1st John 2:18-27
You have an anointing
Now
he follows with words of encouragement, verse 20, doesn’t
want us to be discouraged as we hear this. He
says, “But you have an anointing from the
Holy One, and you know all things. I
have not written to you because you do not know the truth,
but because you know it, and that no lie is of the truth” (verses
20-21). He
says, ‘Yup, there’s a danger, yes, this is going
on. These guys are in the Church, and they’re
leaving the Church, and of course that creates a real challenge,
and you can be sure there’s even some hanging out in
the Church right now, but I don’t want you to become
despondent and thinking that you’re just sitting ducks.’ So he speaks now of our discernment as
believers, as born-again believers in Jesus Christ. And as he says here in verse 20, this
discernment, we have a discernment that’s supernatural. I have discernment that has been given
to me of the Holy Spirit. He
refers to it as an anointing there in verse 20, or as the
King James says, an unction. What exactly
is the anointing? The anointing that you and I have
is the Holy Spirit. We’ve
been given the Holy Spirit. When
I became a Christian, when I became born-again, the spirit
in me became alive, the Holy Spirit entered my life [cf.
Romans 8:15-16]. And
I have the Holy Spirit now in me, working. The
Holy Spirit, as we studied in John, he will lead us in all
truth [cf. John 14]. So
I have this supernatural discernment. So
I have this supernatural discernment. In
fact, I had it the day I was born-again. The
word that he uses there in verse 20 for the word know,
it’s not that Greek word ginosko, to
know experientially, something that you learn in time, that
word he uses is the word oeda,
which means to know intuitively---an intuition that the Holy
Spirit within you has given you. Maybe you’ve had experiences like
that. But I’ve had experiences like that
where I’ve turned on the television, I’ve even
heard of young believers, turn on the TV, there’s the
preacher (televangelist) there, and maybe what he’s
saying at that time seems right on---saying, yeah, that seems
right on---but as I’m listening to him, there’s
something just really bothering me on the inside, and it’s
like I can see through this guy, and it’s like, this
guy is not legit. He’s going somewhere, he’s
got some other motive. Maybe
you’ve had that experience. I
read a story, one of the commentators, where a missionary
had led somebody in another country to the Lord, and this
person had come with them and they were in the United States,
and walking down the streets, and they walk by one of these
guys on the street, you know, street preachers, and evidently
this missionary knew about this guy, knew he was kind of
bizarre, but this new believer from this other country walked
up to this guy and started to listen to his message. And the missionary said ‘Oh no,
I hope he isn’t influenced by this guy’s teaching
and weirdness.’ Well anyway, after a few moments this
young believer left that and started to walk with this missionary
and the missionary said ‘What did you think?’ He
says, ‘You know, I was listening to him, and it wasn’t
so much what he said, but as I was listening, the whole time
in my mind I kept hearing the word liar, liar, liar.’ And that’s what he’s talking
about. It’s the Holy Spirit. And if you’re a born-again
believer you have that unction. And
I’m sure you have those experiences. I
remember a new believer, somebody got saved at the church,
I think it was a week after they got saved, living in Gardner
at home, and don’t you know the Jehovah’s Witnesses
show up at their door, knock, knock. Just
got started [in their spiritual walk], you know, very little,
just enough that Jesus saved them. So
the Witnesses come to their door, they sat down, he’s
thinking initially
‘oh they must be Christians, let’s have a little
Bible study in the house.’ So anyway they came to me that week, and
I said ‘Oh man, that happens, it happens a lot, especially
right after somebody comes to Christ, these cults show up.’ But
this individual says, “You know”---and he didn’t
really know anything about the Jehovah’s Witnesses,
or even discern anything in what they said, but he says---“the
whole time I was just real uncomfortable. There was something about these guys that
was bothering me the whole time.” It’s
the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit. So
he says ‘Don’t be discouraged. Yeah
there’s this danger, the antichrist is growing in the
world, the spirit against the true Christ, but the Bible
declares the true Christ. Yes, and there’s even people that
are leaving the Church, and there’s the danger that
maybe it’s somebody you look up to, like, ‘that
guy is cool.’ And
you’re thinking, ‘I don’t want to be deceived
by a man.’ But he [John] says here, ‘Don’t
be despondent’, because you do as born-again believers,
you have the Holy Spirit in you, and the Holy Spirit will
help you discern. If you’re walking in the Spirit
he’ll help you discern, and it’s a protection. In
fact, he says in verse
21, he says “I’m have not written to you
because you don’t know the truth”. It’s
not that you don’t know it, but because you know it. You
know the truth. The
Spirit is in you. And
Jesus said “I am the truth.” You
know him, so I know the truth. And
I know my Jesus, I walk with him, I know what he’s
about. So I’ll
hear something, and never really thought about that doctrine
or that type of statement, and I’ll hear something,
and I’ll go “That’s not my Jesus, man. It just isn’t him.” That just grinds against what I know about
him. So, he warns,
explains things, but he says ‘You have this discernment.’ And
so he’s encouraging.
