Resources For Tackling 1 John 2:18-27

Y’ALL. I’m so sorry. I have to admit my lack of Bible study writing has mostly been because I was involved in a Bible study at our church and I recently entered our mentoring program and I’m going through a great book with my mentor! But also….there have probably been some days of laziness. Thankfully I don’t think that any of you beautiful people were doing the study week by week with me, so I’m hoping I didn’t let you down too much. I’m thinking that in the future I’ll keep my publish times for a live blog bible study for summer and Christmas break—times when most of us are not involved in any type of study.

But—I did want to share the approximately one million links to resources I DIVED into for a couple of weeks. It all began when I moved onto the next chunk of Scripture to study in 1st John. When I began studying verses 18-27 one of the questions that kept coming up was that if these "anitchrists" had once been part of them but now did not continue on...then how does that play out in light of the security of our salvation? I've always believed that once you are saved you are always saved in Christ...but I realized I did not understand this concept deeply enough to explain it (to myself or anyone else). It was just one of those things I had always taken at face value, and now I wanted to go deeper and truly understand it for myself. Then the same week one of my best friends struck up a conversation with me about assurance of salvation and perseverance of the saints. With the combination of the Scripture in front of me and a friend to go back and forth with…I seriously got a little obsessed on the subject. But I’m glad I did! I have a greater (not complete mind you…still waiting for that completeness until He takes me home) understanding of the topic and some Scripture to really meditate on and try to memorize.

If I tried to write a weekly study of this chunk of Scripture I would have a hard time doing it without stealing the ideas and words of the scholars that I turned to. So instead I’m just going to give you those resources for now. As previously mentioned…this isn’t really a time for me to dive into writing a ton of bible study material, although I will be poking in occasionally and posting. But behind the scenes I really hope to fill binders and journals with content for this summer while most bible studies take a break anyway. If you keep an eye out on the blog, I will be sharing more about choosing when to say no, and when to wait on things in my life. I’m really excited to share more on the blog about living slowly and surely so I hope you will join me there!

For now, here are some amazing resources!

Desiring God Interview Eternal Salvation: Vaccination or Therapy?

Desiring God Interview Can a Born-Again Christian Lose Salvation?

Desiring God Interview Is Your Doctrine of Perseverance a Contradiction?

Desiring God Interview Certain and Conditional: More on Eternal Security

Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology Podcast: Perseverance of the Saints Part 1

Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology Podcast: Perseverance of the Saints Part 2

Week 9 Meditation and Prayer

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Photo: Light and Letter Photography

This week is simple but powerful. Over the course of the week read through all the cross references for 1 John 2:1-6 (and write each verse reference near the reference point in this passage on you printed copy). But instead of pounding it out in one sitting, take it a little at a time. Plan to read a few cross references each day. 

The reason we are slowing down with these particular cross references is because these verses so powerfully flush out the Gospel.

As you read take even five minutes and meditate on the verses you read. Write in your journal the words and phrases that are most powerful to you.  

Spend prayer time remembering and acknowledging the ways the Gospel has changed everything for you. 

Approach God with gratitude solely over God's abundant gift of grace and salvation for you. 

Tell God the Gospel story. One of the most popular conversation starters in getting to know people is asking a couple how they met and fell in love. Spend time with the Lord telling the greatest Story of all time in your own words and enjoy worshipping Christ as you recall all that He did to save you. Reveling in remembrance not only leads us to worship, but it also prepares us to readily share the Gospel with others.

Repent of heart attitudes or behavior that fall short of God's glory and thank God for his unending forgiveness. 

Week 6 Insight and Inspiration

 The last thing I want is to go through the motions every week, repeating the study process and not pausing to worship. We are women, we like feeling the feels! Our minds are being used and we're learning more about God and His Word and His way, that SHOULD move us! People studying the Bible should be the most inspired, most passionate, and the most called to action! Far be it from us to be staunch, stiff,  and unmoved.

So bust out your journal and turn on some tunes (I'm adding a playlist of some of my favorite worship jams that you can listen to if you'd like!). We're about to get outside the box a little, but this exercise is for all types. Noncreative and non writers: you're safe and loved here, don't be afraid.

Listen and enjoy

We are going to do a free write. A free write is just what is sounds like. You write and don't stop for the allotted amount of time. If you can't think of what to write, then write "I don't know what to write...la la la...I'm bored." Until it leads to something else in your mind. Just be free.

