Scripture Focus: 1 John 3:1–3
Table of Contents
Introduction: The Language of Children
I’ve had the privilege this year of attempting to learn a new language. If you’ve ever tried that—whether on your own or in a class in school—you know there are various degrees of success and failure in that process. It’s one thing to understand the language being spoken and another thing to speak it; it’s one thing to read another language and another to write it.
Part of our task was to learn enough of a language (specifically for us, Hungarian) to function in a foreign country for 50 days. But our chief concern was being able to communicate with children.1In particular, the three-year-old twins we adopted from Hungary.
While we were in Hungary, and even now, we have been quickly reminded that there are some things, regardless of culture, that you can bank on when it comes to children’s communication.
One word requires no training to recognize: “no,” which is fairly recognizable in every language and a popular phrase with children.
Another word or phrase that you’ll hear on the lips of children is “do it again” or “one more time.”
Those two examples are in response to something you’ve done: No, I don’t like that, or yes, I do like that … do it again!
When it comes to neutral phrases—phrases uttered because of the child’s initiative and not as a reaction to something you’ve done—I think number one on the list would be “Look.”
In English, Hungarian, or any language, children often say “Look” or “Watch me.” Look, Daddy. Watch what I’m doing. Look at what I’ve made, what I’m holding, what I broke, what I fixed.
If the child isn’t convinced that you’re looking, instead of “Look,” he might say “See it?” a few times over.
The Lord in His grace has given my household the opportunity to hear that phrase, once again, ringing in our ears twice over.
This phrase—Look; see it?—is what I want to focus on in this sermon. And I do want you to think of it in the context of children, for two reasons.
- In the Bible, there’s a directive to “look” that takes the dual form of both a command and an exclamation. In a sense, it is a command that says, “Look at the children.”
- There’s another instance of looking and seeing that we’re currently physically unable to do, but we are encouraged to, nevertheless, in the meantime, “Look with the eyes of a child.”
In the Bible, there’s a directive to “look” that takes the dual form of both a command and an exclamation.
See It?
First John 3:1 begins, “See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are.” In this verse, we are commanded to see something that the Father has done. But it is beyond mere visual inspection. Because if you think about it, identifying the children of God isn’t a matter of visual inspection. We don’t believe in God and start glowing—not in this life anyway. There’s a sense in which the command “Listen” would be appropriate, because it is a teaching we are to embrace. We are to hear God’s declaration that we are in fact His children.
The idea is this: Be aware; look, see, behold; take special notice of this thing: of “how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God.” And so we see that the object of our gaze is manifold. It’s the Father’s love, but it’s also the result of that love. We are to look both at the Father and at ourselves. We’re to see how much He has loved us, and we’re to look and see His love in the fact that we are His children.
We are to look both at the Father and at ourselves. We’re to see how much He has loved us, and we’re to look and see His love in the fact that we are His children.
As we ponder both of these things, we become aware of something: We no longer fit in this world: “For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him” (1 John 3:1b). In a sense, what John will say next is that we as children of God will outgrow this world: “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be” (3:2a). He is of course not saying “now we are children of God, and we’ll be something else later on.” Once a child of God, always a child of God. What he is saying is that there is a future for God’s children. There’s a maturation—we expect children to grow up; there’s an inheritance—a future in which we are more and more unlike this present world and more like a complete child of God when we are taken to live in our Father’s house.
So we observe here that there is something that you must see: you are a child of God; and there’s something that you cannot yet see: what it will mean to be a fully matured child. There’s something you can see now and something you can’t see now.
There’s something that you cannot yet see: what it will mean to be a fully matured child.
Our present reality draws our gaze toward a future that we cannot see. Here, John gives a future guarantee about our vision: If ever there was a reason for someone to exclaim “Look!” it’s this: Christ will appear, and we will see Him. And this viewing causes something to happen: “We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is” (1 John 3:2b). We will look, and we will see clearly for the first time in our lives. And when we do, it will change us. We will gaze upon purity itself, and it will purify us.
Listen to me … look: This truth is so noble that if you can hold on to it, then purification will become a present reality.
First John 3:3 says: “And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.” In this verse, John is giving us another way of seeing. I will call it a childlike gaze, because it’s a privilege given only to the children of God, and it will require, to some extent, I believe, what we can properly call imagination. Why? Because it is an invitation to bring before our gaze something unseen. The unseen thing is this: who Christ really is and who we really are because of Him.
