MESSAGES FROM THE Apostle John
DR. JIM DIXON
1 JOHN 1:9, 1 JOHN 2:15
JULY 25, 1993
The Apostle John was called the beloved disciple. He was perhaps the youngest of the 12 disciples of Jesus Christ. He was perhaps temperamental, since our Lord Jesus referred to John and his brother James through the word “boanergés,” which means sons of thunder. It was John who stood at the foot of the cross of Christ, at the time of the crucifixion, and to John our Lord Jesus Christ entrusted His mother Mary. According to church tradition, John is the only disciple who did not experience death through martyrdom. John lived a long life. He died in an elderly age in the city of Ephesus, in the region that today is called Turkey. From John, we have five books in the Bible, the Gospel of John, I, II, and I2 John, and the book of Revelation.
This morning, from the Apostle John we have two messages, and they both come from the little letter of 1 John, and the first message is this: do not love the world. If you believe in Jesus Christ, if you take the name of Christ and call yourself a Christian, if you have invited Christ to be your savior from sin and the Lord of your life, do not love the world.
Ernest Hemingway was one of the greatest writers in American history. In 1954, Hemingway received the Nobel Prize for literature. Of course, many of his novels are well known to you, The Old Man and the Sea, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms. Some of his short stories are also renowned, such as The Snows of Kilimanjaro. In virtually all of Hemingway’s books, the hero was a man, a strong, courageous man. Hemingway called these heroes “God substitutes” and Hemingway needed a substitute for God because Hemingway didn’t believe in God. By the world’s standards, Hemingway lived a very full life whether he was serving as a war correspondent or leading a big game hunt in the African continent, he always lived life to the fullest. Sometimes Hemingway lived in Italy, sometimes he lived in Spain, sometimes he lived in France, sometimes he lived in Cuba. Most of the time, he lived in his home in Idaho, near the Sawtooth Mountains. Hemingway loved Spanish bull fights. He loved midnight feasts. He loved to party with his friends. He loved wine. He loved women. He loved the hunt. He had four wives. He had countless affairs. The truth is that Ernest Hemingway viewed women as part of the hunt, trophies to hang on the walls of his ego.
But by the time Hemingway was 60 years of age, his body was riddled with disease. He had high blood pressure, diabetes, he was overweight and he was tired of dieting. His liver was corroded with the abuse of alcohol. He could no longer function as a man. It was at that time that Hemingway said, “What does a man desire? What does a man desire, but to have good health, to work hard, to eat and drink with his friends and to enjoy himself in bed?” He said, “No longer can I do any of these things.” So it was that Ernest Hemingway began to contemplate suicide, began to think about killing himself. Through the years, Hemingway had flirted with death, both in war and in adventures. He had referred to death as that old whore. He once said that when it came time to take her upstairs, that was his business and no one else’s.
So it was that on Sunday morning, July 2nd, 1961, Ernest Hemmingway went down into his basement where his wife had locked his guns up, but his wife had left the key to the basement on the windowsill above the kitchen sink in plain view. Perhaps she felt it wasn’t her right to deny him his choice. So he went down there and he chose his custom-made 12 gauge shotgun, inlaid with silver. It was his favorite gun. He took some ammunition. He went upstairs. He went through the living room and into the foyer. There, he put a shell in each barrel. He carefully put the butt of the gun to the floor. He bent over. He took a deep breath. He felt the cold metal in his mouth. He tripped the triggers. Ernest Hemingway took his own life.
In the words of Chuck Colson in his book, Kingdoms and Conflict, Ernest Hemingway gave into the seduction of death. In describing the life and death of Ernest Hemingway, Chuck Colson said that Ernest Hemingway was the quintessential 20th century man. Born in 1899, he saw the rapid rise of technology. He saw the increasing faith in science. He saw decreasing faith in God. Ernest Hemingway bought, he accepted, the philosophies of this 20th century world. He sought fulfillment through materialism, through hedonistic pleasures, through ego, and through self. In the end, for him life had become a meaningless void. In the end, his life was just filled with despair and despondency. In the end, it all seemed like vanity.
