1John 3:15 - On Killing Off Your Brother (or Sister)...

"Every the [one] hating the brother of him a manslayer is."

-Hate = murder.  Murder is murder, but so is hating your brother.  Or sister.  That's how God feels about it.  That's how He sees it.  He cuts us no slack here in the least.  It is the antithesis of life, one who takes life, who extinguishes life.  Opposing and running counter to the ways of the Life-giver.  This is particularly true when that hatred is directed towards a brother.  Who in their right mind would so disrespect their Dad and undermine His family by hating their brother, whose blood and kinship they share?  Exactly.  Cain, that's who.  John just talked about him.  Cain butchered his brother, cut him down in cold blood.  Oh, such sad brokenness, that one would get to the place where they would carry out such a heinous, UN-loving act.  Against a fellow family member.  In the world, you get something like that, you get hate, but things should not, must not be this way in the church.  Not like this.  Not like this.

-And let's think about this.  What is hate?  Because we're not talking about literally terminating another person's life here.  We're not THAT depraved, are we?  No, what we're talking about such intense personal dislike for another person that you terminate the relationship.  They are dead to you.  You kill them off in your heart.  Every time you see them, in fact.  If you see them.  You for sure can't stand them, you go out of your way to avoid them, can't say one nice thing about them, the very sight of them makes you angry and totally quenches the Spirit in your heart.  And meanwhile the Body of Christ is fractured.  No, things should not be this way.  Brother, sister, if this is you, you need Jesus.  If this is me, I need Jesus.  I need Him to intervene.  I need Him to help me begin to see this brother or sister as HE sees them.  Begin to see that they are not the enemy.  They are broken and oh-so-needy (just like me) - but not in need of my murderous glances and bitter avoidance.  No, they need forbearance and forgiveness.  They need love and grace (just like me).  And prayer - prayer not for fire and brimstone to rain down on them from heaven but prayer for mercy and grace, prayer for them the way they would pray for themselves.  They are not my enemy.

-But, there is another hater.  A murderer from the beginning (John 8.44), that one.  The evil one.  He is the enemy of our souls, and of the family of God.  He set out to deceive, yes, but his intentions were surely murderous, to destroy the life and beauty which God had so meticulously crafted.  If he can't steal the glory, he's gonna destroy it.

-But so, hating our brother is tantamount to murder.  And Jesus broadened things still further by including anger and arrogance/disrespect ("you fool") in the list of capital crimes against our fellow family members (Matthew 5.22).  It is a complete contradiction of terms.  How can the life and love of God be in a person who would be so unloving towards another child of God, a brother or sister in the faith?  No such loveless life-taker would have eternal life abiding in them.  It shows that their darkened heart is shut off from God, in utter depravity and deception.  Not in the family.  Now, to be sure, there is room for repentance.  Always.  Come to Jesus today, fall on your knees and beg Him to have mercy on your soul, receive His free offer of forgiveness and eternal life, allow Him to recreate in you a new life and heart of love, love which covers a multitude of sins and missteps and offenses and differences and even the slightest of slights.  But most assuredly, there is no quarter for hate (or anger or disrespect) anywhere in the family of God, not here, not now, not ever...!

1John 3:14 - Mostly dead, true love - and true life!

"We are having come to know that we have passed out of the death into the life, because we are loving the brothers.  The [one] not loving remains in death."

-So, what you get in the world is hate - and death.  Remaining in death.  The default state of the unbelieving heart, this.  Death.  Dead to God, dead to glory and the life that is found in Him, and destined to be separated from Him for all eternity.  Shut off from His Light and goodness and love.  A walking spiritual corpse, for all intensive purposes (real life walking dead - spiritual zombies?).  And for the one who does not love the brethren, they are remaining that way still, still dead in their sins, regardless of what motions they have gone thru, what experiences they have had or what professions they have made.