The whole concept turns on a paradox the more you ponder it: Fix your hope upon the unseen so that you might gain a spiritual vision of the future that pervades your present. If you want to see more clearly, look to the unseen! Do you want to purify yourself in the present? Fixate upon the future.
If you want to see more clearly, look to the unseen!
We’re asked to contemplate what we can and cannot see, and if you do it properly, you will see more clearly:
- God;
- Yourself as an individual child of God; and
- Others as children of God (if they are fellow believers) and as people made in God’s image.
If you want to fulfill the Great Commandment—if you want to love God, yourself, and others—seeing God, oneself, and others more clearly is a good start. I draw your attention to these verses in 1 John because of where we are and where we’re going.
We’ve seen this set of verses in our studies on resurrection from the dead. And they also fit well with our next topic of study—eternal judgment, which is the sixth and final elementary principle of the oracle of God (the overarching theme of our series based on Hebrews 5:12–6:2). When studying eternal judgment, we will talk about this appearing of Christ (1 John 3:2) and all that means in terms of judgment and eternity.
Before we get there, I want to speak to the current state of your spiritual vision.
An Imagination Check-Up
How is the health of your imagination—the purity of your gaze?
We are image-bearers of Christ. I think the shape of both our present and future is largely measured by the extent to which we reflect Him well. We will reflect Him in this life, and we will reflect Him in the next life. The extent to which we will reflect Him in the next life, I believe, depends on how well we reflect Him now. But I get ahead of myself. That has to do with eternal judgment. Still, we can ask this question now:
How can we see and better reflect the unseen Christ?
My prayer is that the body of believers at GraceLife (where I serve as pastor) is poised for a season of doing just that. My prayer is that you, wherever you live, will do just that.
The Oracles of God sermon series that I’ve been preaching through for over two years now is not about establishing a foundation for foundation’s sake. Foundations exist for a purpose—to have something built upon it.
I remind you through the words of the writer of Hebrews, “Let us press on to maturity” (6:1). We do so at GraceLife in various ways, programmatically. We also do it by training our imaginations, as we will do in this sermon. We’re going to need our imaginations as we consider heaven and hell, and as we consider concepts like eternity, infinity, and forever.
In GraceLife’s midweek gathering this spring, we’re studying C.S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce—a piece of literature that I highly recommend to anyone. It fits along well with the topic of eternal judgment. An imaginative book, it’s a fictional story about someone who goes to heaven and hell, but it’s anything but the same genre as pop phenomena of these sideshow books about people claiming to have traveled to and come back from heaven or hell.
The title itself is intriguing. (Why are we calling divorce “great”?!) It’s a response by Lewis to another work that talks about the marriage of heaven and hell. Lewis is saying no, these two things don’t go together. At some point in history, there is a great divorce in which heaven and hell are seen for what they are and eternally separate.
The book is full of interesting scenarios—like a murderer and the person he murdered both ending up in heaven; and a priest who started a theology society in the next life, but is actually a resident of hell.
The Great Divorce is where we get the following quote from:
There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, “Thy will be done,” and those to whom God says, in the end, “Thy will be done.” All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. To those who knock it is opened.
Seeing the Unseen Christ
There’s a lot that can and should be said about seeing the unseen Christ and therefore becoming more like Him. This idea of catching a glimpse of Christ in this life and being conformed to His image is a topic some call “spiritual formation.”
There was once a Quaker worship service in which someone began to preach about the lessons of spiritual formation and said, “Now, we want to learn these lessons so that it won’t take us 40 years like it did Moses.” To that statement, another in the audience, himself quite interested in spiritual formation, said loud enough for everyone else to hear, “I doubt it.”
There’s truth in both of those views. We know that, ultimately, the formation isn’t complete until we see Him face to face. But we also hold on to the promise that we can start to gaze toward that hope and begin to change even now.
Depictions of Jesus in Art
Let’s consider a relatively modern exercise in seeing Christ. It’s one in which our thoughts and imaginations about Christ are awakened because someone is not only urging us in the spiritual sense to “see Jesus,” but is depicting Jesus in art.
People have been depicting Christ probably since He walked the earth. I am not positive about this, but I am fairly sure the first depiction of Jesus that we have is actually a mockery of Him, from the first or second century. We have images from the early church that show what He might’ve looked like, what He might’ve been doing.