In the words of the book of Ecclesiastes, vanity, vanity, all is vanity. His immediate legacy was simply the ruin of blood, bone, teeth, and hair that his wife found blasted into the walls of the foyer. But through his writing, through his literature, he has left a greater and more lasting legacy. Yet, surely in the sight of God, Ernest Hemingway has become the perfect illustration. A perfect illustration of the futility of loving this world. The perfect illustration of what it means to love this world and the things of this world. We can’t help but think of these words of the Apostle John, “Do not love the world or the things that are in the world for if anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him. All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life is not of the Father, but is of the world and the world passes away and the desires of it. But he or she, who does the will of God abides forever.”
In this little verse, “Do not love the world.” The Greek word for world is the word “cosmon.” This Greek word had two meanings. Sometimes it referred to the material universe. Sometimes it referred to the creation. That’s not how John is using it here. God wants us to love the material universe. God wants us to love His creation. God wants us to enjoy His creation. God wants us to love people. People are the very crown of His creation. God wants us to love all people, all the people in the world.
But you see at other times this word, cosmon referred to human society, fallen human society. Sometimes the word world referred to fallen human society, human society that is dominated by demonic powers, human society which the Bible tells us is ruled by the prince of darkness, ruled by Satan. Human society, the philosophies of which are antithetical to God and to His Son Jesus Christ.
About 2,600 years ago, there lived a man named Aesop. Aesop was a Greek slave. He was famous for the telling of tales. His fables all included animals, but they illustrated human truth. In one of Aesop’s fables, he told the story of a bat. This bat lived at a time when the birds of the air and the beasts of the field were at war. Whenever it looked like the birds of the air were winning this bat pretended to be a bird and would fly with the birds and hung out with the birds. But whenever it looked like the beasts of the field were winning this bat became one of the beasts and walked with the beasts and hung out with the beasts. Of course, eventually his hypocrisy was discovered. According to Aesop, the bat was therefore banished to the night. But the point that Aesop was trying to make is that there’s a lot of people out there who want to have it both ways. A lot of people in the world out there who refuse to make a necessary choice, and they try to walk on both sides of the fence.
Now unfortunately, the tragic truth in the Christian world as we’re approaching the end of this millennium, is that there are so many Christians who at least nominally believe in Christ and yet follow the ways of the world seeking fulfillment through materialism, hedonism, ego, and self. You see, God says, our Lord Jesus Christ tells us, “You can’t serve two masters. You’ll either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. No one can serve God and mammon.” Of course, mammon is a word that is sometimes translated money. But the truth of the matter is that Greek word mammon came to refer to the ways of the world. It came to refer to the philosophies of human society. You cannot serve both God and the philosophies of this world.
The Bible tells us that as Christians we have been set apart from the world. This world’s not our home. The world’s never meant to understand us. We’re always going to look a little freakish to the world. We’re bound for heaven. We have a kingdom to serve. We have brothers and sisters the world over. We have been set apart. The biblical word, holy, the word “hagios” literally means set apart. So Christ has called His people to a whole different set of values. He’s called us to holiness.
Of course, we’re not always holy. This leads us to the second teaching, the final teaching from John this morning. It’s a great passage. John says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, but if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” One of the greatest promises in the pages of scripture. Of course, the problem is that some people do say they have no sin. The Greek word for sin in the Bible is the word “hamartia.” The word hamartia literally means to miss the mark. Of course, the mark is the very righteousness of God. The mark is the holiness of God. By that standard, we all miss the mark. By that standard, we’re all sinners.
