Verse one of chapter two, my little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. And he himself is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world. by this we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments the one who says I've come to know him and does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him but whoever keeps his word and him the love of God has been truly perfected by this we know that we are in him the one who says he abides in him ought himself to walk in the same manner as he walked what a glorious passage isn't it let me get my clock going here that way I don't preach till midnight I get going sometimes and I have a hard time shutting up well last week we took opportunity to look at the first verse and that we see that the Apostle says that if anyone sins, the Apostle says that I'm writing these things to you so that you do not sin. We made some comments about them that Christians sin. Born again, forgiven, justified, believers, sin. secondarily justified believers fight sin and that is the great difference between the regenerate and an unregenerate person the unregenerate person is under the power of sin he's a slave to his sins but the regenerate person at the cross the Lord Jesus Christ broke the power of sin and set the captive free and so we are not bound we're not subjects of sin any longer we're slaves but not to sin we're slaves of Christ Doulas in the Greek were slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ But he goes on and says this if anyone says we talk about he fights we fight sin. We've got a weapon He says I'm writing these things to you that you may not sin and God's given his word to us Which is an effectual weapon against sin but then he goes into verse 2 that if we sin if anyone sins and if you will remember what I taught you last week that that in in the Greek that would have it has a strong emphasis upon if anyone sins and you're going to we already know that this is not teaching sinless perfectionism it's not teaching Wesleyan ism It's not at all, it's teaching us that Christians do miss the mark still. It's about the governing principle of our life that we are still battling, that war is still being waged on the inside of us. We're seeing the newness, the new life that is in Jesus Christ and there's still that old remnant that is still there that we must contend against, the flesh. And by the way, I didn't know if I mentioned this last week, one of these days that flesh battle is going to be completely over. We're gonna be with Christ, we're gonna be perfected, we're gonna be glorified, and our propensity to sin will be forevermore over. In heaven there will be no sin. There's no tempter there. I don't know about you, but that makes me feel good, to know that the Lord is gonna perfect His people, and that when we are communing forever with our Lord in heaven, that there's not going to be what we now know as normal, that other side of the story. Or as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story. You know, we're born again, we love the Lord, but there's still that war that goes on on the inside of us. And the other side of the story is, is that there's that flesh spirit thing that goes on on the inside of us. And there is the joy of the Christian life and there's the groan of the reality that we still have a battle to fight. Then he goes on and talks about verses and verse the end of verse one in the beginning I talked about this just in moments before we closed last week the believers advocate the believers advocate if anyone sins we have an advocate with the father Jesus Christ the righteous and he himself is the propitiation for our sins and not I don't want to go back and re-preach all that I preached last week because this is online if you want to listen to it it's at gracelifeprior.org. Last week we talked momentarily about Jesus being our advocate that Christ he performed a satisfaction on our behalf and he's a the propitiation for our sins. And then it says that he is our advocate with the father Paracletus. And if you'll remember back in John 14 for those of you that are with us on the Lord's Day that we taught through John 14 and the teaching upon the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit of God is referred to as the Paraclete the Paraclete us. And we have that very same term in the Greek language being facilitated here by the Apostle John and he's referencing Jesus in his advocacy for us. He pleads with us. We remember last week we talked just in short about what Paul mentioned in Romans chapter 8 when he says, who will bring a charge against God's elect? And that is the church. That is the redeemed people of God. Who's going to bring a charge against us because we have an advocate. with the father the Lord Jesus Christ and Paul goes on to say in Romans 8 34 who is the one who condemns Jesus Christ is he who died yes rather who was raised and is at the right hand of God who intercedes advocates for us not only that but look back at our text that says