"You Have Been Anointed" (I Jn 2:18-27)

Transcript:

Let's remain standing for the reading of God's Word tonight. Our sermon text comes from First John, chapter 2. We'll be looking at verses 18 through 27. This is on page 1211, 1211 of the Pew Bibles. Here now the word of the Lord from First John, chapter 2, verses 18 through 27.

Children, it is the last hour. And as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many Antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would have continued with us.

But they went out that it might become plain that they all are not of us. But you have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all have knowledge. I write to you not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the Antichrist.

He who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also. Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father.

And this is the promise that he made to us. Eternal life. I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you. But the anointing that you received from him abides in you. And you have no need that anyone should teach you.

But as his anointing teaches you about everything and is true and is no lie, just as it has taught you, abide in Him. This is the word of the Lord. Please be seated. And as we take our seats, let's join our hearts together in prayer. Gracious Heavenly Father, we thank youk that yout have given us the down payment, the deposit of eternal union and communion that we will have with youh Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for all of eternity.

But right now youw have given this to us in the Holy Spirit. Now, the same Holy Spirit who anointed Jesus Christ for the ministry that he had in this life, in this world. So now that same Spirit is applying the work of Christ to our lives. That same Spirit is uniting us to Christ. That same Spirit is teaching and guiding us by the anointing that abides in us.

And so, Father, we pray that as we study youy Word tonight, you would teach us. And so we pray that you would give us hearts to understand, eyes to see and Ears to hear all that is contained in the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ our savior. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

Well, as we establish relationships with other people, one of the things that you have probably found yourself doing is to establish points of connection, points of contact with people. Many of you do this all the time by that Dutch bingo game. That again, I'm diligently trying hard to learn the rules and the insanely multifaceted connections that you all have with one another. It's wonderful. I appreciate it deeply.

I'm enjoying the game so far as I'm able to participate in it. But for me, it's not that I'm not able to play Dutch bingo because I'm not Dutch, but when people connect with me, the point of connection is often to my being from Nebraska. I've had this throughout my life. When I started to leave Nebraska, when I was in seminary in Alabama, I was so associated with the state. That was a nickname that I had people just call me Nebraska.

Hey, Nebraska. As I'm walking down the hall once when I was in China, I was on a mission trip in China, and as I'm walking down the street, I see a girl who's walking down the street. And have you ever seen people where they wear, like, clothing that have, like, Chinese characters that no one has any idea what it meant? Well, she had an English shirt that she had no idea what it meant, but it said Nebraska. And so I went to her.

And now thinking about it, here's this tall, white lunatic who's coming up to this random girl on the street in China trying to establish a point of connection. I'm. And from there, I brought out my driver's license. I showed it in Nebraska. We did not get much of a connection from that conversation, but I tried.

Many of you have shared different family connections. Or boy, I went there one time, or I used to have some business there. And you've talked to me to build this relationship with me about the connections that you have to Nebraska. That's how we build relationships. We find who we're related to or where we're from or where we went to school.

And all of these are points of contact that establish some relationship, some grounds for relationship that you can then go from there. The question I want to consider tonight is this. What point of contact do we have with God?

We have nothing in common with God. He is the infinitely almighty, righteous creator. We are weak, frail, sinful creatures. We are made in his image, but that image has been marred and defaced and brought into ruin because of our sin. So what is the point of connection that we have with God?

Well, the Scriptures teach us that God is the one who made a connection with us. And God did this by sending His Son into the world to establish a union and a communion with us, by taking upon Himself a human nature that is like ours in every respect, yet without sin. There is an extraordinary point of connection we have now because the second person of the Trinity possesses a human nature for all of the rest of time. But for us, for our experience, Christ now is in heaven, far away from us. He's distant from us.

And so then we're back to that question, what point of connection can we have with the Christ who, yes, he's the God man, but he's all the way up in heaven and we are all the way down here. What's the point of connection? And the Scriptures teach the point of connection that we have is. Is the Holy Spirit who is given to us, the Holy Spirit, who is the down payment of our redemption. He is the first installment of all of the infinite glory of God, whom we will have communion with for all of eternity, given to us now.