How to determine true from false
He goes a little
bit further in the following verses. He
gives us some practical ways to help us determine a true
teacher from a false teacher, how to determine who is an
antichrist. And
basically we could summarize these next two verses with a
question, and that is, ‘What do they do with Jesus?’ That
tells you a lot about somebody. Verse 22, “Who is a liar but he who
denies that Jesus is the Christ? He
is the antichrist who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever
denies the Son does not have the Father either, he who acknowledges
the Son has the Father also.” He
makes strong statements. Here he talks about what I would call
their denial. He
explains that eventually, if they are a false teacher, they
are going to start to deny the real Jesus Christ, because
that is the spirit of the antichrist, to deny who he is,
as far as his Messiahship, verse 22, and his Deity. And
that’s really especially the test, they deny his Messiahship. Verse
22, “Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is
the Christ.” Meaning, that he’s come---of course,
he’s nailing the Gnosticism right here, the Gnostic
teaching. Jesus came in the flesh, God the Son---and
he came as the seat of David, he is the Messiah fulfilling
that prophecy. Of course the Gnostics had a real hard
time with that. So
they deny that he is the Messiah. And
of course, there’s other groups today that would deny
that. They’ll
say ‘Jesus is a great teacher, the guy’s really
cool, I really respect his teaching, but this Messiah, this
guy’s not gonna come back and rule the world, you know,
later, and have a Messianic kingdom, that’s just a
bunch of bologna.’ He
[John] says the guy who says that is a liar, the guy who
teaches that, that teaches other things, comes across as
a spiritual leader, but then says those things about Jesus. Now when he says he’s a liar, in
the Greek he uses a double negative for emphasis. So
he means that the person who constantly is denying the historical
Jesus as the promised Messiah is the greatest possible liar,
that’s what he means. I mean, that’s the greatest liar,
who denies, some spiritual leader that says that Jesus is
not the Messiah. He is the greatest possible liar. John doesn’t mess around, that’s
for sure, in these statements that he makes. Well,
these guys deny the Messiahship, they also deny the Deity,
and that’s what he’s saying in the second part
of verse 22 and verse 23. “He
is the antichrist who denies the Father and the Son” (verse
22b). What is he saying there? Well the words he uses, and we’ve
seen this consistently in the Gospel of John, he uses words
that equate God the Father, God the Son, meaning they’re
one [Elohim], meaning they’re both God. And Jesus said that many times. John used the same type of way of presenting
things here. And
that’s what he does here, he is saying, the antichrist
is the man or woman or spirit who denies the Father and the
Son, meaning they’re equal. They’re
the same. They’re
both God. Two
different persons, but they’re both part of God. It’s
a denial of who and what God is, and it’s a denial
of Jesus Christ. And certainly that goes on all over the
world. Right? There’s plenty of people that will
teach about Jesus, but they will come out and say that Jesus
is not God the Son. And that’s what he says here is
the spirit of this antichrist, the spirit in the world that
is denying the true Jesus, and trying to hinder people from
coming to Christ. Verse
23 says, “Whoever denies the Son does not have the
