1 JOHN 1 QUICK BIBLE STUDY

0:00Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the Way UK podcast. I'm your host Zoe and I'm joined by my co-host. I'm here as well. Solomon's here as well. I'm also here. Guys, today we are doing a Bible study, as you can tell because we have our Bibles out, and we have them open to the book of 1 John. So if you've got your Bibles, please flick open to the book of 1 John, not the Gospel of John, but the letter... Not the Gospel of John, not 2nd John, not 3rd John.

0:26No, not 3rd John, but... 1st John. 1st John. 1st letter of John. That would be really helpful. There it is. And whilst you are flicking to find that, guys, you already know the drill. You know that our mission here at The Way is to reach every single young person online with the good news of Jesus. A few things that helps us do that is if you're listening on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, please could you leave us a five-star rating and review because it really helps the algorithm for some reason just pushes it out, which is great.

0:53And then if you're watching slash listening on YouTube, please could you subscribe, like, comment, turn on push notifications, all of that stuff, because it just, it helps us do that mission. One more thing, guys, if you think this will be helpful to your friends, then please do share this Bible study with them and you guys could do it all together. That would be epic. Roll the credits. All right, let's get into it. Solomon, would you like to do me the honours of reading the whole chapter?

1:25The whole chapter, I absolutely can. Thank you so much. Friends, we're on page 1,541. Go ahead and flip over there. 1,225. Yeah, either one of them work. Okay, here we go. Chapter one. We declare to you what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands concerning the word of life. This life was revealed and we have seen it and testify to it and declare to you the eternal life that was seen with the Father and was revealed to us.

1:57What we have seen and heard, we also declare to you so that you also may have fellowship with us. And truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We are writing these things so that our joy may be complete. This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not do what is true.

2:24But if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus, his son, cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. Wow. Beautifully read, Solomon.

2:52Thank you. It always stresses me out, the reading. Yeah. Well, you smashed it. You did it really well. What version are you reading? NRSV. What does that stand for? New Revised Standard Version. Ooh, love it. What are you reading? The NIV. New International Version. Nice. I believe. Nice. Love it. Okay. Let's kick it off with some context, I reckon. Yeah. Who, what, when, where. How. How, why. Okay. That's a good question. Kick us off. So who is the author?

3:22Who knows? Who is it? Well, that's a great question. Traditionally, people would say it was John the Apostle, the same guy that's traditionally thought to have written the Gospel of John. Beloved. I mean, it's still disputed when it comes to things this old. There's always going to be disputations. What we can say is if we look at the... the penmanship, the style, the voice, but also the theology and the worldview, we can say that at the very least, if it's not the same guy, it's at the very least coming from the same, what were they called, Johanan tradition, right?

3:53So it's the same group of ideas that are all together representing the same sort of thing. But yeah, so... While it is still disputed, typically we just call him the elder, right? Or we just call him John. John. The author. John. Yeah, most likely. And where was John writing from slash to? Well, I think ancient Ephesus, which is modern day Western Turkey now. And he was writing a letter to, I think he had a few house churches in those areas and was overseeing those communities.

4:26And I think... Some stuff had gone on, which we'll get into as we read the chapter verse by verse in a minute. But that's why he was writing it to them. He was just setting some things straight. And scholars think it was written likely around 90 AD. Cool. So first century vibes, which is pretty cool. Sorry for the interruption, we have news. Zoe, would you like to share? Yes, I would. Friends, this September we're heading to Malawi. We've heard incredible stories of faith and resilience, and we have the opportunity to go and meet the people behind those stories.

5:00Yes, and we'll be doing that with World Vision, a Christian-led humanitarian charity who work alongside local communities to bring support to children and families, and to basically help tackle poverty. They do amazing work, and we're so excited to be partnering with them. Over the course of the trip we'll be meeting people, shaking hands, hearing stories and seeing the work that's already happening on the ground. And we would like to invite you to be a part of it.

