Obedience to God's Commands (1st John 2:3-6)

1. Everlasting Mercy Fellowship

2.  1st John 2:3-6
 3 And by this we know that we have
come to know him, if we keep his
commandments. 4 Whoever says "I
know him" but does not keep his
commandments is a liar, and the truth
is not in him, 5 but whoever keeps his
word, in him truly the love of God is
perfected. By this we may know that
we are in him: 6 whoever says he
abides in him ought to walk in the
same way in which he walked.

3. Last week we looked at John’s analogy of
Propitiation. Let’s recap a bit...
 Sin brought death…
 Genesis 2:16-17
▪ 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat
of every tree of the garden, 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely
die.“
 Ezekiel 18:20
▪ 20 The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of
the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The
righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness
of the wicked shall be upon himself.

4.  God satisfied the penalty of sin once and for all
by coming into human history as the God-Man,
Jesus Christ and making propitiation for our sin.
 John 3:16-21
▪ 16 "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever
believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not
send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the
world might be saved through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not
condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already,
because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. 19 And
this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved
the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. 20 For
everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to
the light, lest his works should be exposed. 21 But whoever does what is
true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have
been carried out in God."

8.  Here’s the big idea: Christians do what God says.
We obey His word (see 1st John 2:4-5)
 1st John 5:3
▪ 3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his
commandments are not burdensome.
 Romans 6:16
▪ 16Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient
slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which
leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?
 John 3:36
▪ 36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey
the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

9. Jesus taught…
 Its entirety. The whole of the Bible is inspired
(see Matthew 4:4; 5:17-18). In Matthew 4:4, Jesus
responds to Satan’s temptation by affirming
verbal plenary inspiration when He said, man is
to live by every word (plenary) that proceeds out
of the mouth of God (inspiration). In Matthew
5:17-18, Christ promised that the entire Old
Testament, the Law and the Prophets, would be
fulfilled, not abolished. In fact, He declared that
not even the smallest Hebrew letter, the yodh,
which looks like an apostrophe (‘), or stroke of a
letter, a small distinguishing extension or
protrusion of several Hebrews letters (cf. the
extension on the letter R with it absence on the
letter P), would pass away until all is fulfilled.

10.  Obey His word (see 1st John 2:4-5)
 Live like He lived (see 1st John 2:5-6)