And in the Holy Spirit we're given faith and to look to Christ. And in the Holy Spirit, we're taught to pray to God. Through Christ and the Holy Spirit, the work of Christ is applied to our lives. The Holy Spirit is the point of connection given to us by God so that we might have a point of connection with him. And one of the way the Scriptures talk about that nature, that point of connection that we have with God as the Holy Spirit, is by the anointing that the Holy Spirit gives to us.

That's what we're looking at and considering in our passage tonight, as we're considering the Heidelberg Catechism. Questions for Lord's Day 12. Our theme is that in Christ we have been anointed by the Holy Spirit. In Christ, we have been anointed by the Holy Spirit. So, three parts to our sermon text tonight.

First, knowing Christ. Knowing Christ. Second, lying about Christ. Lying about Christ. And then third, abiding in Christ.

Abiding in Christ. So in this passage, John begins with this affectionate term that he uses. He says, children, that's not demeaning. That is a term of endearment and affection that he uses throughout this letter. Children, he says, it is the last hour.

And as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many Antichrists have come since Christ's coming. The Scriptures tell us that we live in the last days. These are the last days. Now, those days have stretched for 2,000 years, and we do not know how much longer they will continue to stretch. But these are called the last days because the fullness of what God has done for the redemption of his people people has been accomplished in and through his Son, Jesus Christ, who is the fulfillment of all God's promises in the Old Testament, as we considered this morning.

And so now, in this time between Christ's first coming and the final consummation of all things at Christ's return, we live in an age that is characterized by division. How do you relate to Christ? On which side of Christ are you? There are Christians on the one side and Antichristians whom John calls here antichrists on the other. Now, remember that name, Christian.

We actually recently studied the passage in Acts where that term was first used. It was used in Antioch where in those. In that place in those days, believers were first called Christians. And we talked about the fact that that term, Christian, it's related to the idea of Christ, but it's a word that means belonging to or identified by Christ. On the other side, you have Antichrist.

Now, we are not talking about a single great figure. John says, so now many antichrists have come. And what he's talking about is those who are characterized by their opposition to to Christ. There are those identified with Christ on one side and those opposed to Christ on the other side. And John is apparently, we don't have all the details, but apparently talking about something that has happened in the church to whom he's writing.

And he talks about the fact that these antichrists were in the church for a time. They were professing members. They were sitting right alongside us in the pews. They same thing, sang the same songs, they heard the same sermons, but the difference is that they left. We're not talking about someone who moves away and joins another church elsewhere.

We're not talking about just something along the lines of that from one church to another. We're talking about these people actually left the church. They stopped pretending even to worship Christ. And so one of the things that John is doing in this passage is to ask, what is the difference? What's the difference between a Christian and these antichrists?

And the answer he gives us in verse 20 deals with an anointing. He says, but you have been anointed. Or very literally, it's, you have an anointing. You have an anointing by the Holy One, that is by the Holy Spirit. Now again, if the word Messiah and Christ both mean anointed one.

So Christos is that Greek word that means anointing. That means anointed one. The word for anointing is there's a very similar. These words are very closely related in meaning and in concept to another. And what John is telling us is this is our point of contact, the point.

This is our point of connection with God in Christ. Christ is the anointed one, and we have been given an anointing by the source of the same anointing that Jesus Christ himself receives, namely the Holy Spirit. And by contrast, the antichrists do not have this charisma. Those opposed to Christ do not have this anointing. So they do not belong to.

To Christ. You have been anointed, you have an anointing by the Holy One, and you all have knowledge. And so this is what The Heidelberg Catechism 32 is saying when he says, but why are you called a Christian? It's because by faith, I am a member of Christ, and so I share in his anointing. It's not only John who teaches this.

In Second Corinthians 1, verse 21, Paul writes, and it is God who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our heart as a guarantee the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. Is this anointing that we have? The same anointing that Christ receives? And Therefore, in verse 21, John writes, I write to you not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it and because no lies are the truth. Because you have this anointing, you know the truth.

Okay, so how does this connect? How does our anointing connect to the anointed nature of Christ? When we talk about Christ, when we talk about Jesus as the Christ, Christ isn't Jesus last name. Christ is a title. It means that he's the anointed one.

And it refers back to the three Old Testament offices that were anointed for someone take that office. Prophets, priests, and kings were all anointed with oil. And so, for example, we see in the case of David that when he was anointed with oil, the Spirit of God rushed on him. From that day forward, the anointing of oil was connected with the idea of the anointing of the Holy Spirit. We do not read ever that Jesus was anointed with physical oil.

