Introduction:
John was writing to churches in the region of Ephesus. There were three main false teachings or heresies that they were facing. Gnosticism, Docetism, and Cerinthianism.
Gnosticism
Gnosticism nullified that is cancelled the need for divine grace from God. Yet Paul reminded us that we are saved by grace, the unmerited favor coming down from the Father of lights.
Docetism
Docetism is derived from the Greek word δοκέω, meaning to seem or to appear. This heresy taught that Jesus did not actually live in a physical human body. It just seemed that way. Jesus appeared to have taken on a human body during His earthly life. Docetists believed that spiritual matter was far superior to physical matter.
Cerinthianism
Taught a rejection of the virgin birth, Jesus was the genetic offspring of Mary & Joseph and many other heretical things.
Undeniable, Unequivocal Eternal Life – 1 John 1:1-2
Many will say now days that this Jesus was simply a good man. They will say that He was not really sinless and that He did not die on that Cross, nor was He the Son of God. But I am here to tell you that there is no hope for life, no hope for salvation or forgiveness if Jesus was just a man. If Jesus was just a man, you might as well become a member at the church of the flying spaghetti monster. But let me remind you of John’s words. “We heard Him, we saw Him, we touched Him and He, God lived in the flesh with us for 3 years while we beheld His glory.
Perhaps this will be the first Christmas without a loved one, or perhaps your stuck in a hospital battling fierce diseases, maybe you are just broken, and your relationships are damaged seemingly beyond repair. Maybe you can’t get away from that one besetting sin. Maybe the hopeless you feel is mounting and the pressure is getting worse. I don’t know what your struggle is, but I know that there is Hope and that Hope has a name and His name is Jesus!
Undeniable, Unequivocal Fellowship – 1 John 1:3
true Biblical Christian fellowship (κοινωνία in the Greek) is a meeting of 2 or more people who seek to engage in community, conversation, and exhortation centered around Jesus Christ. The word means quite literally to commune together, to form a partnership. John is telling these churches. “Listen, all these things the false teachers are telling you is wrong. We tell you these things with truth because of our very real experience with the person of Jesus. He invaded all 5 of our senses and we proclaim these truths to you so that you also may have fellowship with us, that is other Christians who hold to a true Biblical Christology.”
If you don’t hold to this teaching about Christ, you are not in the fellowship of Christ and therefore are not in fellowship with other believers. Because the fellowship we have is only possible, John says, as it is with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. The purpose of κοινωνία, Christian fellowship is to encourage, equip, exhort, and build up. The reason we come to church are a not to forsake the assembling together of ourselves—as is the custom of some—the reason we discipleship and are discipled is to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus. It is to help one another, to serve alongside one another. To reach out a helping hand, to teach a Sunday school class, to humbly admonish each other when we see a brother or sister in sin.
Undeniable, Unequivocal Christian Joy – 1 John 1:4
John is speaking on behalf of what he himself and the other apostles have written and taught. He wants those in the churches across the land that love Jesus, hold the truths of scripture close to their hearts, and have fellowship with the Father and the Son to know that there is no greater joy than to see another come to the saving knowledge of Jesus.
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