1st John – Part 6 Lawson and Aaron Perdue

  Praise the Lord, friends, and welcome to the broadcast. I’m so glad that you have tuned in. We’re sharing today from 1 John. Do you know the Bible says that you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you know all things. You have everything that you need today to overcome every lie that the devil is trying to throw in your path. So stay tuned and get ahold of these truths. Blessings. Friends, it’s so good to have you with us today. We’re sharing from 1 John. This is John the beloved, John the disciple. He lovingly calls himself the disciple who Jesus loved, and he has a revelation of the love of God. This epistle is actually written about 90 AD, so it’s written over 50 years after John started walking with the Lord Jesus. So another title we could call it is “Lessons We Learn as We Walk With God.” And he begins in 1 John chapter 1, and he’s talking about Jesus, Him, who was from the beginning, who we heard, which we’ve seen Him with our eyes, we’ve looked upon Him, and our hands have handled of the word of life. In other words, he says, we came into a relationship with the eternal Word of God. And he says His life was manifested. We saw it bear witness, and we demonstrate to you that eternal life. When you have a relationship with Jesus, who is the life of God, then that life changes your life, and you can demonstrate that life to others.

 

  Yeah, I love that He calls Jesus the Word of life. You know, a lot of people say they love Jesus, but they don’t really value the word of God. You know, if you love Jesus, you’re gonna love the Word of God. You’re gonna love the entirety of scripture from Genesis to Revelation. It’s gonna be very important to you.

 

  Amen.

 

  You know, I’ve just been thinking about how much deception there is in the world today, and how easily people are deceived and really the enemy, satan has been deceiving people since the very beginning and trying to distort truth. But if you’re gonna walk with Jesus, be in relationship with Jesus, you’re gonna have a strong relationship with the Word of God as well.

 

  Amen.

 

  And that’s really how you’re founded upon truth.

 

  Amen.

 

  And how you’re not gonna be easily deceived by this antichrist spirit is because you believe the Word of God.

 

  Right.

 

  You stand upon it. You really have a relationship with the Word of God.

 

  Right, and John really writes this to protect believers against the spirit of antichrist. He says in chapter two that “They have an anointing from the Holy One, and they know all things,” and he’s talking about overcoming the spirit of antichrist with the spirit of truth, with the spirit of love, you know, that we have from the Holy Spirit with what we have from God. And so, he had this relationship with Jesus, but he also went on to have a relationship with the Holy Spirit that changed his life. And I love what you said, Aaron, when you talked about how when you have a relationship with Jesus, you’re gonna love the Word. You know, years ago, I read a very notable author, and he said, “Your relationship with the Word and your love for the Word is directly connected to your love for Jesus. And if you really love Jesus, you’re gonna love the Word of God.” So there’s really a problem saying, you know, that I love Jesus, but I don’t love the Word. Now, you know Jesus through the Word, praise God? And He is the living Word. And so, he goes on 1 John 1:3, and says, “Him, who we’ve seen and heard, we declare to you that you may have fellowship with us.” You know, this is the true heart of a believer. We have fellowship with the Lord Jesus, but we also have fellowship with one another. And he says, “Truly our fellowship, our relationship, our foundation, our partnership, our sharing is with the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, and these things we write to you that your joy may be full.” There’s only one place to find fullness of joy. And that is through our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. He goes on and talks about, you know, that He is the light. And when we come into a relationship with Jesus, we walk in the light as He is in the light, and we have fellowship with one another. Again, if you have fellowship with Jesus, right, and you’re gonna walk in the light as He is the light. If you’re saying that you have fellowship with Jesus and you’re not walking in the light, you’re deceiving yourself, and the truth is not in you.

 

  I think it’s really important for every believer to just be really founded upon the truth, just standing upon the truth. I was actually up half the night just thinking about this kind of preparing a message. I’ll be ministering to the youth soon, and I’ll be doing a whole series on truth.

 

  Right.

 

  And its importance of knowing what the truth is and not falling for deception. And what one thing the enemy does is he’ll break off a piece of truth.

 

  Right.

 

  You know, recently, our President of the United States, President Joe Biden, declared March 31st to be Transgender Visibility Day. And it actually happened to be Easter. And he posted something, he actually posted a piece of a truth. He said, “You know, we need to love these people. They’re created in the image of God,” which is true. But it’s deceptive because he took a piece of something not in its entirety, in its entirety that scripture says, you know, “God created mankind in His image.”