it's Jesus Christ the righteous one Jesus Christ the righteous that's how John is describing and identifying the Lord Jesus Christ and I think that the pertinent question to be asked here in lieu of the context is what sense is John using this term and of course we know that there are those that believe whenever you look at what the commentators write about this text that believe that he's talking about the judicial righteousness of the father that the father has applied to a believer's account on the basis and the grounds of the righteousness of Christ but I don't believe that's the context here now we all do understand that whenever a A Christian is born again. God applies to us the very righteousness of Christ. It's an imputed righteousness. I made mention of this last week. Abraham believed God, and God credited it to him as righteousness. God accounted him as righteous. He perceived him. He treated him like he was righteous. But you have to understand, Abraham was not intrinsically Righteous and this is Abram of the of the of the Chaldeans And if you have anything about the history of the Chaldeans They are not the kind of people that you want to move in next door Abraham was not intrinsically righteous He was counted as righteous because he believed God and whenever we trust Jesus Christ when we believe upon him God credits the righteousness of Christ to you. God treats you the way that he treats his son. We're adopted into the family on the basis of the merit of Jesus Christ. This is Christianity, but oftentimes pulpits fail to teach this. So what kind of righteousness is it speaking of here? He's speaking about advocacy, isn't he? Now, think with me just for a moment. I just want the wheels of our minds to be turning. He's talking about advocacy on the part of a believer who has sinned. And if if one sins he has an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ and I believe that this when he makes mention of Jesus Christ the righteous as best understood as the righteousness of the character of Christ which governs the nature of his advocacy for us Does that make sense? It governs the nature. I don't believe he's talking in this sense about the imputed righteousness. I don't believe that's what he's speaking about at all. I believe it's referring to the faithfulness of Christ to our cause, and he presents the case before God based on his substitution, that which he has won for us on the cross, and he does that faithfully and with perfection. Let me just give an illustration. We have a less than perfect legal system, and those of us that are in law enforcement know that quite well. One of the most difficult parts of my job back whenever I was in law enforcement before I retired was going to court, oftentimes on crimes against children or sex crimes against little girls, and oftentimes that through loopholes, legal loopholes, guilty parties are released to go out and harm innocent children. I remember one specific case I worked 954 counts of lewd molestation against a little girl, and the guy walked out of the courtroom on a legal loophole, looked at the little girl and blew a kiss to her as he was walking out. That's what I was doing. I was actually reaching for steel, but I knew I couldn't shoot him in the courtroom. It hurt and what hurt worse was to look at that little girl with the tears rolling out of her eyes by the time she was 16 years old. I mentioned this to illustrate the point. When Jesus Christ is acting as the righteous advocate, he never uses and goes to loopholes in that advocacy. He's righteous. The court system that we have now is flawed because flawed men govern it. Flawed men wrote the laws that we enforce. And so the whole thing is based upon the premise of imperfection, but not Christ's. Whenever he pleads and advocates for us before the Father, it is righteous advocacy. It's not tainted. It's not corrupted. And I believe that's the basis of what John is describing here. Jesus Christ, the righteous, that advocates with absolute perfection according to the perfections of his nature and his character. His advocacy is upright. His advocacy is pure. His advocacy is holy. And there's no loopholes. Third, we see it says that Jesus is the atoning sacrifice. It says he himself is the propitiation for our sins. And what that means is simply this, that on the cross, when Jesus went to the cross, there is divine love taking the initiative to act on the behalf of sin slave rebels just like you and me. divine initiative acting 1st John 4 10 illustrates at best is in this is love not that we love God in this is what not that we love God so we see the premise is not us the initiative and the beginning point in salvation is not with us but that he loved us 1st John 4 10 and he sent his own son to be the propitiation for our sins Propitiation is a frightful kind of a word. It sounds very theological. It sounds possibly a hint sophisticated, but it's not. It's just simply a Bible term that you and I need to understand. And it has the connotation in the