God Wants to Save People
Have you ever thought about how remarkable it is that God wants to save people? You may think we don’t need saving, but why are so many consumed with fixing their lives and the world? We know we were made for something more than this world. We don’t like what we see in us and around us, so we long for liberation, freedom, rescue, and salvation.
The good news is that God wants to give us what we long for, that God wants to save us. 1 Timothy 2:4, “(God) desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 2 Peter 3:9, “The Lord…(is) not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
God wants to save people. He wants people to be rescued from his judgment. He wants people to know him. He’s not in heaven secretly hoping that we’ll perish.
God’s Deposition about Salvation
One of the reasons we know that God wants to save people is because his rescue plan isn’t a big secret. He got on the witness stand of the world and gave testimony to what he’s done to save sinners. He’s given us evidence, proof, and public demonstration to his saving work.
In Jesus Christ, God made a statement about his heart to save the lost, a declaration that he wants to bring his creatures back into a right relationship with him. Jesus is God’s deposition about salvation, his affidavit about escape from judgment.
Jesus Christ is the testimony of God, the proof that God wants to save sinners. Have you believed the testimony of God’s Son? Are you saved?
Our text today is about God’s testimony in Jesus Christ (1 Jn. 5:6-12). The word “testimony” or “testify” is used eight times in these seven verses. The point of the text is that God has spoken in Jesus and those who listen will live. In the text, we’ll see the nature of God’s testimony (vv. 6-8) and the demand of God’s testimony (vv. 9-12).
The Nature of God’s Testimony
First, the nature of God’s testimony (vv. 6-8). Verse 5 says those who “overcome the world” are “the ones who believe that Jesus is the Son of God.” Then in verse 6, John unpacks who this Jesus is. He wants his readers to be crystal clear about his identity because eternal salvation is at stake. If salvation is only found in Jesus, then it’s crucial to make sure we’re believing in the real Jesus. In verse 6, John is clarifying who “Jesus the Son of God” is.
The Water and Blood
John says that the real Jesus is “he who came by water and blood” (v. 6). What’s he referring to?
Jesus coming “by water” has been variously interpreted. Some say it refers to his baptism, some his ministry of baptism, some his birth, some to when his side was punctured after he died on the cross and water came out, and some say that it refers to the sacrament of baptism.
I think that “by water” refers to Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River by John the Baptist. John is trying to prove that Jesus is the Son of God, so both “the water” and “the blood” need to be historical moments which bear witness to this.
Remember when Jesus was baptized by John, a voice from heaven said, “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased” (Mk. 1:11). And right after he died, the Roman centurion standing right in front of him said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” (Mk. 15:39)
The “water” was when Jesus was declared the Son of God at his baptism and commissioned and empowered by the Spirit for his work. The “blood” was when his work was finished. John is emphasizing the unity of the earthly career of Jesus Christ. He was the Son of God at the beginning and at the end.
Some were saying that the Christ came “by the water only” (v. 6b). They taught that “the Christ” was a spiritual being who came down on Jesus when he was baptized and left him before he died. So the Christ came through water (baptism) but not through blood (death). But John says that the One whom believers acknowledge as the Son of God came “not by the water only but by the water and the blood” (v. 6).
What does John mean “by the blood”? Most naturally he’s referring to Jesus’ death on the cross. The only other reference to Jesus’ blood in this letter is 1:7, where John says that “the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” So “blood” refers not just to Jesus’ death, but to his death for the sins of his people. Contra the false teachers, Jesus wasn’t just the Christ until his death, but Christ in his death. This is the only way he can be “the Savior of the world” (4:14).
The testimony of God is that his Son came by water and by blood. If the Son didn’t take our nature at his birth and our sins at his death, he can’t reconcile us to God. The One who died on the cross was as much the Son of God as the One John baptized in the Jordan River. This is the testimony of God. Do you believe it?
The Spirit of Truth
At the end of verse 6, John says that “the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth.” What exactly the Spirit testifies to is left unsaid. But the context and the whole letter and John’s Gospel make it clear that the Spirit testifies that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God (4:2). And his testimony can be trusted because, as Jesus said, he is “the Spirit of truth” (Jn. 15:26, 16:13).
Truth is personified in God (5:20), Jesus (Jn. 14:6), and here in the Spirit. If truth were a person, it would be God. Which is why not believing God is so serious and incoherent (v. 10). God doesn’t and can’t lie. He’s the essence of truth. If you knew it was impossible for someone to lie and yet when they told you something you didn’t believe them, it’d reveal something off in your mind and heart, not theirs.
The Holy Spirit cannot and does not and will never lie. He cannot hide the truth. In fact, one of his roles is to make the truth shine, to make it come alive in our hearts, to make it look beautiful.
The Spirit illuminates the truth about Jesus. He opens our eyes that we may see him. Because Jesus is now in heaven, the Spirit’s main work is to bring Jesus to us and us to Jesus. And when he shows us or tells us something about Jesus, we can trust him. He “is the truth.”