-Passing out of death and into life.  Think about it.  This is the precise opposite direction of the normal course of the world.  Normally we are all passing from life into death.  The dying walking dead.  Mortal, mostly dead, soon to be fully dead (all too soon).  But Jesus throws the bus in reverse, heading in the exact opposite direction, entirely brand new destination.  Life.  Eternal life.  Whoever believes in Him has eternal life (Jn 5.24).  What we are talking about is a total change of address, of outcome, of identity.  We are talking about passing out of death and into life.  Surely we want to be sure about this.

-This then is the ultimate litmus test.  What you get in the church - or should - is love.  True love!  And life!  John is desperate to hammer home this point, that here is how we know for sure that we are genuine believers, that we have eternal life - because we LOVE the other ones who are following Jesus, not hate.  We're not hating them - or treating them as if we did.  This true love and true life go hand in hand, inseparable.  The true life of God is found and lived out in caring committed community.  Let me say that again - the true life of God is found and lived out in caring committed community!  John puts it in the first person, not pointing any fingers here, looking at our own hearts and lives and asking, do WE love our "fellow" believers in Christ?  Do we, are we living like this, walking in love for our family?  And that is the question, because if I do not love it shows that I do not actually believe.  And I might not be a "fellow" believer after all...

1John 3:13 - On amazing Jesus... And amazing hate, how can it be?

"You [all] do not be marveling, brothers, if hating you the world [is]."

-That which is a marvel or a wonder, amazing, which causes one to marvel or wonder, it causes amazement.  Often we are talking about something marvelous, of wonderous, even miraculous proportions - Jesus calming the storm (Matthew 8.27), casting out demons (Matthew 9.33), healing the sick (Matthew 15.31).  We also see Pilate wondering at the silence of Jesus before his accusers (Matthew 27.14), and Jesus wondering at the faith of the Roman centurion (Matthew 8.10), as well as the hard unbelieving hearts of the Jews (Mark 6.6).  He had given them His best stuff, and still they didn't believe!  Amazing!  Now that would be something, wouldn’t it?  To amaze Jesus?  Lord, please let me be more like the Roman centurion than the unbelieving Jews... What we are seeing here, though, is an encounter with that which is out of the ordinary, something unexpected.  Zacharias’ unexpectedly delaying in the temple (Luke 1.21).  Jesus expiring earlier than Pilate expected (Mark 15.44).  Encountering that which is REALLY unexpected.

-What we don’t really expect is to be hated for following Jesus.  It IS amazing on a certain level that those around us, in the world, would in fact HATE those who are pursuing love and doing what is good and right.  To be sure, HOW we follow does play into it, but THIS you would not expect, to be mistreated for doing good to others, right?  Particularly not in the West, the cradle of Christendom.  Ultimately, regardless of where you live or how you might be following, if/when you begin to name the Name of Jesus, you're gonna get it.  Expect it, John says.  It’s the whole Jesus thing, the Light of the world and darkness hating the Light thing.  Jesus actually told us to expect this - John 15.18.  It was already happening in those days (John 17.14).  It should come as no surprise.  The two millennia of church history are littered with the debris of persecution and martyrdom - the children of the devil hating the children of Light, mistreating them and even killing them, primarily because - by virtue of loving the darkness - they HATE the Light.  Jesus said we are the light of the world.  When we align ourselves with the Light, we become a beacon ourselves, reflecting the very same Light from which those who walk in darkness try to hide.  In their proud unsurrendered rebellion they do not want what they do to be exposed, to be exposed as falling short and missing the mark.  They will reject us and our message.  They WILL hate us.

-Question: is there anyone who hates me?  Not because of how weird I might be or something I did to offend them, but because I am following Jesus?  If not, it is probably fair to ask myself, am I shining the Light?  How much?  How much am I shining the Light around others, towards those who need it?  To what degree am I aligning myself with Jesus, living to make Him famous?  Is it truly loving to dim or otherwise obscure my light to keep from offending eyes accustomed to darkness?  May God give us the grace and wisdom and discernment - and boldness! - to let our (not so) little light shine, like a lighthouse, a beacon of hope (hopefully!) in a dark and stormy sea of darkness.  Come what may...