appeasing of an offended party. The Baker Encyclopedia of Bible Terms defines propitiation as the turning away of anger by the offering of a gift. So to understand the word propitiation, which is in scripture repetitiously, we've got to understand that God is holy and that God hates sin. God has a God-sized capacity to have holy anger against what he hates. One source said it this way, his anger is the settled opposition of his holy nature to everything that is evil. everything that is evil God hates it and it's unbiblical for us to view God if we don't understand that God has anger holy anger righteous anger we're living in a world that wants to redefine everything we want to redefine God that God is a God of all love with no wrath a God of all of all goodness with no anger it's not biblical God's given us a disclosure of who he is. He's done that in scripture. Listen to what the Bible says in Psalms 711. God is a just God and God is angry with the wicked every day. In the Hebrew, the word angry means angry. God is a just God and God is angry with the wicked every day. And of course, in modernistic terms, we would try to redefine that, that, well, it really doesn't mean angry. And then if we show in the original where it does mean angry, then we'll say, well, nobody's wicked. Or maybe he's angry at Charles Manson, but he's not angry at me. And then you have to go to what God says in his word about all men being under sin, and that in light of God's perfection, in light of God's burning white hot holiness, we being sinful, and sin's not out here, sin is in here, God defines us as wicked. Romans 2. The Apostle Paul tells us that God's storing up wrath for sinners, we're all sinners, against the day of wrath. And these terms are, they're frightful. The thoughts about God being angry with me are terrible thoughts. I'm not speaking about you, I'm speaking about me. As a sinner, apart from what Jesus Christ did, I understand I'm born again. I understand that Jesus has already satisfied God's wrath regarding my sins. I've been born again. God saved me in his mercy. But if I contemplate God's anger now as a redeemed sinner, that if Jesus hadn't acted on my behalf, God being a just God, God being a holy God, me being a sinner, what I would have to face on the day of judgment is terrible. God is not a corrupt judge like what we have in this country. God doesn't let guilty child molesters walk out of the courtroom thumbing their nose at their victims. And in the court of divine justice, the victim is God. David said this against you and you alone have I sinned. You think about that. Well, wait a minute. He killed Uriah. He slept with Bathsheba. He took that man's little lamb. He sinned against them. Whose law did David violate? Who set the ordinance that thou shalt not kill? Was it Uriah? No, it was God. So whenever David sinned, he sinned against God foremost. We're not any different. Whenever I sin, I sin against God. I've offended God. And so understanding the judgment of God, it is very frightful to think about me being looked upon by God as him being angry with me. But biblical Christianity insists that God is in fact angry with the unrepentant wicked. And the reason that we believe that is because the scriptures of God are ripe with that kind of terminology. And we also have to understand that we can't point to our neighbor without first looking at our own hearts, honestly. Romans 3.9, Paul said this, we're all under sin. Romans 3.19, Paul says, we're all guilty before God. He says that we've all outraged God's grace. We've all trampled the blood of Christ under our feet by our own disobedience to the truth. Hebrews 10.29. Yeah, I was talking about you too. And God is angry, and we are in need of His anger, propitiation, to be turned away. Listen, you're never going to understand what this is teaching in 1 John chapter 2 unless you understand these terms that there needs be. And Christ did, in fact, satisfy God's wrath in that act where He turned away God's wrath away from those who would believe upon Jesus Christ is what we call propitiation. And listen, the gift offered was Jesus, God's only begotten Son. and that he offered his own holy blood upon the cross, and there he absorbed God's anger that has owed me, that has owed you. God is angry. We are in need of his anger to be turned away by the offering of a gift. And John here says he himself is the propitiation for our sins. That should leave our mouth open like, oh, to the glory and the praise of his grace. Oh, to the glory and the praise of his grace. You know, it never ceases to boggle my imagination that there are people that call themselves by the name of Christ and they've become numb to or bored with what Christ has done on the cross. And they say this regarding the gospel that we need to remove and to move on from the gospel. Yeah, we need the gospel to get saved, but God's got something better and higher for us other than the gospel. Are you kidding me? What is better and higher and more glorious than the cross of