Mary, look to the Lord in prayer.
Lord, as we continue together in Thy presence, we ask Thee to quicken us again by Thy Spirit, that we may be able to hear Thy voice through Thy Word.
We praise and thank Thee because Thy words are life and spirit to us. For unless Thou dost speak again through Thy written words, they will just be letters to us.
So, Lord, we ask that as we study Thy Word together this morning, we may hear Thy still, small voice. And by Thy Spirit, we may be transformed, and we may be led into all truth.
We would like to see Thee through Thy written words. We just commit this time into Thy hands and trust Thy Holy Spirit is working. In the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
In this session, we would like to study the Word of God together. It will be a little different from an ordinary ministry time, because we hope that everyone who comes to this second session of study will really do some study himself.
It is not expected that I would do all the study and you would do all the listening. But I hope that you will do some study yourself.
So this time, we would like to use that short letter of John, the First Epistle of John, as our subject. It is short, but it is very rich. I do not know how far we can go, but at least I hope that during these few days you will read this letter again and again and again.
Read it, meditate upon it, and ask the Lord to speak to you through it. If we prepare ourselves in this way when we come together, I believe it will be a studying together, instead of my doing all the studying.
So I do hope that this will be more or less our assignment: that everyone will read 1 John as many times as possible.
I remember once when three sisters asked our brother Watchman to study the Book of Revelation with them. Our brother gave them a requirement. He said, “If you will read the Book of Revelation a hundred times, then you will come back and we will study it.”
And these sisters did read it a hundred times. Now, I will not ask you to read it a hundred times, because you will miss your meals and your sleep. But at least I will say, without laying down any rule as to how many times, read it as many times as possible.
Let me just read the first four verses of the First Epistle of John, chapter 1, from verse 1 through verse 4.
That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we contemplated, and our hands handled, concerning the Word of life—
and the life has been manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and report to you the eternal life, which was with the Father, and has been manifested to us—
that which we have seen and heard we report to you, that ye also may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
And these things we write unto you, that your joy may be full.
The Gospel of John is on life. The First Letter of John is on fellowship. You cannot have fellowship without life, but life must be expressed and proven through fellowship.
How do we have life? We find in John 20 that the Apostle John said he wrote these things to us that we may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that in believing we may have eternal life through His name.
So the way that we come to life is by believing—believing that Jesus is the Christ, the Anointed of God, and that He is the Son of the living God. If we believe with our hearts, we shall have eternal life through His name.
But how is the life to be expressed? How do we know that we have eternal life? What are the evidences that we have eternal life? Can we know that we have eternal life? Are we able to have the assurance of eternal life?
The same apostle said we can. In 1 John 5, he said, “I write these things to you, that you may know that you have eternal life, even you who believe in Jesus as the Son of God.”
So, dear brothers and sisters, we receive eternal life by believing. And we know that we have eternal life—we have assurance that we have eternal life—because we have fellowship with the Son and with the Father, fellowship with the apostles, and fellowship with one another.
The First Letter of John speaks of fellowship. Now, what is fellowship? The very word fellowship means communion, communication, participation, partnership, and sharing in common.
We share what we have together. That is, we possess together the same thing.
You find that the whole letter of John is trying to help us see what fellowship is, how we practice fellowship, what the conditions of fellowship are, and what will happen if we have fellowship. All these things are found in this little letter.
Of course, if you take this letter up, you will find, in one sense, that it is unusual. Why do we call it the First Letter of John? When you write a letter, usually you have someone mentioned there. You see the letter’s addressee, and you have the one who addresses the letter. You have a place where the letter will be sent.
But you do not find any of these in the First Letter of John. There is no address, no addressee, and no name mentioned anywhere in this little letter.
Yet throughout the letter there is such an intimate relationship between the one who writes it and the people who receive it. There is such a flow of life between the one who writes and the ones who receive. It gives you the impression that it is a letter.