But we do read that at his baptism, he was anointed by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit descended upon him as a dove, empowering him for the ministry that he would undertake as the anointed one, as the Christ. And he came not just to be one more anointed one in a line of many Christs, many messiahs, many prophets, priests and kings. He came as the final prophet, the final priest and the final king. Now, what John is talking about here is he's saying we share in the anointing of Christ by participating particularly in the office of Jesus as our prophet.

Heidelberg Catechism 31 says that Christ has been ordained by God the Father and has been anointed with the Holy Spirit to be our chief prophet and teacher who fully reveals to us the secret counsel and will of God concerning our deliverance. And if you note the catechism questions, notice how 31 talks about what it means for Christ to be our prophet, priest and king. And 32 talks about the way in which we connect with those anointed offices of Christ, prophet, priest and king. And as prophet, we confess in Heidelberg, Heidelberg Catechism 32 that I am anointed to confess his name. That is, to believe what our prophet teaches us about who Jesus is.

But once we start thinking about Jesus as our prophet, we have to ask, well, what does he teach us exactly? Heidelberg Catechism reminds us that he is our high priest and that he is our eternal king, the high priest who has delivered us by the one sacrifice of his body and who continually intercedes for us before. Before the Father, and that he is our eternal King, who governs us by his word and spirit and who guards us and keeps us in the deliverance he has won for us. Now here was the point of connection to the officer reading that rich read for us tonight from 1 Peter, chapter 2. It talks about how as Christ was a living stone, so also we are living stones who are connected to Him.

But then it goes on and says that we are a holy priesthood in Christ, and then even that we are a royal or a kingly priesthood in Christ. We have this anointing to understand what Christ our prophet teaches. Christ our prophet, is also our priest. Because of the one sacrifice he has offered. We have been commissioned as a holy priesthood and we will reign with him and as a royal priesthood through all of eternity.

The anointing that we have makes us dependent by faith on the work of Jesus as the Christ, as the anointed One, as our prophet and our priest and our king, but not only to depend upon what Jesus has done for us, the work of Christ, but to depend upon him personally. Now things get personal in this second section, lying about Christ in verses 22 through 23, where John moves on again, second section, lying about Christ. John moves on in verse 22. And he says, who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ. So again, remember, these are the antichrists.

These are the ones opposed to Christ. And the nature of their opposition is to deny that Jesus is the Christ. And in doing so, they're not connected to the truth because they don't have the anointing that teaches them the truth. Instead, they lie by contradicting the truth by saying that Jesus is not the Christ. And because of that, they're liars.

Denying that Jesus is the Christ is a lie. But then John goes On, in verse 22, he says, this is the Antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. It's not only to deny the work of Christ, prophet, priest and king idea, but it's also to deny the person. If you deny the Son of God, you do not have the Father. You deny the Father's relationship to the Son.

You're denying the Father and the Son all at the same time. To be the Antichrist means that you deny the personal union and relationship between the Father and the Son. And the reason for this is in verse 23, you cannot have the Father without the Son. As John writes, no one who denies the Son, Son has the Father. But on the other hand, whoever confesses the Son has the Father also.

Now why is this the case? Why can't you just have the Father and be super impressed with God the Father, but just sort of. I don't know how excited I am about the Son over here. Well, here's why. Because the Son, as the author of Hebrews tells us, is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature.

As you think about, and this gets into trinitarian mysteries, we cannot fully wrap our mind around this. But when we are thinking about the Son of God, we are thinking about the perfect image, the perfect representation, the perfect conception of all the glory of the Father, who is not just an idea. You know, you and I have ideas about who we are. I think about who I am, you think about who you are. If we're not self aware, maybe our ideas are not very closely corresponding to what everybody else might think about us.

We want to be self aware and understand both our strengths and our weaknesses. Well, imagine God's perfect understanding of the fullness of his infinite glory and power and majesty. That is not just an idea, an understanding. But it is the very word of God. The very word which was with God in the beginning, the very word which was God from the beginning, from before the beginning, from all eternity into all eternity in the future.

