Thank you for this day and may I be used as Your vessel of service today. Amen.
1 John 3
Today we want to focus on righteousness and sin. You remember that we initially looked at the meaning of righteousness last week. Again, it is a precise word in the Greek that means that one lives according to the standards of God, according to what He calls “right living”.
Anything that is done apart from the initiation of God is determined to be evil in God’s sight. Therefore, the only way one can be righteous is to be born again (2:29, 3:9) with the Holy Spirit indwelling them (3:24) and guiding their way of life.
This is so contrary to the thinking of man because man’s philosophy is that there is “good” in everyone, but Jesus said that is not true. In Matthew 19:17, Jesus questions a rich young man who called Him “good”. Jesus’ response was: “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God” (NKJV).
Was this man admitting that Jesus was God?
God alone is good, and God alone can determine what is righteous. It has nothing to do with mere humanistic kindness and morality.
As we learned at the beginning of this study, Gnosticism was the prevalent philosophy that the Church was being exposed to in her early days. Another philosophy of that day was Universalism, which falsely teaches that all human beings are children of God. This is now the false teaching that John begins to refute.
In 2:29 you saw that only those who are “born of Him” can practice righteousness. And John continues that thought by further explaining what it means to be “born of Him” in 3:1-2. Here he continues by calling those born of Him “children of God”.
The main theme of chapter 3 is that God’s children practice righteousness.
In Ezekiel 28:12-19 we have a description of the “king of Tyre”, notably a description of Satan at his beginning:
According to Ezekiel 28:16–17, and Isaiah 14:12-15, what happened to him?
He sinned because of pride! He wanted to be God.
In Genesis 2:15-17 and Genesis 3 we see that Satan then tempted Eve to sin by:
What was the result of man’s sin? It separated man from God because God is holy.
Finally, whose obedience solved our sin problem? Romans 5:12-19 - through the obedience of Jesus Christ, the second Adam – the perfect man!
Add to your list of contrasts. What contrasts do you see in chapter 3?
What is the key verse of chapter 3?
What does it mean to “practice” sin?
Look up these verses and note where sin resides.
If the problem is my heart, if this is where sin resides, what can I do about my heart?
List the three reasons given in I John 3 for living a holy life. (3:1-3; 3:4-8; 3:9-10)
Search my heart and see if there is any disobedience in me, oh Lord. I want to bring glory to Your name and never dishonor You as my Father. Amen.