Even though the one who writes the letter is not mentioned, we know who he is, because he cannot be other than the one who wrote the Gospel of John. There are such similarities in many respects between the Gospel of John and the First Letter. So we do believe that the writer of this letter is the Apostle John.
The Holy Spirit used the Apostle John to give us this very lovely letter. As to the time of this letter, we gather that it must have been written in the last decade of the first century. It is one of the last books of the New Testament.
It was written at a time when the rest of the apostles had passed on, and only the last one, John, was still living. During his last days, we know that he labored in Asia Minor, probably residing in Ephesus.
So most probably this letter was written by the Apostle John in the last decade of the first century, to those whom he loved in Asia Minor—and, of course, not only to those in Asia Minor, but to us today.
During the days when John wrote this letter, Jerusalem had already been destroyed. The temple was destroyed. The testimony of God upon this earth was upon the shoulders of the church, the Body of Christ.
The problem with them was not, at that time, outside persecution. There is no mention of persecution in this letter. The problem of the church at that time was from within.
You remember the Apostle Paul. The last time he passed by, he called the elders in Ephesus to come for a meeting. There you remember how he poured out his heart to the elders.
He told them that for three years he had labored among them with many tears. He had not withheld anything from them, but he told them the whole counsel of God. Then he committed them into the grace of God, but he warned them that after he left, grievous wolves would come into their midst.
There would be people even from their very midst coming out, trying to mislead the people and trying to draw people away from Christ unto themselves.
Then you remember that when he wrote 2 Timothy, he mentioned the same thing. He said, “We are in the last days,” and the last days are difficult times, when people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, lovers of pleasure, and not lovers of God.
In the same letter to Timothy, he says that people will not listen to sound teaching, but they will listen to many teachers who will satisfy their itching ears.
So you find that when John the Apostle wrote this first letter, it was a time when false teachers were coming up in the church. They began to teach false doctrines and false teachings, especially concerning the person and work of Christ.
It was to correct and strengthen the believers against the false teaching that came up at that time that this letter was written. The danger the church faced at that time concerning the world was not outside persecution, but rather the subtle temptation of the world.
But anyway, you find that the central thought of this whole letter is very positive: it is on this matter of fellowship.
This little letter can be roughly divided into three parts.
The first part is chapter 1, verses 1 through 4. It is an introduction, and this introduction lays the ground of fellowship.
It not only introduces the subject of fellowship, but actually, in these four verses, it gives us the very essence of fellowship. What follows in the letter is but a development of all that has been mentioned in these four verses. So we may call it the ground of fellowship.
Then, from chapter 1, verse 5, through chapter 5, verse 5, you find the conditions, or the practice, of fellowship. Let us call it the grace of fellowship.
In this section there are three parts:
Then, of course, we have the last part, from 1 John 5:6 to the end, verse 21. This is the conclusion. We would call it the glory of fellowship.
So altogether, in this little letter, we find the ground of fellowship, the grace of fellowship, and the glory of fellowship. This morning, we would like to begin with the first part.
A letter is itself a form of fellowship. The Apostle John at that time was very aged, probably in his nineties. But there was something burning in his heart, something very precious to him, and he would like to share it with his fellow believers—these people among whom he had labored.
In order that he might share what he had in his heart with these people, he wrote them a letter.
Remember, when he wrote his letter, he was in his closing years. He did not have much time left. But there was still much in his heart, much that he had learned that he wanted to pour out and share with his fellow believers.
He could not afford to make small talk. What he was trying to bring out in this letter was of tremendous importance to him and of tremendous value to the church. It was not something insignificant.
It was the very center of all that he had learned through the years: when he followed the Lord Himself for three and a half years, and afterwards how he served the risen Lord until he came to his closing days. That is what you find in this little letter.
Sometimes we talk a lot about nonsense. Sometimes we talk a lot about trivial things, small things, that really do not matter too much. But not the Apostle John in his closing years. Time was too precious to him.