 

  “And He made them male and female,”

 

  Them male and female. So just taking a piece of truth is actually deceptive. And so, you have to understand to love the entirety of the Word of God. Another, there’s three ways I think that every person, it will just be stand firm in the truth and not be shaken, not be deceived. It’s to really believe the entirety of the Word of God, first and foremost. Secondly, is to be in fellowship with other believers.

 

  Amen.

 

  If you really love the Word of God, if you really love Jesus, there’s gonna be a desire inside of you to connect with other believers to have fellowship.

 

  Right.

 

  You’re not created to just be on your own.

 

  Right.

 

  And one of the first things that God did for mankind, for Adam was he gave him Eve. He knew that mankind needed fellowship.

 

  Right.

 

  Believers still need fellowship today. And thirdly, you have to have a personal relationship with Jesus.

 

  Right.

 

  You know, in the world, especially with all this social media stuff, there’s something called being catfished. It means like someone isn’t presenting themselves as who they really are. They have a false picture posted. They’re trying to get you to go on a date with them, and they’re lying. They have a false picture.

 

  Right.

 

  Maybe they doctored up the picture and when you meet them, that’s not the person you thought you were gonna meet. It’s called being catfished. And you have to know Jesus for yourself.

 

  That’s right.

 

  You know, religion will catfish who God is. They’ll portray God as angry, God as religious. God is controlling everything and doing all these mean things. That’s not who God is.

 

  Right.

 

  If you really know who God is, like John the beloved did, you’re not gonna be catfished for these lies.

 

  Right. And you know, Jesus talked about this in John 17. He was talking, praying, first of all for Himself, then for the disciples who believed on Him. And then He prayed for those of us who would believe on Him through their word. So Jesus was praying for us. And He says, I think it’s in verse 15, He says, “Father, I’m not praying that you take them out of the world, but I’m praying that you keep them from the evil.” So how does God keep us as believers from the evil that’s in this world? Then He says this in John 17:17, “Sanctify them, set them apart through thy truth. Thy Word is truth.” And what we have to realize is the center of truth is the word of God. The center of truth is Jesus Christ, and we are not the center of truth. We do not determine what truth is. God determines what truth is. And when we stray from the Word of God, when we stray from the Judeo-Christian ethic, we are straying from the truth. And we need to stick to the truth that’s in Christ, stick to the truth that’s in the Word of God. And let the Word of God set us apart from the world.

 

  And what the enemy does to deceive people away from the truth. And I think the same thing was going on in John the beloved’s day, that there’s three ways he does it. He breaks off, I call it breaking the truth. He’ll take a piece of scripture and use it to try to distort something. Satan did that with Jesus when he was trying to tempt Jesus. He used scripture. He would break scripture outta context and try to get Jesus to do what he wanted him to do. But Jesus knew the entirety of scripture.

 

  Right.

 

  He is the Word made flesh, and He corrected it with scripture.

 

  Jesus overcame the devil every time by the Word of God and speaking the Word of God and by the spirit of God. It’s immediately after Jesus was baptized by John in the river Jordan that he was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil for 40 days, 40 nights. He overcame him every time. But satan came and tempted him the same way, really, that he tempted Adam and Eve in the garden. You know, the devil doesn’t have any new tricks? It’s the same bag of lies done over.

 

  So breaking the truth, a half truth isn’t the truth. It’s actually a lie.

 

  That’s right.

 

  It’s actually deceptive.

 

  Also, there’s something else called blending where you take lots of things. That’s like what universalism is like everything is true. Everything. There is no absolute truth. Every, it’s called blending. That’s a form of deception. And another one is called bending, bending the truth slightly. It’s called compromise.

 

  Right,

 

  That was an issue during John’s day.

 

  Right.

 

  You know, and Jesus addressed it in His, you know, in Revelation, His messages to the churches. There was a doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which was a doctrine of compromise. Hey, the church needs to just be like the world to get along with the world.

 

  Right.

 

  If they have pagan worship, we should just go in and do it.

 

  Right.

 

  And we could still worship Jesus, but let’s just still worship, you know, these worship in these pagan temples as well.

