I John 4:6

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We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

THE STUDY:

          John contended that true believers would tune out messages from “the world” (v 5). They would refuse to give heed to the “false prophets” (v 1) who had left the Christian churches (“gone out into the world,” v 1). John calls his readers to reject the Gnostics. They should instead listen to him and those allied with him. He insists that when people do “not listen to us” and chooses to listen to a contrary gospel, they show themselves to be “not from God”.

         A positive statement of this principle appears in John 8:47: “He who belongs to God hears what God says.” For John, teaching alien to his views clearly placed person in the arena of falsehood or deceit. Listening to him was to listen to “truth.” A person will inevitably be mindful of one spirit or another.^[1]

Why do God’s people listen to preachers? Because preachers proclaim God’s Word, and that Word has divine authority. God’s people hear his voice when the preacher speaks.^[2]

WHAT WE CAN WALK AWAY WITH ….

• We walk away this morning with the understanding that being of God (A believer of the faith) we will tune out the world and hear God! Not just hear Him but heed to his word. The opposite is true as well: Not of God we will have an open ear to the world.

CONCLUSION:

          Our friends and the social contexts we embrace incline us toward certain habits. Our associates affect how we entertain ourselves and how we spend our time and money. Admittedly, we cannot always choose our environment. But we are always to choose for the holy, rather than contrary to it. Susanna Wesley advised her son John,

Whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off your relish of spiritual things; in short, whatever increases the strength and authority of your body over your mind, that thing is sin to you, however innocent it may be in itself. (Wallace 1997, 109)^[3]

          My friends, pursue God in everything we do so that we may “BE OF GOD” and not of this world. My challenge to us today, whatever is pulling us away from God REMOVE IT!

Blessings my friends

Pastor Rod

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^[1] Williamson, R. (2010). 1, 2, & 3 John: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition. New Beacon Bible Commentary (140). Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill Press.

^[2] Kistemaker, S. J., & Hendriksen, W. (1953-2001). Vol. 14: New Testament commentary : Exposition of James and the Epistles of John. New Testament Commentary (329). Grand Rapids: Baker Book House.

^[3] Williamson, R. (2010). 1, 2, & 3 John: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition. New Beacon Bible Commentary (141). Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill Press.