Jesus Christ? Are you kidding me? He bore God's wrath for me. He propitiated for my sin. The punishment that was due me was laid upon the shoulders of the Lord Christ. He bore the wrath of God for me and in my stead. And Jesus is the propitiation for my sins and our sins because Jesus became sin and he was punished for my sin. Isaiah spoke in terms that are fit for the thought of propitiation. Listen to Isaiah 53, four and five. Surely his griefs, or our griefs, he himself bore. Our sorrows he carried. Yet we ourselves esteemed him stricken and smitten of God and afflicted. Listen to this. He was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening punishment for our well-being fell upon him. By his scourging, some translation, stripes, beating, we are healed. And if you go on and read verse 10 of Isaiah 53, it tells us that God was crushing his son. I mean, these are not terms that are just casually approached. This is serious. That God crushed his son in justice so that he might mete out mercy to us. Propitiation. The next thing I want you to understand that atonement and this whole issue of propitiation was substitutionary and vicarious. Vicarious simply means by term in the place of another. Substitution. Substituted instead of the other. So what this means is that Jesus Christ literally, not hypothetically, he literally took your punishment instead of you. every time you kicked your little sister in the shin when he was seven and every time you shook your fist at heaven and curse God Jesus Christ actually paid for specific sins listen hypothetical and I mean by that is people that perceive the death of Christ as a blanket death of that's just thrown out there and suspended into this orb, and that if you want it, grab it, if not, is completely foreign to what this Bible teaches. Listen, when he went to the cross, he went to the cross and bore sin, real sin for real people, not hypothetical imaginary folks. He bore sin. He paid for it. And I realize that some people think so surface level. And they're not willing to dig into these deep doctrines because they're afraid of what they might find. Or maybe it's just the fact that no one has been taught. But our forefathers in Christianity, from the Apostle Paul through the ages, have taught vicarious and substitutionary atonement. And what I mean by that, to clarify the terms, is that when Jesus Christ went to the cross, that he was literally and physically punished by the wrath of God for true sins that people have truly committed, individuals. I heard one guy say it this way, he didn't just die for you, he died as you. We like to put on the shelf those kinds of thoughts, but the Bible doesn't. The Bible doesn't he didn't go to the cross for a hypothetical people and for the sins of a possible people He actually bore the sins of a particular people Matthew 121 he shall save his people from their sins The view of a universal atonement of an unspecified group of people and an unspecified group of sins is the foundation for universalism. Universalism is that foul demonic doctrine that teaches at the end everybody is going to get saved, that nobody goes to hell. That's what Rob Bell turned into, who was once at one time possibly, I don't agree with him, I've heard that he was a quasi-evangelical preacher. And now he's on Oprah Winfrey's show saying that nobody goes to hell. He wrote a book called Love Wins and in that book he twists and perverts the Christian faith into universalism and saying that when Christ went to the cross and that he died and bore the sins of every person that has ever lived and every sin that was ever committed and that everybody in the end thereby and therefore is saved. You tell me how that squares with scripture. I understand that an emotional person that can't bear the thought of God-hating rebels that refuse and reject the gospel of Jesus Christ going to hell, some people will not own up to that could ever be true. A loving God could not do so. But I'll say to you, how can a loving God not do so? Let's go back to my story. I'm just taking my time, I'm slowing down a bit. What about that guy that walked out of the courthouse? What about a judge that knew that loophole wasn't real and that dismissed those 900 and some counts of molestation against that little girl and let that guy walk out? Is that love? What if everybody walks out and gets hold of your kids? Is that love? The problem is this. We want him punished. But we don't wanna see ourselves as sinners before God and deserving of God's wrath for our sins to be punished. That's the problem. And I'm just like you. I see offenses against children as the most heinous. I really do. And I had seven years of, that's all I did, work those kinds of crimes. And they're heinous, they're utterly heinous. But we're talking about a holy God that hates all sin. He hates lying, says all liars will have their part in the lake of fire in the book of Revelation. All liars. A God that hates sin. He hates little white lies, because there are no little white lies