If you will take your Bible and turn with me to 1 John chapter 2. 1 John chapter 2, I'll begin reading in verse 28 through chapter 3, verse 3. 1 John chapter 2, verse 28. And now little children, abide in Him. so that when he appears, we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming. If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him. See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God. So we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. Beloved, we are God's children now, and what will be has not yet appeared. But we know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. Everyone who thus hopes in Him purifies himself as he is pure. Let us pray. Father, we do need to see your truth from your Word. So give us eyes to see, give us ears to hear. Lord, give us a mind to think properly upon your truth. For we need to think upon Jesus rightly. And Lord, I do ask that you would help me to speak clearly and in accordance with your word. It's through Jesus that I pray this. Amen. These verses speak about, as John writes to those, they speak about their present state and how they ought to live in the present. And then He is also directing their attention to the future. He is directing their attention to the future. And the future meaning when He appears. When He appears occurs in verse 28, Now little children abide in Him, so that when He appears. And then also we see in verse 2 of chapter 3, Beloved, we are God's children now, And what we will be has not yet appear, but we know that when he appears. And so there is a focus now. Now, little children, verse 28, and. And now, we are God's, verse 2, beloved we are God's children now, but there is a, as we think about what's currently happening now, the Christian life, who you are in Christ, as John writes to these believers, he's saying that has importance for the future. That has importance for the future. And so in light of that, there is a question that I'd like to ask. Child of God, are you ready for Jesus' return? Child of God, are you ready for Jesus' return? John, of course, is writing to Christians. He's telling them the way that the Christian life works. It's a life of confession of our sin against God. He told them in chapter 1, if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Also, he brings their attention to the Christian as the one who depends upon Jesus as their help. Chapter 2, verse 1, My little children, I am writing to you these things, so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate. with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous." So this is the group that he's writing to. This group looks to Christ for help, and they know particularly that the help is because the wrath of God will be poured out upon every sin. They know Jesus to be the propitiation for their sin, or the sin sacrifice that appeases the wrath of God, puts away the wrath of God. Verse 2 of chapter 2, He is the propitiation for our sins, not only ours, but also for the sins of the whole world. This is this group, the family of God. He's talked about the little children, the fathers, the young men. He's referred to them as beloved little children, the family of God. And so we pick up here in verse 28, And he says, And now little children abide in him. So there is a beautiful description of the Christian as the child of God we're going to see in this passage. We're going to see the present Christian life and then also a proper understanding of the future. Quite a few things going on within this passage. But he says there at the beginning of verse 28, now, and now little children abide in Him. We've heard this before, of course. John uses the phrase little children. What do we know about little children? They are the ones that we must be most patient with. Little children. Little children are those that need the most care most of the time. And so he writes patiently and with care to these Christians. And then Matthew Henry says that he's not focusing so much on their smallness, he doesn't think. He doesn't think the little children, we think about that. Matthew Henry says he thinks that his love toward these people he's writing to is the motivation to put those words, little children. So it's because of affection that he writes little children. And Matthew Henry says it could also be rendered dear children. I'm writing these things to you. He cares about these people. This is good for us to remember the nature of the family of God and the proper speech that should occur, the proper correspondence that should occur. Under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, John certainly is communicating properly, and now little children. And he has something he wants them to hear, and it is this, abide in him. This John has put here is nothing different than what the Holy Spirit teaches a Christian. Look back to verse 27 of chapter 2, 1 John 2, 27. But the anointing that you have 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. So John says the Holy Spirit, you're anointed with the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit teaches you, leads you in a direction to abide in Him. And so John repeats this, abide in Him. Abide in Jesus. Abide in Jesus. To stay in Jesus, to remain, not to depart from Jesus. We know that the Antichrist is the one who does not confess Jesus as the Christ. And this confession has to do also with our