IN commencing this Epistle we must be prepared to meet with personal truth-no secrets about heavenly and earthly things, Jews or Gentiles. We do not find these things in John (of course I mean as the Holy Ghost speaks by John). But we have more primary matter; the most intense personality; and this is equally observable in the Gospel of John as in the Epistle.
In the Gospel we find the Son of God, the Saviour, in close contact with the sinner—not the twelve apostles, as such, but Jesus Himself in close intimacy with each sinner. There can be no matter of deeper interest than this. We must have the personal question settled, as a primary thing, before we can look abroad. We must settle our conscience, our own questions, first, and this is the beautiful work that characterizes John’s Gospel. In it we see Jesus with the sinner: in the Epistle, Jesus with the saint, i.e., sinner saved by grace. The woman of Samaria, Nicodemus, the impotent man, the blind man, and other cases in the Gospel, show us this deep personal communication. So, in the Epistles, the Holy Ghost is personal in addressing saints; it is not the Church, but fathers, young men, children, the elect lady, and Gaius; and this personality is beautiful. Suppose the dispensation to be in ruins (as it is), it never puts a cloud on the atmosphere which John breathes, it never can disturb it. It is Christ and you, Christ and the sinner, Christ and the saint.
This same character may be seen in the early chapters of Genesis. We have personal matter until we come to Enoch and Noah; then we have heaven peopled with Enochs, and earth with Noahs. This is dispensational truth, but it is not opened in the first chapters. We must be deeply personal before we can enter on these things. The character of John’s writing is blessedly welcome; it enables saints, though walking apart, to greet one another. There is much difficulty and trouble, and many strange elements abroad, but, when we get into this atmosphere, it is calm as the depths of the sea. Myself and God!
Is there any such consolation? “If the foundations be destroyed” (and Do not you believe they are? I do truly), “What shall the righteous do?” “The Lord’s throne is in heaven!” “The Lord is in His Holy temple.” There I can meet Him. The Lord is not destroyed, “He sitteth above the water-floods,” and there I rest with Him. Not that I am not to recognize the confusion here, and to know where I am, and how I am to behave myself. The Lord Jesus did this in His time. Am I entitled to say this? Yes, by all His life, and especially by Matt. 22. Here the Lord was brought into collision with confusion. Caesar’s coin circulating in Emmanuel’s land was a type of confusion; and how should a Jew behave himself? So they tried to puzzle the Lord. Here is the question; Caesar’s coin is in the land, yet God is the God of Israel! What to do? And this confusion Jesus recognized and met it, as you are to do now. If you say you do not know how, more shame for you. You say you cannot do it like Him. True. But you are told to have His mind: “Let this mind be in you,” &c. He knew how to recognize the claims of Caesar. Many retire from the view, but the duty of the soul is to be with Christ, and to return with Him into confusion, with knowledge, as Gambolt has it—
“Go forth and serve Him, while ‘tis day,
Yet never leave that sweet retreat.”
I must possess the calmness of Him who sits above the water-floods, but while keeping that, I come down and recognize the confusion around, and I know how to behave myself. If I fail in either of these things, I fail in reflecting Christ Jesus. I do not say it is a question of life, but it is of conduct. With these remarks we commence meditating on John’s Epistles.
Here (1 John 1:1-41That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; 2(For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) 3That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. (1 John 1:1‑4)) we are in company with the first chapters of Genesis. God had not shown the heavenlies, but Himself and Adam—the devil and Adam—personal things, and so true.
The Lord was manifested; and mark the august character in which the truth breaks forth, intimating the eternal Sonship. It could never have been written— “That eternal life which was with THE FATHER,” had Jesus been other than the eternal Son. Blessed thought! Could omniscience or omnipotence satisfy my soul? Could glory, even divine glory? I see them all; but what would they be to me without relationship And oh! how blessed, to see it as in heaven, between the Father and the Son! What would even natural life be, if it did not introduce us to relationship? The moment life comes, relationship comes with it, otherwise it would not be worth having. How blessed—yea, how affectionate a thought! And such a thought is brought to you. Could you do without it? Would it suit you to be restored without being related, or can you say you are connected, not related? I will answer for it. You cannot. Divine mystery! Yes, you may say it is a mystery, and that mystery a witness that I am dealing with the unapproachable, the living God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I welcome the mystery; I gaze upon it, but not at a distance; it is brought to be mine— “Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.” It is brought down amongst us, and without the relationship there can be no fullness of joy.
