Walking in Truth and Love Pt. 2

Well, if you have not already, please make your way in your Bible to the book of Second John, the little single chapter letter of Second John.

I don't know if the titles will come across in the bulletin every time or not, but for sure, I want to make sure the point is gotten, if you haven't been attentive to it, that every message in this series, all five of them, has a theme and then it has a sub theme. And the main theme of the whole book is Walking in Truth and Love. So that is essentially the title of every sermon, Walking in Truth and Love, and then with a sub theme below that, which either makes that point in a stronger way or makes a point that somehow associates with it or will end in it. But I want to make sure it's really, really clear that this letter that John wrote is so that Christians would walk in truth and love. Now, I already mentioned, I already did the introductory work last time, but it is to the lady that lady, whoever she is, gets mentioned in this text today.

So the lady can be one of two things. The idea, this lady and her children can be one of two options. There's a bunch of the second option, but it's one category. So the first option is that it is to an individual lady. That is possible.

It's very possible. The language allows for it. It allows that this letter was from the Apostle John to a specific woman and her specific family, her children, her biological children. It could mean that. And many take it that way.

And by the way, right. It's almost right down the middle, depending on who you ask, which. Which is which, whether it's to an individual lady or not, or the other way in the way, Eileen, is the idea that the lady is language. Because this letter was written early in church history, when, when persecution was flaring up, when the church was under the watchful eye of Rome and those who would not be happy that they were gathering and talking about a Lord that wasn't Caesar, that during that time that the church was persecuted. It was.

It is very possible that John is to avoid persecution for the church, addressing the letter and using the language so that a reader of the letter who is not a Christian but might look at the letter and say, oh, this is just a personal letter, but what's actually happening is it was to a whole church that the lady is a church and the children, in this case, and we'll see it today, the children would be the members of that church or the people associated with that body of believers. I tend to lean that way there's a couple of reasons. None of them I would be dogmatic over. I wouldn't fight over it. It's okay if you hold the other way.

But I'll reiterate what I said in the beginning, which is regardless of that interpretation, whether it's to an individual lady or to a church, the application for us is the same. So we either need to apply what is said to the woman to our lives and her children to our lives and to avoid the things that she's said to avoid or told to avoid or with a church, we need to do what this church is being called to do. So the applications and the usefulness of this text in our lives is applicable either way almost identically. You can almost identify, identically apply it to an individual or churches. Now I said the theme of the book is to walk and to live in truth and love.

I said last time I learned from my mentor and I believe wholeheartedly he was right, that love and truth are tied together so intimately that it is almost not enough to say they are like brothers. It's closer to something like what happens in marriage, a one flesh relationship. It's closer to, well, when the Lord says that he and his father are one, that that kind of oneness. When we're talking about truth and love in the New Testament, in scripture in general, but specifically in the New Testament for Christian believers, those two things are so tied together that it's safe to say if you lose one of them, you lose both of them. Meaning there can be nobody considered faithful to Christianity who says you can have truth and doctrine without love.

If you say that you can have doctrine but not be loving, not show love to the brethren, you're not a Christian. I'm saying it as bluntly as I can. And the other side is also true. And this is the one that is most prevalent in our day. We're seeing it in a major way in the last 30 years, really since the advent of the church growth movement, 70s.

I think maybe the 1970s, that after World War II there was a strong push towards strong biblical fundamentalism and we would technically qualify as fundamentalists here. I know that's scary to you, but we don't mean like typical independent fundamentalist Baptist churches mean that. We just mean the five fundamentals of the Christian faith. That these are things that we have held to over the years. And our association that we're a part of has held to them too since 1932ish.

And then world through World War II, this idea that we stand on the authority of the word of God. And whatever it says is what we are supposed to believe. That is sort of foundational to our thinking. But then in our world, in our culture, coming out of Vietnam and during other times, everything sort of shifted to this idea of love and acceptance. And how do we get people to come in the church who have been disillusioned with the church and who are disillusioned with the Christian faith?

And so this whole push of church growth in the under the guise of being loving changed. And what that has turned into now, which is essentially in our culture, it's prevalent. It's more prevalent than it isn't. If something is called Christian, it has this idea in it that love is the primary virtue. And the word love in that context, the word love in that context can and often is devoid of truth.

In fact, you've heard this phrase, haven't you, in your political stuff? If you are political and I'm not. But you have heard this phrase, suicidal empathy. Have you heard that phrase? That's what's happening in our culture right now, that we have to accept everything and everybody, even to the detriment of our whole culture.

Right? This idea that being loving means never saying anything hard to somebody, never judging, never being offensive. If that's true, what do you say about Jesus kicking over the tables on temple grounds and calling those people a den of thieves? Is that loving of Jesus to do that? It is the highest love Jesus has in that moment, but he has it for his Father more than anyone else.

If you separate love from truth, you lose Christianity. There is no Christian love without Christian truth. And the Christian truth is the scripture. Today we're going to see the word commandments. Where are those found?