in God's eyes, they're all lies. And we sin against the truth of the word of God. And I realize this is not the most popular preaching, I probably won't make it on TV. And I don't want to. I want us to grab hold of the truth and embrace the truth and appreciate what Christ did on the cross and that he actually suffered the wrath of God for the sins that I have committed. Is there going to be a tornado? Okay, we've got time. Just for our visitors. In 1942, prior was wiped out. And the one that in fact knocked the only building that stood was this one, this one in the in the PYO building down there. We this building has three foot thick rock and concrete walls. So we're good. Next thing I want to say because this is is I want to bring up that there was a full salvation one that's my third point under this caption a full salvation was one on the cross it says not only for our sins but for those of the whole world and I really need to explain this because it seems somewhat contradictory to what I've decided about the atonement being vicarious, substitutionary, Christ literally taking the sins and dying for the sins, particular sins of people, His people, Matthew 121. It seems that this text, in light of what I've just taught, in light of what we understand now for propitiation to be, It seems as if this text is kind of teaching universal redemption. And that is that Christ's death and atonement was for every person and every sin that's ever been born. And we have to come to the grips of, is that what this is saying? The Puritan said that this verse is the most difficult verse to interpret in the whole sum of scripture. If we believe propitiation to be for every sin that's ever been sinned by any person, then universalism is the only option that we got left. But we all know that universalism is not true. I mean, what about the rich man that died and went to hell? What about the road that leads to destruction? What is that destruction? Does that mean that? What does it mean? What does eternal damnation mean then? And I think that we're all Theologically empty enough to understand that not everybody's going to heaven Jesus said few be that find it straight as the gate narrows the way that leads To heaven eternal life Universalism is not biblical. Not everybody's going to be saved in the end. Love is going to win, of course The universalism is not a it's not love And so we know that can't be. We've got to go by all of scripture, tota scriptura. Not everybody's going to be saved in the end. So how do we look at this verse? Verse two, he himself is a propitiation. He's our advocate. Stop right there. John Gill made a good point. I was reading John Gill on this. He's a Puritan Baptist in the 16th century, scholar, Hebrew and Greek expert. And he said this, is Jesus Christ everybody's advocate? I mean, whenever we get into heaven, we're going to see who the advocacy was effectual for, right? I mean, is Jesus advocating for unrepentant sinners hell bound? Are you kidding me? It says in Romans 8, who will bring the charge against God's elect? And he's using in the very same breath advocacy, propitiation, and we have to look at it in that vein. Jesus is the Christian's advocate, the believer's advocate. He's also the believer's propitiation. Who's he writing to? Look at verse one. My little children, Christians. So in what sense is he saying it's the sins of the whole world? Let me just explain something to you. And I realize that not everybody researches these kinds of things. We have to reconcile these with the whole sum of scriptures and the teaching of scripture on what the atonement is. When you come to the word world cosmos in the Greek, in Johanan literature, and I mean in John's writing, that would be the gospel of John, that would be first John, second John, third John, and the book of Revelation. He uses the word world in a very unique way, cosmos. And it's in reference to a large group of people. And it's used in that way most often in his literature. And for us to believe that this is inclusive of all people and all time, in John's eyes, is nonsense. Absolute nonsense. Let me read a passage out of John 12. Listen to this. Y'all remember when Jesus healed Lazarus? You remember that the Pharisees and the religious leaders in Jerusalem were not real happy. Everybody was going out of the city and going to see this guy that had been raised from the dead. It was a phenomenon. He'd be dead four days, and now he's alive. It's a phenomenon. I mean, it's all over Facebook. The Pharisees were not real happy that all these people were coming out and seeing Lazarus and believing upon Christ. They were upset. Now I want you to notice the use of the word world, John 12, 19. So the Pharisees said to one another, you see that you're not doing any good. Look, the world has gone after him. Does that mean everybody in the whole world has gone after him? Are you kidding me? Cosmos, a large sum of people. Everybody in the world hadn't gone out after Christ because Lazarus got raised from the dead