life as in Christ. We confess Jesus as the Christ and we are trusting in Him. Do not leave Jesus. Don't go looking for another Savior. There is one Savior. of sinners, Jesus Christ. Don't go looking for another love. Jesus is the first love of the Christian. Don't go looking for other truth, for Jesus is the truth. Abide in Him. Remain in Him. Dwell with Him, John says. Now, he's going to tell us about Jesus' return, But he says the Christian life, the present Christian life, is vitally important to the future for the Christian. Abide in him. Remain. Don't go looking for another way to heaven, for Jesus is the only way to the Father. The only way that there can be communion between the Father and a sinner is through the God-Man, Jesus Christ. Abide in Him. Sin separates communion with Jesus. Sin separates communion with Jesus. And so, if we're going to abide or remain with Jesus, then we must be Abiding in Him, not being separated from Him by our sin, but abide in Him, commune with Him. This is day-to-day by repentance from our sin. The question is how to abide in Him now. We trust in Christ. We have been justified. We're declared righteous. We are in Christ. We have life in Christ. But then there is also this emphasis on the Christian life being lived out as a continual abiding in Christ, a continual coming to Him and trusting in Him. Our sins separated us from God. Certainly we are reconciled to God through Jesus. But what about communion with God? Abide in Him? What about this daily abiding? Well, we were We first came to Christ when we were able to see our sin by God's grace. He granted us repentance of our sin. That sin separated us from God. Jesus, though, brings us near to God. It is by faith, trusting and depending upon Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Jesus is the only fit Savior. Abide in Him. If you want to be united with God, you want to have fellowship with God, abide in Christ. And so abide in trust, abide in dependence. We can summarize by saying that in the present the Christian must abide in Christ, must abide in Him. When you think about what is the proper life to be living, it is a life that abides in Christ. And so, and now little children abide in Him. John brings the attention of those who will read this letter to that focus. In the present, the Christian can experience many blessings that come from abiding in Jesus. Jesus grants peace, He grants joy, He grants rest for the soul. Abide in Christ. And John says that this abiding in Jesus affects the future. Look there to verse 28 again of chapter 2. And now little children abide in Him so that when He appears, we may have confidence and not shrink from Him in shame at His coming. The future is very important for the Christian. We are thankful for the day-to-day life that we might live on this earth with fruitful labor for the glory of God, but the future is very important for the Christian. For in the future, Jesus is coming back. Jesus lived 2,000 years ago, walked this earth in Israel. He died, He was buried in a tomb. On the third day, He was resurrected from the grave. We know these details about Jesus as the Scripture has revealed and as history tells us. Jesus then ascended into heaven. He's seated at the right hand of the Father. All of His enemies are being made His footstool. And so what is next? Next is that Jesus is coming again at His appearing. When He appears, So the Bible teaches that Jesus is coming back, and one beloved passage that we have, Jesus spoke to the disciples in John 14. Many of you could probably quote this. Let's turn to John 14, the beginning of that chapter. John 14. We find that Jesus says, beginning in verse 1, In my Father's house are many rooms, dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself. that where I am, you may be also." Jesus is coming back and John says, abide in Him. If you want to be prepared for His coming, then you've got to be abiding. so that when he returns, abiding in Jesus prepares us for his coming. When Jesus appears, we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame. at His coming. That was the continuation there back in 1 John 2, verse 28. So really, we're talking about the present Christian life. I believe that John is talking about the present Christian life. He's exhorting them, abide in Him, and then he's saying the effects and the preparation that that provides for the future when He appears. So when Jesus returns, Our present relationship with the Lord has an impact on our future relationship with the Lord. Everybody, when Jesus returns, wants to be right with Him, wants to be abiding in Him. Anybody with any sense would say, of course, I want to be the friend of God. I want to be united with God. I don't want to be separated from the goodness of God. And that's only through Christ that this happens. So when Jesus comes, we want to have some confidence, some freeness, some openness of speech. When Jesus comes, we don't want to be like the child who is in trouble. What do we know about the child who is in trouble? Many times they're silent before you. They don't have anything to say. You can ask them a direct question that you know the answer, they know the answer, and they will not give an answer. The child that's in trouble is quiet. But yet, the child who has nothing to fear can say, no, this is what happened in that case. And let me explain, mom or