The modern phenomenon, of course, is Jesus in film, and Jesus in TV shows. We have these shows that depict scenes from the Bible.
So instead of trying to figure out where we all are in terms of our gaze upon the unseen Christ, let’s use this as an opportunity about how we can use the things of this world to think about God.
Some questions come up when considering depictions of Jesus or scenes from the Bible, including:
- Should Christ be depicted at all?
- Who has the right to depict Him?
- What must the depictions be like?
- Should I watch?
- Should others watch?
Let’s address these questions now.
Should Christ be depicted at all?
If I say “no,” then the rest of the questions have obvious answers, and this sermon ends. Those who would say “no” appeal to the second commandment (of the Ten Commandments) that says you shall have no graven image of God’s likeness (see Exodus 20:4). I am fairly sure that command is speaking of idols. It’s not saying you can’t draw a picture of God. It’s saying don’t do something like the Hebrew children did, where they formed a golden calf and said, “Look, this is our god.”2See Exodus 32:4. And certainly it’s saying not to form another image of some other god and bow down and worship it.
Bottom line, the second commandment isn’t saying we can’t draw or depict God, but that we should not worship an idol.
Who has the right to depict Him?
If we can get past question #1, we then have to ask who has the right to depict Christ? Let’s say I’m going to start a TV show and make it about Jesus. What if I don’t know much about Him? I shouldn’t be chosen to do the show, especially over someone who does know a lot about Jesus.
This is a good pop culture question, because if you’ve seen the box office ratings from the past month, an animated film about Jesus, The King of Kings, has been the no. 2 or no. 3 at the box office for almost two weeks of April.
Another top 10 film in late March and early April was The Chosen, specifically its season 5 opener that premiered in theaters before releasing on Amazon Prime Video. As both theater and TV show ratings reveal, The Chosen isn’t some poorly done show that’s popular only among Christians. It’s a faith-based series, but it’s gained critical acclaim. A similar thing is happening now with House of David (also on Amazon Prime). These biblical stories are part of our culture.
The question is, who has the right to depict such stories and characters? Should it only be believers? Can unbelievers do so? If it’s only believers, then what kind—where do we draw the line? A big controversy when The Chosen first came out (in 2017) was its production (at that time) by Angel Studios, which has an association with Mormons.3The Mormon Church is technically another religion or cult, not a denomination, so I would not categorize them as believers. However, because Jesus is part of their scriptures (albeit, not the biblical Jesus), the question remains: who should tell a story about the message and person of Jesus? Many boycotted the show for that reason.
Where do you draw the line when it comes to messages about Jesus? And how far do you go with this kind of argument? Think about a worship service. Should everyone who participates in it be a believer—from the pastor to the music leaders to the guy working the soundboard? (Have you ever met a believer who’s terrible at the soundboard, but an unbeliever who’s really good at it? Does it matter if a believer is working it during a service?)
What about the microphone I use when preaching (hard to preach without it!)? Does it need to be made by believers or can it have been made by unbelievers? (Does this affect the delivery of the message preached into it?)
What about popular sources of media we use to give messages about Jesus? Consider Facebook, for example, which I’m pretty sure is not run by believers. Should we not use it, not participate in it?
Should I watch it? Should others watch it?
This brings us to two other questions: Should I watch? Should others watch?
Regarding our own watching, we may wonder, Is my participation (my watching of the film) an endorsement? How should I watch it? Do I watch it critically? Do I dare watch it worshipfully? Should I watch it at all if the depiction isn’t fully biblical?
The answer is that watching films that depict Jesus falls in the realm of personal conviction unto the Lord. Paul writes in Romans 14:
The faith which you have, have as your own conviction before God. Happy is he who does not condemn himself in what he approves. But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and whatever is not from faith is sin. (vv. 22–23)
The principle that we learn in this controversy over meat sacrificed to idols is that there are some things that are matters of personal conviction. And when it comes to matters of personal conviction, you need to act out of that which you believe is acceptable.
A measure of common sense is expected here. You can’t say, “Well, I believe that this is acceptable, and because I believe it, it’s fine.” The whole question is, is the thing a sin—something we ought not to do to begin with. Some things are clearer than others. Other things fall in the realm of personal liberties.
