Christians of all ages and ranks are and should be as little children.
1. As little children are newly entered into the world, and beginning their lives, all things are new to them, so whosoever will be saved entereth into a new state by being renewed by the Holy Ghost, and participating of the Divine nature.
2. Having a new life, they look after that which will maintain and keep it up in good vigour; for all creatures that have life have something put into them which attracteth the nourishment proper to that life.
3. In regard of humility, and designs, and contrivances after greatness in the world. They that become as little children seek not after dominions and dignities and honours.
4. Innocent and harmless as a child, who, though infected with sin, and must be saved by Christ as others of grown age, yet cannot act sin.
II. Such who are as little children have obtained remission of sins for Christ’s name’s sake.
1. “What is forgiveness of sins?
(1) It is a judicial action of God. One man forgiveth another; for our heavenly Father requireth that (Mat_18:35). But our forgiveness is an act of charity or duty imposed upon us. God’s forgiveness is an act of authority, as He is the Governor and Judge of the world.
(2) By which He doth freely and fully release from the guilt of all our transgressions.
(a) Freely. God doeth it, and that without any cost to us (Isa_3:3).
(b) It is full; as God pardoneth freely, so also fully, and not by halves; universally, and not a few sins only.
(c) It is a release from the guilt of our transgressions. Properly if is the obligation to punishment which God releaseth us from. A reprieve only deferreth execution, but a pardon wholly preventeth it.
(d) The object of this pardon is the penitent believer; and that faith is required (Act_10:43).
(e) This sin is forgiven without requiring satisfaction or punishment of the sinner.
2. How it is obtained.
(1) Sin, a transgression of the law, a debt, as being a wrong done against God, obliging the sinner either to repair God in point of honour, or to lie under the wrath of God for evermore; for “the wages of sin is death” (Rom_6:23).
(2) There is no deliverance from this debt of sin, or obligation to wrath because of sin, but by pardon and forgiveness.
(3) There is some hope of forgiveness, because God forbeareth the worst, and doth not stir up all His wrath against them. They have food, and raiment, and ease, and liberty, and friends and wealth, and honour. Everything about us proclaimeth the goodness of this God with whom we have to do (Act_14:17).
(4) Though forgiveness may be probably hoped for from God’s goodness and mercy as represented in common providence, yet till there be a satisfaction for the offence, and we may have our pardon granted with the good leave of provoked justice, the soul can have no satisfaction. The grand scruple that haunts the guilty creature is how shall God be appeased? (Mic_6:7.)
(5) It was agreeable to the honour and wisdom of God that those who would have benefit by this remedy should be sensible of the weight which is upon them, and humbly confess their sins, and with brokenness of heart sue out their pardon.
(6) It is fit also that those who would sue out their pardon in this humble and submissive way should acknowledge their Redeemer, and thankfully accept of the benefit procured by Him, and offered to them in His name; and heartily consent to His covenant to be brought home to God again, that they may be fully recovered out of their lapsed condition.
III. Such as have obtained remission of sins are bound to express their gratitude and thankfulness to God by new obedience.
1. That they may not undo what is done, and so build again the things they have destroyed (Gal_2:17-18).
2. That we may make good our qualification. Certain it is that none are pardoned but those that are renewed and born again; for the application of the merit of Christ and the gift of the Spirit are inseparable (1Co_6:11). S. To express their gratitude and thankfulness (2Co_5:14).
4. Because they have great encouragements (Psa_130:4). Use--
1. Let me now exhort you to seek after the pardon of sins. To this end--
(1) Consider your necessity.
(2) Consider the grounds and hopes of pardon; God’s merciful nature and self-inclination to pity us.
(3) Consider what a blessed comfort it is to have sin forgiven (Psa_32:1-2). Use--
2. To stir us up not to offend God any more, or provoke Him to anger by our sins. (T. Manton, D. D.)
A sermon to the Lord’s little children
I. I want the babes in grace, the weak in faith, to notice their privilege. “I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name’s sake.”
1. This is a privilege extremely desired by the little children. They have but lately felt the burden of guilt; the Spirit of God has but newly convinced them of sin; and, therefore, above everything, their prayer is, “Father, forgive me.” To the freshly saved it is a joy worth worlds to have their sins forgiven; and this joy belongs of right to all the saints, yea, even to the little children in the family of God. The pardon of sin is as the pearl of great price to you in your present stage of spiritual life; you would have sold all that you had in order to procure it; and now that you have it your heart is aglow with gratitude. Far be it from me to stay your holy joy, and yet the Lord will show you greater things than these.
2. At your stage of experience pardon is the most prominent blessing of the covenant. The newly pardoned does not yet see the innumerable other blessings which come in the train of forgiveness; he is for the present absorbed in the hearing of that one sentence, “Go in peace; thy sins which are many are all forgiven thee.” Pardon is but an entrance blessing, a welcome at the doorstep: there are rarer joys within the house. You have become an heir to a boundless inheritance; all things are yours; heaven, and Christ, and God are yours.
