"24 As for you, let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son and in the Father. 25 This is the promise which He Himself made to us: eternal life. 26 These things I have written to you concerning those who are trying to deceive you. 27 As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him."
Your relationship to the truth will determine where you will spend all eternity. Everything that does not measure with the truth is a lie. Truth confronts. Truth encourages. Truth comforts. Truth sanctifies. Truth transforms. The truth exposes our hearts before God. The truth is the inerrant, infallible Word of the One true Living God.
When I first began in the ministry, I never imagined I'd spend much of my time and energy defending the gospel among those within the church. Defending the truth of the gospel against error. Unfortunately, that has been the case. The new perspective gospel. A perspective which tolerates everything except truth. A perspective which flatly denies or avoids the issues of sin and judgment so as not to offend anyone in the congregation. Since the beginning, Satan has actively opposed the truth of God’s Word. He has continuously raised up false teachers and antichrists within the church, in order to deceive God's people.
Christians, therefore, need to be discerning concerning people and doctrine. The truth is inextricably linked with a personal relationship with God. We reveal our value of Jesus Christ by the degree to which we allow Him to transform our lives. We reveal our value of Jesus Christ by the degree to which we allow Him to transform our lives. Only as the life of Christ is faithfully reproduced in our lives can we claim to value our relationship with Him. Abiding in Christ is the practice of the righteous.
I believe that it is important to grow in our grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, to deepen our
understanding through careful study, and meditation and to teach these truths to
others.
Let us pray
Heavenly Father,
Father, we thank You for Your Word. Thank for our time together to read and study these great truths. Lord, we pray that You might use this message today, mightily, powerfully, to speak someone’s heart, that they may come to full repentance and cry out for forgiveness. We pray for those who have been dependent on human wisdom, that You would awaken them to divine source of truth and the resident teacher. Father, You have promised those in whom the Father and Son abide eternal life, we humbly thank You for that. What a precious promise. We know that we are unworthy of such a gracious gift. Thank You for this great reminder us that we are eternally secure. Thank You for this amazing day, let us appropriate it to serving and pleasing You.
In Christ's name we pray
Amen
Today's Message: Believer Beware!
It is not merely enough to have heard the gospel message, it must continue to be present and active in the lives of those who have heard it.
You must continuously call it to mind and apply it to their lives.
This is why active participation is key to the perseverance in the
faith. You must allow it to impact your life.
Open with me your Bibles to I John chapter 2. As we continue in our
study, we come to a section of the Word that runs from verse 18 to verse
27. In verses 18-20, John shows that to avoid spiritual deception, you
must
develop discernment with regard to people. In verses 21-23, he shows
that you
must develop discernment with regard to doctrine, especially, the truth
about Jesus Christ. And, in verses 24-27, he
shows that the means of developing such discernment is to abide in the
Word and in the Spirit. Today, as we near the end of this great epistle, we will be looking at verses 24 through 27.
I invite you to follow along with me as I again read to you the entire passage to set the text in our minds, while we prepare our hearts for what the Spirit of God has is saying to each of us. Listen for the voice of our Lord.
"Children,
it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming,
even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us. But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know. I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist,
the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does
not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.
As for you, let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If
what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in
the Son and in the Father. This is the promise which He Himself made to
us: eternal life. These things I have written to you concerning those who are trying to deceive you. As
for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and
you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches
you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has
taught you, you abide in Him."
Verse 24, "As for you, let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son and in the Father."
In order to avoid spiritual deception, we must develop discernment by abiding in the Word and in the Spirit. The word "abide" is a very important word in John’s writings, especially in his gospels. Abide means to remain or to rest in. It is an invitation to settle into a genuine relationship and enjoy the fellowship and the perspective. It is the same word Jesus used is His promises to His disciples the night before His crucifixion, when He said " You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you."
We have receive the truth from the Apostles teaching in the New Testament. John is telling us to abide in what we heard from the beginning, which is the gospel message. The Apostle had been with Christ during His earthly ministry, they had heard His teaching and witnessed first hand His miracles. They saw Him risen from
the dead. They knew that the entire Old Testament prophesies pointed to Jesus
Christ. In contrast, the false teachers were claiming to have special revelation apart from the Word.
