To Make Our Joy Complete (1 John 1:1-4)

To Make Our Joy Complete (1 John 1:1-4)

Into

Parents have an enormous impact on their kids. For example, show me two parents, and I’m generally going to get a pretty good idea of how their kids will live and what kinds of decisions they will make. 

It’s a little scary for me as a parent that my life is going to have such a huge impact on my daughter! Also, the longer I live, the more I see my parents in me, both the good and the bad.

Now, thank God that is not always or completely true, and that the Lord does intervene in our lives and change mold us in ways our parents never did. 

In fact, that’s what this series we are jumping into is about- the effect being God’s child has on us. If our earthly parents have such a tremendous impact on us, how much more should our heavenly Father? If we can see similarities between earthly parents and their offspring, how much more should we see similarities between our heavenly Father and his offspring?

We are about to jump into a series on the Apostle John’s letters (1-3 John). He’s an author we have not heard from yet, so it will be good for us as we grow in hearing from all of Scripture. 

Why are we going here next? We are going here next because John helps simply explain what a Christian (or “a child of God” is). We just finished our vision/mission/values series, and this simple explanation by John of the Christian life is going to help us understand what living out our values will look like in day to day life. 

Now, onto the letter of 1 John. What should we know about this letter? The Apostle John wrote it- he was one of Jesus’s closest disciples and followers when he walked on the earth. After Jesus ascended to heaven, it’s likely that John ministered in Asia, probably somewhere around modern-day Turkey, planting churches and making disciples. He would have been an old man and seasoned saint by now.[1] This seems like one of his letters to those churches.

What’s going on in the situation of the church that prompts him to write this letter?

Imagine you are in a church and there is a group of people who stop believing in Jesus. They say things like, “he’s not God,” and, “he’s not the only way.” After a season of painful conflict, they leave (2:19). They might even go and plant another church. Then, they even send missionaries to your church, and keep leading people astray (2 John).

Imagine how painful and confusing that would be if that happened in this church here, with people you knew, walked with, and respected. 

At this moment, when many would have been questioning themselves and their Lord, a letter from John arrives. The man God used to start this church. The man who walked closely with Jesus. Oh, how desperate you would have been for this letter. 

Now, one quick word about Scripture: this letter was written to this church thousands of years ago, but it was written for us. That is, while John wrote this letter to address this specific situation, God also intended this letter (and all of Scripture) to address all Christians in all of time until Jesus comes back. While we don’t have the exact same historical circumstances, we have the exact same heart struggles in that we tend to forget and disbelieve who Jesus is and tend to doubt ourselves and our confession. 

Now, we pastors read through this letter ahead of time and put our heads together, making out best attempt to summarize it’s message for us. Here is what we came up with: 

We know we’re God’s children when we believe in Jesus, love his family, and overcome the world and the evil one. 

John weaves these three themes all throughout his letter with the goal of creating confidence and assurance to his readers of who Jesus is and who they are. And here is John, writing at the end of his letter, making this clear: 

13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.

Alright family, let’s jump into the first letter of John:

1:1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life.

·        Strange start! No, “greetings,” or “grace and peace.” Just, “that which was…”[2]

·        Not for John. Starts his gospel story about Jesus’s life, “in the beginning was the word…”

·        In John’s gospel story about Jesus, making point, “Jesus was God, at the beginning, creating.”

·        What is John saying here? “the one who created everything in the beginning, we heard him, we saw him, our hands even touched him.” The creator became a creation in his own world.[3]

·        John uses “we” because not just writing from his own perspective, but other eye witnesses.[4]

·        Because John was an eyewitness to Jesus, he has a special authority to talk about him. In this time of uncertainty, saying, “Listen to me. I was there. I saw him. I walked with him.”

·        Then, “the word of life.” A description of Jesus. Words reveal us to others; Jesus reveals God the Father. When he comes to show people, God, he brings life. John’s going to keep explaining…

2 The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us.

·        “The life appeared” = the one who created life appeared. He made life at the start: a lush garden, world full of animals, two human beings to rule it all. Life flowed at start and now.

·        In John’s gospel story of Jesus, life flows: he heals people, and even brings back from the dead.

·        John, “I saw the one who created at start. I saw him feed 5000, I saw him bring back Lazarus.”

·        “We proclaim to you eternal life” = Jesus created life never end, and he came to make it so.

·        “which was with the Father…” Source of all life within God, comes to be among us in Jesus. When death comes, source of life goes from within God to live among us.

·        Why is John telling this church these things? He explains in verse 3,

3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.

·        “so that” = John’s purpose for talking to them about Jesus. “fellowship” = close relationship.[5]

·        How does this work? When you believe Jesus is the life together, nothing deeper in common. Should overcome every difference for close relationship. Lost fellowship with who left.

·        This is why we do life together in this church (not many would have hung out with me), all kinds of different people, we share bond.

·        As long as this church, and each of us individually, keeps following and holding fast to Jesus, we will never have to experience broken fellowship with each other. We can forgive offenses, not stumble over different political and cultural stances, and we can learn to love people who are difficult for us to get along with. Since we have Jesus, we no longer have to go the way of the world in endless fracturing and bickering. And as long as we keep pursuing Jesus and urging each other to do so, we can avoid ever having a painful church split or crisis where the enemy divides up this family that the Lord Jesus has brought together.