 

  And it’s like in Hinduism, right? And they worship multiple gods, over 300 million different gods they worship. And they’ll accept Jesus if you don’t watch it as one of the gods and not as the One true God. But you know, He is the one true God. And we believe in one true God expressed in three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Along with that, we believe in the deity of Jesus Christ. And we believe that the scriptures are inspired. So they’re given to us by God and the scripture gives us direction, the scripture gives us revelation for who and what we believe. Now, John has this revelation, which Jesus says the truth and talks about walking in the light. And then He says, “If we say that we have no sin,” the problem with a lot of these people that are twisting or bending the truth as you’re saying, or doing these other things with it, they’re not admitting their sin. They’re not admitting their fault. So sin by scriptural definition, is a transgression of the law. First of all, sin secondly is missing the mark because it says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourself, and the truth is not in us.” But if we can confess our sins, if we confess our faults, if we confess our shortcomings, then He says, “He is faithful and just to forgive us for our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” If we say that we’ve not sinned, the problem with making yourself the center of truth and not Jesus and the Word of God the center of truth, is your saying that you have no sin. And he says, “If we say,” in 1 John 1:10, “that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.” So thank God we go to the Word of God. The Word of God is the center of the truth. Jesus Christ is the center of truth. And then we get from the Word of God and from the Lord Jesus truth. And we live that out in this world. And that’s what we’re here to do today, is live the gospel out in this world. Live the truth of the Word of God out in this world, and demonstrate to the world the life, the light, the love of Jesus Christ, praise God. And as we do that, we can make a difference in this world. We’re gonna have a short break, and we’re gonna come back, and we’re gonna be sharing more, so stay tuned. Friends, we’ve been sharing from my Bible school class, 1 John, our relationship with God. And these truths have revolutionized my life. We are making the teachings of this available live from church, and you can receive them downloadable free in audio form and my syllabus, free, online. Blessings.

 

  You can have nothing better than the Word of God. Your ways are not better than His ways. Your thoughts are not better than His thoughts. Your morals are not better than His morals. Your righteousness is not better than His righteousness. I don’t care how many people vote a certain way or think a certain way about a certain issue, if God says it, that settles it. You don’t get a vote on truth.

 

  Friends, I’m glad you stayed with us. We’re right here in 1 John 2:1. And John writes and says, “Little children, these things I write to you that you sin not, but if you do sin, you have a propitiation, you have a covering, you have an atonement, Jesus Christ, the righteous One.” And he says, “He is the propitiation for our sins, not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” The problem, Aaron, as we were talking about in the first half of the broadcast, is when people are deceived, they don’t wanna admit that they’ve sinned. When you think you’re the center of truth, instead of the fact that the Word of God and Jesus Christ are the center of truth, you’re gonna get yourself in a very bad place.

 

  Yeah, and John really had that revelation, too, that came from the Holy Spirit about not being deceived. And Paul also had the similar revelation. He was also warning churches as well in Colossians 2:8, Paul writes, “To the churches beware lest anyone cheat you” –

 

  Yeah.

 

  “through philosophy and empty deceit according to the tradition of men.”

 

  Right.

 

  So in men’s traditions, it’s men saying what we think is right, rather than what God thinks is right.

 

  Right.

 

  “The tradition of men according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.” But get this, verse nine, “For in Him in Jesus dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” You really discover truth when you realize that Jesus is Lord. “In Him, dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” in verse 10. “And you are complete in Him who is the head of all principality and power.” You are complete in Jesus. One way the enemy deceives people and cheats people is to make them feel that they’re lacking, that God’s holding out on them.

 

  That is.

 

  And that’s how a lot of, that’s actually a marketing technique is to make people feel like, if you don’t get this product, you’re not gonna be happy.

 

  Right.

 

  And that’s how the devil deceives people. If you don’t get, you know, if you don’t get this woman, if you don’t get this, like that’s how he tempts people of sin. If you don’t get this, then you won’t really be happy. And people will throw away a beautiful life that God gave them, beautiful position as a pastor, made a beautiful relationship, beautiful marriage, and just get them to think they need something that’s just disgusting.

 

  Right, mom and I actually went, and it was years ago, and we didn’t personally have a lot of finances, but we were going to the west slope to visit her grandma. And they had this deal, you could stay up by Vail, Colorado in a room if you would listen to a sales pitch. So on the, what we did is to take that trip. We spent a night in Vail, Colorado on the way back. It was a real good stop in place for us. And then we went in to listen to this sales pitch in the morning for about an hour. And this lady’s like, “Well, what would it take to make you happy?” And I’m like, “Well, I am happy.”

 

  Mm.

 

  And I told mom, “This is the first time I’d ever heard one of these deals.” I said, “You know what? All they’re doing is selling blue sky. And if you buy this, your fees are gonna more than pay for this place and everything that you pay.” And it was like $25,000 that’s just gonna go to this person as commission. You’re buying nothing. Well, we didn’t have $25,000 to waste, and thank God we didn’t get scammed, but like you say, that’s a scam. And that’s what the devil tries to do, tries to do it with believers. You know, we talked about this a little bit last week, but John said, “I write to you not because you don’t know the truth, but I’m writing to you because you do know it, and you know that no lie is of the truth.” And a lot of people bite off this deal, and they’re always looking for more, not really realizing really what they have in Jesus.