The theme for this free write is LIGHT. Write everything that comes to your mind about the word LIGHT. Give yourself 3 minutes (or one song) and write down literally anything and everything you think of. Don't stop writing. 

Now, read 1st John 1:1-10 and write down everything that comes to mind random or not. Write down questions, write down words, write down song lyrics. Whatever. Do this for about 3 minutes (or again...one song). 

Now tie that randomness together. You don't have to set your timer this time, just write as much or as little as you want. Pull in what you've been learning in 1st John about darkness and light, about practicing truth and about being a liar, about the word of life and complete joy and fellowship. Write about LIGHT that comes only from God. Write what walking in light means in your everyday. Write how God uses your random thoughts about light to remind you of His righteousness and life eternal. Write what makes the dark alluring when you are wondering from the Light. 

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As I was driving to the DMV for the first of three trips yesterday, I was basking in the early morning light. If it were possible to bottle fierce yet gentle energy, it would look like morning light. It's soft and sweet, but pushing you forward, brightening in each moment. If that isn't creation pointing to a Creator I don't know what is.

Light is undeniable and all encompassing. Everyone has needed it, known it, and experienced it. Everyone. 

And what has the power to inspire us like the sun rises and sun sets? When have you ever been in  view of a tremendous sunset and it has gone unnoticed? Even the manliest of men stop mid-sentence to express their awe at it's vibrancy in the sky. 

Light changes us. Light changes the world. 

Austin and I are slightly obsessed with home renovations right now. And I'll tell you one thing you never see, ever...EVER. You will never see Joanna (you know, my gal pal) taking a window out and replacing it with a wall. Never. You will see her make a window bigger, or better still-- making a window into huge, glass french doors. Light makes things bigger and more beautiful. Light is inviting. Light lifts the eyes. Light expands a space and integrates the outdoors. 

God's glory is mirrored by creation and echoes the Truth, on begrudging drives to the DMV, on decks at dusk, over the Grand Canyon at 5am, even in home renovations: The Light brings Life. 

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 2 Corinthians 4:6

Study Guide Week 6

Week 6! I can't believe it's already been 6 weeks together! This week we are moving along to the next chunk of Scripture to study!  

Read 1 John 1:5-10 in your bible, then on your double spaced copy (which you can find all ready to print in our Facebook group!) do the following: 

1. Draw a box around repeated words.
2. Draw a circle around transition words and draw an arrow connecting them to their concluding thoughts. 
3. Highlight or underline words you don't know and define them in the margin.
4. Answer the following questions: 
   • Are there repeated words? (Let me answer that one with a big fat YES for ya!) Make a list of the words and ideas that are repeated.  Why do you think there is so much repetition in this section? What greater purpose could all this repetition serve?
   • What are the major themes emphasized in this chunk of Scripture?
   • What questions do you have? What is confusing or unclear? (without consulting any of the study notes or commentary first) Write our your questions. 

Use a study bible and commentary to help address your questions. Then as much as you can, paraphrase this passage into your own words. It doesn't have to be perfectly detailed paraphrase, just write down your translation of what this passage says. 

Study Guide Week 5

This section is what my daughter would call easy peezy. I think as women, (for the most part, shout out to our one male reader besides my husband--you know who you are) the applicational parts of bible study are the most fun. This is the part when we get to connect the dots from what we are learning in our study to our real life. So that being said--have fun with this! If you haven't yet, join the Facebook group, this is the part of studying that builds community!

1 John 1: 1-4

1. What was the hardest part of this passage for you? (hardest to understand, most frustrating, or even most convicting)
    
2. Was there any part of this passage that was already familiar to you? Did you learn anything new about an "old" verse?
    
3. What does this passage teach you about God? (anything goes, there is no right answer!)
    
4. How does what you learned about God/Jesus/Holy Spirit change the way you see yourself or your life?
    
5. What is your response? (Is this a call to worship? Does this show you a place that you should be serving? Does this change the way you approach a relationship? Again, anything goes!)

Week 4 Insight

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As we go through chunks of Scripture, I'll be posting the study guide on Friday mornings as usual. I will also be adding in a midweek insight occasionally. These posts will be elaborating on the study guide and sharing my insights and application of the text. 

1 John 1:1-4 is the kind of passage that I typically coast over so I can get to the parts that are  more plain-speak. This is a safe place to admit that right? But ever since I started going deeper with my studying, passages which I don't understand right away are now exciting to me. It's like someone literally drew arrows and made a huge sign that says "Buried Treasure."  I've come to love these passages because I KNOW I will learn something since I start off with such little understanding of it. 