5:24One of the initiatives World Vision runs is called Chosen Sponsorship. Now, Chosen basically flips the typical idea of child sponsorship on its head. Instead of you choosing a child to sponsor, Chosen returns agency back to the kids and a child chooses you. Yes, and so we'll be going to Malawi and be seeing Chosen in action. And if you want to get involved, follow the link below and sign up. All right, should we start with verse one? Yeah. Go on, do you want to take us there?

5:49Yeah, okay. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched, this we proclaim concerning the word of life. I mean, that's probably my favorite part of this entire chapter. I think it's just so beautifully written. And it's intentional, right? So I think Jon right there is colliding, is like bringing the eternal and the material, the physical into like... into collision with one another, right?

6:18They're bringing them together. And he takes you all the way back to the beginning, right? From the beginning. And that kind of sounds like Gospel of John, right? Yeah, it does. But then, of course, if it sounds like the opening of the Gospel of John, what else does it sound like? Genesis. The start of Genesis. Exactly. And that's really cool. But then he grounds it, right? It's not just eternal. He grounds it in the physical by then going immediately into sort of like this sensory language of what we see, feel, touch here.

6:42And... That's really cool. And to me, what that says is that to John, whatever Christianity is, it cannot be separated from the person of Jesus Christ, right? It's this person that he saw, heard, touched. And relationship with. Right, yeah. And it threads it all the way back to the beginning. I think that's really cool from John. Good job, John. That's epic. And I think as well, it really like highlights Jesus's divinity and that he was God as well as man.

7:11Like saying that which was from the beginning, like Jesus was always there, you know, which I think is pretty epic. And I think as well, how it finishes with the word of life. I just love that it's like the word of God but also in the gospel of John it's like um Jesus was the word became flesh and the word made his dwelling among us it's like Jesus is this just embodiment of God he's the visible image of the invisible God and so it's like just bringing it back to Jesus I love that and also like daily bread vibes I'm getting get reminded of that with the word of your life and we need him every day we need his word every day Yeah.

7:53Heck yeah. Any other points? I think that was good. You covered it. Great. Do you want to move to verse two? Yeah. The life appeared, we have seen it and testified to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. So in the ESV translation, instead of appeared, it says made manifest, which I thought was so cool. And it just reminded me of the term manifest glory, which is basically like the tangible and visible presence of God here on earth, basically.

8:28And it was just, it just reminded me that like Jesus was and is the most literal form of manifest glory. Like he was... I mean, I think I already said it, the visible image of the invisible God. But I love that John is like really kind of putting this, emphasizing this point to the church because he's being like, don't forget who your savior is and don't forget what he's. done for you and like that he is divine and worthy of praise and worthy of worship and worthy of recognition as being equal to god because he was god um so i thought that was really cool and also just like and the emphasis on which was with the father as well he's like he's really emphasizing this point that Jesus is divine and that Jesus is powerful and God and worthy of praise because I think that yeah I think there were people in the that had left the church that were saying otherwise and so he's like sprinkling some truth back into the communities which I love Okay, let's move on to verse 3.

9:33Verse 3. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. I actually love that. I like that. This seems like it's the first sort of time. It's very clear what John's aim is with the letter, right? It's fellowship. And it's the communal nature of salvation, I think, right? Yeah, that was what stuck out to me initially was, okay, so this is what it's about.

10:05It's not only clarifying who Christ is, but also fellowship among the community. Yeah, no, definitely. And I looked up what the Greek word for fellowship is, which is koinonia. Wow. Koinonia. Wow, you said that with much confidence. Well, I'm probably wrong, but you know, just fake it till you make it, I guess. You didn't even stutter. I didn't even stutter. But one of the like definitive words for koinonia was intimacy. And I think that is so beautiful.