Now, the word sin in the Bible is used in two ways. Sometimes the word is used internally. It refers to internal qualities of sin. In 1922, in Egypt, Howard Carter, the famous archeologist, digging in the valley of the kings, unearthed the burial chamber of King Tutankhamun. Of course, that was a great moment in history because in all of the archeological digs throughout the Valley of the Kings, this was the first time they had found a tomb previously untouched. All of its treasures were still there. Howard Carter was stunned when he went into the burial chamber and he found a casket. Inside that casket, he found a second casket covered with gold leaf. Inside that second casket, Howard Carter found a third casket, and inside the third casket, a fourth casket made of solid gold. Inside the fourth casket, he found the body of the boy king, the one-time Pharaoh, King Tut. That body was wrapped gold cloth, with a solid gold mask covering the face. Of course, that gold mask has been exhibited the world over.
Underneath the gold cloth and the gold mask, Howard Carter found the decayed body of that one time Pharaoh. Despite mummification, the body could not be preserved, and it was subjected to decomposition, decay, ruin. Howard Carter said, you know, he said he couldn’t help but be startled by the contrast of the outward adornment, the contrast of the incredible encasements and the gold caskets, and the gold cloth, and the gold mask when contrasted with the rot and the decay that was inside. It’s kind of a graphic illustration of what is true of all of humanity. Because no matter how great we look on the outside, no matter how beautiful, no matter how handsome, no matter how loving our actions appear to be, you see deep within each and every human being, there is darkness.
It’s what the Bible tells us. Deep within every human being, there’s a little decay. Now, I don’t mean to say that you’re not wonderful. I mean, we’re all created in the image of God. We’re all created in the image of God. But you see, we are fallen. We are fallen. The Bible speaks sometimes of sin in the sense of the sin nature. We are all born with a sin nature. We are all in Adam, the Bible says. You see Adam sinned, Adam fell, and the whole human race, the whole human race was in Adam, in his seed. We are all born fallen, the Bible says. We’re all born with a sin nature, and we go astray from the womb. That’s what the Bible says.
Therefore, our thoughts, our attitudes, our feelings are oftentimes displeasing to God. That’s what Jesus was saying in the Sermon on the Mount. Even if you think externally you’re doing pretty well, internally, there’s sin there. If we say we have no sin, if we say we have not a sin nature, we deceive ourself. The truth is not in us. The good news of the gospel is when you come to Christ, when you come to Christ and you receive Him as Savior from sin and Lord of life, His righteousness is imputed to us. Despite our sin nature, we are in the courtroom of heaven deemed holy because we’re viewed through the spectacle of the Son. We’re given a new nature, the Bible says. That old nature, that sin nature will one day be burned away. We’re promised that one day that old nature will be burned away. In the meantime, we do struggle with that sin nature. We do struggle with it. But what God wants us to do, you see, is confess our sin, that we might be cleansed.
Now, sometimes the word sin is used externally to refer to improper actions. Sometimes in the Bible, the word sin refers to sins of omission and commission. Sometimes in the Bible, the word sin, the word hamartia refers to the things we did we shouldn’t do. Sometimes it refers to the things we didn’t do that we should have done. Sometimes it refers to external, the whole realm of external actions. Of course, the problem with sin externally is that this sin tends to be habitual. I mean, if you think about it, most of our external sins, most of our behaviors, most of our sinful actions tend to become chronic. Whether it has to do with temper or pornography or gossip or alcoholism or gluttony or lying or even just laziness, whatever the sin in our behavior, it tends to become chronic.
Here’s the problem: so many Christians grow comfortable with their sins, kind of feel at peace with their sins. God doesn’t want us to do that.
Perhaps you’ve heard of the French aristocrat, the baron Richard Dearsy. He died in 1977. He had a very unusual pet. It was a cat, but it was not a normal cat because it was a lion. He’d had that lion from birth and he played with the lion. He rolled around on the carpet with the lion. He teased the lion. They seemed to really like each other. It was one day, one night in 1977, he was trying to get the lion into the bathroom where the lion spent the night. The lion didn’t want to go, he tried to pull the lion in, and suddenly something snapped. Something snapped in that lion, and the lion just jumped him, killed him in seconds, shredding his body.
