In Friday's study we talked about how the baptism of Jesus and the death of Jesus both proved that He is who He says He is. At His baptism, God the Father spoke from heaven and testified that Jesus was His Son. The people standing at the Jordan heard this voice. The death of Jesus proved that He's the Son of God because He rose from the dead. If He had gone to the tomb and remained there, how could we ever be sure that anything He said during His life was true? He kept telling His followers He would rise from the dead; if He had not fulfilled this promise, He could not have been God the Son, for God cannot tell a lie.
Today John talks about the testimony of God. In this world it's possible for people to give false testimony even when under oath in court, but it is not possible for God to give false testimony. This is because God, who is perfectly righteous, cannot tell a lie. "God is not human, that He should lie." (Numbers 23:19) "God...does not lie." (Titus 1:2) "It is impossible for God to lie." (Hebrews 6:18) We can trust the testimony of God. In the Old Testament, God told us how we would recognize His Son. He told us Christ would be born into the world as a baby to a woman who was a virgin. (Isaiah 7:14) He told us Christ would be born in Bethlehem. (Micah 5:2) He told us Christ would perform great miracles. (Isaiah 35:5-6) He told us Christ would be rejected and would suffer and die---not for His own sins but for the sins of others. (Isaiah 53:1-9) And He told us that Christ, though He died, would again see the light of life and would be satisfied with the "offspring" (the believers) His sacrifice had produced. (Isaiah 53:10-12) I have referenced only a few of the Messianic prophecies that can be found in the Old Testament, but only Jesus of Nazareth has fulfilled them all. These prophecies are the testimony of God. They were the checklist by which anyone who claimed to be the Messiah could be compared. Everyone throughout history who has claimed to be the Promised One has failed the test---except Jesus of Nazareth.
John warns us in our passage today that if we reject Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah, we are rejecting the very words of Almighty God. We are also resisting the testimony of the Holy Spirit, whose ministry it is to work with our hearts to prove to us that Jesus is the Son of God. This is why, when we lived in doubt and unbelief, the gospel message troubled us. Hearing the gospel causes a person to have to do something about what he or she has heard. There are really only two choices we can make: either we accept the testimony given by God and by the Holy Spirit and by Jesus Himself and by all the prophets, or we reject it. It may seem like there's a third option where we can push the matter to the back of our minds for the time being to be dealt with at a later date, but there comes a point when failing to make a decision is a decision. We aren't guaranteed the next breath, much less tomorrow, and time may run out for us to make a decision for Christ. Also, resisting the Holy Spirit can make our hearts so hard toward Him that we no longer feel moved by anything He has to say. This can lead us to complete all our days on this earth without ever giving another serious thought to the fact that we are sinners and that we need a way to be made righteous in the sight of the God before whom we will someday stand.
As we said yesterday, under the Mosaic law, two or three witnesses were required to establish a thing as a fact. John picks up there by reminding us we have all the witness testimony necessary to establish as fact that Jesus is the Promised One. "For there are three that testify: the Spirit, the water and the blood, and these three are in agreement." (1 John 5:7-8) We have already discussed why the voice of God at the baptism of Jesus (which John references as "the water") and the blood of Jesus (His death and resurrection) prove His identity. These are two witnesses, which are all that is necessary under the law to prove that a thing is true. But there is also a third witness, the Holy Spirit, who deals with our hearts. The Holy Spirit testifies to our spirit that Jesus is the Christ.
Since we would be willing to accept the eyewitness testimony of two or three people in a court of law, John says, "We accept human testimony, but God's testimony is greater because it is the testimony of God, which He has given about His Son." (1 John 5:9) God can't lie, so if we're willing to accept that the agreeing testimony of two of three human beings is true, why would we not accept that what God says is true? God told us what to look for in the Messiah so that no one would deceive us. Jesus fulfilled the checklist that God gave us through the prophets. There is proof after proof after proof that Jesus is really who He claimed to be. If God had only spoken from heaven at the baptism of Jesus down at the Jordan River, we might be able to convince ourselves that the crowd by the river experienced a mass hallucination. But Jesus did all the things we were told the Messiah would do. No one, not even His worst enemies, ever denied His miracles. They couldn't. They saw them with their own eyes. They couldn't accuse Him of any sin either. In order to bring Jesus before Pilate in hopes of getting Him crucified, His enemies had to make up lies about Him, because no one had a single shred of evidence that He had ever broken a law of either God or man. Believe me, if Jesus had had any skeletons in His closet, those who hated Him would have found them, because they looked so diligently for them. But they came up empty.
The apostle brings a frightful accusation against us if we refuse to accept what God has said about His Son. "Whoever believes in the Son of God accepts this testimony. Whoever does not believe God has made Him out to be a liar, because they have not believed the testimony God has given about His Son." (1 John 5:9-10) I don't want to stand before my Judge someday and be accused of having called Him a liar. But John says that's essentially what we are doing when we refuse to believe what God has said.
I want to stand before my Judge and be counted righteous for the sake of His Son, who died for me and who I have trusted with my eternal soul. I want all my family members, friends, and neighbors to have this. I want everyone in the world to have this. The Lord wants everyone to have this. That's why I find it so difficult to understand when anyone says that Christianity is "exclusionary". The Lord Jesus invites "whosoever will" to come to Him and accept the free offer of salvation. (Revelation 22:17) No one is excluded. Everyone is welcome. Jesus gave Himself for every person on the face of the earth because He loves every person on the face of the earth. He wants to redeem every soul. But He won't force redemption on anyone. Faith has always been a choice, and salvation has always been by faith. The Apostle John wants everyone to have salvation through Jesus Christ the Lord, so he concludes with these words in order to encourage us all to make the right choice: "And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son does not have life." (1 John 5:11-12)
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