“And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us: and if we know that He hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him. If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it. All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a sin not unto death. We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not. And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness. And we know that the Son of God is come, and path given us an understanding, that we may know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life. Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen” (1 John 5:14-21).
We have traced our way along from chapter one, and have noticed how marvelously God has come out in grace in the Person of His own blessed Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, how fully the sin-question has been settled, how completely the believer is purged from every stain and fitted for the immediate presence of God. We have seen how those who put their trust in Christ are brought out from under Satanic domination, are regenerated by the Spirit and the Word, and brought into the family of God, and how in this family there is growth as one becomes better acquainted with the Lord and better acquainted with the Word, so that the child of God moves on from day to day, week to week, month to month, and year to year, from spiritual childhood to spiritual manhood, and eventually fatherhood. We have noticed too how the two natures are still in the believer, but how the Spirit of God gives us power to act in the new nature and be preserved from sin, how the love of God has been fully manifested in the cross of Christ, perfect love triumphing over all evil and over all sin and iniquity, casting out all our fear, and giving us boldness in view of judgment.
We have listened to the warnings of the Holy Spirit to beware of by-paths and false teachings, that would destroy our fellowship with God and hide the glory of the Saviour’s face. We have seen how assurance comes through the Word, through believing the message that God has sent; but, on the other hand, how upon believing we have an inward assurance based upon what the Holy Spirit has wrought within, so that now we love the brethren and delight in obedience to the commands of God. We who were once hateful and loved our own way and found the teachings of God’s Word distasteful, have now the witness within that we have been accepted in Christ because our hope, our confidence, is based upon His finished work.
And now in these closing verses we have first a word as to the confidence of faith, of prayers heard and answered, and then a message as to those who sin unto death, and finally, in verse 18 to 21, the apostle epitomizes the teaching of the entire epistle.
In verse 14 and 15 we read, “This is the confidence that we have in Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us: and if we know that He hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him.” The ordinary word for confidence in the New Testament is the same Greek word as is generally translated faith, but the word used here is a different one. The apostle is not simply saying, “This is the faith that we have in Him,” or, “This is the trust that we have in Him,” but he uses a word that literally means boldness: “This is the boldness that we have in Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us.”
What, a bold thing it is for a man or a woman once a poor sinner condemned to die under the judgment of God, but now redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, to dare to come into the presence of the infinite God, bringing the petitions that His Holy Spirit presses upon his heart and knowing that if he brings these to Him, inasmuch as they are in accordance with His will, “He heareth us.” This is a boldness that the world cannot understand. Men and women who do not know Christ ask, “Do you think that your puny prayers, your petitions, are going to change the mind of Divine Omnipotence, and that God, the Infinite, is going to wait upon your pleadings, a poor finite creature so small that you are but as the dust of the balance in His sight?” Abraham felt something like that, and yet boldly came unto God and said, “O God, suffer Thy servant to speak to Thee, though he be but dust and ashes before Thee.” And because he came in faith and in accordance with the will of God, his prayer was heard. So today we who know Him as our Saviour have this boldness, so we come to Him knowing that, “If we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us.”
You may say, “Well, how do you know whether your petition is in accordance with His will?” That is a very important question. A prayer to be in accordance with the will of God must first of all be in accordance with the Word of God. I might pray, and pray earnestly, but my pleadings would never be heard if contrary to the Word of God. But then on the other hand I might even pray in accordance with the Word of God, but if I am not living in the will of God my prayer still goes unanswered, for, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me” (Psa. 66:18). We read, “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you” (John 15:7). Under such circumstances, God’s will becomes our will, and so as we ask according to His will, we know He heareth us. “And if we know that He hear us, whatsoever we ask (that is, of course, whatsoever we ask in accordance with His will), we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him.”
We may not get the answer to our ‘petitions immediately, we may not see our prayers answered on the moment, but if in accordance with the will of God, if in fellowship with God as we bring the petition, we may be definitely assured that He has heard and has answered, and that sometime, somewhere, we shall see the answer. Of course, we have to remember our human limitations, for we do not know always what is wise or best, and therefore we must be prepared to find that the answer sometimes comes in a way we least expect it.
We remember the incident of the Christian man who was the only one saved from a wrecked vessel after a storm at sea. He found himself cast upon a little island, and by great effort got certain materials together and managed to make a little shelter from the equatorial storms. He waited day after day praying God to send a ship to succor him, and he used to go down to the shore of the little island and wave a signal, just a piece of his clothing, every time he saw a ship passing in the distance, but some way or another they never saw him. One day as he was cooking his dinner, he beheld a ship some distance away and hurried to the shore, earnestly praying that this time they might see and come to his relief. He waved frantically, but they went by, until at last the little vessel was almost lost to sight. Then turning to plod his way back to his little hut he was astonished to see that it had burst into flames. He had left some embers, and the wind had set the place on fire. Everything burned, and then when at last he stood there utterly distressed, not knowing where he would be able to gather sufficient material to build another shelter, to his amazement he saw that the vessel was headed right for the island. As they neared the shore they sent a little boat for him and took him on board. He asked, “Did you see my signal?” “Your signal!” they said; “Yes, we saw your smoke, and so we came to rescue you.” God had answered prayer, but not at all in the way he expected it, and so, some day when we get home to heaven, we shall see that many of the prayers we thought God had not heard were answered in His own wonderful way.