dad, whoever is giving the questioning. We want to have something to say when Jesus appears. We want to have some confidence. And we want to be free and open with our speech. And this is not that we're going to be dominating the conversation with Jesus. That is not the point. Don't misunderstand. What we want is we want to have an exclamation of praise for Jesus upon our lips. We want to be abiding in Him now and step into eternity or at His return to be able to continue that abiding in a greater degree, dwelling with Him. We don't want to be silent at His coming in the sense that we're shameful. We don't want to be ashamed. The Scripture says there, it says that so that the abiding in Him is so that the connection, at least in this verse 28, when He appears we may have confidence and not shrink from Him in shame at His coming. Think about the exclamations of praise that we sing. My Jesus, I love Thee. I know Thou art mine. For Thee all the follies of sin I reside. So abiding in Him affects our life. We want to live for Him. We'll give up sin because we know that Sin only gives fleeting pleasures and we deny the fleeting pleasures of sin by the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us to abide in Him. My gracious Redeemer, my Savior art Thou. If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus tis now. When we see Him. At His coming, we're talking about. This is when it gets serious, you see. Sometimes we just go through life, put one foot in front of the other. We're just trying to make it through life. But you know, this life is going to come to an end. And then we're in His presence. He appears. That's when the eternity begins. That's the time, the point that we want to be prepared for. Of course, day by day, we want to be prepared to go out and live a life that glorifies God. But oh, the day when we step into eternity, or eternity comes down and makes all things new. We want to abide in Him now, and we want to have some confidence at His appearing. When Jesus appears, we don't want to shrink back from Him in shame. We do not like to feel shame. Some people are more given to this than others. But if you do feel shame, you want to draw back. You don't want to be in the presence of the person that you're ashamed of. Many people will not lift their eyes. They won't look at you if they're ashamed. They'll keep their head down and they don't want to make eye contact. And there are some things that we should be ashamed of as Christians. But when Jesus comes, we don't want to have shame before Him. The things that should make us ashamed are our sin. For Peter says that if you're insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed because of the Spirit of glory and of God rest upon you. Don't be shameful for suffering for Christ. That's nothing to be ashamed about. if you suffer for Christ. But He says if you suffer as a murderer, or a thief, or an evildoer, or as a meddler, that's what you should be shameful for. Let none of you suffer in that way. Don't be suffering because of sinful things, for that is a shameful thing. If anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed. You hear that? If anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed. I should give you this reference so you can look in your own Bible and see it. It's 1 Peter 4, verse 16. 1 Peter 4, verse 16. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. There are some things that we should be ashamed of and other things should not bring us shame. Our sin should bring us shame, but suffering for Jesus is not shameful. Taking a stand for Jesus is not shameful. and abiding in Christ and living a life that glorifies Him, that dwells in Him. I mean, our life is Christ. That's the reality of the Christian. For me to live is Christ, is the way that Paul put it there in Philippians. When he's writing to the Philippians, to live is Christ. If I'm going to have life, then it's going to be a life for Christ. That's not shameful a bit. And when He appears, when He comes, We won't have any shame living such a life of abiding in Him. Sin brings shame. Paul said to the Romans that they were slaves of sin and they were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit, he asked, but what fruit were you getting from at that time the things which you are now ashamed? You're now ashamed of that sin which you used to be a slave of. The shame is connected to the sin. We should be ashamed of our sin. But there is confidence. It's possible. We can have confidence before the Lord at His appearing. And that comes from abiding in Him. We want to have something to say, it is appearing. We don't want to be ashamed when Jesus comes. There's only one reason, truly, there's only one reason that we don't have to be ashamed when Jesus comes. I am talking about abiding, and I have made reference to living a life that glorifies Him. But that's only the fruit of the reality that actually dispels and takes away all shame. So let's turn to 1 Peter 2. 1 Peter 2. Verse 6. 