You read the newspaper just a few days ago about the python right here in Denver that had been kept as a pet, and everything seemed to go well for so long. Then just suddenly with no explanation this python killed a 15-year-old boy, just strangled him to death right there in the house. You see some pets, some animals, don’t make good pets. Some animals are kind of dangerous, right? Some pets are dangerous. It is true, tragically true, that you meet a lot of people who’ve kind of made sin a pet. I mean, sin doesn’t make a good pet. You might think that it’s not causing you any problem at all. You might feel really comfortable. Maybe everything seems to just be going great, but the warning of God is clear, mean nothing is more dangerous than sin.
Whatever the sin in your life is, as the Holy Spirit brings it to your awareness, what God wants you to do is so clear. He wants you today to repent. He wants you today to confess that sin. Here’s the great promise of God, that when we confess our sin, when we come in repentance and confess that sin, whatever it is, He’s willing to forgive us, to wash us whiter than snow. If we confess our sin is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness, what a promise.
You know, the Pope is coming to town. I’m sure you all know that. It’s been interesting, I’ve had letters and phone calls and conversations with many of you here in the church. You’ve all obviously got very different opinions regarding the Pope and regarding the Roman Catholic Church. Some of you want me to endorse the Pope, you’ve written me letters asking me to endorse the Pope as a great Christian leader in our time. Some of you have written me letters asking me to condemn the Pope. You feel like the Pope is perhaps the antichrist. It’s amazing the variety of thought that is in our congregation concerning the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church.
Now, I’m going to say this, I’m not going to endorse or condemn the Pope. Now, I would say this about Roman Catholicism. One of the things about Roman Catholicism is; the reason I can’t endorse it is that doctrinally, theologically, there’s just too much there that disagrees with the scripture. But one of the reasons I can’t condemn it is there’s an awful lot there that agrees with the scripture. But you see one of the difficulties with Catholicism, and I want to say I know some of you by background are Catholics and some of you might be member of Catholic churches. Now I know there are some wonderful Christians in the Catholic church. I know that in Protestant churches there’s a lot of people who aren’t Christians. I mean, this is reality and this is true.
But you know, there is some disturbing teaching in Catholicism. There really is. The view of sin in the Roman Catholic Church is tragic. The Roman Catholic Church, if you read their doctrinal affirmations, the forgiveness of sin is appropriated through water baptism, the taking of mass through penance, which is what you are instructed to do after you’ve made your confessional in the booth, and through purgatory. That’s Roman Catholic theology. The forgiveness of sin is only appropriated through water baptism or as you take the mass or as you do penance or as you spend time in purgatory, which every Catholic will have to do except for the saints before they can get to heaven.
That’s scary stuff biblically. Contrast that with what the Bible says. I mean, the Bible clearly says that the forgiveness of sins is appropriated through belief and confession with repentance. Pretty simple, belief and then repentance and confession to Christ. That’s so beautiful about this. This verse, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
You know, we live in a fallen culture and society and our society is living in deception. Many people saying, “You know, we have no sin.” Many people calling good evil and evil good. I think many of us in this church I know would like to see our society, our culture, repent and confess. But we need to understand this fallen human society in which we live has not been set apart for holiness. It’s the church of Jesus Christ that has been set apart for holiness.
Now obviously, we need to be concerned with our fallen secular society and the philosophies of that society. We need to go into the world with the love of Christ and seek to be sought and light. But confession and repentance are so desperately needed in the church because we are the ones who have been set aside for holiness. We are the ones who have been called to be the people of God. How can we be light in the world if we live as the world is?
So, we have these two critical instructions from John this morning. “Do not love the world or the things that are in the world, for all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passes away and the desires of it, he or she who does the will of God abides forever.” “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Let’s close with a word of prayer.