The gospel message is not the result of some mystical revelation. It is the witness to Jesus Christ Himself, written by the Apostles, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. You cannot attain knowledge of the gospel by human wisdom or logic. Any deviation from the truth of the gospel is heresy, and is the doctrine of Satan. The gospel is not only a doctrine to agree with, it is a personal
relationship with the One true Living God through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ. In order to understand the gospel, you must place your faith in Jesus, and trust Him to forgive your sins and accept His atonement for your sin as payment in full.
Jesus said in John 14:6, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me."
In verse 25, John says "This is the promise which He Himself made to us: eternal life."
Apart from the gospel, because of our sin, we are all under the righteous condemnation of God God’s promise of eternal life is not something we can earn or deserve, it is a gracious gift from God, made available to any guilty sinner who will receive it by faith in Jesus Christ. Eternal life is not only experienced in heaven but also here on earth by those who abide in Jesus Christ.What a precious promise God has made to those who abide in Him!
Verse 26, "These things I have written to you concerning those who are trying to deceive you." By denying Jesus, you are blaspheming the entire Trinity, calling the Holy Spirit a liar because the Holy Spirit testifies to the person of Christ. False teachers may tamper with our confidence, they can even raise doubts in our minds, but they cannot destroy our faith. A true believer who knows the truth, will not deny Christ. The fact that there’s relentless attack on the nature of Jesus Christ, His deity, His Sonship, His teachings tells us we are most certainly living in the last hour.
Satan sends his false teachers in the church, he sows his deceivers in among the true seeds God has planted. Sometimes they ascend to the leadership of the church, sometimes they come into the church as the pastor. They are in seminaries, church staffs, colleges, hospitals and our children's schools. They come in along side of you, they subtly introduce damnable heresies, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.
The world sees everything from Catholicism to Jehovah Witness as Christian. Every pseudo fundamentalist as being associated with Christianity. So when you say that you're a Christian, basically, it doesn't mean anything to them. They affirm no single body of truth as Christian. The truth is maligned. Christianity is maligned. Cults focus much of the efforts on believers in other churches. Therefore, we must solidly base our faith on the written revelation of God. Because if Satan can cause confusion about the gospel, everything else is affected.
It is the responsibility of the pastor to protect the flock, driving away the wolves and to warn the flock of those who pervert the gospel. I would not be fulfilling my godly duties if I didn't warn you of these insidious errors and only preached warm and fuzzy messages. That of course includes the error of of failing to teach repenting of sin or submitting to Jesus as Lord. It is the error that is responsible for many who claim to be born again Christians, while habitually living in sin.They profess to know Christ, but by their deeds they deny Him.
Just because some one quotes the Bible though does not mean you should follow them or their teaching.
That brings us to verse 27, in which John says "As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him."
All of these self-styled, charismatic super Christians, portray themselves as having superior knowledge. Some sort of spiritual elevation, that put them on a higher level above everyone else. Look, if you abide in the Spirit, He will teach you and lead you. He will teach you what you need to know. And allow to inform you of this, it will never contradict His written Word! But, you must do your part to apply what He teaches. John is not saying that we don't need godly teachers, but when the Holy Spirit applies the word of the gospel to the soul, we receive it, not as the word of man, but of God.
Take the error of these prosperity preachers, I believe they are going to be shocked when they hear Him say "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness."
In Closing..
Many Christians claim to know God but deny His truth, they want a church that is upbeat and teaches positive messages, that make them feel good.They want sermons that are light and short. And, not too heavy on doctrine. "If you’ve got problems, try Jesus." There's no place for truth in the churches today. We have alienated sin, repentance and judgement from God's Word.
Don't fool yourselves, thinking that you don't need to hear it. Read it and study it over and over, until you know it well. Let the Word of God abide in you! And, apply it to every area of your life. Any Christian who can read and who makes a genuine effort to understand the Scripture, under the teaching of the Holy Spirit can grasp it's meaning. That's not to say that every passage of Scripture is easy to understand, some are much more difficult than others. The truth of the gospel is not a matter of personal interpretation as many claim, it is a revelation by the Holy Spirit, which always works in conjunction with the Word of God.
The Spirit abides in you, but you also must abide in the Spirit.
May it be so..
And now may the Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make His face shine upon you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.
Now and forever, in Jesus' name
Amen
the Lord make His face shine upon you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.
Now and forever, in Jesus' name
Amen
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