Three Witnesses
In verses 7-8, John says that there are three things that testify to the truthfulness of Jesus, two objective, one subjective, two historical, one experimental (cf. 4:13-14). God’s saving work is rooted in historical events and confirmed by spiritual experience. You have to have both or you don’t have the real thing.
God’s three witnesses agree (v. 8). The false witnesses at Jesus’ trial couldn’t agree. But true witness will always agree. The subjective will always confirm the objective, and vice versa.
The Demand of God’s Testimony
If God’s witnesses agree with each other, and they’re true, and we disagree with them, what does that say about us? In verses 9-12, we see the demand of God’s testimony.
Verse 9 is simple logic: If we believe the testimony of men, who’re sometimes untruthful, about something, why wouldn’t we believe the testimony of God, who’s always truthful? The testimony of God is greater than that of men, so why would we believe men over God? As Augustine said in one of his sermons on First John, “Christ is God, you are a human being. Who ought to be believed first?”[1]
Verse 10 says that those who don’t believe in Christ are calling God a liar. This means that unbelief isn’t benign. The world isn’t just lost. It’s in rebellion. We don’t like the truth about Jesus because it reveals the truth about us. And the truth about us is that we’re lost, that we owe God a debt we can’t pay, that we’ve upset the God who made us, that there’s something deeply broken in us, that there’s a darkness in us that we can’t hide from God.
This means that believing in Jesus or not believing in Jesus isn’t just an intellectual choice, but a posture of our heart. Not embracing the truth, goodness, and beauty of Jesus is a serious crime. It’d be like saying to your spouse without cause, “You’re a liar, you’re a terrible person, and you’re ugly.” That would break the relationship and be hurtful and offensive. This is why John Stott says, “Unbelief is not a misfortune to be pitied; it is a sin to be deplored.”[2] One of the reasons hell is a place of eternal torment is because people who reject Christ in this life will live in perpetual unbelief in the next, and thus need to be perpetually punished.
The demand of God’s testimony is simple. It demands a response. Verse 12 shows us the two ways to respond and the result of each response. We can receive the Son and live or reject the Son and die. John elaborates in his Gospel: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” (3:36).
Three Truths and Two Applications
There are three truths taught here about eternal life and two applications. First, eternal life isn’t a prize that we win or a reward for our work. It’s a free gift. Verse 11a, “God gave us eternal life.” Second, eternal life is only found in Christ. Verse 11b, “This life is in his Son.” As Peter said, “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). And third, the gift of eternal life is a present possession. Verse 12a, “Whoever has the Son has life.” In Jesus, the age to come has broken into the present age, so that the life of the age to come, “eternal life,” can be tasted here and now.
The first application we can draw from these truths is that, since we have eternal life in Jesus, we can do hard things because we don’t need to get everything we can out of the world. This world isn’t our home, so we don’t have to squeeze everything we can out of this life. We can give generously, pray unceasingly, share our faith boldly, work diligently, fight sin consistently, and love unconditionally because Jesus is bringing us to Paradise.
What hard thing is God calling you to? What if, in Jesus, you already have all the resources you need to do it? The eternal life of God lives in you. What more could you need?
The second application is that, since God left a testimony to his saving work in Jesus, and because we have that testimony, he wants to save people through us. Jesus prayed, “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word” (Jn. 17:20). People believe in God’s testimony through our testimony.
God wants to save people and God wants to save people through us! We have God’s testimony about salvation, so he wants to rescue people through our church. God wants to save people in this community and we’re the ones he can do it through. Do you pray for the salvation of your neighbors, friends, classmates, and family? Are you looking for openings for the gospel?
“Let Us Be Saved By Him”
Of course, this begs a fundamental question: Are you saved? Does eternal life live in you? You can’t rescue others if you’re dead.
The testimony of God demands a response. You can’t stay neutral, saying, “I’m not religious.” You can’t be naïve, saying, “I’m a good person and I grew up in church.” You have to do something with Jesus. Have you been putting off your response to him? Do you think you can have eternal life without responding to him?
Jesus Christ is the testimony of God, the proof that God wants to save sinners. God wants to rescue you. He wants you to come where he is so much so that he came to where you are. Augustine puts it like this: “He stretches himself to us, for we were far away, and we were journeying far away. It is not enough that we were journeying far away; we were also weak and unable to move ourselves. The physician came to the sick; the way was extended to the travelers. Let us be saved by him.”[3]
God’s testimony is that he made the world good and loves the world and everyone in it, but that we’ve all sinned against him, so that now everyone in the world is in danger of destruction and needs to be saved from his judgment. And God’s testimony is that he wants to save people! So much so that he became a man in Jesus, died on a cross for our sins and rose again so that everyone who believes his testimony will be saved from his wrath. Have you believed the testimony of God?
[1]Homilies on the First Epistle of John, trans. Boniface Ramsey, The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century, I/14 (Hyde Park, NY: New City Press, 2008), 158.
[2]John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John, The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 1988), 185.
[3]Homilies, 145.