EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/10/2025 9:00 PM
Introduction to Second John
Before I begin looking at the letter of second John I
want to work on a introduction from Dr. Warren W. Wiersbe, and then tomorrow I
will look at the introduction from John MacArthur, which will be longer than
the one from Warren Wiersbe.
When I was going through the Old Testament a few years
back I relied on Warren W. Wiersbe and what he calls his “Be Books.” Wiersbe has written a “Be Book” on each book
of the Bible, but sometimes on the smaller books of the Bible he would combine
them. In the case of second John he
combined the following New Testament books 2 Peter, 2-3 John, and Jude. The name of his book one these short books is
called “Be Alert.” This is really a good
name for these shorter Bible books as all of these books are written near the
end of the authors lives and this would mean that they all had some important
to write about near the end of their lives.
I mentioned in yesterday’s comments on the end of 1 John that John was
in his 90’s when he wrote all of his letters including the Gospel of John, 1st,
2nd, and 3rd John, along with the book of
Revelation. Like I said yesterday
evening that it is the Holy Spirit who is the author of all of the Word of God,
but He would use the author’s personality when the books were written. Ok let us look at first Wiersbe’s outline of
2 John and then his outline.
2 JOHN
OUTLINE
Key
Theme: Loving and living the truth.
Key
Verse: 2 John 4
I.
INTRODUCTION –verses 1-3
II.
PRACTICING THE
TRUTH—verses 4-6
III.
PORTECTING THE
TRUTH—verses 7-11
IV.
CONCLUSION—verses
12-13
“The
apostate teachers not only invaded the churches, but they also tried to
influence Christian homes. Titus faced
this problem in Crete (Titus 1:10-11) and Timothy faced it in Ephesus (2 Tim.
3:6). As goes the home, so goes the
church and the nation; thus the family is an important target in Satan’s war
against truth.
“This
brief letter was written to a godly mother and her children. Some Bible students have concluded that ‘the
elect lady’ refers to a local church that ‘her children’ are the believers
fellowshipping in the church. ‘Thy elect
sister’ (2 John 13) would then refer to a sister church that was sending
Christian greetings.
“While
it is true that John does address a group in this letter (note the plural in 2
John 6, 8, 10, 12), it is also true that he addresses an individual (2 John 13). Perhaps the solution is that a Christian assembly
was meeting in this home, along with the family of the ‘elect lady,’ so that
John had both the family and the congregation in mind (see Rom. 15:5; 1 Cor.
16:19; Col. 4:15; Phile. 2). He was
concerned that this godly woman not permit anything false to come into her
house (2 John 10), or into the assembly.
“The
dominant feelings in this little epistle are those of friendship and joy, even
though these are mixed with concern and warning. If you and I are to keep our homes true to
Christ, then we must have the same characteristics as this family to which John
wrote.”
4/10/2025 9:41 PM
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