10:37It's like, That is that we're invited into that with God. And then as a result with one another, with one another, and we get to show fellowship with, share in fellowship with each other, which if we just read the next verse, I'll just read the next verse. Yes. We write this to make our joy complete. And it's like, this fellowship will bring joy and it's a joy to take part and participate and be in the body of the church of Christ. Like what a gift to be part of God's family.

11:10And of course there'll be like ups and downs, not to say that it's always going to be full of joy, but I'm reminded of that verse. It says the joy of the Lord is our strength. And joy doesn't need to look like this really high energy, like hyper excitement. It can actually look like a steadiness and like a faith in the power of God and the faithfulness of God and a contentment and a joy in knowing that. Does that make sense? I don't know if that makes sense.

11:39It also makes you, I mean, when it comes to this point, this is when you start to wonder what exactly was going on in this community. for John to write such a letter about fellowship, what was the problem? We spoke about that a little bit off camera, right? That it was some form of early Gnosticism, which is sort of this like idea where it's the spiritual and the material that are separated and the spiritual, the physical is like a lesser sort of created existence, right?

12:05So that's masticism. Well, I mean... Umbrella term. Umbrella term, I guess. Yeah. Created by some lesser divine being. And maybe some of this was seeping into the churches. What we were kind of talking about. Yeah. Maybe. We were reading a few papers about it, weren't we? Mm-hmm. But... Yeah, I like John's response. He's so clear, right? Yeah, and calling people higher to share in fellowship that brings joy and to recognize and remember that we get to have relationship and fellowship with God.

12:36Yeah, when we're in communion with Christ, we are also brought into communion with other believers. Yeah. Right? Yeah. That's so cool. Because we're hopefully bearing the fruits of the Spirit a little bit more. The communal nature of salvation. Wow. Big words, that, innit? Big words. Makes you sound smart, that one, doesn't it? It does. You sound very smart. Okay, do you want to read verse five? I would love to. This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.

13:07Hallelujah. Amen. It's just true, isn't it? God is light. In him there is no darkness at all. It's like John is really... I feel like I've said emphasizing so much, but I do feel like this is the establishing chapter before he goes on to say lots of other very wise things in the rest of this book. But it feels kind of like a prologue in a way. He's being like, this is what we believe. This is who God is. This is his character. He hasn't changed. Don't forget that he is holy, that he is worthy, that he is pure and that he is light.

13:46And it reminds me of... Also another verse in the gospel of John, John chapter one, verse five, and the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. I love that verse so much because it's it just speaks so, so much of the true power of God and the Holy Spirit and that like the the war against or the battle against the enemy is actually won already. There is something, I mean, I'm just quickly, I want to come back to this, but I also just wanted to add on verse six here where it says, if we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not know what is true and do not do what is true.

14:24And those two verses together, there's something of a fear of the Lord there. So like, I think so often we forget who we're talking to. Yeah. With God, you know, it's great that we feel so comfortable around God, but also he is wholly other, right? He is so... bright he's so light it's blazing right yeah it's we need to hold him in such a reverence i mean we've spoken about this before but it's job 38 i'm always reading job 38 it reminds me it reminds me who i'm talking to uh how how powerful how like unfathomably big god is and mighty and this is one of those times where it's like the light this light to me um is unfathomable it's unfathomably light Yeah, it's so good and so true.

15:09And when I read this as well, I was like, okay, what is darkness? Like the first thing that came to mind was sin. And I think that's what he's nodding to in this, like that darkness here is sin. And I also looked up the Greek word for this as well. What am I like? The Greek word for darkness that was used in verse six. And yeah, I'm not sure about verse five, actually. It could have been a different one. It was skotos. Skotos. And one of the meanings for that was to have means of ignorance respecting divine things and human duties and the accompanying ungodliness and immorality of darkness.

