Intro: Welcome to the Spoken Gospel Podcast. Spoken Gospel is a ministry that's dedicated to speaking the gospel out of every corner of Scripture. In Luke 24, Jesus told his disciples that every part of the Bible was about him. So each week, hosts David and Seth work through a passage of scripture to see how it's all about Jesus and his good news. Let's jump in.
David: Well, welcome everyone to the Spoken Gospel Podcast. Thank you so much for joining us. Seth, how are you this fine day?
Seth: I'm fine. You're fine? This fine day.
David: I'm so glad.
Seth: I'm just kind of happy to be in a New Testament book for the first time on this podcast to kind of go through like consecutively.
David: We've done like overviews, but we haven't done like the Spoken Gospel Podcast thing where we get to dive into a book line upon line and pick it apart.
Seth: And I'm super excited that it's 1 John.
David: Yeah, I love 1 John.
Seth: It's like one of— like, it's kind of one of those books that everybody's like, forgotten favorite. Yeah, at least in my mind, it's like a forgotten favorite. And because there's so many like bangers. Oh yeah, God is light, God is love, right? Like, yes, famous.
David: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. Yes. 1 John is an amazing book. And, and I think it's really practical too, because it addresses a lot of questions. Yes, that we have on a regular basis as Christians.
Seth: Uh, like, yeah, I was just going through it and just making note of all the different types of like pastoral questions John is answering, or the author of John is answering.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Uh, how do I know that Jesus is in my heart? What if I'm scared that God doesn't love me? What is an antichrist? When are they coming? Where are they? How do I respond to them?
David: What do I do when I meet one?
Seth: Um, who is God?
David: Like, It's a really simple question. What's the nature, character of God? How has he revealed himself? Yes. Yeah.
Seth: Um, what is love?
David: Yeah.
Seth: Which is a really profound question. Mm-hmm.
David: Uh, yeah.
Seth: What does it mean to overcome the world? Yeah. What is— this is what I was always scared about as a kid. What is the sin that leads to death?
David: Oh, cause he just talks about that. Kind of throws it out there and throws it out there.
Seth: It's like, well, I probably committed it and I'm about to die. Like, you know, like that kind of thing.
David: Yeah.
Seth: So like there's all these amazing questions in the book of John that feel really live for most Christians at some point in their life.
David: Yes.
Seth: And then even as an overarching kind of like thematic purpose, it's like John, the author of John, is a pastor.
David: Yes.
Seth: Speaking to people who are uncertain about a lot of things. Yeah.
David: Even uncertain about their own salvation. Yes. Yeah.
Seth: And he's writing to them to convince them, to help them to know, to help them to understand, give them assurance, to give them assurance. The, like, the word confidence or assurance is used multiple times throughout the book. And the word to, like, perceive or understand is used 25 times. Wow. And the word to know is used 15 times.
David: So it's like, if you want to perceive or know or attain confidence and assurance, man, 1 John's a great place to be.
Seth: If you're uncertain, John is a great— and I'm like, I feel like uncertain most of the time about most things in my life. So it's like, man, I should camp out at 1 John for a little bit longer than I have. Previously. That's awesome.
David: So I was thinking when I— when you were going through your list, I was like, because I just read it again before hopping on air, and I was like, man, the thing— a couple things that he talks about to me that just stood out were like, like, do Christians keep sinning? You know, and if they do, is it okay? And like, how is it okay? And then also like, there's sometimes when I'm a Christian and I don't feel condemned at all. But then sometimes I do feel condemned. Does that mean I—
Seth: Right. What happened?
David: What happened?
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it's like he talks about all of that and it's like, I think John uses a lot of dichotomies. He does, you know, like light and dark, you know, hate, love, hate and love.
Seth: Cain, Abel.
David: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's like, I feel like there's— but he also blends things well. Like, am I saved or not when I feel condemned? He's like, how about let's do when you feel condemned and when you don't feel condemned, you're saved. And it's like, I just feel like he plays with that really nicely. It's a, it's a beautiful letter. Yeah, so I'm really excited to unpack it. Like, like, like we said, we're gonna go through this kind of chapter upon chapter in some subsequent episodes, but this episode is about introducing the context, the audience, kind of some of the key themes so that you can jump into the book immediately after listening to this and have a pretty good handle on it.
Seth: Yeah, I did not really know quite as much as I should have about the debated authorship of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John.
David: Yeah, it's interesting.
Seth: So I kind of always assumed, well, it's named John, it must be the same— 1st, 2nd, 3rd John. So it must be by the same guy who wrote John, the Gospel of John. Right. And there's obviously a large tradition that believes that.
David: Yes.
Seth: What throws people off is in John 2, where he calls himself the Elder. Some people think there's two people named John, John the Elder, and then John the beloved one of Jesus. He calls himself the beloved one in his gospel.
David: Yes.
Seth: And there's so many parallels between what John records in his gospel and here. It makes total sense for it to be.
David: It sounds like John.
Seth: It sounds like John.
David: If you're confused, John, we're never, we're not told in the letters that it's John.
Seth: It's that, and it kind of breaks a pattern that we're used to in a lot of New Testament letters already. If you've read one of Paul's letters, there's an address. I, Paul and Timothy, a servant of Christ to you, the people of Ephesus, say this grace and peace.
David: So we have who it's from, who was with him, and who he's writing to. Here we don't have an author mentioned and there's not an addressee. And so a lot of people think this was a circular letter, that it went to all of the churches under this elder's tutelage. Yes, that he was over like this apostle who was over many churches. But who was the apostle? Well, it sounds a lot like John. If you read the Gospel of John and then you read this, the syntax, the words he uses, the themes he picks up on are identical.