1John 3:12 - Archetypical Antagonist Extraordinaire

"Not as Cain - out of the evil [one] he was and he slew his brother.  And for the sake of why did he slay him?  Because the works of him were evil but those of his brother [were] righteous."

-NOT as Cain.  The archetypical antagonist extraordinaire.  The quintessential bad example.  Bad boy.  Bad apple?  They usually don't fall far from the tree...  Regardless, Cain did not live into this ideal of loving his brother.  Just the opposite, in fact.  He slew his brother.  Struck him down him in cold blood.  Ugh.  He hated his brother.  John's point is that in failing to LOVE his brother, he thus became the prototypical "child of the devil".  He was not necessarily begotten by the devil in the strict sense, but his parents had sinned, he was born into sin, separated from God in his heart and born to instinctively choose what is not right, and as he grew older he increasingly aligned himself with the prince of this world and with all those who oppose God and what is right.  Indeed, John just gave us the obvious characteristics of children of the evil one - they do not practice righteousness (they don't work hard at it), AND they do not love their brother, and Cain did neither.

-Darkness hates the light, it always has (John 3.20).  Any whose heart is not right [towards God], whose hearts are proud and unsurrendered, are naturally more inclined to hate what is right (esp while my heart insists on staying in that place of proud defiance).  We dislike and disrespect those who try to do what is right, who align themselves with righteousness.  Have you ever noticed that?  Think of all the ways in which the irreligious can tend to disparage [and try to dissuade] those whose heart is to try and do what is right.  Goody-2-shoes.  Do-gooder.  Goody-goody.  Rule-follower.  Self-righteous.  Holier-than-thou.  Sanctimonious.  Pious.  Moralizing.  Hypocritical.  Full of hypocrites.  Totally negative connotations, all.  These folks, are they not simultaneously trying to prop up their own position while trying to tear down these others?  Granted, there is too much sad truth to a charge of hypocrisy in the church - even those who try to practice what is right will continue to fall short.  And of course the way forward is always one of humility.  Often times the best we can do this side of glory is that when we do mess up we try to make it right.  Ours ought not be the way of pretense and pretending that we have it all together.  Far from it.  Aligning ourselves with the light, with Jesus does not mean that we are perfect, only that we are forgiven.

-Though Cain was born into a state of disobedience and separation from the life of God - just like his brother - he had a choice.  And we do not know exactly when he really went away from God in his heart.  His parents had some kind of a relationship with the Lord.  He and his brother were both "raised in the church".  We see them both bringing offerings, at least going thru some motions of worship.  And then we read that God did not accept Cain’s offering (Genesis 4.5).  That passage does not state specifically what was wrong with Cain’s offering per se, but clearly his heart was not fully right.  He responded in anger - towards the Lord AND towards his brother.  It could be that Cain’s heart was not right leading up to this (whereas his bother’s heart was right), or perhaps he fully and finally went away in his heart after this time.  But he was fully a child of the devil before he slew his brother.  Murder did not make him a spiritual monster - that happened before, and is why he eventually did kill his brother.  His anger waxed murderous.  It is interesting to note that Cain, who was exiled because of his deeds, became an object lesson for Israel, a forerunner, if you will, in that Israel - God's "chosen people" - in the days of Jeremiah was guilty of all kinds of unrighteousness, including the shedding of innocent blood, and was similarly facing exile (cf Jeremiah 7.5-7).  And as in the days of Jeremiah, so they were in John's day, in these days of the early church, (so-called) people of God hating their brothers.  Living in anger towards their brothers and sisters.  Friends, Jesus said anger doesn't just lead to murder, it is in fact tantamount to it (Matthew 5.21-22).  It is just as heinous in God's economy, in God's family.  The need of the hour, yes even in our day as well, is for God’s people to LOVE one another, to pursue it!  To forbear with and to forgive one another, to pursue peace and things which make for building up one another, and to pursue righteousness together, no matter the cost.  That's how family should roll.  Surely this is not too difficult for the Lord!  Surely this is what He wants, and what the world needs now.  Surely His grace and His power are more than sufficient...!