15:51So sin. Just to back up my point, I guess. I got some receipts here. There it is. No, I just wanted people to know clearly. Now everybody knows. Thank you for sharing. Hey, if anyone asks, you know. Okay, shall we? I know you read verse six, but let's just read it again. Yeah, let's go back again. Let's have a look at it, shall we? Yeah, do you want to read it? I would love to. If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not do what is true.

16:23What sticks out to you there? Ay caramba. So when I read this, I first was reminded of Romans 6, which I made note of here. It says, what shall we say then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means. We are those who have died to sin. How can we live in it any longer? And I think here John is in, yeah, I think here John is calling the church to walk the walk and not just talk the talk and not, not to sin just because now we have grace through Jesus.

16:53Yeah. To live in the light and to walk in the light, which I think is great. And as well, I don't know, if we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. Him having to write that suggests that potentially there were people that were claiming to have fellowship with Jesus. Then we're just going around and sinning. False claims, is it right? Yeah, so I think it's... And this is one thing I really do like about the faith is that there's a constant invitation to look inward and to be self-aware of who we are, what we're doing.

17:29Are we trying to be like Christ? Are we still actually walking the walk, like you said? I think that's great. This is another example. There's thousands of examples throughout scripture where it's just a reminder to keep looking inward and keep like, you know what I mean? Yeah, that's great. Okay, let's do verse 7. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his son, purifies us from all sin.

17:58What? This is literally epic. Like when I read this, I'm just in awe of the beauty and the power of Jesus's sacrifice. Like that is crazy. This also reminds me of Hebrews chapter nine, which basically talks all about how Jesus is our high priest, the one that goes before us and made the atoning sacrifice for us so that we can be reconciled to God and have a relationship with God again. And there's like a part of the chapter which talks about how powerful Jesus's blood is.

18:34That it was literally only the blood of Jesus that could purify us and all of humanity from like the beginning of time to the end of time. Yeah. Purify us from our sins so that we can like have relationship with God. And I think that is so, so amazing. And like, just so kind of like incomprehensible and, you know, I don't know. It just blows my mind every time I think about the power of the blood of Jesus. Because it's like, it washes every single sin.

19:07Every single one. There's just an invitation of a really beautiful submission to Jesus in that. And knowing that there's nothing that we can do to earn his grace. Because we're covered by God. But then that doesn't mean that we don't. What's pretty interesting is building on that point, I agree with the cleansing us from all sin. That's awesome. That's grace, right? At the same time, in that same passage, in that same verse, it uses the word walk, which is active, right?

19:36It's that we are to walk in the light. We are to, as he himself is in the light, it's an invitation to sort of progress continually, you know, in our walk with God. It's... Yeah, I don't know. I think that, yes, while there is grace for all sin through Christ, at the same time, there is a sort of understanding that we are going to walk. Does that make sense? I'm kind of just thinking out loud here. Yeah, I think so. It's like an intentionality in walking the way that Christ...

20:09If we are to have fellowship with God, we will be walking in the light, actively moving, not just passive. Anyway, that's my little thought. Yeah, an intentionality to walk how Jesus did. Yeah. And also recognizing the power of his blood. Yeah. Okay, verse eight. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. Well, I feel like this one's pretty self-explanatory. You know. It's pretty blunt. It's pretty straight to the point.

20:39We aren't sinless. We're human and we sin. And so let's not pretend to be something that we're not. And let's humble ourselves before God. And of course, like we're forgiven. But as well, like what Romans 6 says, it's not an excuse to carry on intentionally sinning. If that makes sense. Yeah. I don't know. It's such a huge topic, just grace and forgiveness. So I don't really want to get into all of that theology because I don't know a lot. But yeah, it's just I think that what I took away when I read this verse was just recognizing that we are that we have our flesh.

