John, at the beginning of this letter writes, “God is light, and in Him there is no
darkness at all.” Light shines from
the throne of God. All living things face that light and bask in that light. As
we behold His face, we shine that light out to others. As long as we face Him,
we continually transmit that light to the world.
When we look away from Christ and look to the world, we are
poor transmitters of that light. We become spotty, dirty reflectors of that
light. Our sins prevent people from seeing Jesus through us.
In our country there has been a great falling away from the
church. This is not because the church hasn’t been trying. It’s largely because
we haven’t been reflectors of Jesus. We’ve not shown the real Jesus to the
world. Our leaders have been caught in scandal, we’ve pursued political power
and social prestige instead of godliness. People have had a taste something
that they presume to be Christianity, but is really a watered down version of
it.
When people don’t transmit God’s light, but they get in the
way of it, John calls them “antichrist.”
The word “antichrist” in Greek
doesn’t mean “against Christ” or “opposed to Christ” but someone who takes the
place of Christ, and obscures who He really is. An antichrist is someone who
stands in the way of Christ, like a big person in a crowd who obscures our
view. An antichrist is a false interpreter of Christ, who claims to be
interpreting Christ to the world, but is really just speaking his or her own
words. A false leader or false interpreter of the Word is antichrist. Anyone
who wants people to follow them, instead of following Christ is what John calls
antichrist.
Such people are all around us, but how do we know them?
There are so many people demanding our attention and allegiance that it’s hard
for us to know who really deserves to be followed. So in this passage John
gives instructions to help us make such a determination. Specifically, he gives
us four signs to watch for to spot a teacher who will lead us astray.
1. False teachers deny the people of Christ.
John writes in verses 19 and 20,
They went out from
us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have
continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all
are not of us. But you have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all have
knowledge.
Christians do not have to always agree. Disagreement is a
sign of a healthy church. It means that people are not just taking what is said
at face value, but are using their brains to search for God’s truth. There are
issues on which the church must agree, but there are many more issues on which
we disagree.
False teachers seek more than disagreement though, because they
desire separation. We may agree to disagree, but false teachers use minor
disagreements to tear the church apart.
The Jehovah’s Witnesses argue that Jesus was crucified on a
pole not a cross. The Way International, another cult, argues that there were
five crosses on Calvary, not three. Seventh Day Adventists argue that Saturday,
not Sunday, is the real Sabbath. Some Churches of Christ believe that churches
should only be named the Church of Christ.
Jesus Only Pentecostals believe that baptism must be done in the name of
Jesus Only, and not in the Father Son and Holy Spirit. If all of these people
were right, (and I don’t believe any of them are) what difference would it make
before God? These are minor, frivolous
issues. Far more serious in God’s eyes is whether or not we deny God’s people
and separate from those we love. To denounce the rest of the church over minor
issues is like seeking a divorce, because we can’t agree on the design of the
wallpaper in the kitchen!
John says we have an anointing from the Holy One—the Holy
Spirit. The church, the Body of Christ,
is the abode of the Spirit. To deny the reality of the Church on earth is to
deny the reality of God on earth.
In one of my classes I gave an assignment to trace the roots
of their local church. One girl wrote that Jesus Christ started the church, but
it was lost for two thousand years until twenty years ago when her pastor restarted
the true church, and Christ’s church was reborn. I marveled at the arrogance of
this--that Jesus would allow His church to disappear so that people would be
deceived into thinking they were following Him when they were only going to
hell, even though Jesus declared that the gates of hell would not prevail
against His church. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which denies the Body
of Christ and the Spirit of Christ.
2. False teachers deny the person of
Christ.
Verses 21-25:
I write to you, not because you do not know the truth, but
because you know it, and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar but he
who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the
Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses
the Son has the Father also. Let what you heard from the beginning abide in
you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will
abide in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise that he made to us
— eternal life.
