Topic: Do you know the Bible?
There was a man standing downtown waiting for a bus. He said it was raining cats and dogs. There was a lady standing next to him, so he tried to be friendly and make conversation. “If this keeps up, we'll all have to buy an ark,” he said. “What's an ark?” she asked. “You mean you haven't heard about Noah and the great flood and all those animals?” he asked her incredulously. “Look, mister,” she replied, “I've only been in town for four days. I've scarcely had time to read a paper.”
Second John calls us to know the Bible for ourselves. We are to abide, or stay true, to the doctrine of Christ which includes having a solid biblical understanding of what it means to be a Christian, to be a true follower of Jesus Christ. It also includes living in accordance to that understanding. The question is, are we staying true to the doctrine, the teaching, of Jesus? What evidence is there that we are not just playing a game, but that we truly are committed to our faith in Jesus as our Lord and Savior? The apostle Paul says in II Corinthians 13:5 “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?”
John points out in II John that the elect lady, or church was loved in truth. And her children, or church members, were following the command to love one another. God’s Word spells out the perfect and ideal person, what God wants a person to be.
Second John calls us to look out for deceivers. We are not to just accept whatever someone is teaching. We are to check their message against the doctrine, teaching of Jesus. In John's day, there were false teachers of what is called Gnosticism. To them, salvation came through special, hidden, mystical knowledge that only a few understood. They also believed that the material world is evil, including our flesh. Some claimed that Jesus didn’t have a real body but was more like a ghost, meaning that His sufferings weren’t real. Others claimed the “Christ-Spirit” came upon the human Jesus at baptism and left him at the cross. John wants to make sure that we are not taken in by teachings such as that. And we need to be on guard because there are still ideas like that being taught by some today. So John makes it clear in verse seven that the deceivers are those, “who do not confess Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh.”
It takes constant vigilance to guard our faith and stay with what is revealed in scripture. It has been proven that people can too easily be swayed to believe an untruth. For example:
In 2018, Peter McIndoe wanted to let people know about the government conspiracy concerning birds. He said that from 1969 to 2001, the US government murdered over twelve billion birds and replaced them with surveillance drone replicas claiming that birds are government spy-drones and not real animals. He started a movement called, “Birds Aren’t Real,” and said he uncovered CIA documents proving this fact. Even now you may see signs at sporting events, and on college campuses, and posts shared on Facebook that say “Birds Aren’t Real”, and the media has written national stories on the movement. The only problem with this, it’s all fake. Peter started “the movement” as a social experiment to show how gullible people are concerning conspiracy theories.
More and more in our culture, we are having trouble with the line between what is true and what is false. So don't be misled by someone who tells you something different about Jesus. The only way He can be the perfect sacrifice to pay the price for your sins is that He is who He says He is.
Keep reading the Bible!
See you Sunday,
Dr. Scott Kallem