They are found in Scripture. So I want us as a congregation and Christians to be loving like Christ is loving. But we need to get that picture and the definition of that from Scripture, not from our culture. Our culture says love is one thing. The Bible says love is something very different.

And the question will be, are we biblical or are we what our culture says as loving and accepting? So I don't know too many people who would say I am okay having truth with no love. But I do know a lot of people that say, I believe in love and that doctrine divides. There are people who believe love is such a supreme virtue that it's okay to deny truth for it. And we're going to see from John that's not okay.

Let's pray. Father, your word could not be clearer. This text and these Verses we're looking at today are crystal clear. They're crystal clear. They are so plain.

It's not theological. It's not. We don't have to go to school. This is so clear, what you say in your Word, Word. I almost want to ask why?

Why, Father, are we so slow to just do what your word says? I'm embarrassed. In my own life, I'm embarrassed. So much of what's called Christianity says that it is for love when it denies your truth. And you have a passage like this that makes it so very clear.

Would you help us not make that mistake? We want to be loving, but we want to be loving the way you say, too. So would you please help us from this letter and these few verses we look at today because we want to do it just right. Because it shows our love for you above everything. And we thank you for that.

In Jesus name, amen. Well, I'm going to. I'm making a jump here, but it's not an unreasonable jump, okay? And that is, if you look in your notes. I'm saying that John's rejoicing equals God's honor.

Now, I'm going to say this first because it's an interpretive thing before we move forward, so that what I'm saying has a little bit of foundation for you. John is speaking personally. We can all see that this is a personal letter either to a church or to an individual lady. It's like Philemon, right? When Paul writes to Philemon or when Paul writes to Timothy, he's writing to an individual.

But it has ecclesiastical import, right? Well, here what I want to drive at is that what John is saying personally, John the apostle is saying, I personally am experiencing this, but because his words are inspired scripture, because they are breathed by the Holy Spirit, because they're recorded for us, canonized, preserved over the centuries so that we can learn from them. I'm going to suggest to you, and it's not a stretch for me to say this, that what John is saying, indicatively, those of you who are in Sunday school know what I'm talking about, is also imperitival, meaning when Paul says, rejoice in the Lord always, that rejoicing is a commandment. I don't think that John is telling us we're the same as the apostle. But I'm going to suggest to you that when John says, I rejoice greatly in what he's about to say when he says it, I'm saying to you that that is the kind of thing that God approves Of, in other words, John's attitude toward love and toward the church and toward the things he's going to tell us here in a moment.

John's attitude for us is exemplary. We are supposed to be hearing from John and saying, I need to be like John. Now. We're also going to need to be like the lady and we're going to need to be like the children. That's true, too.

Those applications are there, too. But I want you to. I just want to make sure we're clear that when you hear John the apostle talking, he's not just some guy, he's an apostle. He's saying a truth from a personal perspective. But that truth is inspired scripture.

And by the fact that it's inspired scripture, it means God approves of what John is saying. That becomes really important because his approval means a lot. It isn't just a personal commendation to these people, actually an indicative of scripture that this is a thing to rejoice over. So I want it to have weight. That's what my hope is by saying all of that as we carry on.

I want that to. I want you to carry that with you when you leave here today. Like Pastor Montoya said when I heard him years ago at the Shepherd's Conference, I want to Velcro that to you and stick it to you. So that goes out the door with you. This idea that what John is saying, yes, it's personal.

Yes, this letter is small. Yes, it might be even to an individual. But. But that doesn't mean God doesn't care a whole lot about what John is saying for us to learn from. So with that, if you look at it, he says, I rejoice greatly that I have found some of your children walking in truth, as we received commandment from the Father, I rejoiced greatly.

The word for rejoiced here, it's actually Cairo. But that's not the city. It's not the city. It's not related to Egypt. The idea has to do with gladness.

The idea rejoicing, that what you do when you cheer that idea, that the idea of rejoicing, John is saying, I'm celebrating. I'm glad. I'm happy about this. What I'm hearing and what he's going to tell us he's hearing here, he's rejoicing. But then it says he's rejoicing greatly.

Now, this is an interesting word because one very often the word for big or something large or massive in the New Testament is the word mega, where you and I Get mega from, you know, it's a lot of words start with that, that prefix. Well, this is not mega. It's a different word. And the idea has to do with very, very exceeding. So John isn't saying I have big joy.

He's saying I am very, very, very joyful. I'm exceedingly joyful.

Now, before I move on, I'm going to ask you what makes you very, very, very joyful. Tricked you a little bit. And I didn't mean to trick you. I'm just now realizing that I tricked you. So I did not plan to trick you, but I tricked you on accident, which is I said that God approves of John's rejoicing.

