Faith Is The Victory
by Professor E M Blaiklock MA Litt D
THE TEXT: (1 JOHN 2: 12-2: 28)
CHAPTER TWO:
I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven for
His name's sake. I am writing to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young men, because you have conquered the Evil One. I wrote to you children, because you have known the Father. 1 wrote to you fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I wrote to you young men, because you are strong, and the Word of God abides in you, and you have conquered the Evil One.
Love not the world nor the things that are in the world.
If anyone love the world, love for the Father is not in him.
Because everything in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the proud glory of life, is not of the Father, but of the world. And the world and its lust is passing away but he who does God's will abides forever.
Children, it is the last hour, and just as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, even now there are many anti-christs; whence we recognise that it is the last hour. They withdrew from us, but they did not belong to us; had they belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but they withdrew, to make it clear that they are not, any of them, of us.
But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know. I did not write to you because you are ignorant of the truth, but because you know it, and because every lie is not of the truth. Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Messiah? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Every one who denies the Son, neither has he the Father (and the one who confesses the Son has the Father also).
As for you, that which you have heard from the beginning, let it abide in you. If what you have heard from the beginning abides in you, you yourselves will abide in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise which He Himself made us, Eternal Life. These things I wrote to you concerning those who are trying to lead you astray. But as for you, the anointing you have received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you, but just as His anointing is teaching you about all things, and is a true anointing, and not a lie, even as it has taught you, abide in Him. And now, little children, abide in Him, so that when He is made manifest, we may have boldness and not be shamed from His presence at His appearing.
THE INVOCATION
"THE refrain on three vocatives and two tenses, which fills
vv. 12-14, has rhetorical importance. The apostle is about to make a searching and exacting claim, and pauses before he makes it to assure all in his congregation that he addresses them, not as worldlings, but as convinced and victorious Christians. The "little children" of v. 12, and the "children" of the next verse, are probably general appellations subdivided into "fathers" and "young men", the older and the younger presumably in the faith. The verses are designed to form a pause of emphasis in the letter as the way is prepared for v. 15. The change of tense in the two triplets is most plausibly explained as a reference to the Gospel. We have frequently observed that the Epistle is best understood as an accompanying document to the Fourth Gospel. John, there-fore, says in effect: "My children in Christ, young and old, I write now as I wrote before, in full knowledge that you are in Him, and what is more, walking intelligently and faithfully in Him, but there is one precept of surpassing importance which I must impress upon you. It is this—" The appeal he proceeds to make is then based on forgiveness granted and accepted, on the knowledge of Christian experience, and the victory which strong, cleansed hearts have won through the indwelling Word of God. John thus echoes the central theme of his Gospel when he addresses his audience as the people of the New Covenant (Jer. 31: 31-34), whose sins are forgiven, who know the Eternal God (Isa. 52: 3-6), and who have overcome the world. The passage rings with echoes both of the Gospel and the Old Testament.