Abide Session 5: Practice Righteousness, Pusue Love, Possess Assurance

 To give us confidence, John will now explore what it means to be a child of God.  "Little children" = Tekna (Greek). We are the natural or genetic children of God.

John 3:1. "Children of God". Publicly recognized as such by God.  Don't lose the wonderment of this. "Behold of what country is the love of God". 

John 3:1b. "Know" - did not have relationship with or understand Him.

John 3:2. We are His children "now" - miraculous. What we will be has not yet appeared (made manifest).  It's not yet become obvious what we will be.

John 3:2b-3. What's the nature of the hope we have in Him? A present hope and a future hope; something better to come. We will be made like Him according to the first creation (Genesis 1:26-27). The image of God. What if we began to live into the pure desires now?

John 3:4. He circles back to the test of righteousness.  This is a devastating definition for sin "lawlessness". Legalists take God's law which is intended to bring glory to God and twist it to bring glory to them.

John 3:5-6. Don't practice sin - slower to repeat.  It's losing its grip.

John 3:7-9. "Practice".  A discipline.  Practice takes time.  "God's seed" = sperma.

John 3:10. "Evident" (manifest). He's moving to the test of love again.

John 3:11. "Love one another" is actually not new.  It first operated in the garden.

John 3:12. The law had been given though.  Whatever Cain knew he was to bring first and best. Love with God was fractured, so love of brother was fractured as well.  Same with Adam and Eve.

John 3:13-15. Echoes "sermon on the mount".  No "sibling" rivalry.

John 3:16-18. Sacrificial love is generous and tangible.

John 3:19-21. When would your heart condemn you? When you committed that sin again.  Confession is always better than concealment.  Nothing is concealed from God.  God is omniscient.

John 3:23-24. Test of truth.  Test of love. Test of righteousness. Three things repeated again.

End. 1) does what my hands are doing show that I love Him? 2) Does what my mind think about Him show that I love Him? 3) Does what my heart setting its desires on show that I love Him?

Questions

1. What repetitive sin do we need to confess again?

2. Who do we merely tolerate?

3. Where does our heart condemn us?

Next: Session 6: Truth & Error: God is Love