We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The man who says, "I
know him," but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how
we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. (1 John
2:3-6)
We live in the information age. Never before in history has the increase of knowledge been so rapid. For thousands of years of human history we only added to our knowledge. Today, knowledge multiplies. We used to measure the doubling of knowledge in centuries. Now we measure it in months. We are all traveling on the information highway and at breakneck speeds.
But while our age is characterized by such a dramatic increase in the storehouse of knowledge, one effect of the increase is that we all know more about less. Not too long ago, it was possible for a highly educated person to literally know everything about a field of knowledge. Now, people must specialize in smaller and smaller areas within their field. We are all most aware of this in the area of medical science. The doctor used to know what there was to know about medical science. Now, no one can master everything that has been discovered and published concerning medicine. And so we have specialists. They have divided the areas of work into more manageable disciplines. They have even divided the human body up into areas of specialty. This is all because of the increase of knowledge. And it works this way in many other areas of life and work as well.
Truly, in our society there can be no know-it-alls. ALL is now a very large word indeed. But this poses a different kind of question. Can we really truly know anything for certain? You see, knowledge changes because of research and new discoveries. Some of the "facts" of the past are now "fiction" in the present. We found that we believed certain things were true based on the evidence we had and now have discovered new evidence and had to replace the old "truth" with a new truth.
This is probably why many in our society believe that truth is relative. Because certain things we used to believe were true have been shown to be false, some have become practical agnostics concerning the possibility of knowing anything for sure. And they have extended this uncertainty to the spiritual realm as well. And on the face of it, that seems like a logical extension. If one cannot truly know the material world, how can one know the immaterial?
Is it possible to know about eternity? Is it possible to know that one has eternal life? Is it possible to know God? Is it possible to know that you are saved? These are important questions. And none of them can be answered by applying the scientific method. In fact, contrary to popular belief, the scientific method is only one limited approach to knowledge. It is good to evaluate the things to which it should apply, but there are whole areas of knowledge to which the scientific method can never apply. Eternity, the spiritual world, faith, and God will never be evaluated by the scientific method.
There is another authority that we believe gives us real answers to these questions. It is the Bible. And the Bible tells us there is a way to know for certain about the questions of eternity. Concerning whether we know God and whether we are truly following Him, the Bible tells us that we can know that we know.
How do you know that you know Him? And what is the standard or test by which you evaluate your Christian life? Our text today gives us some powerful answers to these questions. In fact, several essentials emerge from our text — essentials that help us define whether we have a real walk with Christ. Let’s turn our attention now to this passage of Scripture and look at these essentials of a walk with Christ.
One essential for all people who are seeking God is to know that they are saved. And this is precisely what our text teaches us. There is something we must know. There is something we need to know. We need to know that we know Christ.
I am always amazed at how many professing Christians don’t even think they can know. In a church I pastored in Virginia, I met such a man. Before I had arrived, in the preceding years, that church underwent a significant change. It had been quite a traditional Baptist church. The church, however, began to experience a real revival in which many of the younger generation came to know Christ. They came into the church and began to really serve the Lord. But this created some problems. Many, who had been long standing members of the church, found that these young people were far more committed to serving God than they were. Some of the older members thought these young people were fanatics and even left the church over it. I arrived on the scene a couple of years after this revival and began to visit in the community. One gentleman I visited was one of these former members. He was now going to the Methodist church. He had been a church leader in the Baptist church. He had been a deacon, trustee, and "pillar" of the church. In the course of our conversation, the issue of salvation came up. I try not to assume that people are believers simply because they are church members. To my surprise, this man told me that there was no way a person could know that he or she was truly saved. I quoted to him 1 John 5:13, where John says, "I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life." Even in the face of that Scripture he continued to say that he didn’t know and no one could know. The best he thought could happen was that you could hope that you would be saved. His mind was made up. I immediately understood why he thought these new believers were fanatics. I must admit I was also glad that he was no longer a leader in the Baptist church I pastored, and saw no good reason to try to take him away from the Methodists.
The truth of the Scripture, and the truth of our text, is that we can know! The passage I quoted in 1 John 5:13 tells us as much. And our text today says that we know. The apostle Peter in 2 Peter 1:10 exhorts us by saying, "Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure." The apostle Paul certainly knew that he was saved. In Galatians 2:20 we read, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." This same Paul said in 2 Timothy 1:12, "Yet I am not ashamed, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day." We can know and we certainly need to know.
Recently I attended a large African-American church during a revival service. The visiting preacher for that evening was preaching on this very subject. The title of his sermon was "How to know who is and who ain’t." I like that. You see, either you is or you ain’t. And you need to know which you are. And thank God we can know.
Not only is there something we must know there is something we must do. This is the second essential that we discern from our text. We read is verse 3: we know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The real litmus test is that we obey Him. Obedience is essential for the Christian life. By obedience we can know for sure that we know Him.
Many people evaluate their Christian life based on their experience or on the experiences they have with God. Now, don’t misunderstand me here. I believe that experiencing God is good. In fact we need more experiences of the goodness and grace of God. We need to be on the receiving end of special encounters with Him. It is needed. It is valuable. In fact, experiencing God on a daily basis should be the goal of every believer. But experiences are never to be a litmus test designed to prove that we have a relationship with God.
There are two problems with using experiences as such a test. The first problem is that experiences are very subjective. How we interpret what we are experiencing may or may not be accurate because we are personally involved in the experience. The second problem is that even non-Christians experience the goodness of God because God is good. God may send His blessings on a person but that is no indicator of a relationship with God. The Bible says that God sends His rain of both the just and the unjust, and rain in this context is a good thing. People in the arid region of the Middle East welcome rain for their crops and for their land. So, if we evaluate our Christian life based upon our experience, we may come to some wrong conclusions.
Obedience, on the other hand, tells us where our heart really is. If our desire is to please God, then we will obey Him. Now, we are not talking about perfection here. We have already seen in earlier studies in 1 John that none of us is perfect. The issue of sin has already been dealt with. All of us fall short. All of us sin. And when we do, we must deal with that sin by confessing it and receiving forgiveness. So, we are not talking about perfection here, but a life of obedience. Obedience reveals a changed heart — a life surrendered to Christ. Obedience reveals that we have true faith. Faith is always validated by works. In other words, the works that we do reveal that the faith we say we have is genuine faith. We can know that we know Him if we obey Him.
The man who says, "I know him," but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. (1 John 2:4-5)
We come now to the third essential. There is not only something we must know, and something we must do, there is also someone we must follow. In 1 John 1:5b-6 we read, "This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did." Jesus is the One we must follow. He is the standard by which we evaluate our Christian lives.
Here’s the question: How did Jesus walk? In order to answer this question, let me take you back to John’s Gospel. There we see that Jesus lived His life in total dependence upon the Father. Listen to the words of Jesus. In John 4:34: "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work." In John 5:17 Jesus says, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working." In John 5:19: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does." In John 5:30: "By myself I can do nothing; I judge only as I hear, and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but him who sent me." Again, in John 6:38: "For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me." In John 7:16: "My teaching is not my own. It comes from him who sent me." And finally, in John 8:28: "I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me."
The way Jesus lived His life was in utter and total dependence upon the leadership of the Father. He listened for the Father speaking. He watched for the Father’s leadership. His life was a life of communion with God. And so should ours be. Our life should be lived by spending time with God in prayer, study of His word, and seeking His face. This is how Jesus walked. If we would follow in His steps, then we must walk in the same way. It is in this way that we will know that we know Him.
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