Seth: And for a series of books to be about one of the main, like, thematic things that comes up is God is love. And even John himself calls himself the disciple whom Jesus loves.
David: Right.
Seth: It just feels really powerful to have that connection regardless.
David: And then there's also church history. And church history holds that this is John's— these are John's letters.
Seth: Regardless, what's more important than who specifically wrote it is why the author wrote it. And I think for simplicity's sake, we're just gonna say John.
David: Yes.
Seth: Because John— yeah, yeah, we're gonna say John.
David: We're gonna say John. And if it wasn't John, it was an apostle. Yes. Regardless. Yes. We know that because of some internal evidence here. And so anyway, we're going to say John.
Seth: Yeah.
David: But yeah, it's an interesting little history for this book.
Seth: It really is. And I think the question we— so after like, who wrote it? Why did they write it?
David: Yes.
Seth: And John gives us like multiple reasons why he writes it throughout it.
David: Yes.
Seth: And it goes kind of back to what we said at the beginning, like this John is a pastor of these people.
David: Yes.
Seth: He cares about the people he's writing to.
David: He calls You can like see it as you're reading the book. Like, this guy loves these people.
Seth: Little children, my fathers, my son. Like, he's like intimately for the people he's writing to. And he's concerned not just about their theological acumen or their ability to go against the false teachers that we'll talk about in a second, but their state of well-being as in the middle of that context. Like, do you feel condemned? Let me talk to you for a second.
David: Right.
Seth: Do you feel overwhelmed? Let me talk to you for a second.
David: Yeah. It's like he'll be like, like Paul, he'll be like going through kind of like a theological diatribe, point upon point, making his argument. And he'll be like, ooh, pastorally, my people might feel a little condemned right now. Let me stop and tell you a poem. And like, my sweet, sweet children. And it's like, aww.
Seth: And if this is the same author as John, who wrote both the Gospel of John and the Book of Revelation, apparently, and I'd have to do a little bit more study on this, but apparently that in 1 John is the only poem recorded by the author John. There's hymns in Revelation, but there's no poems. And it comes after kind of this really intense, like, if you don't do what is right, you are in the darkness.
David: And it's like, oh, little children, let me tell you something.
Seth: So he's— it's really a sweet letter.
David: It really is.
Seth: And he— I wrote down 4 different times he says, I'm writing this to you for this reason. Oh, okay. So in 1 John 1, He says, we write to you for so that our joy may be complete.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So John is writing for his own personal joy's sake. And then in 2 John 1:12, he uses really similar language. He's like, I will complete my joy when I talk to you face to face.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So I think there's something— it goes back to this pastoral relational quality of the letter, like he wants these people to to be close to him. Yeah, he wants them to feel close to him. He wants to see them one day. This letter is written for his joy, right?
David: And it even says in verse 3 that you guys can have fellowship with us. It is about closeness, like we can have fellowship together and have mutual joy in our salvation in Jesus.
Seth: Is that— I had this question like lined up for later, but is fellowship just like relationship, man?
David: So like Krause in his, in his commentary, the Pillar Commentary series, he says that John, John exploring a definition of koinonia, which is the Greek word for fellowship, is one of the main themes of the book. And so it's like, yeah, so it's like, it's like, it's all, it's a loaded question for the context of John here because it's like you have fellowship with the dark, you can have fellowship with the light, you can have fellowship with God, which means you have fellowship with Jesus, which means you have fellowship with one another, which means the Spirit is in you having fellowship with him and the triune God and me. And so it's like, I think when John uses fellowship, I think you can almost go read John 15 to 17 in his, in his gospel, which is all about how when the Father and the Son and the Spirit dwell in you like a house, you have fellowship with the divine and with everybody else who has fellowship with the divine. Like there's this community of saints that we— and we share community with the Father, which means we share in his love and his light and his eternal life, which are themes we're going to talk about later. So it's like it's a very loaded theological term for John. Yeah, yeah.
Seth: Which that makes me think too, he's writing it for our joy's sake. He wants to complete his joy by being in relationship with them physically, seeing them face to face. He's talking about this theme of union and fellowship and communion with the saints writ large, with Jesus himself, with God and with his Spirit. It just made me think again about how the book of John is structured.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: There's this like cyclical kind of like repeating meditative, almost like a meditative quality to the letter where it's like every metaphor stacks on top of one another. The idea of fellowship is given layers the deeper you go into the book. If you go back to the book of John, the Gospel of John, you'll see how there's a history of John thinking about this particular topic. That's just it. Yeah.
David: Yeah. Yeah, totally.
Seth: So his second reason he gives us for writing this is like, I write to you so that you will not sin. 1 John 2:1.
David: Right.
Seth: It is preventative. Right. He does not want his children, these fathers, these young men, these women to sin.
David: Yes.
Seth: He is preventing them from sinning.
David: Very pastoral so far.
Seth: Another reason: I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray. So he is trying to warn them about some people he calls the antichrist.
David: So it is protective.
Seth: It is protective. Yep.
David: Pastoral, preventative, protective.
Seth: Yes.
David: Is there another P in there?
Seth: We'll see. 1 John 5:14, he says, we write so that your name would be in the name of Jesus, going back to this idea of fellowship and being inside.
David: Proclamative.
Seth: Proclamative. I have underneath all this pastoral rather than polemical.
David: Oh, there you go. Yeah.
Seth: Some more Ps. Like, yeah. And I think that kind of brings us up to who these antichrists are. Why is Paul— why is John writing this letter? For the sake of fellowship, for the sake of unity with these people, to prevent them from sinning, to protect them from false teachers, to remind them that they are in the name of Jesus.
David: Yes.