The great truth that unites the church is that Jesus is God,
the Son, and not just the Son of God. For the Jehovah’s Witnesses, he is a
lesser god, the same as the archangel Michael. For the Mormons, he is the
physical son of God, and Satan was his brother. For the liberal church, Jesus is
just an enlightened man. For the Christian Science practitioner, he is a disembodied
Spirit. Yet Jesus made in John 8 when He said, “Before there was Abraham, I
am.” I AM is the literal translation of
Jehovah. He accepted worship, He told his Disciples to pray to Him. He said, “I
and the Father are One.” For hundreds of
years, the church debated this, struggled with this, but came to a unanimous
decision that this in fact was what Jesus is.
Christians disagree about many issues, but we all agree on
the basics. Those basics center on Jesus, His person, life, death, and
resurrection. False teachers become false in one of two ways. Either they deny the basics of the faith, or
they add to those basics with their own rules or doctrines.
Getting close to Jesus means study. There is no way around
this. If you want to understand Jesus, you have to read the Bible, and not only
the Bible, but what people have thought about the Bible. You should read this
critically, but you must become involved in seeking to understand just who
Jesus is. Any sermon, any teaching that
does not include Jesus Christ is not Christian teaching. Any message which may
be preached by a Muslim or Jew is not Christian. Christ is the center of all we
teach and all we do.
3. False
teachers deny the presence of Christ.
John
continues in 25-27:
And this is the promise that he made to us — eternal life. I
write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you. But the
anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that
anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything—and
is true and is no lie, just as it has taught you—abide in him.
Knowing Christ is not enough. We must also live in Christ.
This means spending our time, energy, and power seeking to be united with Him.
In school, students often come to class not realizing what
they are doing in higher education. They assume all they need to do is “learn
stuff.” By that they mean there is a
body of knowledge they need to memorize. That’s fine for elementary education,
but not for higher education. Higher education is all about applying stuff, analyzing
stuff, synthesizing stuff with other stuff, and being able to restate and
refine stuff, so that it becomes part of us.
They swallow information the way we would swallow a rock—we don’t digest
it; it just goes right through.
Jesus is a living person with whom we have a relationship. We
have to come to know him with our heart as well as our head. We must talk to
Him in prayer, seek Him as our friend and companion, and imitate His Lifestyle.
False
teachers see Jesus as a packet of information that they alone possess. They
have no concern whether Jesus lives in his followers, but they seek to have people
depend on their knowledge. But Jesus wants us all to abide in Him. A preacher
is not someone who goes up on a mountaintop to discover God, so that He can
come down and lead the people. He lives among the people, constantly training
them to go up on the mountaintop, and discover God for themselves. We are all
children of God and responsible for discovering the Father for ourselves.
4. False Teachers deny the practice of Christ.
John ends the chapter in 28-29:
And 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. If
you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices
righteousness has been born of him.
Antichrists put their will above God’s will. They do not look to God, but to themselves
for guidance. They may say Jesus is Lord, but they practice something else.
Language leads us to hypocrisy. We are comfortable saying,
“Jesus is Lord” because “Lord” is an archaic word we no longer use in common
language. Can we say, “Jesus is Boss”, or “I must do whatever Jesus tells me to
do”? Making Jesus Lord means doing what
He says---all of what He says, and not just a part.
False teachers lift one part of Christ’s commands and lift
them above the others. They may lift up personal holiness and deny love, or
else do it the other way around. They may lift up the life of personal prayer,
and deny the commands to go out among people. They may lift up the commands to
be faithful to the church, but deny the need to constantly renew and reform it.
There are antichrists who are innovators and traditionalists, activists, and
separatists, emotionalists, and intellectualists. When really Jesus is
commanding us to do all.
Let’s summarize like this. A true reflector of the Light is
one who love Jesus with all his heart, mind soul and strength, and loves God’s
people the same way. He follows Jesus, but not alone. He knows he needs the
others, and he loves the others as well. In all ways, he bows his knee to the
Christ, and worships Him alone.
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