21:20And like I'm thinking about Romans 7 as well. When Paul writes, I do what I do not want to do. And hallelujah that God is forgiving. And that we're in dire need of a saviour. Yes. You know what I mean? Extreme need. We can trick ourselves as much as we want, but truth is truth regardless of how we feel about it. Yeah. Full stop? I guess, pretty much. Amazing. Okay, verse nine. Would you like to read this? I would love to. Yay. If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

21:56Confess? What is confession? I'm so glad you asked. Ladies and gentlemen, go ahead and check out our former podcast with our friends from the Catholic side of the church. I think there's like a multitude of different ways to confess. And it can look different in different traditions in the church or different denominations. You know, confession could be directly to God, like in your private prayer time. It could be to say, if you have like an accountability group with friends, you're confessing your sins to them.

22:29It could be to a priest. Like there's lots of different ways. But I think what confession is, is like admitting the wrongs that you've done, basically admitting the ways that you've sinned against God. And then I think the beauty of confession is that it then leads us into repentance. And what is repentance? Repentance is turning away from the sin that you've done and walking towards and seeking forgiveness from God. And then you can be on your way to continue walking your walk with Jesus, I think.

23:00Sometimes that's easier said than done, isn't it? Oh, absolutely. I think it just requires courage. Doesn't it? To confess. Definitely. Get rid of all the shame. Yeah. Bring it into the light. Yeah. It can be scary and that should be recognized. Yeah, absolutely. It's not an easy thing to do. It's not an easy thing to do, but it's an amazing thing to do. It's an amazing thing to do. And it tells us what happens if we do confess. Totally. We get forgiven.

23:23Yay. Okay. Verse 10. I got this one. Go on. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. That to me creates a sense of dread. Yeah. I feel I got dread in my heart reading that. Yeah. That's the last thing you want to do. I don't want to call God a liar. No. That's crazy. So I think as well, like when I read that, it's kind of similar to verse eight in terms of like recognizing. the sinful nature that we have as humans and not blaming God for the wrong that we do or pretending that we can't do any wrong because that's just not true because it literally says in the Bible, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

24:11So... Let's not try and pretend that we don't. And hallelujah, you know that verse in Lamentations? That's like his mercies are made new every morning. Oh, yeah. Thanks, God. Yeah, I'm just reminded of that as we're reading all about confession and sin and light and darkness. But I guess to wrap it up, this whole chapter... is kind of like a nod to the divinity of Jesus, that God is light and powerful. I was going to say the divinity of Jesus, but also the humanity of Jesus.

24:46yeah the how it opened with the scene yeah but i think it's i think that's just such an important part isn't it yes the divinity of jesus also the humanity of jesus given the contextual historical background of it yeah but yeah what were you gonna say i kind of interrupted you there yeah no no that's great i i guess just that god is light we are humans that have a sinful nature to confess our sins even though it's hard and turn to God. Walk the walk.

25:15I heard a quote once that said, I've never heard anyone kept out of the kingdom of God for their confessed badness. And I can imagine many have been kept out for their supposed goodness. Wow. Does that make sense? Gosh, not quite, but that sounded profound. It's by Trap. I forget his first name, but it's by Trap. Check him out. Love that. Yeah. Okay. Any final encouragements? Sigh. Yeah, we kind of said it. I think one thing that really sticks out to me in this is don't be afraid to confess.

25:46Yeah. That would be mine. Yeah. That would be my encouragement. Go out there, confess your sins. Confess your sins. To people that you trust. Be bold. Be leaders, pastors. Yeah, what about you? I'm sure you've got something. Mine is, I mean, it says it in the text, like walk in the light. Yeah. Yeah, just walk in the light. Walk the walk. If you're going to... Yeah, walk the walk. Walk the walk. Bear the fruits. Chase after Christ. Yeah, remember the power.

26:17And his virtues and fruits. Aw, amen. Amen. Okay. All right, guys, I think that's it for today's Bible study podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in. We hope that you learned something in this and that it's blessed you. Please leave a comment of the walking man or woman emoji in the comments. Yes. I feel like that's fitting. Definitely. And be blessed. We'll catch you in the next one. Bye.