Jesus, as the Light, Brings to Light the Works of the Devil in Order to Destroy Them

T. Austin-Sparks


I am going to continue this evening where we left off last night. We will read again the first five verses of the First Letter of John:

"That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; (for the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us,) that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. This then is the message which we have heard of Him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all."

Now as we broke off before we had finished this particular word, we must just look back a little in order to get the connection. You will remember that we said that John wrote his Gospel, his three Letters and the Revelation at a time when everything was in confusion; especially was that true in relation to believers. Believers were turning aside to something either different from Christ or less than Christ. They were becoming occupied with certain interpretations of Christian truth, and so there were separate groups of believers all circling round some particular aspect of truth. And these various aspects of truth divided the Lord's people, so that certainty had almost disappeared. Many of the Lord's people did not know just where they were. They were full of doubts and questions, and the testimony of Jesus was losing its power because of these divisions.

So John wrote because of that situation, and his Gospel and his Letters are his answer to that situation. John's great purpose was to bring the Lord's people back to certainty. So over against all the questions John said in this First Letter thirteen times, "We know," by which he meant there is a ground of absolute assurance for the Lord's people. Then as we mentioned last night, ten times he said, "This is." Ten things he said, "This is" the foundation. This is the ground of assurance.

Now we take it up there this evening, and we include all that John has to say in one thing. The Lord's people had gone off in all different directions on some teaching. So they were divided by many teachings. You will see that John employed one solution to the whole problem, and John said that this solution is a sure and certain one. Sometimes you will see an advertisement for a certain medicine, and the advertiser will tell you that this medicine will cure all troubles. You can suffer from any malady, but this will cure it. Of course, nobody believes that, WE are very suspicious about advertisements of that kind. But John is right. He says, I have got the cure for all your troubles; and he says it with great emphasis. He says, 'That which we have seen, and heard and handled, that which was from the beginning, this is the cure for all Christian troubles.' John has no doubt about it, because he himself had proved it. John had lived a long life. He was older than anybody in this gathering tonight when he wrote this. He was the last of the apostles. Paul spoke of himself as "Paul the aged" (Philemon 9). But John was much older than Paul. He had lived a long life. He had seen many troubles. He had met many difficulties amongst the Lord's people. He knew about all those conditions of which he wrote in the first, second and third chapters of the Revelation. He himself had suffered great persecution for Christ's sake. But after all, John says, 'We know." - And this is the solution to all our troubles.