Lord's Day: March 16, 2025 Preacher: Carlos Montijo Series: First John Topic: The Christian Life Scripture: 1 John 3:9–11, 1 Peter 1:23, 2 Corinthians 5:17, 1 John 4:8, Psalm 5:5, Psalm 7:11, Romans 13:8–10, Romans 5:8, Romans 6:1 I. The beloved apostle continues expounding for us the black and white, good and evil, light and darkness, God and devil, Cain and Abel contrasts 7 Little children, let no one deceive you. The one who does righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. 8 The one who does sin is of the devil, because the devil sins from the beginning. The Son of God was manifested for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. 9 Everyone who has been born of God does not sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God. 10 By this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifested: everyone who does not do righteousness is not of God, as well as the one who does not love his brother. 11 For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another; 12 not as Cain, who was of the evil one and slew his brother. And for what reason did he slay him? Because his deeds were evil, and his brother’s were righteous. 1 John 3:7–12 God’s Seed and Purpose (Providence) and the Devil’s Seed and Schemes ("works")The threefold sense of God's SeedWe are regenerated by God, adopted by His fatherly love II. By counterfeited contrast, the devil and his own, his seed, are diametrically opposed to God and His seed, and all that is true, good, and beautiful; pure, lovely, and excellent (Php 4:8) 3. The devil’s seed and works are, in sum: The devil’s anointing, a false anointing of lies and disobedience, sin and shame/guilt, and of overexposure (perversion, corruption) III. Although these verses contain serious warnings against living in continual, unrepentant sin… W.G.T. Shedd: “Holy inclination is inability to sin…. The [holy inclination] originates in the operation of the Holy Spirit upon [the believer’s will], while the [unbeliever’s sinful inclination] is self-determination [self-will] pure and simple [flesh], without any internal efficiency [power] of the Holy Ghost…. There is, consequently, a “slavery to righteousness,” as well as a “slavery to sin.” A [believer’s] will which, by regeneration, has been “powerfully determined” (Westminster L. C., 67) and inclined to holiness, is unable to sin, in the sense in which Christ intends, when he says that “a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit” (Mat. vii. 18); and in which St. John intends, when he asserts that the regenerate [believer] “cannot sin, because he is born of God” (1 John iii. 9). This does not mean, that the regenerate, while here upon earth, is sinlessly perfect, committing no actual transgression, and having no remainders of sinful inclination. See 1 John i. 8. But it means that the regenerate [believer’s] will is unable to sin in the manner of the unregenerate [unbeliever’s] will: i.e., impenitently and totally.”[1] IV. In verses 10-11, another explicit connection between “doing righteousness” and love—loving your brother, by contrasting the opposite Remember, to do righteousness is first and foremost to believe and apply the truth of God, and it means to love, love God and neighbor [even personal enemies, cf. the gospels, Matt 22:36-40], but loving God and neighbor also means to love and obey God’s lawPSA: It is fatal, destructive heresy to divorce love from the Law of God—Antinomianism V. No such thing as lawless love, that has no repentance, because God’s love is not unjust God is love (1 John 4:8), and His love, like His law—and like Himself—is holy, just/righteous, and goodMany today, within and without the church, agree with movements like “He Gets Us,” who claim that Jesus is “the world’s most radical love activist”[2] who “created a radical love movement,” who “touched lepers. Welcomed outcasts. and loved without condition.”[3] Their favorite words…radical and love“We’re challenging our own assumptions and preconceived notions about who he is and creating space to doubt, question, and learn from the authentic Jesus,” outside of the church, because “He Gets Us is not a back to church campaign”This Jesus is only about unconditional love, not hate, not repentance, not even about church—but about love divorced from truth, justice, holiness, and the churchLiberals like Gary Wills, a leftist Roman Catholic scholar who wrote What Jesus Meant, but, what Gary thinks Jesus meant is that the Father's "love is undiscriminating and inclusive, not graduated and exclusive" (29).[4]“What are the tests for entry into the reign [of Heaven] or exclusion from it? They are very simple. One will not be asked whether one voted, whether one was a good citizen, or even whether one dealt justly. That is not enough.... The simple test is ...
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