Father.” That’s
why he says that. I
mean, they’re one. If
you deny Jesus, how can you have the Father? You’re
denying the Father when you deny Jesus. [Jesus
said in one of the Gospels, “before Abraham, I was”,
meaning that he spoke with Abraham personally. For
this the Jews tried to kill Jesus, because he was claiming
to be the very God who spoke to Abraham. John
6 is another good section to read, showing the Father-Son
relationship. And
of course, John 1:1-14 is where John explains the pre-existence
of Jesus as God the Word.] So
he says “he who denies Jesus denies the Father.” That
word “denies” there is in the present tense,
meaning a continuous action. When
he says “who ever denies”, he doesn’t mean
a one-time denial, like Peter. Peter
had a bad day there, struggling with fear of man, and he
was ashamed and he denied Jesus. That’s
not what he’s referring to. He’s
referring to somebody who consistently by his nature, by
what he is and says, he says “Jesus is not God the
Son.” And
he who denies the Son, he says, does not have the Father. And that’s what the Word of God
says. Now that is not “politically correct”,
that’s for sure. And
if you were on NBC or sitting with different religious leaders
in this country, and you said that, man, you’d have
people really ruffled and upset. But it is what the Word of God declares. If you deny Jesus Christ as God the Son,
you deny God, you do not have God, simply put. All
ways do not lead to heaven [i.e. salvation], there’s
only one way, and it’s through Jesus Christ, that is
the declaring of the Word of God. He says, “he who denies the Son
does not have the Father.” So
he is saying it is impossible to claim that you know God,
it is impossible to claim that you’re going to go to
be with God in heaven [or dwell with God in the Kingdom of
God, which will end up on earth, cf. Rev. 21], and yet deny
Jesus Christ as the Lord of your life, as God the Son, but
also as God that became man, that died on the cross and rose
to life for the sin of the world. It is impossible to know God if you deny
that. Now, it’s
amazing, you know he’s talking about these types of
things, but it’s amazing about this spirit of the antichrist
in our world today, it’s amazing what people are saying
today, man, it is really bizarre. And
it’s just escalating. I
just got this email, maybe you got it too, from worldnetdaily.com. “A
doctrinal candidate in Australia was paid $51,000 in public
funds to research Jesus’ sexuality”---This guy’s
paid 51 Grand---“Declaring unequivocally the founder
of Christianity was homosexual. According to a report in this one Adelaide
Advertiser, Roland McCearly, who himself is homosexual, earned
$17,000 a year for three years to work on his thesis on homosexual
spirituality. The grant came from the University of
Queensland. But
McCearly will be awarded his doctorate tomorrow, and in the
future hope to make gay spirituality a separate academic
discipline. Beside
determining the sexual orientation of Jesus, McClearly’s
research claims three or four of Christ’s disciples
were also homosexual.” Interesting, “The starting point
is John, who always referred to himself as Jesus’ beloved
disciple, McClearly told the Australian paper.” According
to the Advertiser, he claims “Jesus astrological charts,
clues in the Scripture to which the Church has been blind,
and accurate biblical translations, all played a part in
his conclusion.” Augh,
gosh, what can you say to that? The
spirit of the antichrist. Man. Blasphemous, it’s just growing in
blasphemy, that’s for sure.