And now I'm asking you, what do you rejoice over? So now you're stuck. I didn't mean to, but I put you in a pickle because now what if you answer something that God doesn't approve of? I rejoice when my team wins the super bowl, just came through the World cup, how many people were cheering for, I don't know, Argentina or Spain or whoever won, or your, your. I rejoice when I get a raise at work or I rejoice when my kids leave me alone or whatever it is.

The kinds of things you rejoice over. I'm saying that the thing that John is rejoicing exceedingly over and what he's about to tell us, he rejoices exceedingly about the thing, the thing that when he knows about it, when he hears about it, and he'll see how he hears in a moment or maybe that he heard when John is saying I am rejoicing greatly and here's what I'm rejoicing about. That blank. What do you put in that blank? Because I'm suggesting to you by putting this God's approval thing up front that we learn from John what to rejoice over.

And if we don't rejoice over the things that John rejoices over, the change that needs to happen is we need to learn to rejoice over the things that make God happy and bring God honor instead of finding our joy and our pleasure and our happiness and other things that are not God's. So let's look at what John rejoices over. He rejoices that I have found some of your children walking in truth. Again, either her individual children. Again, a hint, by the way, that I think that it's a church, not an individual is because it is unusual unless you're a Megana or a Vasquez to say some of your children.

That's an unusual phrase to say, some of your children. Most people don't have enough children to use the word some because, like, I have three kids. Nobody's going to say some of your kids went to the store. Three kids. Two of your kids is what you would say.

You wouldn't say some. It's just a hint. And by the way, the word some is not there. You'll notice it's probably italicized. Maybe it is.

I don't know.

I have. I'm rejoicing exceedingly that I have found some of your children walking in truth. I don't remember the commercial. You don't need to tell me now. But I have a vague recollection when I was a kid, back before I was saved and watched TV of the television commercial or a show or something, having the catchphrase eureka.

Does that sound familiar to you? I just remember. I don't remember what it was for. And I couldn't find it. The Internet failed me this time.

I couldn't find the source of that. But I always remember as a kid, somebody yelling, eureka. And then I remember being shocked to find out that it was this town in California. Like, okay, what does the town in California have to do with the commercial that's yelling Eureka? And now I find out.

I take all that seminary stuff in Greek class, and I find out it's a Greek word. It's not even an English word. When you say eureka, what do you mean? I found it. That's what it means here, too.

I found it.

I don't want to use the word revelation because that word has a technical meaning, but it's kind of like a revelation. Like, I found this. This has been revealed to me. I understand. I have found some of your children walking in truth.

Now, pessimistically, we could say, that's sad to read that, right? It's sad to find out that only some of your children walk in truth. Oh, man. One of the most heartbreaking things as a pastor over these decades is families who have children in their family that don't walk in the truth. Individuals is one of the most heartbreaking things.

It's one of the things that stifles the most Christian walks. When parents have children who don't obey the Lord. It is arresting. It can be crippling. It can, in fact, get people to the point where they themselves can abandon the faith.

So it could be pessimistic. You could. You could take it that way. You could say, yes, it's it's negative that some of them are not walking with the Lord. Or you could take it the way John is taking it.

I rejoiced greatly. That's how he starts this. How does he start it? With rejoicing. Yes.

I understand that people don't walk with the Lord. That is our normal state of affairs. But if God plucks out somebody you love or plucks out a believer out of that darkness and saves somebody, that is cause for rejoicing. Now, he does say. I said some is probably italicized in your.

In your Bibles, that word some. Is that not actually in the Greek? It's really hard to translate. If you translate it literally when he says I have found or eureka, it's something like, if I were to say it most literally, and it wouldn't make sense. It would be like, I found out of ones, I found out of children.

Because. Because that's the word. It's the word Ek. It's what I said last time on the sign exit. It's out of.

So the idea is out of some of your children, some of them are walking with the Lord. Right? That's the idea. So John has found. Now, how did he find.

That's an interesting question, too. How did he get word? How did we know? How did he find them? Was he out and about and saw these people out in the world and saw that they were walking with the Lord?

Probably it's one of two things. Either John had visited this group of people and he saw them walking with the Lord, but most likely he got a report back. And again, this is me saying this. You don't have to. It's okay not to agree with me on this.

I think this is a church, and I think the church is like it should, giving a report to the church, planter John, something like that, and saying, hey, there are people here that maybe you knew about at our church who are walking with the Lord and they're sending a report to John like we see when Paul gets the reports from the churches. That's what I think is happening. But however he found it, he found it. And I do want you to see the theme of our series on the theme of the book. What did he find that caused great rejoicing?

Children doing what? I rejoice greatly that I found many of your children getting good grades in college.

I rejoice greatly that your children are really involved in lots of extracurricular activity. Your kids are on the soccer team. I rejoice greatly that you have a good 401k at your job. I rejoice greatly that you are able to move into a better neighborhood. I rejoice greatly that you are comfortable.

I rejoice greatly. None of that is what he says. None of that is what John says. Do I think that John would rejoice over those things? Maybe.

