PT-2 "Intro to 1 John 1:7, 9; 2:1a

 

EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/04/2024 10:29 PM

 

My Worship Time                                                         Focus:  PT-2 “Intro to 1 John 1:7, 9; 2:1a”

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                              Reference: 1 John 1:7, 9; 2:1a”

 

            Message of the verses:  “But if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin…If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness…My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.”

 

            I have been quoting from John MacArthur’s commentary and the reason is that I believe that this is some very great information to help us better understand what is in these verses.

 

            “In order to justify their indifference toward God’s moral law, many who hold such a position relegate Christ’s teaching on forgiveness to another dispensation (contending that Jesus’ instruction applies to Old Testament Israel only, and not to the New Testament church).  Thus they argue, when Jesus commanded the apostles to pray for the Father’s forgiveness (cf. Luke 11:4), His words reflected the era of law, not grace.  They further suggest that the reason Christ gave such stipulations to His disciples was because He understood salvation in the Old Testament to be conditional—based on confessing sin, offering sacrifices, and keeping the law.  But their claims are ultimately unfounded, for salvation never functioned that way during any part of the Old Testament ear (and, obviously, that was not how Jesus understood it).  God saved people then on the same basis that He saves them now—but the substituionary, atoned death of Jesus Christ, which the sacrificial system pictured. Sinners then as now were saved by faith only, demonstrated when, overwhelmed by their sin and inability to keep God’s holy law, they cried out to God for mercy and received His pardon (cf. Ps. 32-1-2a; Isa. 55:6-7; Mic. 7:18-10; Luke 18:13-14).  Those whom He saved before the cross, God in eternity past chose, and looking ahead to the death of ‘the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world’ (Rev. 13:8 NKJV) applied Christ’s coming death to their account, even as He now looks back to Cavalry and extends the same electing grace to all who have believed the gospel.  The just have always lived by faith (Hab. 2:4; Rom. 1:17), so no sacrifice, confession, or law keeping in any era could earn a right standing before God or satisfy His just judgment against sinners (cf. Rom. 4:1-24; Heb. 9:11-15).  Only the perfect, substituionary death of the Lamb of God could satisfy justice and save believing sinners from God’s wrath.  And only the righteous life of Christ credited to their accounts could make them acceptable to God (John 1:29; 2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Peter 1:18-19).

 

            “So how can one reconcile the comprehensiveness and permanence of God’s forgiveness and the imputing of perfect righteousness to believers at salvation with the continual need for Christian penitence (e. g. , Pss. 6:32; 38; 51; 102; 130; 143; Matt. 6:14-15)?  It is necessary to recognize that divine forgiveness consists of two interrelated aspects; the judicial ( or legally forensic) and the sanctifying (or personal, paternal).  The Lord illustrated those two aspects of forgiveness when He washed the apostles’ feet in the upper room:

 

3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come forth from God and was going back to God, 4 got up from supper, and laid aside His garments; and taking a towel, He girded Himself. 5 Then He poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. 6 So He came to Simon Peter. He *said to Him, "Lord, do You wash my feet?" 7 Jesus answered and said to him, "What I do you do not realize now, but you will understand hereafter." 8 Peter said to Him, "Never shall You wash my feet!" Jesus answered him, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me." 9 Simon Peter *said to Him, "Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head." 10 Jesus said to him, "He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you.’” (John 13:3-10).

 

            I will try and finish this introduction in the next SD.

 

9/4/2024 10:56 PM