·        Next, John turns over one more stone about the fellowship we share with one another. He says,

“And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.”

·        “with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ” = John pulls back curtain and shows us:

·        More than one person in God, he’s like a family, called the trinity. John’s focus is on Father/Son.

·        John 1:1 “Word [Jesus] was with God, and he was God.” God one being; more than one person.

·        Whose confused by that? That’s okay. Goal not that we fully understand, but delight and love it.

·        Imagine: no world exists, only God exists. Yet, in just God, there is already fellowship, and already love before anything else exits.

·        It means that as God existed by himself before he made anything else, he wasn’t lonely, he wasn’t a needy God. It also means he wasn’t cold and indifferent to relationships, he had a relationship of love.

·        If God is only a singularity, and there is no Father and Son, then there is no God who is full of love. There’s only a lonely God or a cold, indifferent God- we worship neither. We worship the God who loved and knew before he made anything at all. This is why John is able to say later in the letter, “God is love” (4:8).

·        So, when you think of God, you should think of a perfect Father loving a perfect Son. God is full of affection, full of goodness, full of relationship: He’s a full and abundant God.  

·        What does this have to do with saying our fellowship is with the Father and his Son, Jesus?

·        What God brings all of us into when we follow Jesus is this relationship with the Father/Son. The Father and Son are already in close relationship, and we get to join in.

·        It’s like being an orphan on the streets and entering into the community that adopts you.

·        You ever see a group of people hanging out and want to be included? Jesus came to include us.

·        Jesus puts it this way in John 17 when he is praying,

21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

·        There’s a relationship going on and we get to get in on it together. I may not understand the trinity, but I love the trinity! I love that God is full of love and wants me and us to join him.

·        Getting to experience God together gives us deepest fellowship together (imagine triangle).

·        Do you notice that the fellowship of God expands outwards? First it includes Father and Son but then it goes outward to include others? John get at this in verse 4:

4 We write this to make our joy complete.

·            How does writing this letter complete John’s joy? Let’s connect this statement to before.

·            There was a Father and Son in relationship, then they overflowed in creating the world. Didn’t have to. Overflow not something you have to do, but want to do.

·            Likewise John, as a follower of Jesus, receives fullness of life and joy from God and also wants to overflow to others. God’s an overflowing God and he makes his people into overflowing people.

·            Adds to John’s joy to share God with other people; Adds to John’s joy to keep these Christians.[6]

·            That’s what’s motivating John’s ministry: the pursuit of his own joy in bringing God to other people. That’s what he means by, “We write this letter to make our joy complete.”  

·            In our world, people take from others to make themselves happy. In God’s kingdom, we pursue our happiness by giving ourselves away to serve others and fill them up with God.

·            This is where our three CORE VALUES comes together: we spend time with Father to overflow in loving family and making disciples.

·            What’s going on when I fail to love and serve others?  It’s not because I’m too interested in my own joy, it’s because I’m not interested enough. I’m settling for something small like “comfort” or “me time.” I think I’m making myself happy, but I’m actually missing out.

·            You see, we all have the opportunity to be a channel of God to other people. Life flowing into us and flowing out from us to others. Better than comfort. Better than world’s pleasures.

·            And I need to be reminded of this as I am always feeling a pull from my flesh back to comfort.

·            Some of my happiest moments are after I’ve spent time with someone pouring out my soul. Spent but so full.

·            One thought: When God asks us to do something that’s hard, we need to remember, though this might be costly in the moment, it won’t ultimately take away from my happiness, it’s going to add to it!

·            Church, our path to our greatest joy is to overflow to others.

·            John began this letter by mentioning that the creator of the world became a man, Jesus. In this world of death, he became a human being in order to die.

·            It’s how Jesus brings life: he died in the place of our sins, and rose from the dead, and becomes our source of life again. That’s how any of us receive life in the first place before we give it to others. If that’s never happened, talk to someone.

·            Now, I invite this whole community together with me to make our joy complete by seeking the life and joy of others. Instead of acting out of our lack, our insecurities, our emptiness within, and harming other people in the process; let’s seek to be so full of God that we only overflow life to one another. What kind of community would be if we sought our own happiness in the life and happiness of others?  

·            Let’s pray.

·            Please spend some time praying for the person beside you that God would fill them up and make them a life source to others.

[1] Colin G. Kruse, The Letters of John, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans Pub.; Apollos, 2000), 27.

[2] Colin G. Kruse, The Letters of John, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans Pub.; Apollos, 2000), 28.

[3] John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries on Hebrews, 1 Peter, 1 John, James, II Peter, Jude, trans. Henry Beveridge, vol. XXII (Grand Rapids, MI: BakerBooks, 2009), 158.

[4] Karen H. Jobes, 1, 2, & 3 John, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2014), 44.

[5] William Arndt et al., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 552.

[6] Colin G. Kruse, The Letters of John, ed. D. A. Carson, Second Edition., Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; London: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company; Apollos, 2020), 55–66