Wednesday, December 4, 2024

PT-2 "Christians Accept the Faith" (1 John 2:20-21, 27)

 

EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/4/2024 10:05 PM

 

My Worship Time                                                       Focus: PT-2 “Christians Accept the Faith”

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                Reference: 1 John 2:20-21,27

 

            Message of the verses:  20 But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know. 21 I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie is of the truth…. 27 As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him.”

 

            I really thought that I would finish this section in my last SD, but didn’t get it all done and so I want to complete it this evening, and then we will have one more sub-section to finish this chapter. 

 

            What I did not get to write about yesterday evening was verse 27 as it is almost as long as verses 20-21 together.  What we have in verse 27 is that it reiterates the truth that the anointing, (which speaks of the Spirit-given knowledge of the truth) which John’s readers received from Him abides in them.  His readers possessed the truth; it resided in them permanently as it does in all true believers.  Here is a list of verses that shows this truth too (John 14:16-17; Rom. 8:9; Eph. 1:13).  So they (John’s readers) had no need for anyone to teach them.  And because God’s truth is all-sufficient (Ps. 19:7-14; 2 Tim. 3:16-17) and incompatible with error, His anointing teaches…about all things, and is true and is not a lie.

 

            John MacArthur concludes this section by writing “When the apostle asserted that believers do not need other teacher, he was not advocating a mystical anti-intellectualism that spurns all human teachers.  On the contrary, the Lord given the church godly pastors, elders, and teachers ‘for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ’ (Eph. 4:12; cf. v. 11; 1 Cor. 12:28).  John’s point is that believers must not rely on human wisdom or man-centered philosophy (cf. 1 Cor. 1:18-2:9; Col. 2:8) but on the teaching of God’s Word by Spirit-gifted human teachers and the illuminating work of the Holy Spirit.”

 

            I am very glad for the last paragraph that MacArthur added so that nobody gets the wrong idea of what we are leaning from those verses.  John is writing to a church which was to function like a New Testament church and that is still what we are under and so it is best to continue to learn about how the Church is to operate and follow that. 

 

12/4/2024 10:07 PM  

 

No comments:

Post a Comment