I think this idea of watching films that depict Christ or stories from the Bible falls in the realm of personal liberty.
What if you say, “Well, I just don’t think others should watch these movies”? I’d say, if you think something shouldn’t be watched by you, it’s reasonable that you don’t think others should watch it either. However, I don’t see any clear biblical reason prohibiting it. But there are clear biblical principles regarding our own actions and making sure that our actions are done with faith. And the Bible says there are some actions that are sin for one and not for others—not because of the action but because of conscience.
There are some actions that are sin for one and not for others—not because of the action but because of conscience.
So, give grace! See this as an area of opportunity (to some extent) to reach those who otherwise would not be interested in spiritual things. If what they hear from you is nothing but judgment about your fellow Christians who shouldn’t be watching the film, your impact on their lives will not be positive. Again, give grace. My encouragement is that you reserve those sorts of conversations for your close friends. You don’t want to watch it, and you don’t think others should watch it? Fine. Probably not the thing that you want to herald—not the thing you want to be known for.
What must the depictions be like? (Should they be “biblical”? If so, what does that mean?)
The first question of many believers about a film depicting Jesus or Bible scenes is, “Is it biblical?” A good question. Certainly, some of the films or TV shows about Jesus aren’t biblical. But we have to ask, too, “What do we mean by the term biblical?”
Some mean this: If you’re going to depict Jesus speaking, He can only say words we have recorded in the Bible. That’s it. If you do that, the show is biblical.
The Gospel writer John says there are a lot of other things Jesus did that aren’t recorded in Scripture; if someone had recorded all those things, he doesn’t think the books of the entire world could contain the stories.4See John 21:25. So there’s a sense in which we do at least have a nod from the Scripture that Jesus has done other things besides what’s in Scripture. Is it okay to add those things? We don’t know what they are. But can we have a creative subplot to move the story along?
I think we all can agree Jesus certainly said more than what the Bible records. Can we begin to speculate on those things? We probably ought to entertain what the purpose of the film is. Is the purpose to …
- … act out the Bible?
- … point to the Bible?
- … entertain?
- … inform?
- … persuade?
A warning: Some create a standard of “biblicality” that not even the Bible can stand up to. Did you know that Scripture doesn’t always give us necessarily the words of Christ verbatim? There are some instances in which different Gospel writers tell us what Jesus said but use different words. Have they failed us by not giving us every word exactly as it was uttered?
Some create a standard of “biblicality” that not even the Bible can stand up to.
In reality, we have the New Testament in Greek, but we know that Jesus spoke other languages—Hebrew and Aramaic in addition to Greek. So, be careful if you hold yourself to this standard of “only what the Bible says.” You probably ought to start learning Greek and Hebrew real fast, because you’re depending on a translation that might not give you everything that’s there, word for word, because language can’t always work that way. Really, the question comes down to this: Why am I watching? It’s a pretty good question to ask of any of our activities (“Why am I doing this?”).
I might be watching critically; given my profession I could legitimately watch just about any show about Jesus and call it research.
I might be watching for enjoyment. This is not quite the same thing as entertainment, but I might watch for enjoyment and be entertained along the way.
Here’s what I think I’ve discovered: Most believers don’t know their Bibles well enough to even know if and when they should be offended by the portrayal in front of their eyes. And I think this points out what is the great benefit of these portrayals. It causes people to ask, What does the Bible say? (If only we could have more people asking this question!) The extent to which a film drives people to Scripture, that’s good.
The extent to which a film drives people to Scripture, that’s good.
Something else to consider: Some will say, “I’d rather watch this show than read my Bible.” (There are definitely people who think, “I’d rather watch The Chosen than read my Bible.”)
That’s not shocking at all. Most everybody, believers included, would rather do a lot of things other than read their Bible. Part of spiritual maturity is realizing that what I want and what I should do, or at least what I should want to do, don’t always match up. That’s part of why I’m talking about this in the first place. We need purer visions and purer desires. That’s a process.
It might be that the most spiritual person who shows up at a Sunday morning service yearned to be there. Or it might be that the most spiritual person who shows up to the service had no desire to be there but came anyway. That might demonstrate the greater spiritual maturity and the greater spiritual growth, as that action moved him or her closer to Christ.