Have you ever vouched for someone? Maybe you've been listed as a reference for a friend's new job or you've had to defend a loved one or maybe you are trying to set up a friend on a blind date. That same urgency of "I KNOW them" that comes from your gut....that's what John is bringing to us here. He is coming from this place that's way beyond "Yea I know who he is" this is John talking with a sense of urgency, conviction--this "No...like I really KNOW him" place.

This first passage in 1st John is all about the answering the question "Who is Jesus?" and then only and only then answering the question of what that means for us. This passage, 1 John 1:1-4, speaks to three aspects of his identity (out of like...a bajillion) 1. He is physically real (v1-3), 2. He is relationally present (v3-4), and 3. Jesus is the light that leads to eternal life (v 2 & 5 I know it's not really fair that I just jumped ahead a little). These three qualities are elaborated upon with three major themes: Seen, Proclaim, and Fellowship. 

Seen.

John walks through the physical, tangible, "realness" of Jesus first. He says that they have heard, seen with their eyes, looked upon and touched with their hands-- that's three out of the five senses (and it would be weird to include smell and taste, am I right?). This is kind of the most elementary aspect of Jesus' identity, and yet for me the most convicting. As a person who has grown up in and around church and had a personal relationship with Christ for a while....reading this made me realize how much I keep Jesus in a fairytale box. I know with my head that he was and is still very real and very alive. But I sometimes catch myself living like Jesus is a historical figure or a folklore hero. This passage smacks me in the face cause it says "Dude, get a grip on reality he is as real as you are right now." God became incarnate in Jesus. This means that Jesus is the bodily, tangible, flesh who is also completely and fully God. If you have heard or read the verse "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14), then you have heard about this idea before. Incarnation means that "The Word" (Jesus) took on flesh, but being fully God was made manifest so that we could have eternal life (v2 &3). Gary M. Burge in his commentary on The Letters of John (1st, 2nd, and 3rd John) explains that "Thus in verse 1 John writes that this word was 'from the beginning'....This does not refer necessarily to the beginning of Jesus' life on earth (although some have argued this). It instead sets out the marvelous tension of Christian thought: He who existed from limitless eternity has entered time and space and taken up residence here on earth" (Burge, 53).  John repeats this testimony of their tangible experience with Christ several times. There is no getting past it... Jesus is alive. Jesus is real. Jesus is God incarnate. Jesus is eternal.

Proclaim.

We won't stop. We won't stop because we've seen it. We're changed by it. We won't stop because He is the light of man. We'll testify that He is the way and the truth and the life. We'll spend our life on it because this is the way to eternal life. So we'll testify to it and we'll proclaim it. --This is the way I want to carry John's torch. This steady focus on sharing Christ is the example I want to follow. It doesn't matter whether John is speaking to churches full of believers or a crowd or one lost person. His resolve is the same. He proclaims the truth of God's word and the testimony of Jesus Christ to all people. I love the way that John R. W. Stott puts it, that the Gospel of Jesus Christ "was proclaimed, not monopolized" (Stott, 61) by the apostles. 

Fellowship.

Three things here. 1. "So that you too may have fellowship with us": you and me and our people, horizontally sharing community 2. "our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ": my community is vertical with God, which is the binding pillar in my horizontal community with other believers 3. "that our joy may be complete": our joy together. I've said all this so that you would know and believe and join me side by side as we bind ourselves to the God who is above all in vertical community that we would have complete joy together in this community through Christ Jesus. This wasn't the apostles saying "Hey do this so you can make us happy." This is John saying, believe this so that my joy and your joy will be the same joy which is complete and overflowing.  

And so I'll just end by saying to you, let's do this thing. Let's live it out. Let's breathe it in while we change diapers and breathe it out while we drive to work. Let's be fueled by furthering the kingdom in conversations while we grab our mail. Let's proclaim it with everything we are even when--especially when it makes us feel out of place. Let's live well and deeply and show the world (even when the "world" is a world of toddlers  at our feet insisting on a 4 o'clock snack time) that the grace of Jesus is the light and the way. 

Burge, Gary M. "Letters of John." The NIV Application Commentary: Fro Biblical Text ... to Contemporary Life. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1996. 53. Print.

Stott, John R. W. "The Authoritative Proclamation." Tyndale New Testament Commentaries. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Comapny, 1976. 61. Print.