1 Peter 2. Verse 6. The real reason that we will not be ashamed at Jesus' coming is this reason. For it stands in Scripture, Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame. This is talking about, of course, Jesus, the cornerstone. Whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame. It is those who trust in Christ, abide in Him by faith, that will not be put to shame at the coming of Christ, at His return. Abide in Him by belief. Certainly the relationship begins that way. And it continues as well. But abide in Christ by trusting in Him, believing in Him. Not simple assent to the knowledge, the basics of the Gospel, and that Jesus is Savior, but this is belief that has a trust, a dependence upon, a leaning upon Jesus as your only hope. Are you prepared for His coming? That's the question. You can be prepared for His coming and it is by abiding in Him. Belief. Believe the biblical gospel. There is good news for sinners such as us. And you and I can be prepared and those that John's writing to can be prepared when he says abide in Him so that when He appears we may have confidence not shrink from Him at His coming. But there is, for the Christian life, a manner of life. There is a way that the Bible says the Christian lives. And so back in 1 John 2, verse 29, as we talk about abiding in Him, the beginning of the abiding begins with belief in Him, we continue to trust in Him, and we also live in a manner that is pleasing to Him. We live a righteous life. If you know that He is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of Him." If you know that He is righteous. God is righteous. He does everything right. Jesus lived out this righteous life on earth in accordance with the standard of God. Jesus is righteous. God is righteous. The Bible says we saw up and further back in 1 John chapter 1, we saw that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all, not a speck of unrighteousness in God. The Bible teaches that Jesus is righteous. We said that we have an advocate with the Father from chapter 2, Jesus Christ, the righteous. He does everything right. He is right, approved of in the Father's sight. And Jesus must be righteous in order to save the unrighteous. We are unrighteous because we have not kept God's standard. We have broken the law of God, we have sinned against God, but Jesus never sinned. And so now in Jesus we might become the righteousness of God. It says if you know that He is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of Him. So we have to get to the point where we say, There is something about the description of the Christian as the one who practices righteousness, because those people, it says from verse 29, that person has been born of Him that practices righteousness. And so we can become righteous in God's sight because we're given the righteousness of Christ, the perfections of Christ. That's, again, the only way that we can be justified. We need to separate sometimes in our mind to be clear that we're not practicing righteousness in order to make ourselves approved of before God. But we are given the righteousness of Christ and we are declared righteous before Him. The Bible says we're justified. God is both just and a justifier. We're declared righteous in His sight. But then what about the manner of life of the Christian? Those that practice righteousness, those that have some fruit of a righteous life, they've begun to live in a way that God approves of. They've begun to deny the deeds of the flesh and put to death the deeds of the flesh. That is a mark of those people who have been born of Him, that have this spiritual life, has been born of Him. We see at the end of verse 29, If you want to have confidence and not be ashamed when Jesus comes back, then you must practice righteousness, live in a righteous manner. And some say your teaching works righteousness. No, that's only possible if you've been born of Him. That's what we're saying. There's much confusion on the Christian life. and what emphasis should be made. It is possible to live a righteous life or practice righteousness if you have been born of Him. And so our living in a righteous manner is only because God has made us righteous. And the order is important. The order is really important. We can actually live in a way that pleases God because God has done something first. He has worked in the person's heart. He's given them a new heart. They believe upon Christ. They trust in Christ because they can see their sin. I'm saying this over and over again because I do think that there's confusion, maybe not as much among this group, but certainly at large. There's confusion on how it is that we are right with God, approved of it in His sight. And so John simply says, you know that he is righteous. You may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him. That's pretty good. So we're looking around saying, who's living in a righteous manner of life? And then then you have to. put some more biblical qualifiers on that to mean also to understand that those that have been born of him because God has saved them and now the fruit that they begin to practice righteousness. The children of God who is prepared for Jesus coming by abiding in Him, they practice righteousness. We'll see it much more in the next section for sure of 1 John, but this is important. Again, Matthew Henry says that you can almost connect or you can say it's another way of saying, one, he says there in verse 28, abide in Him. So abide in Him. Yeah, those that know the Lord are abiding in the Lord. And then he says those basically that know the Lord, they are practicing righteousness. If you abide in the Lord, then you will practice righteousness, I think is the connection from this passage of Scripture. That's not to push us to despair and to