Seth: He wants to lead them in a time when there are people out there trying to deceive them away from all that. Like, I think like an image of a shepherd, it's just really powerful. You have a shepherd, a pastor, caring for this little flock of people. And there are wolves coming to attack it. And he's helping— and in this case, wolves in sheep's clothing— and he's helping protect his little flock from these people who are deceiving them, eating them alive from the inside, and they can't protect themselves from.
David: Okay, that's, that's helpful. Yeah. So, and so that's kind of like his, some of his purposes. And then there's an occasion for his writing, which we've alluded to many times, which are these opponents.
Seth: These false prophets in 4:1, or most commonly Antichrist.
David: Yes.
David: Which is a very loaded term.
Seth: Super loaded.
David: But actually, the more you look into it, it's a very— it's like kind of like a— it's kind of a boring term.
Seth: It is a boring term.
David: Yeah.
Seth: So fun fact, Antichrist is only mentioned 4 times in Scripture, and they're all in the books, letters of John.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: They're not mentioned in Revelation. There's the beast in Revelation. There's other figures in Revelation. But the term Antichrist is only ever used here in 1 John. And he does, and he uses it in the plural.
David: Yes.
Seth: It's not one figure at the end of time, although it could be, right?
David: He's saying, I think he does both.
Seth: He does both.
David: Yeah, he does both.
Seth: So even that is significant though, because I think growing up for me, Antichrist was always one figure at the end of time, right? I mean, to deceive the nations. Yes. John is a little more ambivalent about how many there are, right? He knows there's more than one. Oh yeah, there are definitely more, more than one. And he He's accusing all of them.
David: Yeah, he basically, it basically sounds like there's a category for the Antichrist and even says that you knew was coming. So he's pulling on some old prophecies, some old Jewish tradition, things like that. He's like, but I tell you, there are antichrists right now in your midst. And it's like, and so anyway, that can sound really intense, but it's like antichrist is like this, like noun, this proper noun that just exists in English.
Seth: Right. Right. Just—
David: it's kind of weird, but it's just those who oppose the idea that Jesus is the Christ.
Seth: Yeah.
David: He—
Seth: John will go on in pretty explicit detail what these antichrists believe. I mean, explicit detail is probably a little strong.
David: Yes.
Seth: But it's like he, he tells us what these antichrists are teaching. Yes. They teach that they deny that Jesus is the Christ. So they deny that Jesus is the Son of God sent from heaven. Yes. Who lived on the earth. They deny that the Father and Son have a father and son relationship. You see this in 4:1 and 5:1. And I— there's even a hint they might even deny that God is light, that they have like this strange view of the holiness of God perhaps. Or they claim that they have the Father without the Son, right? There's all this.
David: Yeah. And also another commentator said that like they, they probably did not believe in the atoning death of Jesus, which is why he talks about so much that he's the propitiation for our sins, that he came not just by water birth, but by blood death. And so, yeah, they believe a lot of things and taught a lot of things that were extremely contrary to traditional Christianity.
Seth: Yeah. And I think the simplest way to say it is they denied that Jesus came in the flesh. Most basically.
David: Yes, absolutely.
Seth: They denied the teaching of the apostles, of John and the people that actually lived with Jesus. And they did not call sin sin.
David: Yes.
Seth: They deny that the one— this is, this is from 3:7-8. They deny that the one, one does what is righteous is righteous. So they're, they're redefining righteousness and sinfulness. Sin is permissible under certain circumstances. Righteousness doesn't always mean righteousness. And he kind of clearly says, like, this is from the devil.
David: Yeah, there was a really interesting— because there's as many scholars as there are, or as many opinions as to the exact beliefs of these antichrists.
Seth: Yeah.
David: But one that I thought was really interesting was—
Seth: so they—
David: some teach that the antichrist thought that, you know, Jesus was a physical person who was born, but then at his baptism, the divine spirit came upon him and he was made the Christ. Okay, but not his humanity. His humanity wasn't the Christ, but the Christ-ness came upon him, but then abandoned at his death.
Seth: Yes.
David: Right. And so then at their baptism, they too received the divine spirit. Okay. And became sinless and perfect like him. So that's why they denied that. They said they had no sin because they were just like Jesus, because they were baptized like Jesus. And so they had the divine germ in themselves now.
Seth: Interesting.
David: And so it was kind of like this, you know, for those familiar, like kind of like a Gnostic kind of view of things.
Seth: I was kind of— one of the things I've always been told. And so here's something else to know. He also calls them false prophets.
David: Yeah.
Seth: False teachers. So that also means that this Antichrist figure, the Antichrist figures are probably not like a government figure. Oh, actually a pastor of a church.
David: Yes.
Seth: Like he's actually not speaking to just people in the culture.
David: No.
Seth: Atheists on YouTube.
David: Oh, goodness.
Seth: He's, he's talking about other pastors who are preaching contrary to what the apostles have taught throughout their ministry and through Jesus's ministry. And one of the things— so that's actually a really important thing to name.
David: It really is.
Seth: Antichrist isn't like a political figure or a public figure so much as it's a pastor. Yeah. Teaching falsely.
David: That's right. A very viable, like, occurrence or context for this letter is that these antichrists, which the commentator I was reading, Krauss, he said he calls them the secessionists. They seceded from the church and went and started their own church. And then they sent their prophets, their teachers, their pastors back to the church from which they seceded to continue to teach them these false things and evangelistically try to convert them to their— the right way of thinking in their minds. And that's why John writes the letter, is to offer a defense and support for his little flock. Yeah. And so, yeah, I think you're right. I think these are religious figures that are the antichrists.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Which is— I think that when I first, like, understood that, that blew my mind more than anything. I was like, wait, Wait, what? Yeah, my whole— like, I grew up reading Left Behind. Yes, was all in on Nicolae Carpathia. Like, somebody, somebody from the Carpathian Mountains was gonna rise up and start a one-world government. I was 14 years old, you know, so one world, one people.