1John 3:11 - The What AND The Why Behind It

"Because this is the message which you [all] heard from [the] beginning, in order that we may be loving one another."

-In order that.  This word (it’s a significant single word in the Greek - hina) always speaks to purpose, to result/outcome.  It is the big picture, end-game goal, the why behind the what.  So let's not miss the significance here, when John says, in order that we may be loving one another.  In other words, loving one another is not only the what, it is also the why.  It is what we do, should do, must do, of course.  The new-old command, which John says once more that his readers heard from the beginning.  But here he doesn’t call this a command (aka "the word") as he did in 1John 2.7.  Here he is describing a message, a broader category of teaching, and this whole message was delivered with a purpose in mind, a desired outcome, specifically love.  John elevates this here as the why behind and above all that we do.  It’s a nuanced approach for making his point, a slightly different tack than simply conveying a command to love.  When given as "just" a command, the implicit assumption is that the big picture God has in mind is obedience.  "I’m telling you, love one another, and what I want is for you to obey, to do what I say."  And of course there is nothing wrong with obedience.  Obedience is good - but there's something more, way more.  But when stated like it is here in this verse, the focus is shifted somewhat.  The emphasis is on love.  Love gets just a little more love.  It’s as if the Lord is saying, "This message I’m giving you, I’m giving to you, SO THAT you will love one another.  What I want more than ritual and rote obedience, what I SO want, for you (both individually and corporately) and for the whole world, as well as for the sake of My Name, for My glory, is LOVE, is for My people - YOU - to love one another."  Does that make sense?

-John does restate here that this whole notion of loving one another, it is nothing new.  These believers and really all believers had been hearing this message from the beginning, from the very inception of the church.  The body of Christ and the localized assemblies thereof is to be characterized by love for one another, a family of brothers and sisters who show they are family by their faithful joyful sacrificial love for one another, hilarious generous sharing of their time and their talents and their treasure, their hearts and their lives, children of God who resemble their loving heavenly Father in this one respect as much as anything.  Love one another is more than a command, one of hundreds of such imperatives which we can sort of take a stab at, which we can generally approximate, try to do our best to comply with and hopefully check off our spiritual to-do list at least most the time.  It’s way more than that.  It’s not just one more thing to do.  In the horizontal plane, it is THE thing to do.  This is to be the outcome, it is the desired result of the message which we have heard.  All our hubbub, all our commotion, and programming, and emphases on buildings and tithes and sermons and preachers - the goal of all of this is love (1Timothy 1.5).  THIS is our "BHAG" - Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal.  For all our talk of processes and systems and new strategies - failing here, we fail ultimately.  Love.  This is our so-called widget.  Loving our people, our brothers and sisters in Christ, well.  In order that we may be loving one another...  Let it be so.

1John 3:10 - SPS (not GPS) and The Mother Of All Moves

"In this it is obvious the little child of God and the little child of the devil.  Every the [one] not doing righteousness is not out of God, also the [one] not loving the brother of him."

-John restates his two most salient litmus tests for us here.  So easy to tell them apart, these two groups of people.  Plain and obvious, right out in the open, in plain sight, plain for all to see, plain as the nose on your face, as plain as day.  In the spotlight.  Children, sons and daughters of different fathers.  Polar opposites, in fact - just like their dads.  The proverbial acorn landing not far from the tree at all.  Two ways to tell them apart, these children of God and children of the devil.  The former do what is right, and they love other believers, as a general rule.  And the latter do not.

-Those who would be fairly described as children of the devil do not wind up in that diabolical family in the same manner, however.  In fact, we all start out as "children of the devil", do we not?  There is no seed planted, no faith involved.  We simply grow up walking in those same shoes we were born with, doing what comes naturally, me-first, rejecting God and His truth and His ways.  And His people.  There is no changeover whatsoever.