So we would like to get into his very heart and try to see what it was that was so central, important, and precious to him—and that which he tried to share with us, that we too may have it.
Now, what is it? “That which was from the beginning.”
In the Gospel of John, you find that the Gospel begins, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Verse 4: “In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.” Verse 14: “And the Word became flesh, and tabernacled among men,” full of grace and truth.
That is the way he begins the Gospel of John. But when he begins to write the epistle, he says, “That which was from the beginning.” Now, you notice that there is a difference there.
In the Gospel of John, he says, “In the beginning was the Word.” But in the epistle he says, “That which was from the beginning.”
“In the beginning” is before time began. There was the Word, the eternal Word. The eternal Word existed before the beginning of time, because He was the beginning.
So, in the Gospel of John, when you find, “In the beginning was the Word,” he shows us the very nature of God. He shows us who God is. He is the beginning of everything.
But then when he writes the epistle, he says, “That which was from the beginning.” He who is the Word already existed, but now you find He begins to step into time. “From the beginning.”
The very phrase “from the beginning” speaks of the eternal purpose of God. From the beginning, God has a purpose, and His purpose is concerning His Son: that His Son should be made the heir of all things.
It is with that in view that He began to create. Time and space have their beginning for that one purpose: that the Son shall be the heir of all things.
So, “that which was from the beginning” tells us that our Lord Jesus is the purpose of God. He is, from the beginning, the purpose of God concerning all things, concerning all creation, and especially concerning the church.
“That which we have heard.” This is much more than what the apostles heard directly from Jesus. It includes that which was spoken through the Old Testament times.
You find in Hebrews 1 that God spoke in the past, in many ways and in many portions, to our fathers through the prophets. God, all through the Old Testament days, through the prophets, spoke to our fathers in many portions and in many ways.
Sometimes He spoke in plain words. Sometimes He spoke in types. Sometimes He spoke in commandments. Sometimes He spoke in parables. Sometimes He spoke in history. But in many ways and in many portions, God spoke to our fathers.
And now, in these last days, He speaks to us in His Son. That is what we have heard.
What have we heard? We have heard all that the prophets have spoken. We have heard what our Lord Jesus Himself has spoken to us. That is included in “that which we have heard.”
“That which we have seen with our eyes.” It brings us right down to the time of the apostles. The apostles had seen the Lord with their eyes.
You remember one day the Lord was passing by, and John the Baptist said, “Behold, the Lamb of God.” Two of his disciples went to follow Him. The Lord turned and said, “What do you want?” They said, “Where dost Thou live?” And the Lord said, “Come and see.”
So they saw, and they knew that they had found the Messiah. “That which we have seen.” He came down to the time of the apostles.
“That which we contemplated.” Many people saw the Lord when He was on earth. He traveled, even though in a small area: Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and Galilee. He was seen by many people.
But they saw Him only as the son of a carpenter. They saw Him as the man of Nazareth. But thank God, there were those who contemplated Him. There were those who perceived, in this man of Galilee, the Son of God, full of glory.
In John 1:14 it is said:
And the Word became flesh,
and dwelt among us
(and we beheld His glory,
glory as of the only begotten from the Father),
full of grace and truth.
The Word became flesh and dwelt among men. Many men saw Him. They realized that He was full of grace and full of truth, but that was all.
But thank God, in the parenthesis it is said that there were a few, there were some, whose eyes were opened by the Father to see that in this man they saw the glory—the glory as of the only begotten from the Father. That takes revelation.
So here you find the apostles received such revelation. They not only saw the outward form of Jesus, but they saw in Him God—the very God, the Son of God.
“And our hands handled.” After our Lord was raised from the dead, the disciples were in the room, and suddenly the Lord appeared to them. They could not believe it. Even though they were told that the Lord had risen, it was hard to believe because it had never happened before.
But then the Lord stood in their midst and said, “Handle Me. A spirit does not have flesh and bones, but ye can handle Me.”