David: That's gonna date this episode. Yeah, for anybody who knows what I'm referring to.
Seth: Falcon and the Winter Soldier fans. Yeah, I mean Captain America.
David: Oh, oh, oh, well, now I got to go back and add a spoiler alert. I'm not going to do it.
Seth: Um, that blew my mind when I read it for the first time. And I think it's important to just stop and like, if it's blowing your mind right now, like, let it, let it blow your mind for a second.
David: Like, the Antichrist is more likely to be in your church than in your government.
Seth: Yes. Yeah.
David: Or on your YouTube page.
Seth: Yes. Yeah.
David: It's anybody who denies that Jesus is the Son of God, the Christ.
Seth: I want to kind of land on that. Can I ask you some open questions about that? So one of the things I've always heard about false prophets is they don't normally come out and say, "I deny Jesus is the Christ." Right. Because it's too obvious.
David: Way too obvious.
Seth: Because a normal Christian wouldn't be led astray by that. Nope. They're going to see right through it. And I keep trying to like, why is— are these antichrists convincing?
David: Right.
Seth: Why? And maybe it's kind of an impossible task to drum up from the—
David: to mirror read well enough to figure that out.
Seth: Yeah. But it's like, okay, And it's like, they don't— I just like, that's— I have this in my notes. They don't seem sneaky enough by the way that John is describing them. But I, as I was like meditating on the idea that they deny that there's a Father and Son relationship, whether they deny that Jesus is coming in the flesh, or they deny the teaching of the apostles, all that actually felt pretty sneaky.
David: Oh yeah.
Seth: Because like, oh, they don't have to be Father and Son. I can just believe in God. I don't need to believe in the divinity of Jesus.
David: Right.
Seth: Okay, that's one thing. Yep. I deny that Jesus was incarnated on the, on the earth. He was a spiritual— it was a metaphor. It was a story, a narrative that we were supposed to live out. I've heard that before. Oh yeah, recently denying the teaching of the apostles is kind of like rampant within most churches.
David: Oh yeah, that's just like pop. That's just pop Christianity now, right? It's like, you know, Paul was a misogynist. Let's not listen to him.
Seth: Right. Or like, or whatever, whatever it is. Oh, that I've heard that often enough.
David: Oh yes.
Seth: And or the idea that deny, like, sin is permissible under certain circumstances, or that righteousness isn't righteousness all the time. Like, I've heard that. Oh yeah, sneakily around, and been tempted by it myself on more than one occasion. Like, yeah, that feels really sneaky. Um, and that kind of helped me put myself in this place a little bit. And I think part of the reason why John just says so starkly, these people deny that Jesus is the Christ, is because he's getting to the the tail end.
David: That's right.
Seth: Of what they're doing.
David: Yeah. Like I said, and it's like, okay, I mean, you mentioned a lot of things. It's really easy to find people in churches who deny the atoning effect that the blood of Jesus on the cross has.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Like the fact that Jesus's blood wiped away our sins was a propitiation, which, you know, is, is, is, is a unique word. Yeah. Here in 1 John, that is like propitiating the wrath of God. It's not like an atoning, although he talks about that. There's a propitiation. God was angry and Jesus's blood on the cross satisfied that anger.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it's like, well, there's plenty of people who want to say that God was never angry at sin and Jesus did not stand in the way of that, you know, of that anger and bore the wrath of God, you know? Yeah. It's like, well, there's plenty of people saying that. So watch out. Maybe that's an antichrist, you know? And it's like there's plenty of people saying that the— that Jesus is not God the Father. Jehovah's Witness, Mormons, Unitarians, right? Like, yeah, this is— this is in the water everywhere. And then even— and then like you said, that some want to make metaphorical the incarnation, you know, where it's like, well, you know, Jesus wasn't actually God in the flesh. It's a story about God.
Seth: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
David: Yes. So it's like anything that tries to denigrate or downgrade or downplay, yeah, the historical truth that God came in the flesh in his Son Jesus, died a propitiatory death in our place, and rose again to give us eternal life—
Seth: anything that subjugates that, yeah, that undermines that. And then he also adds an ethical or moral component.
David: Absolutely right.
Seth: It's like not just that if you deny deny these certain beliefs, right? But if you fail to meet these certain demands of hospitality, of love towards your neighbor, and obedience to God's laws—
David: yeah, it's not only what the, what the Antichrist taught, but how the Antichrists lived that proved that they were these wolves in sheep's clothing. They did not obey the commands of Jesus or the commands of God. Yeah, right. And then they didn't love one another. They didn't love each other. And it's like, that's everywhere too.
Seth: Yes.
David: Like, we don't love each other. We don't call sin sin. We don't obey the commands of the Bible, the explicit commands of the Bible. It's like these things are just really obvious now where it's like, oh, okay, so how many antichrists are there?
Seth: Yeah, yeah. It's like, okay, they're everywhere. Yeah. And I think the— and I think it's important to name what the net effect of the teachings of these antichrists did to the true and uncertain and insecure believers.
David: Yes.
Seth: It was to make them doubt if they knew what they grew up believing was the truth.
David: Come on. It is. Yeah. No, it is so good.
Seth: It is to make them doubt whether what they read in the Bible was true. It is to make them doubt that God even loves them because they have not done X, Y, and Z that they are telling them they need to do in order to be whole and finished.
David: Okay. So, this is interesting because you are kind of describing a third group of people. Which I have a lot of love for.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And because these are so many of my friends.
Seth: Yeah.
