Names of God; part 36. Being a son in the house of YHVH.

Title: Names of God; part 36. Being a son in the house of YHVH.

1Jo 3:1 See how great a love the Father has bestowed upon us [perfect tense: it is our permanent possession], that we should be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him.

1Jo 3:2 Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we shall be. We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is.

1Jo 3:3 And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.

1Jo 3:4 Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness.

1Jo 3:5 And you know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin.

1Jo 3:6 No one who abides in Him sins [present active indicative of harmatano]; no one who sins [present active participle of harmatano] has seen Him or knows Him.

Character is shown by one's habitual actions, not the extraordinary ones. Abiding is in the present - habitual. It is the habit of abiding in fellowship with Christ.

The one who is habitually abiding in sin is the unbeliever and not the son in the house.

The entire epistle deals with the ideal reality of life with God. He is not teaching sinless perfection. He acknowledges that Christians sin in 1Jo 1:8-10, and he forbids sin in 1Jo 2:1. The Christian is a son, and if he has the habit of fellowship with Christ he will not only not be a perpetual sinner, but he will in fact continually practice righteousness. Note that he does not practice righteousness from his own human effort and is then granted fellowship with Christ. He chooses to abide in Christ and in that condition he will practice righteousness as opposed to sin.

1Jo 3:6 No one who abides in Him sins [present active indicative of harmatano]; no one who sins [present active participle of harmatano] has seen Him or knows Him.

Both "seen" and "knows" are in the perfect tense. The one who practices sin has never seen or known Him.

1Jo 3:7 Little children, let no one deceive you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous;

“practices” – present active participle of poieo. We are called to practice righteousness, to be good sons, to be disciples, and by the grace of God, we have everything to do it.

John is refuting Antinomianism, which had greatly infiltrated Christianity at the time under Gnosticism. The teaching revolved around the idea that the body and the spirit of a man were separate and therefore the one didn't influence the other. Further, the flesh was evil as was all matter and the spirit was saved and good. Putting these two ideas together and the conclusion is that sinning in the flesh does not affect the spirit and has no bearing on it. So then, Gnosticism taught that no amount of sin could defile the soul of a Christian and that the saved person was saved in spirit only, which had no affect on the body. For obvious reasons, this false doctrine appealed to many.

He did not write that every Christian practices righteousness. He states that the one who practices righteousness possesses the righteousness of Christ.

Do not be deceived. The practice of righteousness is only possible by the grace of God. A believer is given righteousness, wisdom, and power and he can choose these grace gifts.  

The believer is created a new creature in Christ by God. He is given the truth of the word of God, which reveals clearly to Him the ethics of true righteousness. The Holy Spirit is given to him so that he can clearly understand the Christian life and also the meaning of that life. His destiny in heaven is revealed to him as an absolute reality. All of this calls for a life that is Christ and of the grace of Christ.

We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works. We are called to practice righteousness because righteous is what God has made us to be. It's not for the purpose of impressing people or earning points with God. It is simply who we are, who Christ is, and so it is the only life that can be rightly given the term "life."