say, oh, I'm going to look at my life and see if I'm living perfectly. But it is when we see our unrighteousness, when we begin to live in a sinful way, then that should push us to Christ once again. Unite, abide, you've gone away from Him if you're living in a sinful way. But no, come to Him, abide in Him, and you will live in a righteous way, and you'll be resting in His righteousness for your perfection before God." I hope you can see the connection. Matthew Poole put it this way, God hath no children destitute of His image, or who resembles Him not. If we're not beginning to look like Christ, beginning to walk in a way that pleases the Lord, then the question is, have we really received the grace of God in Jesus Christ? Have we really begun to abide in Him? Look, there's something else to see in verse 1. See, chapter 3, 1 John 3, verse 1, see what kind of love, behold, what manner of love the Father has given to us that we should be called the children of God. And so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Look closely. This is Something we do quite often. Look closely. Many of you have the magnifying glass or you have magnifying glasses on your glasses, the reading glasses. Look closely. So many things to look closely at and to look at for a long period of time. A long period of time and we're blessed by God to have these eyes that we can see things with. And John says, see, look. Here is what we should look at. Don't look at sinful things, but it is good for us to look for a long time at the love that the Father has given us. There is the focus from that verse. See what kind of love the Father has given to us. You want to abide in Christ? Look at the kind of love that the Father has given to us. What does the love of God the Father look like? Direct over to 1 John 4, verse 9. In this is the love of God. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world so that we might live through Him. There it is, the Father's love looks like Him sending His beloved Son to the world so that sinners might have eternal life. For Jesus died in the place of sinners. Everyone should look. Everyone should listen to the good news of Jesus Christ, but not everyone sees or hears. Only the children of God see the love of God. John encouraged these believers, look, see, behold this love. It's only the children of God that can see the love of God in Jesus Christ. Why doesn't everyone see the love of God? Well, that's because everyone is not a child of God. Everyone's not been given the love of God. That is the difference between the Christian and the non-Christian. The Christian is different. They have been given the saving love of God that they should be called the children of God. What a privileged position. What a motivation to abide in Christ when we look at the love of God. For God has great love with which He loved us. Even when we were dead in our trespasses, He made us alive with Christ. It's Ephesians chapter 2. Look at the love of God that makes us children of God. For we know it was in love He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will. Look at the love of God. And so, have you seen the love of the Father that has clearly been displayed, made manifest, in Him sending His Son? Have you seen it? in the way that John says we ought to see it. See what kind of love the Father has given us, that we should be called the children of God, and so we are. Look to Christ, abide in Him. This is John's constant teaching. If you want to really estimate the love of God, you actually even have to look, you have to look as McLaren puts it, to the death of Christ. We say God gave His Son, and we think, well, He came down to this earth and He walked in this fallen world, and that is certainly quite a sacrifice in itself. But look to Christ on the cross! Look to Jesus dying! Oh, what love it is that He would offer His Son to die in such a way. God shows His love for us while we were still sinners. Christ died for us. The love of God. You say, well, I'll send my Son over there to help you. Many of you will do such a thing. I'll send my Son over to help out a bit. Oh, no, God does more than that. He says, I'm going to send my son and he's going to give his life to help you. He's going to die that you might live. This is the manner of love the Father has given that we should be called the children of God. And so, have you been given the love of God the Father through Jesus Christ? We need to receive the love of God by faith in Jesus' saving work. We trust and depend upon what Jesus has done for sinners. Providing salvation for sinners, we need to receive by turning away from our sin, repent, turn to Jesus this day and cry out, have mercy on me, a sinner. But you know, Christians, we're talking about the eyes, and he says behold, and he says see. Everybody's got eyes. Some of your eyes are closed right now. All right, everybody, open your eyes and look at me. Yeah, I've got to wake you up from the afternoon nap because the illustration is not going to work. So you're looking at me now, you are. But guess what? Can you see Jesus Christ with your literal eyes? Alexander McLaren again brings our attention to the point that we can't touch Him, we can't feel Him, we can't see Him with our eyes, so what is it? How are we going to look to Christ? is we've got to think upon Him. Our mind has to be engaged with these great and glorious truths