-And that’s the primary point, isn’t it?  With the children of God, there is a change.  There is this change of mind, a change of heart.  There is a radical change of family.  And a change of address, abandoning the kingdom of this world altogether, and moving into the kingdom of heaven.  Address: heaven.  It's the mother of all moves.  You need to mail out those old change-of-address cards, 'cuz Alice doesn’t live here anymore.  But it’s not about geography, is it?  It’s about where my heart is - and my subsequent behavior.  It’s not where I am physically, it’s not about gps.  Nor is it about circumstances.  This is SPS: spiritual positioning system.  Who I am (becoming) should come oozing out of my spiritual pores regardless of where I find myself.  I (begin to) resemble my (new) heavenly Father.  I (begin to) do what He do, what is right, and I (begin to) love my brother, those others who name the Name of Jesus.  Failing to do these two things, absent this change, it is safe to question whether I am even a child of God to begin with.  Good chance I haven't made that move in my heart.  Thus these two markers give us a pretty good idea of who’s who.  And rather than an exercise in finger-pointing, the best way to proceed with this knowledge is with self-examination.  Take a look at my own life, and take courage or fair warning based on what I see (or don’t see) in me.  How am I doing at doing what is right and at loving my brother?  Is it in me?

1John 3:9 - Guaranteed Seed, and a Divine Cocktail?

"Every the [one] having been begotten out of God sin is not doing, since His seed in him is remaining, and he is not able to be sinning since out of God he has been begotten."

-His seed.  God’s seed.  The ultimate sin-eradicator, this - we know that for sure.  God’s seed resides permanently within the heart and life of a believer, this one who has been born of God.  But commentators are actually quite divided over what John might specifically have in mind here: God’s power.  Or God Himself (His Spirit, or His nature).  Or God’s truth, His Word.  Or a pious (i.e. regenerated) spirit.  Or a general divine principle of life.

-Zooming out, in this letter we see that we who are having believed have multiple things ‘abiding’ in us: the Word of God (1John 2.14), the ‘anointing’ (i.e. Holy Spirit - 1John 2.27), the love of God (1John 3.17), and God Himself (1John 3.24, 4.12-13, 4.15-16).  So it could very well be that the "seed" of God to which John refers here then is not an either/or, nor is it merely a principle per se but rather a combination or sum total thereof, a divine cocktail of sorts - God Himself, His Spirit energizing His Word within our hearts and lives such that there is a new creation, this entirely new quality of life.  That which germinates from this germ, from this seed of God, is like God.  God-like.  Godly.  A seed, by its very definition, is that which develops into another of the same kind (cf Genesis 1.11-12).  God’s seed in us develops divinity, it reproduces a godly life in (and thru) us.  Guaranteed.  Obviously the analogy breaks down at a certain level, inasmuch as the vagaries of actual seed-sowing in the tired, fallen fields of this planet are exacerbated by challenges of conditions of seed and soil as well as those of water and sunlight and temperature.  Meaning, in the physical realm, not every seed which Mary-Mary-quite-contrary sows in her garden actually germinates (germination rates vary from between 40-80% - at least those are the standards set by the "US Federal Seed Act")(not long ago I tried to grow some pine trees from seed, and out of like 36 seeds, only a handful of them germinated, only one is still alive and growing).  But God is the Master Gardener.  His germination rate is 100% - the point being that God’s seed is guaranteed to germinate AND bear fruit springing up to godliness and eternal life.

-Now, John is not going so far as to say that the believer is completely unable to sin (not in this life, at least).  But rather, they are not only able to NOT sin, but they are UNABLE to go on sinning, to continue in it unabated.  Believers will still make mistakes - but they will also make things right when they do (usually sooner if not later).  And sin will be trending down, godliness will be trending up, further up and further in, towards God Himself.  God has permanently planted His seed in this life of a believer, and this seed invariably brings forth a harvest of... Himself.  Of godliness.  Of belief and faith and trust and hope and peace.  Of righteousness.  Doing what is right.  Everyone.  Each and every person who truly trusts in Jesus.  Guaranteed.