But those aren't the ones that made scripture. The ones that made scripture are. I rejoice that I have found some of your children walking in truth. Do you remember in the first letter when John says, nobody. If they don't have the truth in them, they're none of his right.

You can't say you're God's person and not walk in the truth. There are people who lie. There are people who fake it. But no, I've found some of your children walking in truth. And it makes me, the apostle, do cartwheels.

I'm so excited about it because there's genuine truth, genuine conversion. People who say they follow the Lord and then live their following of the Lord. And then he amplifies it by saying what he says in the last part of verse four. As we received commandment from the Father. So the first thing is, I'm rejoicing that you are walking in the Lord.

And then I believe what John is saying. As God told you to. You're doing what God told you to do. Like we received the commandments of the Lord. You have received the commandments of the Lord and you are walking in truth.

So this is now me tying together commandments and truth. That you think of scripture, you think of truth. You think of inspired words of God. You think of him giving his clearly revealed will in the word of God. God the Father in this case, by the way, catch that.

That it's the commandments of the Father that's important to patriology, the doctrine of God as Father. God the Father has given us commandments. And in a moment he's going to say, they're not new, they're old commandments. We talked about that in the first letter. But for now, what I want you to see is John is saying, we received commandments.

And now I hear you're walking in them. Your children are walking in them. Your children are living the commandments. Your children took the word of God, internalized the word of God, and they're walking in it. And man, that brings me great exceeding joy.

The thing that makes me most happy is to find out people I care about are walking in the truth of God. Again, I'm asking you. You're American. It's right in our foundational documents that you're an American, you have life, liberty and the pursuit of what? What makes you happy?

Maybe I should ask you more clearly. Are you even happy? Are you miserable? Are you down in the mouth? And if you were John, what would make you happy?

My children walking in truth and you in the room. I know there's people in this room whose children are not walking in truth. And I'll tell you. But somebody's are. And you can rejoice in that with them.

You can celebrate that with them. You could be happy that God is giving them joy. That's hard to do. I know it is, but it might give you a little strength to continue praying for your children to continue talking to the lost. I just want you to notice what John is not rejoicing over good jobs, good income, security, success.

He's rejoicing over children walking in truth. And they received that commandment from the Father and carried that commandment forth in their life. What are you doing with the word of God? Are you walking with the word of God internally? Do you live the word of God?

Are you a truth oriented person? Does the GPS or the compass internally in your life, is it directed by the word of God? Is the data that's going through you right now that's making you choose what you choose and go the way you're directed is that. Are you being moved by the whims of society? Are you being moved by hedonism and pleasure?

Are you being moved by what the world tells you is important? Are you being moved by what you tell you is important? Or are you moved and internally motivated and informed by truth? I want my life and every action I commit to reflect the truth of God and the commandments that he's given me. I want.

When people see my life, they see commandments. Why am I faithful to my wife? Because there's a commandment that tells me to be. Why am I not stealing from my neighbor? Because there's a commandment that tells me why am I not using that language of God and using his name in vain?

Because there's commandments that tell me not to do that. And I love him and I would never do something that insults him. We receive these commandments. John says, I'm rejoicing that some of you are walking in him. Some of your children are walking in him.

This is beautiful. Hallelujah. Now he gets into some serious language. Verse 5. Look at the beginning.

And now I plead with you lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment. To you, but that which we have had from the beginning, that we love one another. I plead with you now, that word plead, That's a. Normally, I don't pick on the new King James translation because new King James usually translates pretty well. The thing here is that the word could just be ask.

It could. I mean the word itself. Like, if I say to my, I don't know, the person in my house, he's back there, I don't want to throw him under the bus. If I ask someone in my house, there's only one other man in there. If I ask, hey, I'm asking you to take out the garbage.

How much urgency is in that? But what if we're 10 asks in. I'm asking. You hear the tone of voice, the intensity of my. Now I'm just picking on Judah.

I'm just picking on him. He's going to say something like, have you seen your garage, dad? You know, he's thinking that even if he's too good of a guy to say it. But do you see that ask can have different levels of intensity so that the translation is not off base. If John is seeing some walk in truth, and now he's going to say in the next section, not today, but in the next section, that there are deceivers out there, then it's completely fathomable, acceptable to say, I'm pleading with you.

Because the word ask can mean plead in the right context. And that is what's happening here. And now I plead with you, lady. Lady's a great word here. This is not a word that gets used of ladies normally.

This is a very special use of a special word. One of the words that is used for Jesus most often and God the Father in the New Testament is kyrios. It's one of the most common words of God. And that is the word that is almost always translated, Lord. Kyrios is almost always translated Lord.

And here we have the feminine of Kyrios, Kyria. Not a lot of them. In fact, it might be only one. But I want you to catch it. Or in this context, I mean, I want you to catch it, that John is very respectful if this is a lady, an individual.