about who Jesus is. Jesus needs to be in our mind, you see. We need to be transformed by the renewal of our mind. We need to have a mind that is set upon the truth of Scripture. So it is with the mind that we look to Jesus. Of course, the heart is affected. When we properly have thought about it, the Lord in His grace has taken these glorious truths from our mind and applied them to our hearts, but we need to get our mind filled up upon the good news of Jesus Christ. And a Christian should not stop looking to Jesus. So what am I saying? You should not stop thinking on the good news of the gospel. You want to abide in Him? You want to dwell with Jesus and remain with Him? Your mind, your thoughts need to be filled with Him. Does the exercise of reading the word of God and meditating on the scripture, does this exercise always produce a great effect? Not always, but you should continue to do it. When you're looking to the love of God and Jesus Christ, you will see this manner of love, this kind of love. And you think upon Jesus, you will see, oh, that is the way the Father makes those in His creatures, His children, those that have sinned against Him, the people that He has made. We should not stop looking. We should continually behold the manner of love that the Father has, the manner of love that the Father has, the kind of love that the Father has given to us. Continually look, look, look, or think, think, think. Meditate continually. Fill up your mind with His truth until it has an effect upon your heart. You know, all of us, Christians in this room, have known something of the joy of the Lord. And oh, it is a great blessing to have your heart stirred because you are thinking upon what is true and what is eternal and what will for sure happen. We can experience joy for many things. Sometimes it's kind of a false joy. If you were really happy at about 10, 15 last night, that joy will not last because I bet Auburn will probably lose a game this season. I'm not speaking bad words like that, but I'm saying something. I'm not trying to say they're going to, but I'm saying more than likely, all probability, they will. But some of your hearts got stirred last night when they pulled it out at the end of the game. And I'm saying this, behold, what manner of love. The Father has given to us that we should become the children of God, continue to look unto Christ, continue to rejoice in this love of God that was made manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world, that we might live through Him. And this is the love of God, not that we have loved God. We didn't initiate this relationship. We're not the ones getting God's attention so He'll start loving us. It was that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. The Father sent His Son to be the sacrifice. And Scripture says the Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world. The Lord had this plan in place for a long time. You see this love. It should affect us and it should stir us, you see. It should prepare us. He is coming again. It should prepare us. He is coming again. So our looking to Christ, thinking upon Him must be intentional. I'm taking some ideas from some things, again, that Alexander McLaren wrote in his expositions. And what he says is that, There is effort involved in keeping the eye of faith upon Christ and looking at the manner of the love that the Father has given us. He says that there are many things of this earth that will try to get our attention and we will try to look there. Whatever it is, whatever you might be looking to here and now and temporal will only be secondary to eternal joy. And so the world does not know us, the world does not know Christians. According to John here in the end of verse 1 of chapter 3, the reason the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. And so the world does not understand Christians because the world did not understand Jesus. They continue to not understand who He is. Their thoughts are not directed toward Him properly in accordance with the truth. We are foreign to those of this world. This should be a helpful word for us. You should be comfortable with this reality. The world does not know you. The world does not know us, it did not know him, says John. And Christians throughout the ages. You know, Christians are different. Barnes says they have different principles, different conduct, different joys, different comforts. The Christian is different. And so MacArthur, John MacArthur can say the real aliens in the world are not extraterrestrials. They're Christians. These are the strangers and exiles on the earth from Hebrews chapter 11. These are the sojourners and the exiles from 1 Peter chapter 2. Be very comfortable. We should be comfortable. The world cannot see the love of God and of course we should be a witness of the love of God to the world and wait upon the Father to give His love according to His will. Are you prepared for Jesus coming? Abide in Him. If you want to be prepared, then see the love that the Father has given. And so quickly, verses 2 and 3, Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared, but we know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. Those loved by God, we are God's children now. Are you waiting to see if you are in the family of God? Well, if you're abiding in Christ today, then you are in the family. You want to know the fruit of