 

  Well, that’s actually the original lie. It goes back to the Garden of Eden when the serpent spoke to Eve and said, “You know, well, God doesn’t want you to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil because He doesn’t want you to be like Him.”

 

  Right.

 

  It was actually a lie because God created mankind, created Adam and Eve in His own image.

 

  Right.

 

  He created them and just with completion,

 

  Right.

 

  So as believers, you need to realize that you’re complete in Christ Jesus. That’s how you’re not gonna be cheated –

 

  Right.

 

  out of what you already have.

 

  Yeah, it says right here in 1 John 2:4, “He that says, I know Him, and keeps not His word is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps his word in Him verily is the love of God perfected and hereby, we know that we are in Him.” Praise God. The word of God is the foundation for truth. Knowing God and knowing God through Christ is the foundation for truth. He goes on and says, if we say that, we, you know, abide in Him, we ought to walk as He walked. And so, you know, we get the truth from Jesus. And we’re walking in love. We’re walking in the light, we’re walking in the Word. He goes on down. And you were talking about how this same thing that happened to Adam and Eve in the garden, right? “The lust of the flesh? The lust of the eye, and the pride of life.” Did you know satan uses those same temptations today? Jesus overcame those same temptations. Matthew chapter four, Luke chapter four, spoke the truth, took the truth in context that you were talking about in the first part of the broadcast, spoke the word to overcome how satan twisted the Word of God. Satan’s still trying to twist the Word of God. And then John says, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” This is 1 John 2:15-17, “For everything in the world is the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life. It’s not of the Father, but of the world. And the world does not pass away, but, and the lust there are, but he that does the will of God abides forever.” Praise God. So you know what? The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, the pride of life, that’s the same temptation that satan used in the Garden on Adam and Eve. Same temptation that he used against Jesus. Now, Jesus overcame him as a man anointed by the Holy Spirit, but He overcame him by speaking the word of God, because the word of God is the truth. Now, a lot of times in the church, we talk about the lust of the flesh, the lust of the, the pride of life. But we don’t talk about what we have. And here’s what John says. And if you understand what you have, then this is an antidote against what the enemy is trying to use against you. And he says five things that we have in verse 12 through verse 14. He says, “I’m writing to you because your sins are forgiven. I’m writing to you because you have a relationship with God. You’ve known Him who’s from the beginning. I’m writing you because you’ve overcome the wicked one.” You see, the goal of Christianity is not to overcome sin and overcome Satan. We couldn’t do that in our own power. We still can’t do it in our own power. The goal of Christianity is a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. And Jesus came and overcame sin and overcame Satan for us. And when we believe on Jesus, we are made overcomers through our relationship with God. And that’s what John is talking about. So “you are forgiven, you have a relationship with God. You have overcome the wicked one.” He says, “because you are strong,” in verse 14, “and because the word of God abides in you.” And when you understand who you are and what you have, then the world, the flesh, and the devil are no problem. The problem many times in the church is we’re teaching people, you know, about, hey, stay outta lust of the flesh. Stay outta the pride of life. Stay outta the lust of eyes, but we’re not teaching ’em. “You are forgiven. You have a relationship with God that you are strong. You have the word of God, and you have overcome the wicked one.” When we teach ’em what they have, then it’s an antidote against what the devil wants to bring.

 

  Because the devil tries to deceive people into thinking that they don’t have it. You don’t have health.

 

  Right.

 

  You don’t have prosperity, you don’t have righteousness. You don’t have peace. You don’t have access to God. You don’t. But that’s a complete lie. That’s a complete lie. And you have to look at what you have in Christ Jesus. When you know what you already have, that you’re already complete in Him, you’re not gonna be cheated-

 

  Right.

 

  from traditions of men and just all this vanity that’s in the world.

 

  You know, Paul talks about this in Colossians 1:27. You were just in Colossians, chapter two. It was powerful. But in chapter 1:27, he says, “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” He says, before that, “I’m preaching,” you know, “the mystery that was hidden from ages and generations.” Again, if you know what you have, it’s a antidote against the spirit of antichrist. It’s an antidote against these things, talking about what you don’t have. In many times, the church is talking about stay outta sin, but they’re not talking about what we have. He goes in the last part of 1 John 2, and says, “We have an anointing from the Holy One. And we know all things,” 1 John 2:20. We have an anointing of truth. We have an anointing of life. And because we have this anointing, when you realize what you have, that is an antidote against the devil and his lies. And so many people are looking at what they don’t have instead of what they do.