David: That I hope are listening right now. But like, like so many of my friends have heard teachings from these— this is— it just feels wrong to say like from these antichrists. I won't name them because then that would feel really intense.
Seth: Yeah.
David: But it's like, you know, people who just really deny like the teachings of the apostles, you know, like some of these historical facts.
Seth: Yeah.
David: You know, and it's like they are eroding your faith in the Bible, your faith in some of the traditional teachings that you grew up believing in church that was like, well, maybe that's just like a fantasy story, you know?
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it's like maybe you don't go hook, line, and sinker all the way in, you know? Yep. But they have these like deconversion stories or these de-evangelical stories where there's this mass exodus from traditional Orthodox Christian belief and they're kind of like Christian light now, you know, and they kind of just hold moral teachings that the Bible has loosely. They don't really care about the exact divine claims of the Trinity or, you know, things like that. It's like those things just start to erode. And it's like that is the effect that this, this Antichrist teaching can have on people is it can just make you less sure of like if what I grew up being taught is true, right? Which is why John was written to tell you that it is true. Yeah. And like we touched and felt Jesus, we saw his blood spill out, we saw him raised from the dead. The Holy Spirit is telling me that it's true. And if the Holy Spirit is in you, he's telling you that it's true. Like, have assurance. And like, there's so many people I just want to name, like, that my friends that have gone through this, I'm like, friend that I will not name, please let your assurance come back from—
Seth: yeah. And what— and we'll get into this in just a second. And John's prescription for people who are on— in feel uncertain, unknowing, doubting whether God is love. Like, it makes me wonder, like, we have so much talk about God as light and love. If part of the false teaching that came in was saying the God that you grew up with isn't loving, right? Like, it just, it makes me think that. Sure. Like, it just, it's like the God that you used to believe in isn't as enlightened as the God that we're telling you about right now, the one we've discovered that you need to come over to. Like, man, It feels really important.
David: Yeah. Even for this, I mean, our culture has redefined what a loving God would do, you know? And it's like, it's like, I just can't believe in a God who would blank because that's not loving. And I'm like, well, you're saying that love is God, not God is love. And you're redefining everything for yourself.
Seth: Yeah. Or yeah. It's like, so it's like that idea that anyway, yeah, that's all on the table.
David: Yes.
Seth: The book of John.
David: Yes.
Seth: Um, and I, here's what, I was getting at. I was like, um, John's prescription for people who feel uncertain, who feel undone by the accusations and insinuations of their friends and their false teachers, is actually really, really simple. He—
David: it's in—
Seth: I'm just going to go there because we're here. So how do we know that Jesus really is God? He says, okay, well, Jesus came.
David: Right.
Seth: He was sent by God, right? Came. And in 1 John 5, he'll talk about him being sent by water and by blood. He was born and he died. I think those are— right now I'm convinced those are metaphors for birth and death.
David: Oh yeah.
Seth: Like water breaking at birth, the blood shed on the cross, right? Jesus lived and died. He was a real historical human being. And we as the apostles saw it, we touched it, and we felt it. Yep. That's how we know Jesus is God. We saw him be God. We touched him as God. We saw him heal people as God. And the Spirit that lives inside of us tells us that's true.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: How do you know that Jesus is God? That's all you need. Yeah.
David: And well, there's a— there's another one that he talks about all the time. He's like, and look at our lives. They're different. Like, yes, we're obeying the commands of God. We love you. Like, we love our brothers. Like, our lives are different. Yeah. Like, that's proof too.
Seth: Yes.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Yeah, that's exactly right. Right. So like, there's this really— so like, for all the uncertainty, he gives these really concrete things. No, Jesus came. He was a historical person who historically died. We saw him. We touched his resurrected body where our lives were changed by it.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And his spirit now lives inside you telling you that it's true. Right. You do— like, the Antichrist don't have anything on that.
David: Right.
Seth: Like, they're bringing up legitimate criticisms. Sure. But you have something better than the doubt and uncertainty that they're offering you. I think that's like really a powerful, like simple confidence.
David: Yeah. No, I mean, another way to say it is I remember one time I was speaking at a conference and this angry young kid just came up to me after performing and they just said, like, how do you— like, how do you know God is real? Like, how do you know Jesus is who he said he is? You know, all that kind of stuff. And I think it was, how do you know God is real? And I said, and I was like, I believe God's real because Jesus rose from the dead, right? Like, it's like a historical boots on the ground confidence.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it's like, it seems almost too simple, but like, that's how John opens his letter is like, how do you know that, that Jesus is the Son of God? It's because we saw him. He was here. You know, it's like lots of us did lots of— anyway, it's just like, yeah, there's a simplicity and a groundedness. Yeah.
Seth: To John's response.
David: Yeah.
Seth: His apologetic, his apologetic. Yeah. That feels really different in kind than the doubt and uncertainty that the false teachers bring. You see what I'm saying?
David: Oh, definitely.
Seth: The false teachers bring, well, let's redefine the nature, the way that God the Son interact with one another. Let's redefine the way that he interacts with humanity. How did he do that? Let's redefine how sin and righteousness work under certain circumstances. Like, let's redefine as metaphorical or as allegorical the story of the gospel. And it's like, in place of that, like, destabilization, John offers just really concrete, earthy, unimpressive Yes. Truths.
David: Yeah.
Seth: He came.
David: Yeah.
Seth: He died. We saw it. We did stuff.
David: Our lives are changed. The Spirit tells us it's true. Right?
Seth: I'm like, it can't be that simple.
David: Can it, John?