The people in that region that knew about it a large sum of people And so whenever we approach first John 2 2 we've got to understand that This use of the world word world cosmos is in the same vein of interpretation Now, let me explain another thing This is a Jewish audience John is addressing Jewish believers. The little children were Jewish believers. And so whenever he is approaching the issue of the atonement, what are they thinking? They're thinking about the economy of the day of atonement that they had been focusing upon for generation after generation. Leviticus 16, 17. And in Leviticus 16, 17, where it defines where God sets the standards for the day of atonement, what does he say other than that this is for the community of Israel? It's for Israel. And so in a Jewish mind, whenever John is making mention that this propitiation is for our sins, they would have understood in the mindset of a Jew in the first century that had been celebrating Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, their whole life and their dad and their mom and their grandpa and their grandma and their great grandpa, all the way back to the early days when God instituted the Day of Atonement that belongs to Israel only. So now what's happening? They're saying, no, wait a minute. Christ went to the cross and He atoned, atoned Yom Kippur. It says right there in Leviticus that it's just for the community of Israel. And John says, not just for the community of Israel, but for communities all around the world. For peoples from every tribe, tongue, and revelation 5-9. Revelation 5.9 says that Jesus shed his blood for peoples, for God, from every tribe, tongue, kindred, and nation. And that's what he's saying. Cosmos. For a Jew, it would be unthinkable in this era for atonement to be for just everybody. Because it was just theirs. And John was saying, oh no, no, no. Not just us. But now it's for those who would believe. It's for the church. Believers in the Jews, believers in the Gentiles. One of the scholars on this is Dr. James Montgomery Boyce. I quote him a lot on the Lord's Day in my sermons. He says this, if John as a Jew is actually thinking of the propitiatory sacrifice as it was practiced in Israel, particularly the Day of Atonement, and how could he not? that it may well be of himself and other Jews as opposed to the Gentiles that he uses the word us or we in this phrase. The contrast would therefore be not between Christians and the as yet unsaved world but between those Jews and for whom Christ died and those Gentiles for whom Christ died both of whom now make up or eventually will make up the church. Remember Ephesians 5? What does it say in Ephesians 5? Christ loved the what the church and gave him up himself up for her the church voice goes on to say according to this view what John wishes to say is that Jesus fulfilled the pattern set by the Old Testament sacrifices but that he did so in such a way that now Gentiles as well as Jews are safe and that's difficult for some people it's difficult That is exactly what this text is teaching in the context in which it's written Who will bring a charge against God select who will bring a charge against the church Why what do you say because there's no sins left to prosecute Christ is their advocacy because he paid for their sins in full on the cross He bore them Yes yours. Yes mine There's nothing left for us to pay for. When we sing the song Jesus painted, all to him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. Why do we sing that song? He paid the price I couldn't pay. He bore my sins. He paid for them. He died in my place. Paul breaks out into praise in Ephesians 1 6 0 to the praise of the glory of his grace where he has made us Accepted in the blood Jews and Gentiles believing Jews believing Gentiles Everybody okay Verse 3 let's look at the believers assurance the believers assurance by this we have we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments and John Cotton was an early American Puritan and he said that the Apostle John had shown in the former verses that Christ is our advocate in propitiation and here his little children might reason but how shall I know that Christ is my advocate and reconciler though he is both yet how shall I know that he is so for me in the answers hereby we know that we know him if we keep commandments the proper question I think that needed to be asked in this first century is a rhetorical question and the question is this what kind of a knowledge is in fact saving knowledge by this we know that we have come to know him are you what kind of knowing is saving and what kind of knowing is not so saving now I want you to remember that The false doctrines that had crept into the early church that was circulating largely. John is writing for this very purpose. He's writing to the little children, which were believers because Gnosticism was on the rise. That was a false doctrine and foundational to Gnosticism is the supremacy of extra biblical knowledge. The word is Gnosis, G-N-O-S-I-S. They