But he is very much revering this lady. I tend to think it's probably a church again, that that language is used on purpose to sort of revere the church. Maybe that's me. Me talking. But I do want you to know he addresses the lady, the individual, the curia, and he's pleading with her.

I rejoiced earlier but now I'm going to beg you for something. I get the report back that your children, many of them, are walking in the Lord. Some of them are walking in the Lord. Some of them have taken the commandments of God and they've absorbed the challenge. They responded to the gospel and faith, and now they're living in the Lord and they're living in the truth.

And then John turns the corner and says, I'm pleading with you now again, I'm going to do. I say again a lot. This is not again. I said it something like this morning. Sometimes when I say again, it refers to a year ago.

Sometimes it refers to Sunday school. Okay? So if I say again a lot, there's usually a reason. But I do want to tell you here. Paul does something just like John is doing here in Philemon in the New Testament.

Doesn't Paul. Does Paul have apostolic authority to say do or don't? He does. But you know that Paul sometimes will qualify. Not, not.

Not that this is a commandment. He might say, right. And Paul always navigates that carefully. And Paul appeals to love sometimes. Well, John is doing that too.

Do you notice that John does not say shape up or stay strong or continue or keep commandments. There's no imperative. He's asking, he's begging. He's appealing to their better inclinations. In the Lord.

I'm asking you. In the Lord, I'm asking you. Who say you love the Lord, who say you want to honor the Lord. I'm begging you, please don't make me tell you what to do. I want you to do it from love.

He's not saying that. I'm amplifying it. Not as though I write a new commandment to you, but that which we have heard from the beginning. The reason I am pleading with you and I don't have to give you a new commandment. I is this commandment has been there the whole time.

You already know the commandment. So I don't have to tell you what to do. You know what to do. We receive the commandments from the Lord. He tells us to walk on them.

And now what I'm really saying is do what he says. Please, please, please, pretty please with sugar on it. Do what he says. I'm pleading with you. I'm not writing a new commandment to you.

I'm repeating and reiterating the same old commandment that we love one another. It's all over the New and the Old Testament, to love your neighbor. All of the Old Testament laws, all of the theocratic rule of God over Israel, all of it has love of God and love of neighbor in it. All of it. Now, I know we think of like, okay, wait a second.

If my neighbor's oxen, Gore's one of my servants, like, how does that, how does that, what does that have to do with love? Because you're supposed to love your neighbor as yourself. And you don't let your ox gore your neighbor. You don't let your sheep eat your neighbor's flock, right? So although even the rules, the practical laws and rules of the Old Testament, all of them have love of God and love of neighbor built into them.

All of them. And the Ten Commandments are essentially an expression of love of God and love of neighbor, right? Doesn't Jesus himself summarize it? To love God and to love your neighbor as yourself. That is the whole law.

And I've done this a hundred times or thousand or however many, but I'm going to do it again. How does that, how does do the Ten Commandments display the love of God and the love of neighbor? Well, the first four, you love God and you don't make any others. You don't engrave any images. You keep God's day holy.

That shows that you love God. You don't blaspheme God's name. That shows that you love God. Now, how do you love your neighbor? Well, the first ones that you're born to, you honor those neighbors that you're born to your family, right?

You honor mom and dad because God is a parent and you're reflecting your love for him by loving the neighbor. And you don't steal from him, you don't kill and you don't covetous things. And that's how you love your neighbor, by keeping the second table of the law.

So John isn't coming off the cuff with some new commandment. He's saying, I'm rejoicing that your children walk in truth. I'm celebrating that. And that truth is the commandments that the Father has given us. And now I'm begging you, not like I'm giving you a new commandment, not a different commandment from the Father, but one you already know.

A commandment that you understand correctly. A commandment that any solid, even remotely discipled, mature Christian would understand. A basic, simple thing. And I have to tell you that the Bible is not. The Bible is a living word, but it is not like what the way we use the phrase a living document.

When we in our modern culture say that something is a living document or what does that mean? That means it can be adapted, it can be changed, it can be adjusted, Right? So when we in modern times say that's a living document, we're saying it has the, it's mutable, it can be changed. But when we say the Bible is living, that is not what we mean, that it can be changed. We're saying the Bible is alive and powerful.

Right? Well, I'm going to ask you, is the living document in the Bible terms is the living word of God, can it be added to or taken away from? So John isn't adding new commandments there from the beginning, Love God and love your neighbor. And now I hear from you, lady, that some of your children are walking in truth. Hallelujah.

Amen. And I know you received the commandments of the Lord and I'm going to beg you right now, this isn't a new one. This is one of the commandments you already received from the Father. I'm begging you with all that's in me as an apostle who knows that the safety and security of the body of Christ, the church, or individuals in the church, if this is to an individual, I'm about to beg you to do something that is already established eternally in the word of God. This function that comes out of an attribute of God himself that he's loving.