Seth: And I think he'll go, he'll, he'll, we'll talk about all that. Yeah. But like, I love that. And I'm also unsettled by it myself. And like, that doesn't always feel as convincing to me as I just made it sound, but like, that's what he's doing. Yeah. And I kind of want to like rediscover for myself that simple, grounded earthiness of John's apologetic as like a, as a foil against the uncertainty that I experience everywhere else. I want to say one more thing about that before we move on to like major themes within the, within the book. One of the most confusing lines in the book of John is the very last one: "Little children, keep yourselves from idols." Yeah, he hasn't talked about idols. No, here's what he has talked about: false versions of God. Oh, which isn't versions of Christ. Yeah. And so I was like, that helped me tie the whole book together. Like the whole book is actually about idolatry in a different type of way than we're used to thinking. He spiritualizes idolatry. He makes idolatry not a calf that was set up in Israel.
David: Totally.
Seth: He makes it something—
David: any version of Jesus other than the one he encountered.
Seth: Yes.
David: Is an idol.
Seth: I was reading Anne Lamott.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And she said she has this great little quote. She says, if your God hates all the same people you hate, then you're dealing with an idol. Yeah. I was like, What a convicting, like, little line.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And I think that actually goes to the heart of a lot of what's happening here. If your vision of God hates all the same people you hate, has all the same values you value, if your God has all the same doubts and uncertainties that you have, you're probably dealing with an idol and not a historically empirical God.
David: Right.
Seth: Your version of God is actually less stable than the one that was seen, touched, felt by John the apostles and that rose from the dead. Yeah. And I was like that, I want to land there.
David: Antichrists are idolaters.
Seth: Yes. Yeah. Antichrists are offering idols.
David: Yes. Um, that's good.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Yeah.
Seth: So that ties a loop on that.
David: Okay.
Seth: Very good. Let's talk about some main themes, uh, within it. We've hinted at one, the idea of apostolic authority.
David: Oh yes.
Seth: Like John will come back to it multiple times and really it's like, He is an apostle, saw Jesus, touched Jesus, right? Was with Jesus and has been designated to spread that news to others. So maybe let me ask you this question. What is an apostle? Right.
David: I was going to ask you that if you didn't ask me that.
Seth: I got you first.
David: Well, I mean, it means— so the word means sent one and it— and so it kind of—
Seth: presumably by God.
David: Yes.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Presumably by God or by Jesus. Jesus sent the apostles in an earthly ministry, and they were sent by the Holy Spirit after Acts 1 and 2. But then it's also— so it's not— but it's not just an operation, you know, or maybe an office. You know, there's still some many Christian denominations who practice the office of apostle, but that's lowercase a apostle, you know, meaning like they often preside over multiple churches and they kind of—
Seth: or I've heard it used by itinerant preachers, itinerant preachers.
David: But this is what we're talking about here is a capital A apostle, of which there was a limited amount, and they lived during a certain period of time and had been given a certain kind of authority. Paul talks about himself being an apostle unnaturally born, right? Because he was— he didn't see Jesus in the flesh, which is one of the criteria of being an apostle.
Seth: Where do we get that criteria?
David: Yeah, so that comes from Acts 1. And whenever they are— whenever the 11 apostles, right, because Judas has hanged himself at this point, the 11 apostles are like, we need a 12th apostle because we are supposed to be the new 12 tribes of Israel. And that's how God wanted this done. They cast lots because there's only 2 people who meet the criteria that's listed, which are those of us who have seen Jesus live, die, and raise.
Seth: Okay.
David: And so they have to have been people who experienced Jesus in the flesh, dying on the cross and rising from the grave. They have to have seen him in those three states, which is why— and Paul says he's an unnatural born one because he saw him in a vision. He saw the resurrected Christ only. Right. And so he's like, am I— you even see him wrestling with it in some of his letters, like, am I even an apostle? Because I didn't get to know Jesus in his earthly, fleshly life. Right? Yeah. So an apostle is not— but, but again, in Acts 1, the, the other, the other potential apostle who the lot did not fall to wasn't included, even though he did, right? Along with many people, he did experience Jesus in the flesh and in the resurrection. So did a lot of people, hundreds of people. And yet not all of them are apostles. So it's not only those who experienced Jesus in the flesh, in his death and in his resurrection, but it's also those who were called specifically by God to bear this responsibility, this office of apostle.
Seth: And presumably that was just an early church planter, right? No, that was like—
David: I would say it was, it was somebody because there's a whole bunch of churches planted by random people.
Seth: That's right. Yep. There was something special about the 12 disciples that became the 12 apostles. Yes. Specific authority. Or in Paul. Yes. You know. Yeah.
David: So these are, yeah, people, these are like a very limited number of people given a specific authority over the early church. Yeah. Yeah. And then it grew and there were elders and, you know, local church government and everything like that. And then went with the— and, you know, this is a— this is a contested issue. But with the finalization of the canon of Scripture, we have the apostolic witness now, right, in our Bibles.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And that witness like fulfills the apostolic ministry of correcting, rebuking, training, you know, warning, you know, all that kind of stuff is what the apostles did. And now we all have the apostolic ministry and authority in our lives, not through new people, but through the preserved word in the New Testament.
Seth: There you go.
David: There's my spiel on apostleship.
Seth: Apostleship. And which is really all that to say, which is this is why 1 John 1:1 opens with, "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and we have touched with our hands concerning the word of life." It is like he is drawing on his apostolic witness, his apostolic authority to speak to these people who are confused, uncertain, and doubting. And he is saying, "Hey, don't doubt too much. I have seen them. I have touched them. I have been there." He's pulling on that and he does it often enough throughout the letter. That's really important to name because I don't know if there's another book of the Bible that does it like John does.
David: Mm.
David: Yeah.
Seth: You know?
David: Yeah.