The One who came into this world, the One who died on the cross, who was buried in the tomb—He is risen, and He could be handled. He is so real, so living.
And here, brothers and sisters, you find the Apostle John saying: “That which was from the beginning”—you start from the very beginning, the purpose of God; “that which we have heard,” through the ages up to the time of Christ; “that which we have seen with our eyes,” the apostles; “that which we contemplated,” for we received revelation; and “that which our hands handled,” for He is risen from the dead.
You find the whole range, concerning what? Concerning the Word of life.
All these descriptions are concerned with life—with the Word of life. In modern idiom, you would say, “Concerning the revelation of life.”
This life has been revealed. This life is the very One who is from the beginning. This life is that which we have heard throughout the ages. This life is the One whom we have seen, contemplated, and handled because He is risen from the dead.
Dear brothers and sisters, what is it? It is life. It is a person, a living Person—even our Lord Jesus Christ.
Oh, what a revelation that is. What the Apostle John tries to share with us is not a teaching, not a doctrine, not a system, and not history only. What is so precious to him is life. The life is Christ.
That is a great revelation. There is no revelation greater than the revelation of life. This is what he tries to share with us.
Verse 2 is in parenthesis:
And the life has been manifested,
and we have seen, and bear witness,
and report to you the eternal life,
which was with the Father,
and has been manifested to us.
He puts that in parenthesis because he wants to show us that he has personal experience of it. This life that he is trying to tell us about, that tremendous life, is a life that has been manifested.
The Word became flesh, and we have seen it. Therefore, we bear witness and report to you the eternal life that was with the Father and has been manifested to us.
This life was with the Father. You find distinct Persons in the Godhead, and yet you find the unity of the Godhead. This life was with the Father. They are one. Yet this life has been manifested to us.
Because it has been manifested and we have seen, we can bear witness. Therefore, we can report to you.
Then in verse 3 he continues: “That which we have seen and heard we report to you.”
Now, dear brothers and sisters, you cannot report something that you have not seen and have not heard. But I do not believe that when John said, “What we have heard and seen,” he meant only what they had seen and heard with their natural eyes and ears. No.
I believe there is a development here. You may see something and you may hear something, yet if there is no revelation—if you do not see with your inner eyes and do not hear with your inner ears—no matter how accurately you report, it cannot bring in fellowship.
It is death. It is just letter. The letter kills, but the Spirit quickens.
I believe that when these apostles said, “We have seen and heard,” what they meant is, “We have not only seen and heard with our natural eyes and ears, but we have seen with our inner eyes and heard with our inner ears.”
The Father has revealed the Son in us. Because we have seen and heard in such a way, therefore we can report to you, and our report is living and real.
Of course, those who hear the report must hear it not only with their ears, nor merely try to see with their eyes, but they need to look to the Spirit of God to reveal the Son to them.
Then you find there is a consequence. Something will happen. If the reporting is by revelation, and if the hearing is by the Spirit, you know what will happen? We may have fellowship with one another.
If the Apostle John held back what he had seen and heard and did not bring it to us, he would be enjoying life in such abundance, but we would be poor. He would deprive us of having that One.
But thank God: freely we receive, freely we give. You find these apostles, and especially the Apostle John, were filled with this life. Here he tries to pour it out to us, reporting it without withholding it, that we may have fellowship.
I think there is a principle even to learn. If you have seen and heard in the Spirit, do not hold back. You should share it with your brothers and sisters, that we may have fellowship one with another.
So here you find that the apostle says the very important thing is that fellowship comes in the communication of what has been seen and heard.
What do we mean by fellowship? Fellowship simply means that you report what you have seen and heard to me, and I report what I have seen and heard to you. You receive my report, and I receive your report. As we do that, we finally share in common, and that is fellowship.
But the point is: what do we report? What do we receive?
What is the report? It is life. It is Christ as our life.
What do we report when we share with one another? What is it that we hear? Do we hear ourselves? Do we hear a teaching? Do we hear a doctrine? Do we hear an experience? Or is it that we hear life?