That is demonstrated in the love that Christ has for us when he sacrifices himself and goes to a cross for us. Now going to tell you to do what is only fitting for people who walk in truth and that is to love one another. I find that so compelling. We've said over and over again that love and truth are inseparable. You cannot divorce love and truth.

They're tied together, two sides of the same coin. There are a lot of doctrines like that, by the way, like the doctrine of reconciliation is two sided because there are people that are separated. So you have to take away what separates, then you have to bring together. That's two things, not one thing. But it is one thing.

It's called reconciliation. Conversion is like that. The word conversion is not one thing, it's two things. Conversion is faith and repentance or the other way around, repentance and faith. So you cannot have a conversion that doesn't have both of those elements in it.

Well, I'm suggesting to you that love and truth are kind of like that. I mean, there isn't one word like truv or whatever. You can't combine them into one thing. They are two things, but they're so connected that they're inseparable to where. Now, John just got through saying, I'm rejoicing.

Now, what if I were to say this more like a conservative theological Baptist like I am? It would be something like this, man, I'm so happy that your church is doctrinal. I'm so happy that you stand for the truths, the essential truths, the fundamental truths of the Christian faith. I'm so happy to hear. I rejoice so much that I find out that you're.

You're Baptist. Because we're Baptist or I would say Calvinistic or whatever. Right? I'm so thankful to find out that you have the right eschatology. That's what we would say when we think of walking in truth.

We would think of walking in the systematic truths of Scripture. Right? That's the way we would say that. And John is saying something like that. But the one thing John is not leaving out is the other side of the coin saying, if you walk in those truths, this is not a new commandment I'm giving to you.

It is the outworking of those commandments. For example, if you hold to the doctrine of election, which I do, on what basis does God choose people? Is it any good of their own? Then why would I only choose my friends if they're good? Maybe you never thought that you're not very good at election.

How much grace does God give? Does he hold any back? Is there any of our merit that's favor? Or any of us that would have merit? No.

So if God graciously, with 100% unmerited favor, shows us love and kindness, why do we conditionally show fellow believers kindness? You see, these doctrines are supposed to be in our lives. We're supposed to be living these things. So when John now turns this corner and says, you're walking in truth, just like the commands we've been given, and I'm not giving you a new one right now. When I tell you love one another, he's saying, that is what the commandments are.

That is Christianity. And if you think I'm stretching that, look at the very next three words in your Bible in verse six. What are the very next three words in the Bible in verse six? This is love. Now, I asked earlier, what do you think most people would say they rejoice over?

Now I'm going to ask you, what would most people say is love? This is love. That you accept everybody for who they are, no matter if they offend God or God hates them or not, if they're doing something abominable and they curse God. You have to just be okay with them. This is love to accept people for who they are as they blaspheme God.

This is love that you let people steal from you, maybe even whole governments steal from you. This is love that you just stay quiet and serve the common good. This is love to let your children walk all over you and never show discipline or any sort of restraint or any sort of commandments in your home. This is love that you. You don't dare give your children any reason to think that they're not the center of the universe.

This is love that you provide for your family. These are the kinds of things. So I'm asking you, this is love that you're infatuated with someone, that they're the cutest little thing and they bought me flowers. Well, he is going to tell us what is love? But the first thing I want you to know is that God defines what love is, not you.

And the second thing I want to tell you is since you're Christians and you're listening to the word of God and this guy say it, that if God changes your definition this morning, from what you thought love was to what he knows love is, all I'm going to say to that is hallelujah, get rid of this dumb world's definitions of love. They're all broken. How many love songs do you need to hear from divorced people to stop listening to love songs? How many? Ain't no mountain high enough to keep me away from you.

Right. Ain't no mountain high enough. Divorced. Apparently there was a mountain high enough that kept him away from her. And on and on and on.

Are we going to keep believing what the world says about love, or are we going to hear John say, this is love and whatever comes next? John, I'm in. I'm in. Whatever you say next after that comma, I'm buying it. I'm owning it.

And if my definition of love, if my. Say, if Johnny says, this is love and whatever comes after this is love, doesn't fit what God says, his love, I'm going to change mine to his. This is love. And then the amazing thing that comes next is that we walk according to his commandments. Do you want to know why that's amazing?

Because there is a line. I've been saying it over and over in this series already. I'm only two messages in, and I'm going to keep saying it. There's a line that people. A wedge that people draw jam between commandment keeping and love, as though they're very separate though to say to love God, I cannot say I love him.

And I also keep his commandments. I have to just love him and let him love me. And commandments. If I keep commandments, I'm legalistic, I'm earning my way to heaven. If I keep commandments, that's works righteousness.

If I keep commandments, we still, after all these years don't understand it that you don't keep commandments and have that produce love. That's not how that works. God gives you the love, he indwells you with his spirit. He gives you his word. You now have a new root that makes the fruit of commandment keeping come out.

You're now a new thing. He makes you a new creature. And you are a commandment keeping creature, whether you like it or not. And if you're not a commandment keeping creature, you might still be an old creature, not a new creation. Because a new creation does new things.