 

  Well, I love John because he knew Jesus before the cross, but he knew Jesus after the cross.

 

  Praise God.

 

  And a lot of Christians just look at what happened before the cross and at the cross, but they’re not really living from what happened after the cross. And he’s really writing this epistle from a focus on what happened after the cross.

 

  After the cross. So Jesus, yeah, He was delivered for our transgressions, but He was raised up-

 

  For our justification.

 

  for our just, so that means you are the righteousness of God.

 

  Amen.

 

  No believer  should ever say that they’re a sinner.

 

  Right.

 

  Because you’re a saint now. He was raised up that resurrection power. That happened, so that we could be made righteous. And now, Jesus is our advocate. He’s our intercessor. He’s the one that that stands in the gap.

 

  Amen.

 

  And says, you have access to the Father because I’m here, and I’ve made that connection for you.

 

  Yeah. Without Christ, I was a sinner, right? But now, I am a saint. I was lost. I was on my way to hell. But now, I’m on my, I’m a citizen of heaven on loan to the Earth from God. I’m righteous, sanctified, justified. I’m a new creation in Christ. Paul, and John talks about this in 1 John 4:4. He says, “Greater is He that’s in you than he that’s in the world.” He’s talking about there’s a spirit of antichrist, but the One in you is greater, and you have already overcome him through your relationship with God.

 

  And that’s really the great mystery of the gospel that Paul writes about a lot, is that we have Christ in us.

 

  Yes.

 

  That’s the hope of glory.

 

  Amen. That’s the hope of the manifested presence and power of God. And so, he’s talking about in verse 24, he says this in 1 John 2, “Let that therefore abide in you, which you have heard from the beginning. If that which you have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, you will continue in the Father and in the Son.” Praise God, see, so many people don’t realize what they have. They have an anointing of truth. They have an anointing of light. They have an anointing of life. They have an anointing of love. John talks about these things. And when you understand what you have in Christ, it’s a antidote against the spirit of antichrist. It’s a antidote against the world, the flesh, and the devil. It’s a antidote against the temptations that the devil tries to put in your tracks and stop you from receiving what God has for you.

 

  And I have a word for you watching right now. You are anointed. You are not without God’s power. You’re not without God’s presence. You are anointed by Jesus Christ Himself. He’s the anointed one. Because He was anointed, He can then anoint us. He can give us His presence and His power.

 

  Amen. So I wanna say a great big thank you to those of you who have been watching us. If you need prayer, I want to invite you to call in today. You know the things that we’re talking about are true if you’re born again, if you’re a believer. And I’m gonna be coming back at the end of the broadcast to pray for you. And if you haven’t received Christ or aren’t you know, confident in your relationship with God, stay tuned and and pray that prayer with me. Also, you can pray. I have trained prayer ministers that are here to minister to you, and we have free products available online. So if you need prayer, give us a call. We’d love to hear from you. Thank you and blessings.

 

  When you know Jesus and experience His incredible love for you, you will know who you truly are. You’ll understand the anointing that’s in you, and you’ll realize that you’re part of God’s great family. You can come home to Him today through the person of Jesus. We’d like to bless you with a digital copy of “1 John, A Relationship With God,” a $21 value, free of charge. Download your copy today at the CharisChristianCenter.com.

 

  Hey, everybody. I wanna welcome you to our Charis Camp Meeting where we’re gonna have great teaching for adults. We’re gonna have special youth meetings, special children’s ministry, and special worship. It is gonna be a great time celebrating Jesus and the truth of God’s Word. If you can’t come personally, we would love to have you join us online. Thanks so much and blessings. Friend, we don’t want to leave this broadcast today without giving you the opportunity to pray and surrender your life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Pray with me right now. Heavenly Father, I believe that Jesus Christ is your Son. I believe that Jesus died for my sins. I believe that you raised Him from the dead on the third day and made Him Lord, and I surrender my life to you in Jesus’ name.

 

  Thanks for watching “Grace For Today.” This broadcast has been made possible by our faithful partners. If you would like to become a partner, need prayer, or have a question, please call us at 719-418-4000, or to partner online, go to CharisChristianCenter.com/Give. You can write us at P.O. Box 63733, Colorado Springs, Colorado, 80962. See you next time on “Grace For Today.”