Day 1 - A Quick Introduction to 1 John
In the second volume of the 4N6 Ministries devotionals, I thought it would be appropriate to do something I failed to do in the first volume: provide an introductory overview of the books we’ll be meditating on. Without a proper understanding of context (both historically/culturally and within the over-all scope of Scripture), it is far more difficult to understand the meaning of the verses we are studying.
With this in mind, let me take a moment to share a few things with you before we proceed.
First, this next volume of devotions will be taken from the three epistles (a fancy word for letters) attributed to the Apostle John. John the Son of Thunder. John the Beloved. Yeah, John the Revelator as well. That John. The man known for his intense love for Jesus. The man for whom Christ told Peter, “What’s it to you if I decide to make John immortal?” (I’m paraphrasing there.) So, yeah, these letters are most likely written by a guy who truly knows what he’s talking about.
Authorship
Wait a minute, you might wonder. Might have written? How can there be a doubt that John wrote them? His name is right in the title of the three books! Well, biblical scholarship can be bit complicated and lots of times, egos get in the way. There are lot of books in the Bible whose authorship is questioned by so-called experts, and these letters are three of them. Personally, I have no doubt John wrote them and I’ll explain a few reasons why in a second, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t at least mention that, like the book of Hebrews, we simply don’t know for sure.
And guess what? It’s perfectly okay if John didn’t write them. Why? Wouldn’t that mean the Bible has a mistake? That it’s not inerrant and not infallible? Not at all! Remember, when the books of the New Testament were written, they were written primarily in Koine Greek, not English. They did not have spaces between words (picture a humongous Word Search Puzzle and that’s kind of what reading the original manuscripts is like) and no punctuation. They definitely weren’t written in verses (except for the occasional song or poem, of course). They had no chapters or chapter headings. And guess what. They didn’t have book titles either. These things were all added later by monks who copied manuscripts and later Bible publishers to make it easier to read, digest, and understand. Easier to memorize verses, etc.
And like the book of Hebrews, the Epistles of John have the distinction of also not providing a salutation with the author’s signature in it. No where in any of the three letters will you find John’s name.
This has, as you might imagine, caused quite a few debates over the centuries as to its authorship. That being said, I believe we can have relative certainty that John did write them because of a few major factors.
First, he is believed to be the author of these letters by the majority of the early church fathers. While a small few doubted his authorship, most had no qualms about attributing these letters to him. Why? Because the tradition of him writing these letters were widely agreed upon in the early second century (an era in which many of John’s personal disciples would have still been alive…they certainly would have known whether he’d written them or not). Then, there’s the second reason: style and vocabulary. If you examine these letters and compare the grammar, turns of phrases, stylistic voice, etc., these letters are written in almost the exact same manner as the Gospel of John, which had no early qualms about authorship. There are many other reasons to believe in the Johannine authorship of these letters, but I simply don’t have the time or space to get into them at the moment (for further reading, check out D.A. Carson and Douglas J. Moo’s An Introduction to the New Testament (a phenomenal book!)).
No, in reading these letters, we can know for near certainty that the Apostle John wrote them. But even if he didn’t, like I said, it doesn’t change anything. Someone very close to John (maybe an amanuensis (a fancy term for transcriptionist or secretary)) most definitely did write them. And since none of these books specifically stated John wrote them, if it turns out that he didn’t, there is no error in Scripture we need to worry about. Simply faulty attribution by early churches who read and studied them.
Audience
Who was John writing to when he wrote these three letters? We don’t really know. Just as he didn’t sign his name to these letters, he also didn’t address them to any specific church. It’s obvious that he’s writing to a group of believers. A church or possibly multiple churches. This group of churches is known as the Johannine churches, by the way.
One thing we know for sure about these churches is that they had been infiltrated by a group of false teachers who were bringing confusion and doubt into the hearts and minds of the believers there. The identity of these false teachers is unknown, but from clues we get from the texts themselves, we can guess that they were most likely rooted in gnosticism…a mystical philosophy that became very popular in the second century that believed in ‘salvation through secret knowledge’.
Purpose
So, what is the purpose of these letters? Specifically, what is the reason John wrote this first letter?
There are four reasons John wrote this letter. Ultimately, it is to combat the influences of the false teachers that were actively proselytizing this church(s). But he does so by addressing four specific things. He specifically tells them as much in the text itself:
To make our joy complete (1:4) - In other words, he’s writing this letter so that he and the church can have live full of joy. Worry and doubt robs us of our joy. It strips us of assurance and security. John is telling them, I’m giving you your joy back with these letters!
To prevent the believer from sinning (2:1) - While we all sin, the true follower of Christ should be in a perpetual state of sanctification (i.e. growing more and more like Christ). We should not remain in lifestyle of sin. Therefore, these letters will address that.
To identify the false teachers and help the church guard themselves against heresy (2:26) - Pretty self-explanatory there.
So they will know they have eternal life (5:13) - Honestly, this is the overall theme of the entire book. Blessed assurance. So many of us struggle with doubting whether or not we’re really saved. This letter is designed to give us sort of a self-diagnosis checklist to know for sure!
Number four is the reason this book is so beloved by so many followers of Christ! It’s why it’s one of the most quoted of all books in Scripture. In studying it, we can not only safeguard ourselves against false doctrine, but know without doubt that we truly are saved!
Are you excited? I hope so! Because I’m so excited to dive into these three short letters and get a taste of the assurance of our salvation in Christ Jesus.
So, buckle up. Go ahead and start reading through 1 John. Pray over it. Meditate over it. And let’s get started in our next post!
Father God, thank you for the apostle who loved Jesus. Thank you for John and his words of encouragement to us. Help us Lord to saturate ourselves in your word. Help us to understand. Help us to live out what we read so that we reflect your light in this dark world.