David: Yeah. That appeals to that earthly, like, yeah, like fleshliness of the witness. Because I think, you know, you have Paul appeals to his apostleship a lot, but as a, as a one called by God.
Seth: Yes.
David: Right. But not right. But not. As one who walked with him. Yeah, that's, that is, that's true. That's very unique to, to 1 John. Yeah, I haven't thought about that.
Seth: Yeah. And I, and I think, and I, the only thing I can make of that right now is kind of the theme we've been tracing here is of like the doubt and uncertainty fostered by these antichrists compared to the cert— rock-solid certainty of something that I've actually touched and held and hugged and laid next to.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Yeah. That's We're just really powerful. Yes, absolutely. So that is a theme running throughout it.
David: Okay.
Seth: The other two major themes are famous phrases that God is light and that God is love. Okay. So God is light is, um, in the beginning, 1 John 1:5. This is the message. This is the apostolic message.
David: Yes.
Seth: This is John.
David: We hung out with Jesus. And this is his message.
Seth: We have heard from him and proclaim to you that God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all. Yeah. Which one? What is this? Not the way that I would have summed up Jesus's ministry. You know, it's like, here's the message, right, that I received from God. God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all.
David: Right.
Seth: I'm assuming you're pulling up John 1. John read that. So have that in your mind and read John 1.
David: Yes. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. Here we go. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not— to use another 1 John word— overcome it. And so John is talking about here how Jesus is God himself, the light of the world, that God— that Jesus calls himself in John, the creative power of the world. That's right.
Seth: Yeah.
David: He is the creator who shines light into everything. And in him there is no darkness at all. Yeah. And that there is darkness in the world and his light has overcome that darkness.
Seth: Right.
David: The darkness of sin and the devil.
Seth: Yeah, that's right.
David: Which 1 John will unpack at length.
Seth: Yeah, the— he like, uh, the way that John will embody the uncertainty of these— this little flock is to call what they're experiencing darkness around them, uh, and to call it—
David: yeah, call it darkness of the devil, Antichrist, and then to remind them that Jesus overcame it as the light.
Seth: Yeah. And so the reason why we bring it up now is be— and so like We were struggling with how to talk about this introduction. Yeah. Because it's actually— John is not structured like Paul. Paul's like, A follows B follows C follows D follows E follows F follows G. Yes. Therefore, B equals D, which equals F, and therefore we know Jesus loves us.
David: Yeah.
David: What?
Seth: What?
David: Yeah.
Seth: Um, John, I don't have another word to describe it rather than like circular.
David: Right. Or stacking, I thought was a good metaphor.
Seth: Stacking or layered.
David: Layered. That's what it was. Layered. I, because when you said circular, I was like, I don't quite resonate with that. But when you said layered, that's like, okay, we have light, we have eternal life, we have a witness, we have, we have love, we have all these things right at the beginning. And it's like, okay, I think I get it. And then the next time you come upon that phrase, it's deeper.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it has more context and it's like, oh, so I think he operates in layers. He says, he says it once. And then he kind of repeats it, which is the cyclical thing you're getting at here. But as he goes through it again, it deepens.
Seth: So what we normally do in these intro podcasts, like, the main theme of this book is that God is light, right? We kind of give you a thematic run-through of the book. But if we did that now, we'd actually undercut what John is trying to do.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And like, in the process, over time, as you read it.
David: Yeah.
Seth: So we just kind of wanted to flag it as like, this is one of the major themes. And what he'll do is he'll stack, he'll layer. Yes, he'll come back round two. He'll unwind it a little bit. He'll add a clarifying comment. He'll say what he doesn't mean. And the idea is that you keep coming back to this one truth over and over again and receive encouragement from it. Yeah, that God is like that.
David: Jesus, to say even more specifically for John here, that Jesus is the perfect creative God in whom there is no darkness and who overcomes all darkness. You know, like, there's, there's a lot there. Okay, so God is light. God is also love. Yes, this comes from John 4:7-12, one of the most famous verses in the Bible, right? God is love.
Seth: God is love. Yeah. Yeah. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not love God, because God is love.
David: Love.
Seth: And in this, the love of God was made manifest among us, right? That God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. And this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins, right? Yeah.
David: So it's like, okay, God is love. What— define it. What does that mean? Love in— for John, love means Jesus dying for us on the cross. Yes. God sending his Son to die for us on the cross before we loved him, before we loved him, while we were his enemies. Not that we loved him first, but he loved us first and died for us. That is love.
Seth: That is love. And he circles back to the implications of that throughout his letter. And what— it's kind of weird, actually. That's like his summary statement of love. And he mentions love multiple other times before he gets there.
David: Right.
Seth: So you've been like skirting around the edges of how light and love work together. And then right at the end you get this bomb drop. God is love and he loves us in this, that he sent his son to die for us.
David: Right.
Seth: Before we loved him.
David: Right. It's so that light could conquer darkness.
Seth: Right.
David: Love could conquer hate. Yes.
Seth: Yes.
David: Yeah.
Seth: So those are the main points of what he's driving at. Apostolic authority. God is light. God is love. And then really, I mean, this is a fourth main point. Those are the three metaphors or the three mechanisms that he uses.
David: Yeah.
Seth: But one of the other major points is that, so be light, walk in the light.
David: Yes.
Seth: Love one another. If you don't love one another, you don't walk in the light.
David: It's since God is light and you have koinonia, fellowship with him, you will be light. Yeah. Since God is love and you have fellowship with him, you will be love. Yes. And those, as we're going to pick it apart as we go through, are so intricately connected.
Seth: Yeah.
David: You know, I think another, another theme, or maybe I'll call it a bookend.
Seth: Okay.