that? You begin to practice righteousness. Is there evidence? Look through all of this letter, 1 John. There's many things that I think will point us to the marks of a Christian. How does a Christian look? But he says now, if you've really believed, if you're really not depending upon your own ability, your own good works, but if you're really trusting in Christ, then today, now, We are God's children. Beloved, we are God's children now. What a blessing to be in the family of God presently. But what about the future? Well, the future is what we will be has not yet appeared. I hope that you have experienced blessings of being in the family of God, being in fellowship with God now. What we will be has not yet appeared. If it had appeared, then as like Matthew Henry said, that would put a stop to all current affairs. If you really recognize the reality, you were living in the reality of being a child of God, the glory of the adoption into the family of God, the fact that you are children of God now, could grasp that, at least Matthew Henry says, that a stop of current affairs would happen, but there are some that must now proceed. And so we cannot, we've not been able, but we know that what we will be has not yet appeared. What we will be means that we certainly will have a glorified body. I hope that you are looking forward to this. There are benefits of the glorified body and absence of sickness, absence of the effects of age, becoming old, not going to be an issue, there will not be death, and there will be completely without sin. What we will be has not yet appeared. Those are all blessings. Only one has walked the earth with such a body, and that's Christ after His resurrection is what we will be, if you want to have an idea of what that's like. We know that when He appears, we shall be like Him. When Jesus comes back, we shall be like Him. Well, in what way? And ESV study note says, Christians will be morally without sin, intellectually without falsehood or error. Wow. It goes on and it says physically without weakness or imperfections and continually filled with the Holy Spirit. What we will be is not yet appear, but we shall be like him in glorious nature. as much as we can describe that. And so, we shall see Him as He is. The wicked will see Him in His frowns, in His terror, The Christians shall see him in his smiles and his beauty." Again, those are some words from Matthew Henry. So the children of God are blessed now and they will be blessed that he's coming. What we will be has not yet appeared. And the children of God have hope. They have hope and the hope produces purity. See this connection again of abiding in Christ, communing with Christ and what effect that has upon a person. Look in verse three. Everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. If you hope for the coming of Christ, if you look forward to Jesus appearing, then you should strive to live a pure life as the Lord is pure. If Jesus is really your only hope, then you will purify yourself. You will cleanse yourself from defilement. Again, this does not mean that we're going to wash away our own sins. That's not what I'm saying, but I am saying by God's grace, His power working in the Christian, we see that we will repent of our sins and we will live in a righteous manner because we have a new nature. We have new desires as Christians to live in a way that pleases Him. We want to be prepared for His coming. Are you ready for Jesus' return? Abide in Him. Abide in Him. That will be preparation. Those that are prepared are beginning to practice righteousness by His grace. Are you prepared? Are you ready for Jesus' return? Look at God's love that makes us children of God. We know the world can't see this and doesn't understand Christ, but our focus upon Christ and our looking to the love of God in Jesus Christ will prepare us for eternity. Children of God are blessed now and they will be blessed at His coming. I mean, I hope that the description from chapter 2 will deliver you from the fear of death. You know, knowing Christ delivers us from the fear of death. There should be a joyful anticipation and hope of what will be. And the children of God that have this hope in his coming, that produces purity. Lord, please take your word and work among us. Let us pray. Father, I do plead that you will take your word and cause us to see you as you really are. Oh, may we May we know who you are by looking at Christ. May we abide in Him by faith. I do ask that you would prepare us for His coming, for when He appears, what a glorious day that will be when my Jesus I shall see. Lord, I ask that you might continually grant us this hope that purifies. Lord, let us not have a freedom to sin or think that we are free in any way that we would go on in our sin, but rather it is those who make a practice of righteousness that have been born of you. So, Lord, give us an honest evaluation based upon your word of where we are before you. And Lord, let our response be, I pray, that we will continually abide in Christ, that we will trust in him. that we will repent of our sin, for we know that brings nothing but separation, is nothing but rebellion against you. Oh Lord, thank you that you've sent Jesus, that we might be drawn near to you, that we might become the children of God. That is love. Father, thank you for loving us in such a way. It's through Jesus that I pray. Amen.