God. All right. Finally got it. Ye are of God. You, individually, you are of God. Not you the whole group, but you individually are of God. And he calls us little children. And have overcome them, because greater is he, singular, that is in you than he, singular, that is in the world.
Now, he in you is what? Holy Spirit is in you. The devil cannot read your born-again mind. So be careful how you pray. Do not rehearse your problem. He knows that he sent it. Don't want to tell Satan all about it.
Just thank God for the solution, because we know it's on the way. He sends every problem. More than that, he sends everything. Everything was first good when it left Christ. The devil can only twist things.
He can only use what God sends and twist it all out of shape. But it is good. That's why I asked to begin with this morning, mention something that was bad this past week. There isn't anything bad. Romans 8 .29 says, For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.
1 Corinthians 6 .19, what? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own? You cannot stray away from the Bible and be ignorant of it.
You just cannot do it. You cannot ignore it. And at the same time, expect the Holy Spirit to lead you. We live like the devil all the week, and we come to church on Sunday, and we say, Oh, Lord, thank you.
Lead me this coming week, and we go right out and live like the devil. We can't do that, folks. We need to be very, very careful of the methods we use in our churches. Because believe you me, he's in this church.
If they're like the worlds, they're wrong. The flesh depends on who? On himself. They are of the world. Therefore speak ye of the world, and the world hears them. Why does the world hear them? That's right.
They hear their own. They cannot hear Christ. They are attracted by the carnality of our music, gimmicks, programs. They're attracted by the same pattern of the world. We are of God. He that knoweth God heareth us.
He that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God. And everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God.
Did you realize that you, as a Christian, can love on a different plane than the world? John was sure of who the Lord Jesus was. He could say, and the world was made. The word was made means to become flesh and dwelt.
Pished his tent among us, and we beheld his glory. For the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. And John gave us the purpose of his gospel. And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book.
But they saw them, they experienced them. But these are written, that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life through his name. John had certain indestructible, inevitable evidence that Jesus was who he claimed to be.
John knew. John knew that. And that is something we need to be a little more sure of ourselves. There are times that we forget. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. Again, may I say that the word for love here is not eros, E-R-A-S-O-S.
John's not talking about sex all through this section. The word for love is agape, pronounced the same, spelled the same, means different. It is not sentimental. It is not sexual. And it is not social love.
It is supernatural love. It is that which the Holy Spirit can put in our hearts. And only the Spirit of God can make it real to us. It is the love of God. And only the Spirit of God can enable us to extend this love to one another.
This is not the kind of love that you would have for your friends, whom you delight to be with. I'm afraid that this verse has been misused. Nine. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him.
Now, he was sent as the only begotten Son. God sent his only begotten Son into the world. Myron, what's the difference in in and into? Is there any? Every place we have a reference to him sending his Son, he sent him into the world.
Well, that's a true statement, but that's not what he means here. He sent him into the world because he was outside of the world. I don't know. So, God is outside of the world. He sent him into it. In means you're already in, you go from one room to another.
Well, this is another verse to which those who want to try to rob God of his deity, they turn, Jesus Christ is called the only begotten Son. It means that he has a unique relationship with the Father.
He was not created. God called the created angels his sons, and he says those who trust Christ are sons of God, but yet he says that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God. You cannot have a son without a father.
Ten, herein is love. Not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. That is the $10 word. What does propitiation mean? Oh, payment, that God was satisfied with that payment.
We've seen so many shenanigans go on in execution of justice in this country. Judges and others who are in authority have wanted to get rid of capital punishment. Why do they want to get rid of that? They know that the man of influence and money won't be punished.
That poor fellow on the end that can't escape his due punishment. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another in the same way. If we love those who love us, or if there is a selfish motive in our loving them, there is no value in that.
The Lord Jesus said, for if you love them which love you, what reward have you? Do not even the publicans do the same thing? I'm glad he said ought in this verse. We ought also to love one another. When John says ought, he means it.
He's not talking about the cheap sentimental type, which is the great many of people entertained today. Jesus said, if you love me, keep my commandments. And it is really love, keep his commandments. Turn to John 14, 15, please.
I don't have that here. If that's where I think it is, I want to show you something. Read the starting of about the 14th verse.
You shall ask anything more. Pray to the Father, and he shall give you the Bible. And the Bible shall be the spirit of truth. Your reward cannot be seen, but it will dwell within you. And it shall be in you.
I will not leave you yet a little while. You shall live also. And that day you shall know that I am with you.
There's another place that says, if you keep my commandments, and this is my commandment that you love. Where is it? Where is it be? I was going to show you something, and I can't find it. No, what I've got you looking for is that you will keep my commandments, and this is my commandment, that you love one another.
First John? All right, there is another place that says that. But he tells them to keep his commandments, plural. Commandments. This is my commandment, singular. So we keep his commandments by keeping his commandment.
All right. Okay. So he gave us a commandment to believe on him. By doing that, you keep the commandments. No one can go live with God forever unless you keep his commandments. And we do that by keeping his commandment.
All right. My student's carrying on an extra conversation here. Do you mean to tell me that you can hate Christians down here and still love God? I want to tell you very frankly that if you cannot demonstrate in your life that you have love for the believers, there's a serious question about your childhood.
No man hath seen God at any time. If ye love one another, God dwelleth in us. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he is in us because he hath given us of his spirit.
Is this wicked world in which you and I live, how are they to know God? Unfortunately, too many believers are trying to please the world. We're concerned about what the world thinks of us. But the important thing is what do they think of Jesus?
What do they think of us as we represent Jesus? Someone's put it like this. At the age of 20, we don't care what the world thinks of us. We're going to do it anyhow. At 30, we worry about what the world thinks of us.
At 40, we discover it wasn't thinking of us at all. At 80, we just don't care what the world thinks. It's all Jesus. We today are to witness to the world. How are we going to witness? By giving out the word, yes.
That's all important. But the world is hungry for love. They do not know what love is. Their definition of love would be a three-letter word spelled S-E-X. That is the love the world knows about. But they don't know anything about the love of God unless we tell them and show them and live it.
And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. And we have known and believed the love that God hath in us.
God is love, and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. His love for us proves that he is wrath against those that love him not. Did you ever think of that? Because he loves me, it proves his wrath against the others.
Herein is our... Yes. That's right. That's absolutely right. That's right. Herein is our love made perfect. And we may have boldness in the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. The love we have is our present likeness to Jesus Christ, and it came from him.
We have been brought back to the part of God again. The new nature is righteous as God. Now know that, believe that, live that. Your new nature is just as righteous as God, for it is God. You are not a sinner saved by grace, and I dare any of you to say that where I can hear you.
Any person that says that is putting himself first, himself as the center of everything. You're not a sinner saved by grace. Do not continue to think of yourself. You belong to God in Christ. Remember this, and act like it.
Think like it. Know it. If you love God, you love your brother, the Christian. Quit thinking about the flesh. God must be your first consideration in every event. When he is, all other things fall into the right order.
You must fight the internal battle, not the outside battle. Satan wants you to think only about the external. 18. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear. That's what we heard this morning, wasn't it?
Because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him because he first loved us. If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar. But he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
And this commandment, have we from him that he who loveth God loveth his brother also. He did not say, if you feel like it. You are not dedicated to the Lord unless you can demonstrate it. So closes our lesson with Myron.
Yes. Now, if you can remember. When you come back, when you come back, I'll have a set of questions for you on this chapter. Greg, dismiss us please.