David: Is Jesus is the eternal life is another title that's given to Jesus because apparently there was something about how to get eternal life or something in the false teachers, in the antichrists that was on the line.
Seth: Well, what is a messiah? What is a Christ? Christ, Messiah.
David: Right.
Seth: Saves you from something.
David: Yes, that's right.
Seth: You have to have a version of salvation.
David: Salvation. Right. So how do you get salvation?
Seth: Yeah.
David: How do you get eternal life? Which is a Johannine, you know, John's way of talking about salvation. He talks about it in John 3:16, right? For God so loved the world, right? He talks about so that we might have eternal life. It's Johannine way of talking about salvation.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so he says Jesus in himself as the light is eternal life. It's like, what is eternal life? Well, it's wrapped up in God. God is the only eternal Right?
Seth: Yes.
David: He was from eternity past. So was Jesus.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so— but now when you've put your faith in him, your belief in him, you now have him inside of you, and therefore you have eternal life.
Seth: And think about the ways that eternal life and eternal light parallel one another. You have light coming from like the blackness before time.
David: Yes.
Seth: Shining into a world, causing life. And then that light stretches back into eternity like he's playing with all the same images, stacking them on top of each other. And the reason why we're like just naming them without going into them is because part of the joy of the book of these letters of John is kind of like discovering them in process as you read them, layering them for yourself, understanding them for yourself, um, as you move on, because he is paralleling these ideas over the top of one another so that you make these connections.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Um, so we're naming them so that when you go this week and read all of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John, because it should take you like 20 minutes. Yeah, that you can start to see these things for yourselves before you listen to our next podcast, which you of course religiously do, right?
David: Yeah. I think a good way to like wind down would be to like land on some good news here, which is like, okay, if you're feeling discouraged, unsure, doubting your salvation, feeling condemned for your sin, you know, all these things, it's like without getting into too much of the details of 1 John, something we've landed on here is faith in an idol version of Jesus, right? A version of Jesus that's an idol.
Seth: A version of Jesus that agrees with you on everything.
David: Right. Or a version of Jesus that's just like, didn't die for your sins, right? That's not actually God, you know, who didn't actually live the life you should have lived, died the death you should have died, was risen to life like you will, you know, like any part of that Jesus that gets eroded you no longer have good news, you know? And that's why your faith is languishing, is because like your faith is in an idol.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so like, I would just encourage you to like, man, fix your eyes upon Jesus, the Jesus who came and who was touched and who touched others and who lived perfectly and who actually bled and died and bore the wrath of God on your behalf and rose to life guaranteeing that he will raise you to life one day, that he has overcome the world, he has overcome sin, he has overcome the devil, like he has overcome death. Like, that is the Jesus that will offer assurance and confidence to you. And it's a Jesus that you can know, to use a very Johannine word, right?
Seth: Yeah.
David: I wrote these things so that you may know. And it's like John wants to give you confidence. Yeah. But not in yourself or anything else. Confidence in who Jesus is and what Jesus did.
Seth: I've been thinking recently about how incredibly complicated it seems to be to obey God consistently.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And I'm just kind of overwhelmed by it. Like when I think about all the different areas of my life that I'm being a person and the ways that they overlap with one another, or the— my space in a society that I don't agree with. Or like I was reading an article about whether or not we should have reparations.
David: Right.
Seth: And I was like, I don't even know what I think about this right now, but I feel so undone by the complexities of it. I just don't even know what obedience actually means anymore.
David: And what I—
Seth: I'll go back to like the same earthy simplicity of like the message of John. Hey, Jesus came.
David: We saw him.
Seth: Our lives are changed, and his Spirit will tell you that. And how do you know what your life should look like? Well, do you believe that Jesus came? Do you believe that Jesus rose? Do you love doing what he commands? And do you love others? Man, that's, that's it.
David: That's it. You're okay.
Seth: Do you believe Jesus? Do you obey Jesus? Yeah. Do you love others? Yeah. Like, man, that feels like refreshingly simple. Yeah. For a world that feels as complicated as mine.
David: Totally. I mean, and like, not to steal Jon's thunder later, but he will talk about how, how do you overcome the world with all of its complexity, all of its sin, its problems, its mires, its pits, right?
Seth: How?
David: By faith. Yeah. By believing that Jesus is the sent one from God who saves us from our sins. That's how we overcome. And it's like, Jon, it's too simple. It's like, yeah, but we need simple. Yeah, because everything is so complex. Like, we really, really need a simple salvation. And so I think John offers us that.
Seth: I sat down feeling like, um, oh, here it is: whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our hearts. Yeah, it's like that simple truth. It's like, I— my heart condemns me all the time. Yeah, all the time, right? And I always have new things to feel condemned about. Because the internet, because— because you are still alive, because I'm still alive, because I failed at being a dad, whatever it is. I find new ways to condemn myself most daily. Yeah, but God is greater than my heart. Yeah, and he came. Yeah, he died for me, and he wants me to obey him and love others.
David: Yep, and that is the simple good news that John has bringing us today. So I'm excited to dive in the rest of this book with you, Seth, and with everybody listening. So go read 1 John, it doesn't take long. Read 2 John, it doesn't take long. 3 John takes even less.
Seth: It's the shortest book in the New Testament.
David: I think so.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Yeah. And so 12 words.
David: Yeah.
David: So anyway, all, thank you so much for being with us. And we're looking forward to going through the letters of John with you. So be blessed and we'll see you next week.
Seth: See ya.
Outro: Thank you for listening to the Spoken Gospel Podcast. Spoken Gospel creates short films, devotionals, and podcasts like this one. Everything we make is free because of generous supporters like you. To see our resources, visit SpokenGospel.com or subscribe to our YouTube channel. Thanks for listening. See you next week.