Further encouragement, practical
protection
Well,
he talks about their denial, but again he comes right back
with some encouragement for you and I, some practical protection
from this type of spirit. Verses 24-27, “Therefore let that abide in you which you have heard
from the beginning. If
what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also
will abide in the Son and in the Father. And
this is the promise that he has promised us, eternal life. These
things I have written to you concerning those who try to
deceive you. But the anointing which you have received
from him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach
you. But as the same anointing teaches you
concerning all things, and is truth, and is not a lie, and
just as it has taught you, you will abide in him.” So
he talks about their deception and their denial, and all
that, but then he comes with this practical protection. And
what is it? In
verse 24 the practical protection that he gives us is our
doctrine. Basically he says, stick to the basics. You stick to the basics, what you learned
from the beginning about Jesus Christ. [And
what my very first pastor, a minister in a Sabbatarian Church
of God, taught me about Jesus Christ, was to teach us John
1:1-14, that Jesus is God the Son, God come in the flesh,
the pre-existent Word of God from the beginning. That
is the basic doctrine John has been teaching us here.] The
basics about who Jesus is in the Bible. And
here in the new believers Bible class that we had, and the
basic things that you’ve learned, the basic doctrines
of the Christian faith, if you stick to that and abide in
that, that will indeed protect you. It will make you strong, that is what
he is saying here. [That
would include normal daily Bible studies and daily prayer. See
the section on prayer on this site ( http://www.unityinchrist.com/prayer/bibleway.htm )
and check out Ephesians for putting on the armour of God
( http://www.unityinchrist.com/ephesians/putonarmour.htm ).] Stick
to your doctrine. And he goes a little bit further, he says
if you’ll do that, you’ll abide in the Son and
in the Father, meaning that, you know, the basics, what we
already have, is all we need to have to live a very full
life, to have an abundant life. The
problem is, and you see that at times, is that people get
bored with the basics. And
often though, that is a sign that they don’t know Christ. I’m
not bored with the basics, learning about Jesus, what the
Bible teaches me. There’s so much here, we’ve
just skimmed the surface of what we have. I’m
not bored at all. It’s
a journey, it’s an adventure. But
what happens, people are part of churches, and they’re
listening to the Word, and they’re bored with it. [And
some of these churches, sadly, may not be teaching the Word
very thoroughly, their messages may lack life, or a proper
presentation of the complete Word of God—pastors putting
their congregations to sleep—that’s another problem
related to what is being said here. The
early Separatists in the Midlands of England would travel
over hill and dale to find a live, on fire congregation where
the Word of God was powerfully and thoroughly preached (see http://www.unityinchrist.com/history/saga.htm for
their story). Maybe
that’s what some of you need to do.] And
that’s an indication that they’re not alive in
the Spirit. So they get bored, and then a false teacher
arises and says something a little different, and it tickles
their ears. So they get led astray, and start following
that. So, our
doctrines, just sticking to the basics, man, just learning
that and living by that is all we need, man. It’s
a glorious life. It’s a full life. If it isn’t a full life to you,
then ask God to instill a hunger in your heart. It’s
a full life to know Jesus and to study his Word. It’s a great meal, that’s
for sure. Well, he says if this abides in you which
you heard from the beginning, if that does, then it’ll
protect you, it’ll help you from being misled. And
it will have a tremendous effect upon your life, that’s
for sure. As
somebody has said, the Gospel never changes, but it changes
those who hear it and study it and obey it. It
says in verse 25, “This
is the promise he has promised us, eternal life.” So,
I mean, if you abide in the Word, and you have this promise,
eternal life, eternal life, there’s a lot in that word. It
isn’t just that, well, I got mansions in heaven waiting
for me. That word means a lot more than that. When he says “eternal life” he
is talking about the very life that God possesses. God’s
life is eternal life. I
have received that life when I became a Christian, I received
his very life [by the Holy Spirit who now indwells him],
and that is eternal life. It’s eternal in that it started
one day, and it’s gonna continue forever, and my life
started one day. But also, it’s eternal in quality. It started for me when I was 15 years
old, and it’s going to continue through eternity, but
