In our worship service this past Saturday we continued with our expository study in 1 John 2. Verses discussed were 15-17 (Do Not Love the World) and 18,19 (Warning Against Antichrists).
We were each challenged to answer the following questions:
1. What is the meaning of loving the world?
2. What are things (regarding the text) that are in the world? Give practical examples of ways the world/culture influences people in these areas.
3. What is the result of loving the world? Loving God?
4. Choose which verse you would like to pray over and share with someone.
5. What does the writer mean by “last hour?”
6. Who or what is the antichrist?
7. Can this “test” be applied to modern day false teachers?
8. From Piper’s sermon notes (below), what are the applications for these verses?
The following sermon notes from pastor, writer and theologian, John Piper, offer a summary explanation of 1 John 2:15-19.
Sermon notes by John Piper
Scripture verse: John 2:15–17
“Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world passes away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.”
The text begins with a command — it’s the only command in the text and therefore probably the main point. Verse 15a: “Do not love the world or the things in the world.” Everything else in the text is an argument, or incentive, for why we should not love the world.
Love for the World Pushes Out Love for the Father
The first incentive John gives is that “if anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him” (verse 15b). In other words, the reason you shouldn’t love the world is that you can’t love the world and God at the same time. Love for the world pushes out love for God, and love for God pushes out love for the world.
As Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Matthew 6:24). So don’t love the world, because that would put you in the class with the God-haters whether you think you are or not. “If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him.” That’s the first reason John gives not to love the world.
“If you love the world, it will pass away and take you with it.”
Then in verse 16 comes the support and explanation of that first argument. The reason love for the world pushes out love for God is that “all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world.” Leave out those three phrases in the middle of verse 16 and it would read like this: the reason love for the world excludes love for God is that all that is in the world is not of God. In other words, it’s just empty talk to say that you love God if you love what is not of God.
John could have rested his case at the end of verse 16. Don’t love the world because love for the world can’t coexist with love for God. But he doesn’t rest his case here. He adds two more arguments — two more incentives not to love the world.
The World and Its Lusts Will Pass
First, in verse 17a he says, “And the world passes away, and the lust of it.” Nobody buys stock in a company that is sure to go bankrupt. Nobody sets up house in a sinking ship. No reasonable person would lay up treasure where moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal, would they? The world is passing away! To set your heart on it is only asking for heartache and misery in the end.
That’s not all: Not only is the world passing away, but also the lusts of it. If you share the desires of the world, you will pass away. You will not only lose your treasure. You will lose your life. If you love the world, it will pass away and take you with it. “The world passes away and the lust of it.”
If You Do the Will of the Father, You Will Live Forever
Second, in verse 17b John says, “But he who does the will of God abides forever.” The opposite of loving the world is not only loving the Father (verse 15), but also doing the will of the Father (verse 17). And that connection is not hard to understand. Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15). John said in 1 John 5:3, “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.” So loving the Father in verse 15 and doing the will of God in verse 17 are not really separate things.
If you love God, you will love what he wills. It is empty talk to say I love God but I don’t love what God loves. So John is saying in verse 17, “If you love the world, you will perish with the world, but if you don’t love the world but love God, you will do his will and live with him forever.”
In summary, then, the text contains one commandment and three arguments, or incentives. The commandment is, “Don’t love the world or the things in the world.” The first incentive is that if you love the world, you don’t love God. The second incentive is that if you love the world, you will perish with the world. And the third incentive is that if you love God instead of the world, you will live with God forever.
Scripture verse: John 2:18–19
“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.”
Verse 18 begins, “Children, it is the last hour.” That was 2,000 years ago. But the message of the New Testament is that when Christ came, we entered the “last days,” and nobody but God knows how long they will last.
The Last Days. Read the following scriptures:
Acts 2:16–17
1 Corinthians 10:11
Hebrews 1:1–2
Hebrews 9:26
1 Peter 1:20
The last hour is an hour in which the spirit of antichrist will be increasingly active.
He refers back to the words of Jesus in Matthew 24:5, 24. “For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray . . . For false Christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.” So John saw evidences of the last days not only in the victorious spread of the gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit, but also in the multiplication of false Christs and false prophets and deceivers in the world. And if John saw that as a sign of the end, how much more should we be alert.
The spirit of antichrist does whatever it can to diminish Christ and substitute other views or other persons for the true incarnate Son of God. Consider the following scriptures where John refers to the antichrist (these are the only places in the whole New Testament where the term antichrist occurs).
1 John 2:18
1 John 4:3
2 John 1:7
1 John 2:22
John is very concerned that the church be alert to what he calls “the liar” or “deceivers.” Many such have gone out into the world. We live in a period of time where God in his sovereignty allows deception to spread. In 5:19 John says, “The whole world is in the power of the evil one.” That is the first point: We live in the last hour of deception.
We hope to see you next Saturday, August 14th from 10:00 am – 12 pm.