A creation who God gives His holy Spirit to does holy things. And holy things are found in the commandments. And you can't say you love somebody and not keep commandments on their behalf. You want to know how much God loves you? Right now, you who can hear me is he makes me love you.

Me, right now I'm talking. I mean in this moment, right now that you're hearing me talk. I am required by God to love you. That's how much God loves you, that he expects all the other people naming the name of Christ to love you. Now do you understand though that that's how much he loves me too and that you have to love me too.

And the way we love each other is by not stealing, by not blaspheming, by not coveting, by not lying. The way we love each other is by doing God's commandments. The best thing I can do for you, the best thing I can do for you to show you that I love you, the best thing I can do for you is be like Jesus. And Jesus kept his Father's commandments. This is all over the New Testament.

Jesus says it himself. If you love me, keep my commandments. Jesus will go on to say In John chapter 15, if you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love. Hey, Jesus, that sounds conditional. It is not conditional to get his love, but it is certainly conditional to prove that you've been loved by Him.

There are conditions that prove you are loved by God. Faith without works is what. Yeah, so works must be present. But he does say if you love me, if you Keep my commandments. You will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.

How do we know that Jesus loved his Father? He tells us he did what he said. Now here's the real thing. What would that say? When I read this, this is the first time this ever hit me.

Every once in a while, these things happen. I had two of those happen this morning in my review. They rarely happen. They'll happen, like, once a week or once a month. But, man, I had two bing bongs this morning.

I could tell you all what a bing bong is in my family. Years ago, Jamie and I were tasting pomegranate juice, and it was so bitter and sour that one of us, I don't remember who now it's been decades ago, said bing bong. Like, it was. Like. It was so.

So shocking to the system that bing bong was the word that came out. So now if we eat something that's sour in our family, we say it like it's an adjective. Man, that's bing bong. We don't even, like, say it with the expression, oh, that's bing bong. Okay, so now you have inside the Sloan.

You're in the house. You're paying attention to pj. I had two spiritual scriptural bing bongs today. One of them I'll discuss in the afternoon service. I'm not gonna.

It's. It's not the lesson. It just hit me internally that, man, I need to think about this. And it hit me, arrested me as I was thinking through the thoughts, as I reviewed, I just. I was under arrest.

Like, oh, I need to think about this. I need to internalize this. I need to care about that, right? So it got me. Well, here is another one.

It happened when I was reading John 15:10, that when Jesus says, I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love, it never, ever once hit me until this morning or today to connect that to the people who call commandment keeping legalistic.

So if you don't know, that phrase is called antinomianism. That's a big fancy word that just means people who think that you're not supposed to employ the law in Christian teaching. You're not supposed to appeal to the law. You're not supposed to think about the law. The law condemns, but grace saves.

So that whenever you talk about the law, there's a whole group of people that think that anytime you talk about law, you are anti grace. Like, the two are Opposed to each other that you had. It's one or the other. And what they're. The mistake they're making is that they're saying that we believe you can be saved by the law.

No one has ever said that. That is not biblical. You are saved by grace. Everybody knows that. We put it on the sign and people still think we think it.

So what I'm driving at here is those who think that you have to divorce and draw a line between loving God or loving each other and commandment keeping don't realize, in my opinion, what they say when Jesus says he kept his Father's commandments. I remember telling my friend one time, this was painful to me. I was in a low spot at the time, saying, I just want to please the Lord. And my friend was trying to help me, okay? So I don't want you to be mad at him for what he said, but he was trying to help me.

And he said, johnny, you need to stop saying that. You need to stop saying you want to please the Lord. He's already pleased with you. Now, doesn't that sound warm and fuzzy and loving? Doesn't that sound nice?

Well, I read something in scripture that says, we make it our aim to be well, pleasing to him. So should I listen to my friend or Paul? Who. Which of those two is more authoritative in my life? A lot of people, it's their friend or the favorite preacher that ignores Paul.

We walk according to his commandments. Jesus walked according to his commandments. Jesus did not have to earn his Father's love, did he? He had eternal love with the Father. So his commandment keeping wasn't to get right with God.

He was already right with God. And the evidence that he was right with his Father was his obedience, His Father's commandments. And the evidence that you are right with your father is you walk according to his commandments. This is love. That you walk according to his commandments.

It doesn't say, this is obedience. This is the evidence of your love. How do you know if you're sick? You go to the doctor. Doesn't mean they'll always tell you, right?

How do you know if your car is broken? You ever put one of those little diagnostic things on your car, the little OBD2 thing, and it tells you what the code is? And you look up that code and that code says, oxygen sensor. I could change that. How do you know, though?

Car's acting funny. I don't know. Just change everything, I guess. You diagnose an issue. That's how you know Whether it's working correctly or not.

How do you diagnose the human heart? How do you know whether you're doing God's things or not? The diagnostic tool is the word of God. It's the commandments. That's how you know.