A second person who is God and yet distinct from the person of the Father. So that as the Father looks upon this perfect image and representation of Himself, he cannot help but love the glory he sees in his Son. And the Son looks back on the Father. And the Son cannot help but perfectly love the glory of the Father. Because nothing would be more worthy of love and adoration and blessing and honor than God.

There's nothing the Father can love more than His Son, and nothing the Son can love more than his Father. Now, this does not mean that God is somehow vain, like someone who is foolishly admiring themselves in the mirror. Look, how wonderful. Some of us are not tempted in that respect. So, so that's helpful for us.

But others are. And they stare in the mirror and think, isn't this a lovely picture? This is much more like a father admiring his son. When a father admires his son, there's a connection. There's even a resemblance.

Fathers often see some of themselves in their sons, not just physically, but in character and attitude, things like that. For a father to admire a son and for a son to admire a father, there is resemblance, but there is deep love and respect. And on a much grander scale than the way that human fathers love human sons and human sons love human fathers. The Father infinitely loves and values his Son, and the Son infinitely loves and values his Father. And it's this Son whom God gave to you, his most precious, his most only begotten, infinitely valuable Son.

It is unfathomable grace that he did not spare that Son, but gave him for you. Which is why you can't have the Father without the Son. If you reject the Son, you are rejecting the one in whose image the Son is.

You can't have the Father without the Son. But if you confess the Son, if you put your faith in the person of God, the Son, you have the Father too. Now, that's a little bit of an excursion of what John is writing about. But I think it's important to really get a track, an inside track to the thrust of what John is saying. Because sometimes I think that we are tipping, tempted to see the teaching of Christianity as some kind of a get out of hell free card or some kind of password that we now have that we can sort of say when we come before the throne of God.

If you Were to die tonight, what would you say to God? And well, I know the answer. I know the secret password. I know I've been advised I should not talk about me. I should not talk about how God of a person I am.

I am supposed to say that it's because Christ died for me. That's the right answer. But it's not some kind of secret knowledge that if you just know the password, you will be let in.

It's not secret knowledge. It's not enough simply to know our doctrine or our theology. These catechetical sermons are not to inform you of the correct password so that you know that the gospel of Christianity calls you to lift your eyes not to a password, but to a person. God created you to be united to the person of God the Son. And God sent the person of the Holy Spirit to indwell you, to anoint you so that you had a point of contact with God from whom you were estranged because of your sin.

And God loved you so much that he didn't just sort of bring us together at no cost to Himself. There was great cost. He appointed his beloved Son as your Savior. He sent him into the world and he anointed him by the Holy Spirit as the Christ. And as the Christ he taught you as your prophet.

He sacrificed himself on the cross as your priest, and he sat down on his throne in heaven after his resurrection and ascension as your king. Christ then sent the same Holy Spirit who had anointed him for the royal rescue mission to anoint you to trust in him for your salvation. Not just to know about him, but to trust him. And to describe the nature of this trust, John uses the word abide. And that gets us to our third section, abiding in Christ.

In verses 24 through 27, the word abide. Before we look at the text, the word abide means to remain. It's the idea of receiving, resting and rejoicing in a renewed relationship to Christ. And So in verse 24, John writes this. He says, let what you heard from the beginning abide in you.

And if what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father. Now, this is the connection between the words that we preach and teach and read from the Scriptures and the person of God. Again, it's not just to know the words. It's. It's not just to think about this as some kind of secret password to get you past the entrance gate into heaven.

The word is not something you give rote memorization to. Just to have those words ready to go, although you should. But that word, when it abides in your heart, then connects you to the person. It's not just for your head, it's for your heart. It's to restore you by faith to your relationship to the Father, by the work of the Holy Spirit, to teach you to look to Christ the Son for your salvation.

And in this, when you have this kind of relationship of faith, you abide in a personal relationship with the Father and with the Son. And the quality of this relationship is what John calls eternal life, verse 25. And this is the promise that he made to us, eternal life. Now, this tracks with what Jesus himself said in the high priestly prayer in John 17:3, as Jesus is praying to his Father, he says, and this is eternal life that they know you, not know about you not know some information or even the creeds and confessions to elucidate a lot about who you are, but know that they would know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. To know God, to abide in God through faith in Jesus Christ is the experience of eternal life.