In this connection, I do not doubt that the thought will come to many minds, “What of faith healing? May I not pray for the sick, and will they not be healed?” Yes, if it be His will. But sometimes it is not. However, many will say, “Our blessed Lord is ‘the same yesterday, and today, and forever’ (Heb. 13:8), and when on earth He healed all the sick that came. Therefore, we are assured that when those who are sick cry to Him or call their brethren in to pray, they will be healed.” Of course, He is an unchanging Saviour, but His methods are not always the same. When He was here on earth He raised the dead, but He is not raising the dead now. However, He is the same Jesus, and by and by when He returns, He will raise the dead and prove that His power is just the same. But now we have to wait upon Him in regard to questions of physical healing.
So in verse 16 we read, “If any man, see his brother—referring to a child of God—sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death.” The implication clearly is that sometimes—not always, but sometimes—sickness comes to children of God as divine chastening, as a means of correction and discipline because of waywardness. Sometimes the discipline has the desired effect in the spiritual restoration of the one who had failed and the body is healed also, but at other times it does not seem to be the will of God to raise up the disciplined one and put him in the place of testing again, and so we read, “There is sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.” Of course it is physical death that is in question. He is not speaking of eternal death: he is not speaking of the soul, but of the death of the body under divine discipline. I think the indefinite article in this part of the verse might better be omitted. It is not that there is some specific sin that always results in death, but there is sin unto death.
Moses and Aaron sinned unto death when they became angry with the children of Israel and smote the rock in indignation, instead of speaking to it as they had been commanded, and the Lord said, “Because ye believed Me not, to sanctify Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them” (Num. 20:12). Now there came almost immediate restoration. Moses besought the Lord that He would forgive him and permit him to enter the land, but the Lord said, “Speak no more unto Me of this matter.” Moses had sinned unto death. If today every time Christians got angry they sinned unto death, how few of us would be here! I am afraid every one of us, unless there are some exceptionally sweet-dispositioned people here, would be at home in heaven. God would not have trusted us any longer. Why was He so severe with Moses? Moses was one who spoke with God face to face, and the greater the privilege the greater the responsibility. Do not forget that.
Turning to the New Testament, we find the Spirit of God was working in great power in the early Church, and among the professed converts were two, Ananias and Sapphira, upon whose eternal state we are not called to decide inasmuch as Scripture does not pronounce upon it. They sinned against the Holy Ghost in pretending to a devotedness that they did not possess, and when they were faced with the sin, they told a lie. The result was that first Ananias and then Sapphira his wife fell down dead. They had sinned unto death. If God were dealing with all Christians that way now, how many of us would be here? How many Christians are there who have never pretended to a devotedness that they did not possess? How many Christians are there who have never permitted others to think that they were holier than they really are? And is there a Christian here who has not sometimes so forgotten what should characterize the believer that he has been guilty of a lie? You say, “Oh, but we bitterly repented?’ But, you see, for Ananias and Sapphira there was no restoration to a place of trust and confidence on earth. They had sinned unto death when they pretended to be more spiritual than they were, and when they lied concerning it.
We find another incident in the First Corinthian epistle. There was a great deal of laxity and carelessness of behavior at Corinth when they gathered together to take what we call today the communion, to observe the Lord’s Supper; and because of the laxity, because of the carelessness that marked them, the apostle by the Holy Spirit writes like this: “For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep” (1 Cor. 11:30), or are dead. Sleep is the term he uses throughout that letter for the believer’s death. If every time a Christian took the bread and cup at the communion table carelessly God were to visit with temporal death, how often tragedy would follow the observance of the Lord’s Supper! So we cannot say of any particular sin that it is the sin unto death, but we say rather that there is sin unto death. God gives His people opportunity after opportunity, but if at last they deliberately go on refusing obedience to His Word, He says, “Now I am going to take you home; I won’t trust you in the world any longer. I will deal with you at the judgment-seat of Christ.”
I can look back on my own childhood and remember a group of children playing in the evening, and by and by there would be a quarrel, for children so readily change from having a good time to fussing with one another. A mother would appear in the doorway calling one of her own, “Here, what does this mean? You behave yourself.”
“Yes, Mother. I will try to do better.”
“Well, if you don’t, you will have to come in.”
And in a little while there is a fuss again, and again angry voices raised. Once more Mother’s voice, “You come inside.”
“Oh, Mother, I forgot myself. We are in the midst of a game. I will promise to be good.” “Very well, but you be careful.”
The game goes on, and then once more a fuss, and the mother’s voice says, “Now you come in.” “But Mother—.”
“Not another word; you come inside.”
“But, Mother, I will try to behave myself.” “No, I can’t trust you any more tonight; come inside.”
When inside maybe something takes place that we had better not speak of.