Does it give fullness of joy to be brought back and left outside the door? Will that satisfy you? Do you not yearn after the pulses of a child and the spirit of adoption? No fullness of joy without relationship? To know the Father and the Son is fullness of joy. Where can there be anything more blessed?
In Hebrews and Ephesians we have the conscience perfected, and the heavens opened; but, as one has remarked, there is the difference between Paul and John—that Paul is heavenly, John is divine. Paul speaks of heavenly mysteries, John of divine mysteries.
Verse 5— “This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.”
Here we find our proper place in light (still it is personal truth). This message was a direct contradiction of Satan to Eve. Satan’s lie was—There is nothing but darkness in God. You shall not eat of the tree because you would be like Himself. This was the lie that robbed of life, because it robbed of God. By this lie all was lost to Adam—God, life, Eden. Everything was lost as soon as the lie was listened to. The Lord Jesus appeared as the Repairer of this breach; this and all others. The devil’s lie said, ‘No love or light in God.’ This message says, “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.” The belief of this message is evangelic faith. If I do not walk in the certainty that I have been extricated from the lie of Satan, I do not know God in the light. I allow it is in the nature of the flesh to suspect the truth of God; but are you conscious of life and truth, by which you are extricated from Satan’s lie? In that light you have fellowship with the Father and with the Son?
What was Adam’s fellowship? Was it on the ground of bloodshedding? No, but of innocence. There is none saved but by the blood that cleanses from all sin. Adam’s fellowship (as a creature) continued as long as his innocence. We know not the time, nor does it matter. Now, if we have such a thought as returning to communion by innocence, there is not a fragment of truth in us, not a ray of light. We must take our title from this substratum— ‘poor sinners’ —if we would walk in light and life.
Nothing can be grander, but the blood of Christ is the foundation—grand consideration, magnificent prerogative, to walk in the light as He is in the light. And now, how to conduct ourselves-how in confusion—how in communion on the calm and settled foundation of the blood of Christ. Do you call it a severe task? A blessed task! Shame if it is not! There is relief and there is a remedy for mistakes, but we should know how to behave ourselves.
Some speak of “sinless perfection.” If I do so, I know not what I am. Sinlessness is for heaven, not for faith. Sinlessness for heaven; struggles now. The third of Philippians gives us that. Paul has Christ as his perfection, and he himself is struggling up-hill. We shall have sinlessness in resurrection, till then conflict. I do not charge this doctrine, in its consequences, on the proposers of it, but, if proposed to me, I detest the very thought of it. What am I to do with sin? To confess it. “He is faithful and just,” that is faithful and just to the blood and intercession of Christ “to forgive us our sin.” I am left judicially without a speck. Is there a return to innocency? No, I deny it. Innocency is not the ground of my communion, nor is sinlessness the power of it.
Can we, then, say the blood gives license to the lusts? Could a saint say so? When Adam sinned he lost everything. If the saint sins he has an Advocate; and is God afraid to commit you to such principles? Dare you take advantage of them? The Lord resents such a thought” Use not liberty as an occasion to the flesh.” It is a wonderful calling. If I sin I am not turned out; I have an Advocate. It is a “high calling”—not alone in Christ Jesus, but in the Son of the Father. We do not find the “Messiah” in John, but the “Son,” whose commission is from the Father’s bosom. Matthew gives us the Messiah whose mission was from the throne to Israel. The Father can place the child in full communion, varied light, whose rays sparkle every way.
Chapter 2:1, 2— “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the whole world.” Here we have the Lamb of God for the sin of the world; and the advocate for the sin of saints, in Jesus Christ the righteous. No pardon but on such grounds. God cannot give up His righteousness for your salvation. Never! It all rests on the Righteous One. In that great propitiation is contained the righteousness of the throne of God; and this is a matter between my Father and myself. Not learning secrets of dispensations, but alone in company with Him, with whom every question is settled forever. When He is satisfied, it is high time you should be so. When God has taken it into His hands to reconcile sinners to Himself, it is high time for sinners to be satisfied. God has done it, let Christ look to it. Blessed to be able to say, Lord, Thou shalt answer for me!