And that's the hope we have for all of eternity. Well, in verses 26 through 27, John writes that we gain this purpose, personal relationship with the Son to know and abide in the Father, that all this comes through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. He is our first point of contact. Verse 26. I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you.

But the anointing that you receive from him abides in you. And you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything and is true and is no lie, just as it has taught you, abide in him, don't just be taught, but because of the teaching, abide in Him. Now, again, in John's day, there were people who taught that you just needed to have the secret knowledge. You just needed to have sort of the secret information.

And that would be the key to unlocking your relationship to God. They were called the Gnostics, from a Greek word ginosko, which means to know. And they claim to have this secret knowledge. And unless you entered and were taught by their secret mystery religion and cult teachers, you would not have the secret password. I want to be really clear.

I am not a teacher who can offer you some secret knowledge of God.

That's what John is saying. I'm not a teacher in that sense. The only thing I can really do is to teach you about what you already have to teach you more about what you already know through the scriptures. Because the knowledge you have is not just a relation or is not just information. It is a relationship.

Maybe this would be helpful. It's the difference between knowing an acquaintance and oh, yeah, I know that guy, versus knowing my wife. That's a different thing, right? There's a different depth of relationship there. You use the same words, but it's a totally different experience.

My call is to lead you as a teacher deeper into the word of the one whom you already know. Maybe this illustration might be helpful if you were to come to me seeking some marriage counseling. Maybe your marriage had hit a point where there's some difficulty where you're kind of just butting heads together and not really making any progress. You're sort of talking past each other, rehashing the same arguments over and over and over. And when I've sat with couples in these positions, in these difficulties, I don't come into that with any sort of secret relationship of either of them.

You know, if you came to me, I don't have secret inside knowledge about your spouse to tell you. And that'll just unlock your relationship with your spouse. You know your spouse far better than I can ever know. And furthermore, it's not in that relationship about getting both of the spouses to connect with me. I've got to kind of get out of the way.

The only thing I can kind of do then is to sort of maybe help them to hear what they are not able to hear anymore of what their spouse is saying to them. You're going through the same argument again and again and again. You're talking past each other. This is what your wife is trying to say. This is what your husband is wanting you to hear and to try to maybe offer some biblical advice as that's appropriate.

But again, the goal is not for me to be brought into your marriage. Now I'm just going to move in with you, and all three of us are going to work through this together. The goal is for me to send you back to enjoy the relationship that you have together. This is what I get to do every week as I open the word of God, I bring you no secret knowledge. My goal is only to help you to hear more clearly what God has given you once for all in the word of God.

The goal is not to connect you to me. Oh, I am dull and uninteresting. You don't want that. The goal is to connect you to Christ.

So what does your bridegroom, Jesus Christ, want you to hear from him tonight. Well, as we're thinking about this anointing and the work of Jesus the Christ in this personal relationship that we are called to have with Him, I want to ask you a question that I pray you will give serious consideration too. Do you simply know that Jesus is the Christ? In other words, do you just know something about him, or are you trusting Him? Are you abiding in him and is he abiding in you?

Is your relationship to Christ one where you are satisfied by information or where you love him and are constantly seeking to grow in your love for him? Do you know about him, or does he indwell you by the Holy Spirit again? He has given you his Holy Spirit to indwell you. The same Spirit who anointed him as the prophet, preached priest and king as the Messiah is the same Spirit who anoints you, brings you into his anointedness and teaches you about everything that you need to know, not just for information sake, but to have a personal relationship, to know him personally better and better and better. Are you satisfied with information and doctrine and theology?

Or is that word that has been abiding in you something that teaches you to abide in the Son and in the Father, leading you further up and further in, to know Christ in an ever deeper, ever richer, ever more vivid, personal way, so that by that experience you've already come to know a taste, a deposit, a down payment of the eternal life that you will experience with him forever. Because this is eternal life that we might know the Father and Jesus Christ whom He has sent. Consider that prayerfully. I pray. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, I pray that if any of us is here and has spent a lifetime in the church learning much about God but not knowing you personally, I pray that tonight would be the night when you would remove scales from eyes and hearts, when you would draw someone out of death and into life, when you would give abiding joy in Christ Jesus, your Son, through a personal relationship. By your Spirit, give us hearts to understand, eyes to see and ears to hear all that is contained in the good news of the Gospel of your Son, Jesus Christ. I pray. Amen.