We hear the life of Christ—the life of Christ that we have seen, heard, and experienced. Dear brothers and sisters, if we learn to share the life, oh, what a rich fellowship it will be.
That is the only fellowship you find in the Bible.
This is the fellowship of the apostles. In Acts 2:42, on the Day of Pentecost, you remember how the Spirit of God came down upon the one hundred and twenty, and they were in one Spirit baptized into one Body. Oh, what a fellowship.
There you find that three thousand were saved and baptized. In verse 42, we are told that they persevered; they continued in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles, in prayers, and in the breaking of bread.
Here you find the one hundred and twenty and the three thousand people. They continued in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles. The apostles had fellowship with all these other people. Why? Because the apostles told these people Christ, the life.
As they presented Christ to these people, they said, “We have seen Christ.” There you find they were having the fellowship of the apostles.
But the fellowship of the apostles, which they tried to draw us into, is nothing but the outflow of their fellowship with the Father and with the Son.
So we have to go back to the origin of fellowship. The apostles did not originate the fellowship. In reporting the life to us, they draw us into their fellowship, but they did not originate it.
Why? Because their fellowship is the outflow of their fellowship with the Father and with the Son. They have fellowship with the Father through the Son. They have fellowship with the Son by the Father.
You remember that the Lord Jesus says, “No one knows the Father but the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son wills to reveal Him. No one knows the Son but the Father.”
So here you find that the apostles have fellowship with the Father through the Son, and fellowship with the Son by the Father. The Father revealed the Son to the apostles so that they might have fellowship with the Son, and the Son led them to the Father so that they might have fellowship with the Father.
Out of their fellowship with the Father and with the Son, they bring that fellowship to us, that we may have fellowship with them and may have fellowship with the Father and with the Son.
Remember, the fellowship they bring to us is not fellowship merely with them. They are just a channel. The fellowship they bring to us actually is fellowship with the Father and with the Son.
How tragic it would be if our fellowship stopped with the apostles and did not go further.
What is fellowship? When and where does fellowship begin?
The apostle says, “We have fellowship with the Father and with the Son.” Oh, dear brothers and sisters, in 1 Corinthians 1:9 we are told, “God is faithful, through whom ye were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Here you find eternity past, before there was time and space. Here you find eternity: the Father and the Son were having fellowship in the Spirit. There was fellowship. There was the beginning of fellowship.
The fellowship was between the Son and the Father in the Spirit. Oh, that fellowship—that oneness, that perfection, that harmony.
There was no distance between the Father and the Son. There was no shade, no shadow. They were in perfect agreement. They were in love, in purpose, in everything.
Here you find, in eternity, the Father and the Son enjoying fellowship one with another. Oh, how the Father enjoyed the Son, and how the Son enjoyed the Father. There was never a problem between them. There was never any controversy. There was perfect harmony.
Whatever the Father desired, the Son desired. When the Son thought of anything, the Father thought of the same thing. They did not need to talk. In the Spirit, you find perfect oneness, perfect harmony. What life, what love, what pleasure, what joy.
Oh, that fellowship in the Godhead. What satisfaction. What glory. We cannot imagine, because that is the origin of fellowship.
It is called the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ. It is the fellowship that our Lord, the Son, enjoys with His Father. It is the fellowship that the Father enjoys with His Son. Oh, how inseparable they are. They are together. They are one.
That is the beginning of fellowship. It is the most exclusive fellowship in the whole universe.
Yet the Father, because He loves the Son so much, said, “It is not good for man to be alone. I want to give Him a helpmeet. I am going to create man. I want to give man to My Son to be His helpmeet.”
“He is to be the Bridegroom, and He will have a bride composed of all the men that I have created, that He may not be lonely.”
Oh, the Father said, “I want to give You something.” And the Son said, “Father, I am willing. In order that Your love towards Me may be fulfilled, and Your purpose of giving Me a bride may be fulfilled, I am willing to become man.”