It's how you know what God wants from you. It's how you know what love looks like. I've already said it. But love looks like commandment keeping because it is. By this, John says in his first letter, we know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep his commandments.

It's so simple. So if you're confused this morning and you think that commandment keeping makes you right with God, I have a challenge for you. Especially you parents or grandparents. Here's a challenge for you. Try to explain to your children today the difference between grace and law, and try not to compromise either.

And if you are able to explain that to a child, the idea that we are sinful and completely depraved and incapable of doing anything for ourselves. So in order for us to be right with God, I'm telling you right now, I could ask 10 children, maybe even in this room, if I ask 10 children, how can someone be right with God when they're sinful? They will say obedience. They will. They're not going to understand the full grace of God in the Gospel.

That's your job as a parent, to teach them the gospel. So if you can express that, let me show you. We cannot make God happy. We're broken. Even dad, even Mom.

But God gives us grace and he forgives us. When we break God's commandments, He forgives us. We're not obedient. We're disobedient. And he forgives us anyway.

But guess what? Now, son or daughter, now we love his commandments because we're his children. We're in his family now. He took us into his house. He made us his children, his special people.

And we want to make him happy. How do we make him happy? The One who loved us, the One who already saved us, the one who right now is preparing a place for us in glory. How can we make him happy by keeping his commandments? Get that in the right order.

Teach that to your children. Teach it to your neighbors. Teach it to people who think that being right with God is trying to obey and outweigh the bad with the good.

This is the commandment, verse 6. We walk according to it. This is the commandment that, as you have heard from the beginning, you should walk in it. So simple. This is.

These are hard passages to preach. I don't mean they're hard. I mean it's not difficult. These are easy passages to exegete. Usually, not always.

But what I mean is to do the work of translating and breaking it down grammatically and getting it ready to preach. That part of it's not the hard part. The hard part of it is when a text of scripture is so very basic and you see so much ignoring or dismissing of it. Like the hard part of it is to bring that into the pulpit and try to say it in a way where I'm compelling and I'm trying to impress on you, man. God tells us just to obey his commandments and that means to love each other.

That's what he's telling us. That's what we're supposed to do. We're not supposed to be griping about each other behind our backs. We're not supposed to be seeing the worst in people. We're not supposed to be fault finders.

We're not supposed to be critical. We're supposed to be peacemakers. We're supposed to be promoting restoration. We're supposed to be lifting people, edifying people, strengthening people, loving them, bringing God's word to bear in their lives in a meaningful way so that they can go from darkness to light. Love people and you love them by bringing God's word into their life.

And you yourself, living God's word in your life, that's the best thing you can do for them is you live God's word. You prioritize, you rejoice that you're walking in truth. You rejoice in truth walks. And you say, I walk in truth. My wife walks in truth.

My kids walk in truth. My church walks in truth. Hang around me and I'll help you walk in truth. How do you walk in truth? What's the truth?

It's the commandments. It's the Commandments. It's living the commandments. This is the commandment. He says that as you have heard from the beginning, you should walk in it.

We are predestined to be conformed to the image of Christ. There is no conforming to the image of Christ. That isn't truth and love based. Christ is truth based. He came to the world to save sinners in his love.

So I say, watch out. If you have it in you that you can be only truth based and no love based, or only love based and no truth based, and I have it strong. Please take these words to you when John is writing to this lady or this church. And he's saying, I'm happy to hear that people are walking. In truth, I'm happy.

But I'm pleading with you, begging you. You are supposed to be keeping God's commandments, sacrificially putting your will, your desires aside for the Lord's. The Father's commandments are the Father's will. So that when you say thy will be done, the first place you look for thy will is the word of God. And once you know thy will, you can live thy will to thy people.

I can love you and I can love them.

The truth walk is God centered before it is man centered. He doesn't say, I rejoice greatly that you walk in truth and live your own quiet little private life and never ever do anything toward my people. He doesn't say that our Christianity in modern times is very vertical. It's very vertical. It's very me and the Lord and the Internet.

And I don't need to join with other believers or find my place in their life or encourage them. And John is saying, no, you get. You lock up with my people and you love what I love. I love the commandments. Jesus says it, he abides in his Father's love and he kept his commandments.

We abide in the Father's love and keep his commandments. And we love him and we love each other. And we should be scared if we don't. And by scared, I don't mean God's going to strike you with lightning. I just mean it should bother us if we're not 100% sure that we're walking in sacrificial commandment, keeping charitable love toward the brethren, toward the Lord.

Let's pray. Father, you deserve attention in these verses. It's very clear what you want from us. And now I would just ask that we would live it that as we leave here now, we'll return later, but as we leave here now, we would be committed to loving the way you love, that we would rejoice in what John rejoices in in the walk of truth. Help us, please.

We need the help, especially with each other, especially with those around us. Help us be loving the way you tell us to. In Jesus name, Amen. Would you stand, please?