especially that word means eternal in quality, I mean, it’s
the life of God. It’s his life that I now have in
Jesus Christ [cf. John 14 for an interesting study]. So,
he says, you abide, and this, man, you have. You’re in the Son, you’re
in the Father [and they are in you, John 14], and you have
eternal life, which is abundant life. Which
indeed is the good life. He
says in verse 26, “These things I have written to you concerning those
who try to deceive you.” And
he makes this point, because in the Greek the word carries
the connotation: they will persistently, they will be unyielding,
they will not stop until the end of time, they will persistently
try to deceive you. And
the Bible says these false teachers come “as an angel
of light” (read 2 Corinthians 11:3-4, 13-14). They
appear like they have the truth, man, they got the smile,
they got the nice white robes, they got the glitter in their
eyes, but inside their hearts is just wickedness and evil,
the spirit of deception. He
says “they will
be unyielding, seeking to deceive you.” The
word the King James uses is, “they will seduce you,
and seek to seduce you and not stop.” So
here we are, we’re in the Church today, I’m walking
with Jesus Christ today, I’m in the Word. But there’s guys out there, there’s
a spirit out there, seeking all the time, it’ll continue
to seek, this week and next week to the very end of my life,
trying to deceive me. [Read Revelation 12:9. When will the deception of the spirit
of antichrist end? Read
Revelation 20:1-3, not until this evil age of man is over
with. And even
then it is allowed to recur for a short span in Revelation
20:7-10.] So,
I stick to the doctrine, I stick to the basics, and then
he says something about our defense there in verse 27. He
says, “But the
anointing”---again, this supernatural work of the
Holy Spirit in you---“which you have received from him abides in you, and you do not
need that anyone teach you, but the same anointing teaches
you concerning all things, and it’s true, and it’s
not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide
in him.” He
says, again, you have the Holy Spirit, you don’t need
anybody to teach you, you have the Holy Spirit, and the Holy
Spirit is where it’s at. [Again, look up and read John 14 for Jesus’
description of what the Holy Spirit does within each and
every believer.] The Holy Spirit will show you, ‘This
is error, this is truth.’ That’s
all you need is the Holy Spirit. So
our defense, we have the Holy Spirit. Now
he says that, I believe especially because of the tactics
of the cults. [And I would say most if not all the cults
don’t believe Jesus is God the Son, the pre-existent
Word of God—excellent test to help determine which
group is really a cult, and which isn’t.] The tactics of the cults is, it’s
true of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, it’s true of
other groups, that you get into these groups, and they don’t
give you the Bible, they give you their magazines, they give
you their books, it’s so important that they’re
with you to have the Bible study (and they’re using
their own translation of the Bible). They don’t encourage you, ‘Hey,
go study the Word in the Greek and the Hebrew, get a bunch
of books (commentaries).’ It’s ‘No, come to me, read
my magazine. Let’s go through this book.’ In fact, somebody in this church who used
to be a Jehovah’s Witness was telling me this last
week, that when they were a Jehovah’s Witness, for
Sunday for their services, I don’t know if this is
true with all of them, but the one’s he went to, they
don’t even study the Bible, but they study the magazine. That
magazine is called “Awake” and they sit down
and read through the magazine. So
that’s what the cults do. They
don’t want you, really, to have the truth, because
they’ve twisted it. They’re
false teachers. But
he says, you, as a Christian, have the Holy Spirit, and you
don’t need anybody to teach you, because the Holy Spirit
will always help you to walk in the Spirit, to discern truth
from error. And
I tell you, that’s encouraging. We
got the danger, we got the battle around us, but man, he
comes with encouragement. So, you’re thinking, ‘George,
you’re up there, I don’t need you.’ You
know, ‘Get outa here.’ [laughter] But you have to balance every Scripture
against Scripture. And
it isn’t that there aren’t teachers in the Church
[read Ephesians 4, the whole chapter!]. Paul says in Ephesians “And he himself
gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists,
and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints,
for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body
of Christ.” God’s
given the ministry of teaching just to build up the body,
but it is true, every single thing I say, you should be listening
to the Holy Spirit, going ‘Is he on, or is he off?’ ‘Is
he on, is he off?’ You
should be in the Word, studying the Word, listening to God,
and not depending upon a man. If you depend upon a man, potentially
you can be deceived.