“I am willing to be slain from the foundation of the world. I am willing to die for these men, to redeem them, that Thy purpose may be fulfilled.”
Oh, dear brothers and sisters, here you find in eternity the Father and the Son having that heart-to-heart fellowship in the Spirit. They were in perfect agreement. That is how it begins: from the beginning.
What fellowship the Father and Son enjoyed one with the other—not only in eternity past, not only in purpose.
When God created the world, you find the Bible says that the Son was there. Oh, how He rejoiced. How He rejoiced in God’s creation. He delighted with the sons of men. He was actually the One through whom all these things were created. They were one in creation.
In the Old Testament times, even before He came into this world to become man, He appeared again and again as the Angel of the Lord to perform the Father’s errands concerning men.
Then He came in the fullness of time, to be born as a babe in Bethlehem. He was willing to empty Himself and to take upon Himself the form of a slave. He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
Perfect communion with the Father. Again and again you find heaven opened, and the voice said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Perfect communion.
Dear brothers and sisters, God opened that fellowship to the apostles. Our Lord Jesus came into this world to open the way that men might be drawn into His fellowship with the Father.
He paid such a tremendous price for it, in order that we may be drawn into His fellowship with the Father.
He opened the door of that fellowship to the apostles, and the apostles were drawn in. They began to enjoy fellowship with the Son and with the Father, and they were so overjoyed that they said, “We cannot hold back the good news. We have to go out and tell others, and tell them to come and join with us in this fellowship.”
That is how the gospel is preached.
So, dear brothers and sisters, what is fellowship? Fellowship is not only with the apostles, but fellowship is with the Father and with the Son. Here, brothers and sisters, we are called into such fellowship.
Sometimes we say, “I belong to this fellowship,” or, “I belong to that fellowship.” That is too small. There is only one fellowship: the fellowship of the Person, the fellowship with the Father and with the Son. That is the only fellowship.
Dear brothers and sisters, we are in the most exclusive club, however low in social status we may be, because we have joined the fellowship of God’s Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. That is the fellowship we have. Tremendous. This is our calling.
Then we have to finish with verse 4. What is the result of such fellowship? The result of such fellowship is that joy may be full—joy to the full.
You know, our Lord Jesus’ fellowship with the Father is of such a nature that His joy is always flowing forth to overflowing.
Even on the night of His betrayal, He knew that He was to be betrayed and crucified. His disciples did not really understand the full meaning of it, but they were already overwhelmed with sorrow.
Yet our Lord Jesus said, “I leave My joy with you. I give My joy to you. Do not be so sorrowful. I am so joyful.”
Now, brothers and sisters, we must remember that joy is the fruit of the Spirit. It is not just an emotion, although it includes emotion. It is more than that. It is the fruit of the Spirit.
What is the joy of the Son? The joy of the Son is the Father and the Father’s will. That is the joy of the Son. So long as the Father and His will are there, no matter what happens to the Son, He is full of joy.
This is the joy that was before Him.
Dear brothers and sisters, if we really belong to that fellowship, no matter what happens to us, that fellowship will fill us with joy: the joy of knowing the Father and the Father’s will; the joy of being with our brothers and sisters; the joy of being the bride to the Bridegroom.
That is our joy. Our joy will be filled full, and that is the result of fellowship.
So here in these four verses, you find the essence of the whole letter. What follows is but a development of what is contained there.
Our heavenly Father, we do praise and thank Thee that Thou hast called us with a high calling, even calling us into the fellowship of Thy Son, our Lord Jesus Christ—that which He has with Thee.
Oh, what a privilege. What a privilege that we, who are outcasts, rebels, sinners, and enemies, yet by Thy grace, through Thy Son, through the cross, are called into such a fellowship.
Oh, that we may know this fellowship, that we may experience this fellowship, that our days on the earth may be as heaven. We ask in Thy precious name. Amen.