Examining What You Enjoy and Why
When we find ourselves enjoying something in the world to an extent beyond what we think is proper—either because of the amount of enjoyment we engage in, or because of that enjoyment in contrast with some other thing—it is an opportunity to ask the question, “What is the good in the thing I’m after?” Why do I enjoy it? Why do I enjoy this more than that? Is it something about me? This question is an important one. It’s a question that the Christian worldview answers well, while the world does not. The world says, “If you enjoy something, it’s about you—embrace it, because that’s who you are!”
If it’s not something about me—do I enjoy it because of something about the thing itself?
A question few probably answer in terms of responsibility for how we enjoy things: Do I enjoy this thing because of something about my habits and the me I’m created to be? Formation works in both directions.
Is It Good?
We rush to the question “Is it biblical?”, and it’s a fine question. But we should also ask, “Is it good?” I can make a movie that’s biblical (as in, biblically accurate), and it could be a really bad movie. I can also make a really good movie, and have it not be biblical.
My main challenge to you, in engaging these depictions of Jesus or of the Bible, is this: the extent to which you find something compelling in such a story and find that to be lacking in the Scriptures, you are missing something from the Scriptures. The story is there. It’s not the Scriptures that are deficient.
The extent to which you find something compelling in a story and find that to be lacking in the Scriptures, you are missing something from the Scriptures. The story is there. It’s not the Scriptures that are deficient.
I enjoy a lot of these modern portrayals of Scripture because they weave themes throughout a story (over the course of a show, movie, or season), which is exactly what Scripture does. Scripture is also telling a story, a story of a Lamb, a story of a Lion, a story of Light. These themes are there. But it’s a story written by God, and so you shouldn’t expect it to be easy. There’s some work to be done on our part.
I enjoy what modern screen depictions of Scripture do for my imagination. But they drive me to Scripture and to holy contemplation—and they do that because I’ve built that foundation. I’ve reached a point in my spiritual journey in which it is not going to ruin my imagination to see a depiction of Jesus on the screen. You may not be there, or you may have a different conviction, and that’s okay. I’m not going to get to heaven and be disappointed that Jesus doesn’t look like Jonathan Roumie or Jim Caviezel or Robert Powell or Max von Sydow.5Stars cast as Jesus (listed in order of most recent to least recent) of The Chosen, The Passion of the Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and The Greatest Story Ever Told, respectively.
But I get that conviction as well. “I don’t want these actors to shape the way I think about Christ” could certainly be a holy conviction.
To use a secular example, I remember when the Lord of the Rings movies first came out. I didn’t want to watch them because I hadn’t finished reading the books. I knew that once I watched the film depictions, I wouldn’t be able to think of the characters with my own imagination. It would be forced upon me by someone else’s view.
Let me draw on that analogy of not wanting someone else’s impression to invade my own imagination. The whole point in that example is that there is a text that was authoritative—a text that said, “This is the story.”
In a parallel way, you should ground yourself in the biblical text first; it’s the foundation for everything. The text of Scripture is asking us to fix our spiritual gaze upon a Christ whom we have not seen. That’s the Christ who made the world and every creature in it. His goodness is present even when pagan poets put ink to paper. The apostle Paul said that very same thing in a Scripture we looked at in my sermon from Athens. He tells the Athenians, “Even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children’” (Acts 17:28); then he proceeds to say, in effect, “So now let me tell you how the children of God should think.”
His goodness is present even when pagan poets put ink to paper.
Conclusion
That brings us back to where we began, fellow children—1 John 3:
See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. (v. 1)
Given these words from John, we should not be surprised when the world doesn’t depict Jesus accurately, or when it does so in a way that we don’t like. It doesn’t know Him and it doesn’t know you!
Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. (1 John 3:2)
Be careful about your judgments of others’ depictions, because you’ve never seen Him either.
And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. (1 John 3:3)
There is a way to see Him, and there’s a way to see Him progressively clearer with every blink. We can take that which we do know about Him, and let it fuel our longing to know even more about Him.
But this must drive us to one purpose: not to gain more knowledge about Christ, but to be more like Him—which comes, yes, from knowing about Him, but it also comes from knowing Him.
The world gives us many opportunities to do that. Each opportunity to grow closer to Christ comes when we see some reflection of the good that exists because of Him and in Him and through Him.
And the gospel of Christ declares this: Look and see it. See the hope of the future in the present even now because of God’s timeless grace.