believed the basis of their salvation was upon they had the right kind of supreme and extra biblical knowledge And the knock the Gnostic doctrine taught that the way of salvation was by way of obtaining that knowledge But it was through these mystical encounters and by these super mystical in mystical encounters it provided for them a great Supremacy of knowledge and that through that knowledge they were saved but John is impressing upon them and pressing upon his here's his audience and The biblical and the god-ordained means of salvation and that is not the supremacy of knowledge But the supremacy of a bloody sacrifice that was hanging on a cross outside of the gates of jerusalem Gnosticism circumvented the cross It circumvented the necessity of vicarious substitution it circumvented the blood of the atonement for sin And let me just add another note on this. Strangely enough, I spent 10 years in the charismatic church when I was a young man. And oddly enough, I never heard one single sermon in 10 years that illuminated my wickedness against the backdrop of the bloody cross. Not once. For 10 long years, here's what I heard. You need a second work of grace. Through that second work of grace. You're going to get some knowledge and by that experience It's going to be special and unique and that's what you need to focus on Over and again on Sunday and Sunday night on Wednesday over and over and over and over not the cross not my sin Not what Christ did but on my need for the second work of grace the second baptism to give me this special knowledge that dumb Baptists like me didn't have You want me to tell you what it did? For 10 years, that focus never shifted. And for 10 years, I never heard about my need for a Savior. For 10 years, I never heard what Jesus did on the cross of Calvary. For 10 years, I never knew that I was a brave, wretched sinner in need of mighty grace. For 10 years, all that was being taught, all that was being emphasized was this superlative experience, this higher knowledge that I needed. Sounds to me like Gnosticism. Why does it sound like Gnosticism other than that it is Gnosticism? That message that I heard for 10 years, and this is just a caveat, that message that I heard for 10 years quieted and stilled and made a stillborn issue of a sinner's need of true grace that was saving for us. The true message of the gospel was aborted and the lie was burned. Week after week, year after year. But here John is defining for us the object of saving knowledge. It's not some esoteric experience. And what I mean by esoteric, I mean some mystical encounter, some outside of me encounter that's super spiritual and mystical and goose bumpy. John defines the object of saving knowledge as not that experience, it's the cross, not gnosis, but substitutionary atonement. He says blood, death. sacrifice, propitiation, substitution. That's how we're saved. It's faith in the right object. And it's not by experiencing goosebumps in a mystical situation. How do you know Christ savingly? How do you define salvation? You know, the knowledge that saves is the knowledge of what took place on that cross, the knowledge of who we are as sinners, and it's our throwing ourselves at His feet by His grace in repentance and in faith that His death is in place of mine. His death is in place of mine. And that's the foundation for Christian assurance. John Cotton goes on and says, so then it is such a knowledge as makes us trust in him, a knowledge that makes us fear him, a knowledge that makes us honor him, a knowledge that makes us serve him, cleave to him, and yield obedience to him. That's the kind of knowledge. In other words, it's a knowledge that transforms. It's a knowledge that performs. It's God's power. It's God's grace at work. It's faith that works. James 2, 6. Well, I didn't give her a thought, did I? Well, Father, we're so thankful that you are very clear to us in your word what your son has done for us, your church, your people, the ones that you have saved. Lord, we're so thankful, thankful for what you've revealed. Lord, that while we were dead in our sins, Jesus died for us. Lord, we're so thankful for these verses, Lord, that are so powerful and effectual for us. Oh, Lord, we just give you the praise for it. Lord, we glory in the cross. We glory in what Christ has done. Not in ourselves, but in Christ. Oh, Lord, we're so thankful that 2,000 years ago that our Savior bore our sins in his body on the tree and that he died in our place, that he bore the wrath that we deserve. And on the basis of what Jesus Christ has done for us, Lord its salvation has now extended us through his name and Lord we give you praise we give you honor and we give you glory Lord I pray Lord that these words will teach us and instruct us that we'll have a deep and profound and mysterious appreciation for the work of the cross and for the propitiation that Christ has made for us and we give you the praise and the glory and Lord in our obedience is do what you've done for us in Christ's name amen