So with God and His children down here in this world. He gives them so many chances, He is so wonderfully gracious; and after a failure they repent and say, “Now I have learned my lesson.” Perhaps a little later the same thing occurs, and then God says, “Now I am going to lay My hand upon you.” Perhaps there is, a long siege of illness, and they have an opportunity to bring it all to God in sincere confession, but the Lord says, “You have sinned unto death; I am going to take you home.”
I once knew a splendid young man who left his home in obedience to what he believed to be the call of God to engage in Christian work in a needy district. He had not been there long before a proposition for a very good temporal position came between him and the Lord. Then too the young woman whom he desired to marry declared that she would never marry a preacher, and so he decided to take the position. He settled down, made money, and got ahead, but inwardly was always very unhappy. He knew that he had sinned against the Lord because he had been called to a different service. By and by tuberculosis laid hold of him. He gave up his position and spent the earnings of years in a sanitarium, where he lay flat on his back. I was near by, and he sent for me and said, “My brother, I want you to pray with me, but not that the Lord will raise me up, unless He should make it very clear to you that it is His will. I have been facing a great many things here lately. I see my failure now as never before. I believe I have sinned unto death.” I looked to the Lord asking, if it was His will, to lift him up, but if not, to give him great joy in departing. Two weeks later I saw him again and he said, “I will never see you on earth again. I have had two very wonderful weeks. The Lord has been very near to me, but He has told me that He is going to take me home, that I lost my opportunity, and that inasmuch as I chose my own comfort instead of His will He can’t trust me here any more. But, thank God, I am perfectly resigned to His will. I am going home!” And, sure enough, three days later he died. He had sinned unto death, and it was useless to pray for his healing, but he went home happy in Christ.
“All unrighteousness is sin and there is sin not unto death.” All unrighteousness is sin and is therefore distasteful to God, but there are certain circumstances that do not make conditions quite so serious as others.
In verse 18 to 21 we have the epitome of all that has gone before, and this section is divided into three parts. Each one is introduced by the expression, “We know.” This word translated know really means an inward knowledge, not merely that we know because we have read it, have heard it, or because some one has told us, but we know because of an inward assurance that has come to us. So John says, “We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not”— doth not practice sin. “But he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not.” This is just another way of saying that the child of God, having received a new nature, even though he does fall into sin, has an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and the accuser of the brethren will not be permitted to lay one charge against him, for he is in the hands of his own Father who will deal with him about his failures.
And then in the next instance we read, “And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.” This is sometimes translated, “The whole world lieth in the wicked one.” Somebody may say, “What assumption for a little group of Christian people in a great city to say that they have the inward knowledge, the absolute assurance, that they are of God, and that the whole world lieth in the wicked one!” Yes, it may seem like assumption to men who do not know God, but there is a reality about it that cannot be explained to the world.
Take a young Christian, for instance, who has but lately come to Christ, who is faced by the specious arguments of atheists, agnostics, and other unbelievers. He finds that he is unable to answer their questions, and they say, “Well, you see we have riddled your notions and proven to you that you are all wrong and that God never spoke to men.” I have seen these young believers look them full in the face and say, “I cannot answer you, but I know that I have passed from death unto life.” I have seen many a man who had lived a life of sin, now transformed by grace divine, and when people said, “Explain it,” he would say, “I can’t explain it.” “Well, then,” they would say, “we can’t believe, because it is contrary to certain laws, and if you can’t show that it is in harmony with these laws, we have to reject it as simply the notions of an overwrought brain.” “You may think me crazy if you will,” would come the answer; “I cannot explain it. But one thing I know, whereas I was blind now I see, whereas I was once the victim of sinful habits that were wrecking and ruining my life, now I have found liberty in Christ Jesus.” Explain that if you can. Every believer as he walks with God has this blessed inward knowledge. The only believer who loses it is the one who is disobedient to God. He loses the sense of this hallowed assurance, but when he comes back to God, makes a frank confession of his failure and is restored, he has once more this blessed inward knowledge by the Holy Spirit.
Then we read, “And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.” Of course John could speak from actual knowledge, for he had leaned upon the breast of the Lord, he had walked with Him for all those wonderful years, he had heard the message proceeding out of His mouth, and he had seen His works of power. You may say, “But we have no such evidence.” True, but we know nevertheless, for He has revealed Himself to us in His blessed Word. Blessed relationship, divine life, the same life that is manifested in all its fullness in Christ, partaken of by every believer. So, “we are in Him that is true.”
Having spoken of our Lord Jesus, John immediately adds, “This is the true God, and eternal life.” Who is the true God? Jesus Christ our Lord. “This is the true God, and eternal life.” Eternal life is seen personally in Christ and communicated by Christ to those who believe in Him.
Now we have the closing exhortation, and though brief, what an important one it is! “Little children, keep yourselves from idols.” Anything that comes in between your soul and the path of obedience to God is an idol, and sometimes God has to come and take these idols away from us in a way that seems very hard, and we may even charge Him with being cruel, but it is in order that Christ may have His rightful place, that our hearts may be entirely devoted to Him. “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.” And mark, of Jesus Christ we read, “This is the true God;” therefore any god other than the God revealed in Jesus Christ is just an idol. In Christ alone God is fully made known.