In summary
So,
John, as we’ve
seen in past few weeks, has told us about issues of the heart,
dangers within. Now he talks about the danger around us. And it’s the battle with the truth. But he talks about that, and says it’s
not only around us in the world, it’s also in the Church. We have the danger, but we also have the
departure of these people who leave from the Church, they
seem to be a part of the Church, but then they leave the
Church. But with
all that going on, he reminds us that we have from God, from
heaven above, as born-again believers, we have discernment,
supernatural, intuitive knowledge, the Holy Spirit working
in us, and it’s based upon the truth. But also we have practical words from
him here, that
we can learn a lot about what a man is about as far as what
is he teaching. What
does he say about Jesus? If he denies Jesus is the Messiah,
if he denies Jesus as God the Son, even though he’s
just got moving words and great stories and all these things
to say, and even if he can do signs and wonders, he’s
a heretic, he’s a false teacher. He
has the spirit of the antichrist. But
he says you also have a practical defense in your basic doctrine,
man, stick to it. These
guys are just unyielding in their deception. You
have your doctrine, but also you have another defense, and
it’s the Holy Spirit within you, man. Let’s close in prayer….” [Transcript of a sermon given in a congregation
somewhere in New England.]
Now I want to
make a comment about the Sabbatarian Churches of God, which
many apologists have labeled (libeled) as cults. I
was spiritually brought up in the Worldwide Church of God,
when it was Torah observant. (I spent 30 years in that denomination,
mostly while they were Torah observant.) The
United Church of God and Global Church of God, as well as
Fred Coulter’s Sabbatarian house Churches of God have
all split off from the Worldwide Church of God, and remain
Torah observant Sabbatarian Churches of God. When
I first came into the Worldwide Church of God, one of the
very first doctrines I was taught was that Jesus was God
the Son, the pre-existent Word of God, part of the very God
called Elohim in Genesis 1. The
pastor’s teaching was right from John 1:1-14. Although
the Sabbatarian Churches of God interpret the Law of God
that believers should keep as being the Old Testament 10
Commandments, including the Sabbath and the Holy Days of
Leviticus 23, and they believe this by their literal interpretation
of Matthew 5:17-19, and by their not fully understanding
Romans 14 properly---they as a whole have the Holy Spirit
indwelling them as a group and within most of their individual
members. As the Jews
for Jesus said in a book describing Messianic Judaism,
the said about the Torah observant Messianic Jewish congregations,
which have the same identical belief system, ‘Yes,
they are a part of the body of Christ. But by their Torah observancy, believing
that believers must adhere to Sabbath and Holy days, they
have separated themselves out from functioning in the body
of Christ---but they still are believers, and they still
are a part of the body of Christ.’ I
remember being encouraged to use the King James Bible because
at the time it adhered to the Greek and Hebrew better than
many translations extant at the time, and I purchased my
Strongs Concordance shortly after baptism, as well as Josephus. Our
pastors taught straight out of the Bible---all the time, and
our interpretation in prophecy was basic Classic pre-millennial. The very fact that the Torah observant
Messianic Jewish congregations are not slammed as cults,
but the Sabbatarian Churches of God are, is a huge disservice
and slander against a particular part of the body of Christ. And
this occurs mostly out of pure ignorance. It
is my personal belief, based on a study of recent early Church
history discoveries, that the Sabbatarian Churches of God
are truly a remnant of the early Judeo-Christian churches
of Asia Minor that existed for the first 300 years of the
Church. See http://www.unityinchrist.com/history2/index3.htm for
a research article I wrote based on the study of these recent
historic discoveries. The
editor.
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