39 - Spiritual Strength and Victory

Spiritual Strength and Victory; 1 John 2:14

1 John 2:14 ^NASB "I have written to you, fathers, because you know Him who has been from the beginning." John is talking about Jesus Christ here. The reason we know that he is not talking about God the Father but is talking about God the Son is that going back to the beginning the very issue that gave rise to this epistle had to do with the deity of Christ. At the very beginning we dealt with the issue of incipient Gnosticism, Docetism, that the real issue related to the person of Jesus Christ as undiminished deity in true humanity. The verb here is what breaks open the meaning of that phrase. It is the perfect active indicative of the second person plural of ginosko [ginwskw]. The perfect tense emphasises the present results of a past action. It doesn't say anything necessarily about the ongoing results of that past action into the future but John is saying at this point in time they were spiritually mature (though they can still go into reversionism and carnality), they have come to know Jesus Christ. The subject is these individual believers who have reached spiritual maturity. It emphasises the fact that it is a result of their volition that they have reached spiritual maturity because they have made it a priority in their life to study the Word of God and to apply it consistently in their lives. As a result of that they have reached a point where they have come to know—not just an academic knowledge but in terms of a relationship with God Jesus Christ. It is more than academic knowledge.

The epistle is written by the apostle who was present in the upper room and he is the only Gospel writer who gave us all the details of what Jesus taught in the upper room. The vocabulary, phraseology, and idiom of John's epistle is similar to that of the upper room discourse. John adopted a way of speaking and writing that was very similar that which Jesus used. For example, in John 14:7 Jesus says to the disciples ^NASB "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him." The concept of knowing Jesus can be understood in one of three different ways. First o0f all we can know Jesus in an academic manner. People can read and talk about Jesus and understand certain facts about Him such as the fact that He was born in Bethlehem, His father was a carpenter, He lived in obscurity until He was about 30 years of age, He had three years of ministry then crucified. They may interpret these in different ways and understand certain things academically about Jesus that have nothing to do with whether or not a person is a Christian or not. Another way what the word "knowing" Jesus means has been interpreted in a salvation sense. This is comparable to the idea of "You have met me" in a salvation sense, that we have trusted Christ as saviour. But that is not how Jesus or John uses the perfect active indicative of ginosko.

Jesus made His statement to the disciples in the upper room when He was instructing them on the principles that will characterise the spiritual life of the yet undisclosed church age. He is just beginning to give them this instruction and they are beginning to question Him. They were surprised when He said that He was leaving, they couldn't grasp what He was teaching about the fact that he was going to the cross. In the course of that discourse He said: "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father." They had been with Him for three years. This isn't academic knowledge or even salvation because these eleven are saved. This is something deeper, more profound, than a simple academic truth. He is talking about if they had come to know Him in an intimate way; and they haven't. So this tells us that you can be saved and not know Jesus; you can be saved and not have a profound understanding of who He is. This knowledge is a more in-depth knowledge based on an in-depth relationship with Him. The principle of how well we know Jesus has to do with His commandments. 1 John 2:3 ^NASB "By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments." So coming to know Him is an advanced stage in spiritual growth, according to this verse, and it is characterised by obedience to His mandates. So the point that John is making to the fathers in 2:14 is that there is an intimate knowledge over time that now characterises their relationship. If they have come to know Jesus and you put that together with verses 3 and 4, that means that they are also keeping His commandments. They are spiritually mature; they understand His Word. To keep His commandments you have to know His commandments; to know His commandments means you have to understand the commandments. That means they have had clear instruction and have advanced beyond elementary doctrines and they are consistently walking in fellowship.

Love in Scripture is always evidenced by action. Notice what John says in 1 John 2:4, 5 ^NASB "The one who says, 'I have 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, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him." Keeping His Word is tantamount to being obedient. We cannot know Him without spending a lot of time in the Word learning about Him; we cannot love someone we do not know. We cannot know Jesus unless we are in the Word, and it takes time. Knowing Jesus is related to spiritual maturity. The spiritual adult is characterised by love for God and that demonstrated by obedience to divine mandates.

The second group is the young men, and the next four verses are going to characterise them: "… I have written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one." He says to then first of all, "you are strong." The key word is "strength" which is the masculine plural nominative adjective ischuros [i)sxuroj] which is from the noun ischus. It is important to make these connections because of other verses where these words are used. For example, Ephesians 6:10 ^NASB "Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might." We have to look at several synonyms that are used in this verse to help us understand the connections here. These adolescent believers have reached a level of victory in spiritual conflict. "Be strong" is the present active imperative of the Greek word endunamoo [e)ndunamow], and that is the preposition en [e)n] plus the verb from dunamis [dunamij], meaning power or ability. The word "strength" could be better translated "power," to be consistent with the word found in 1 John 2:14. This word translated "strength" in the NASB comes from kratos [kratoj], having to do with strength or power, and it could be preferable to translated "in the power of his strength." The word "might" is from ischus. The reason for going to this verse is because it demonstrates the connection between these three synonyms: that we are to be strong and our strength comes from God's strength, it is not our inherent strength. This is seen in 1 Peter 4:11 ^NASB "Whoever speaks, {is to do so} as one who is speaking the utterances of God; whoever serves {is to do so} as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever." So we are to serve in the Christian life not on the basis of our own power, our own ability, but on the strength that God supplies. The ultimate goal of the Christian life is to glorify God. We are here to serve God and to do that we do it in the strength which he supplies.

A synonym for ischuo is dunamis, as we see in Ephesians 6:10, and to understand the concept of how divine power is given to the believer we need to go to an episode that also relates it to a spiritual warfare issue in 2 Corinthians 12:8. We see a situation in the life of the apostle Paul where he is faced with some sort of debilitating and overwhelming adversity. We don't know exactly what it was but there are hints in the text that it indicates the extreme opposition that he had to face in performing his ministry. 2 Cor 12:10 ^NASB "Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong." This is the strength of the believer. How did he come to understand this? As he was advancing in his spiritual life and he faces the fact that in his ministry serving God he has certain abilities. He had more revelation than any other apostle, he had a higher IQ than anybody else, and so there was a natural tendency, as there is for anybody who has been given so much and to be so talented, to be a little bit arrogant. So God allowed something to happen to his life that would keep him humble. In v. 7 we read about it. ^NASB "Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me—to keep me from exalting myself!" There was some continuous irritation and problem. The origin of this adversity is Satanic. [8] "Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might leave me. [9] And He has said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected [teleiow = brought to completion] in weakness.'"  So God's answer to Paul is that in the midst of his weakness he was going to realise that it was not by his power, his might, his intelligence, his ability, but God's power, plan, ability, strength and provision that is going to enable him to face and handle any difficulty. Before he got anywhere in life he had to understand that the principle is grace. His grace is more than enough to handle any situation or problem in life.  Strength derives first from grace orientation. In 1 John 2 the adolescent believer is being praised because first of all he is strong. He got strength because he was grace oriented. 2 Peter 3:18 tells us that we grow by means of grace and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.  "…Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me."

So the principle is that God's grace is sufficient for us and because of God's grace we have power—dunamis which is a synonym for ischuo. Secondly he says, not only are you strong but "the word of God abides in you." The Word of God dwells in them. This is the next spiritual skill that is developed: doctrinal orientation. Jesus said in John 8:31 ^NASB "If you continue [abide] in My word, {then} you are truly disciples of Mine." This is not something that just happens at salvation, it is something that happens through spiritual growth.