Limapela Education Project
Faith in Action
This project aims to provide quality education to children in Zambia's Copperbelt Province.
The Christian message not only reveals truth. It also challenges how we live. In this address on the first letter of John, given at Greyfriars' Classical Service on 2 July 2006, Rob Yule talks about John's emphasis on putting things right as the key to knowing God and having close relationships with other people. He then explains how Jesus died on the cross to atone for our sins, and how we can put things right with God and with one another.
The Christian faith is first and foremost about truth. The beginning of the first letter of John emphasises that God exists and has made himself known to us. 'The Word of life... which was with the Father has appeared to us.' (1 John 1:1-2). Christianity makes a claim about reality. God exists and has revealed himself to us.
But Christianity isn’t just about truth. It's also about life. It makes a claim about how we should live. It isn't only about reality - what we believe. It's also about morality - how we behave. Christianity challenges how we live. Christianity is a lifestyle, a way of life.
The main reason people reject Christianity isn't because of its truth claims and its intellectual cogency. It's because it makes a claim on how we live. There are plenty of self-help religions that make no demands on how we live. But Christianity is different. If God exists, then he makes an ultimate claim on your life, and you have to give up your independence and selfishness to follow his way.
In this passage John moves from reality to morality. He talks about sorting out our lives: how we can put our lives right and restore right relationships and attitudes. His central challenge is turning from darkness and 'walking in the light.'
First he says that to have fellowship with God we must walk in the light. This is because 'God is light; in him is no darkness at all.' (1 John 1:5).
God is holy. God is good. God is utterly pure. God’s character is perfect and without blemish. There is no evil in God. So, to have fellowship with God, we must give up wrongdoing, live holy lives, seek unblemished character.
This is a consistent theme of the Bible, however much today’s liberal theologians try to dilute it. The Book of Leviticus says, 'Be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy.' (Leviticus 19:2). The prophet Habakkuk says, God's 'eyes are too pure to look on evil' (Habakkuk 1:13). And Job 4 – the scariest passage in the Bible! – imagines a spirit gliding past a sleeping face, the person's hair standing on end, and a voice saying, 'Can a mortal be more righteous than God? Can human beings be more pure than their Maker?' (Job 4:12-17).
If God seems distant, guess who moved!
As John puts it, 'If we claim to have fellowship with God, yet walk in darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son purifies us from all sin' (1 John 1:6-7). To have fellowship with God, we must come out of darkness, give up wrong and unhelpful ways of living, and walk in the light.
Secondly, John says that to have fellowship with one another we must walk in the light. Keeping right relationships, not just with God, but with one another, means that we must be open, straightforward, trusting, transparent with one another. This is important in human relationships – so often there is backbiting in churches and businesses, in politics and public life, in homes and marriages.
'If we walk in the light,' John says, 'as God is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.' (1 John 1:7). Walking in the light is not criticizing, undermining, or deceiving one another. It is being open to one another, encouraging one another, putting things right when we have wronged someone, confessing our faults to one another, not holding grudges, keeping right relationships with one another.
Jesus taught this in the Sermon on the Mount. He said, 'If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift.' (Matthew 5:23-24). Our relationships with one another are so important that they take precedence over religious duty. If you need to put things right with someone, you should do it straight away.
What is 'walking in the light'? Since John lays such great emphasis on walking in the light, we need to be clear what it is. John says that to walk in the light you must ...
Some people's worldview doesn’t allow them to admit sin, or even acknowledge its existence. Many popular notions assume that human beings are faultless and blameless, and that society is the cause of all our ills.
This won't do. The Bible says there's a warp in human nature, a bias towards evil, and we're kidding ourselves if we deny it. 'If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.' (1 John 1:8).
Take just one example: the internet. The World Wide Web is only 16 years old. It wasn't a Garden of Eden for very long. For all its benefits already it's a playground of crooks, cheats, con-artists, criminals, thieves, spammers, virus writers, malware manufacturers, mayhem makers, hucksters of flakey products, hawkers of depravity.
The Bible says the first step in overcoming sin is admitting its presence and persistence. 'Those who conceal their sins do not prosper, but those who confess and renounce them find mercy.' (Proverbs 28:13)
God’s primary purpose is that we shouldn’t sin.
Some people use God’s forgiveness as an excuse to keep on sinning. Voltaire said, 'God will forgive me. It is his trade.' That's not on. This passage specifically says that God's purpose is that we should not sin. 'I write this to you so that you will not sin.' (1 John 2:1).
God puts a fence at the top of the cliff, and on it is a sign:
'Crumbling cliff face.
Do not go beyond this point.'
We must avoid sin. Don't misuse God's mercy and offer of forgiveness as an excuse for continuing to do wrong. Avoid it.
But if you have sinned, the Bible says there is hope for us. 'My dear children,' says John tenderly, 'I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defence - Jesus Christ the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.' (1 John 2:1-2).
God's moral law, his commandments, are the fence at the top of the cliff. But for those who have sinned, there is an ambulance at the bottom. It has a red cross marked on it. The cross is the atoning sacrifice of God's Son Jesus Christ.
When Jesus died on the cross he made a universal sacrifice to atone for the sins of every person who has ever lived, and ever will live. The Bible says,
'He was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.
We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.’
(Isaiah 53:5-6).
God doesn’t want anyone to sin. But for those of us who have sinned, or who are caught in the grip of sin, there is mercy at the cross of Jesus. When Bunyan's pilgrim, struggling with the heavy burden of his sin and guilt, came to the cross, the pack fell from his shoulders and rolled down the hill. The burden fell away, and his conscience was free and light.
If you would be free from your burden of sin, come to the cross, confess your sins. To confess means to admit your sin and turn from it. It means saying sorry, stopping doing it, giving it up, and walking from now on in God's light.
Rob Yule, 2 July 2006
© 2006, Greyfriars Presbyterian Church