3. Here let me observe that the forgiveness of sins is assuredly the possession of the new beginner in the Divine life.
4. Note, also, that your sins are forgiven you on the same terms as those of the apostle, and the greatest of the saints: your sins are forgiven you for the sake of Jesus, for the sake of His glorious person, for the sake of His honourable offices, for the sake of His atoning death, for the sake of His glorious resurrection, for the sake of His perpetual intercession before the throne of God.
5. Now notice that this is the reason why John wrote to you, little children. The moment, then, that a man has his sins forgiven, he is old enough to begin to understand that which is written, and he should become a Bible reader.
II. I have to speak of the knowledge of these little children. “I have written unto you, little children, because ye have known, or know, the Father.” The tiniest babe in the family of God knows the Father.
1. For, as we have seen, his sins are forgiven him. By whom is that pardon given? Why, by the Father; and, therefore, he that has had his sins forgiven him necessarily knows the Father.
2. Moreover, this is a piece of knowledge which the child of God obtains very early in his spiritual life; for whatever a child does not know, he knows his father. Little children, you know God now in your spiritual childhood. You could not write a treatise upon His attributes; but you know Him by the instinct of a child. Little children, the result of your knowing God as your Father is that when He is away from you you are in the habit of crying after Him. On the other hand, when you do get to your Father you show that you love Him by the perfect restfulness of your spirit. In God you are at home. The presence of God is the paradise of the believer. This also is true, that you seek to imitate Him. Would you not be perfect if you could? If you could, would you not be rid of every sin? And do you not glory in Him? Little children when they begin to talk, and go to school, how proud they are of their father! We cannot make enough of our God. We extol Him with all our might. With the blessed virgin we sing, “My soul doth magnify the Lord.”
III. The precepts which John has written for your guidance. First, look at 1Jn_2:1-29. “My little children, these things I write unto you, that ye sin not.”
1. That is the first precept--little children, sin not. Children are very apt to get into the mire. There is so much of carnality about us, so much of the old Adam, that the question is not into which sin we fall, but into which sin we do not fall. Like the pendulum, we swing to the right hand and then to the left: we err first in one way and then in another; we are ever inclined to evil. Avoid every sin. Ask for the grace of God to sanctify you wholly, spirit, soul, and body.
2. Further on in this second chapter the apostle writes to them again, and tells them (1Jn_2:18) that it is the last time, and that there are many antichrists abroad. You will have to run your eye right down the chapter till you come to 1Jn_2:24, for that is what he says to little children, because there are many antichrists in the world that would seduce them; “Let that therefore abide in you, which ye have heard from the beginning.” Little children are very fickle. The toys which they cry for one day they break the next; young minds change with the wind. So, little children, there are many evil ones who will endeavour to seduce you from the truth of God, it is well to be on your guard against those who would mislead you. Till we are rooted and grounded in the truth, new things have great charms for us, especially if they have about them a great show of holiness and zeal for God. “Little children, let that therefore abide in you, which ye have heard from the beginning,” leave to others the soon-exhausted novelties.
3. Little children, here is a third precept for you (1Jn_2:28). “And now, little children, abide in Him.” Let the truth abide in you, and do you abide in Christ, who is the truth. What next?
4. Read on to 1Jn_3:7 --“Little children, let no man deceive you.” Children are very credulous; they will believe any idle tale if it be told them by a clever and attractive person. Little children, believe your Saviour, but be not ready to believe anybody else.
5. Further on (1Jn_3:18) we read, “My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.”
6. You have the next word in 1Jn_4:4 --“Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world.” Satan dwells in the world, and he is mighty; but God dwells in you, and He is almighty; therefore be not afraid.
7. The last precept to little children is at the end of the Epistle. Care fully read the last verse--“Little children, keep yourselves from idols.” I do not think you are likely to fall in love with the idols of the heathen and bow down to them; but there are plenty of other gods which are the idols of one period and the derision of the next. Keep you to Christ. Ask not for pomp and show; ask not for noise and bluster; ask for nothing but that your sins may be forgiven you, that you may know the Father, and then that you may abide in Christ, and be full of love to all the family of God. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The gospel to the young
What is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to the young?
1. It appeals to their conscience, for youth has a conscience, a very sensitive conscience. How the boy blushes when he tells his first lie. The soul of the boy shrinks from sin at first. How penitent he is for the angry blow or the cruel word. May I not tell that child how sin may be put away? Ah, we tell the child, and we tell him today, that the lie will grow, and that the habit will increase.
2. It is also a gospel to the heart. I believe in making religion a personal thing, in bringing before the child, or the growing boy, the Lord Jesus Christ as a living, loving person, One who feels for him, and One who knows him.
3. It is a gospel which appeals to the admirations. It tells the child of the wondrous promises of God, and the little child’s admiration is kindled.
4. It is the gospel to the energies. It represents life as a vineyard to be planted, as a battle to be fought, as a work to be done. The gospel to the young tells them that if they grow up there is work for them to do.
5. It is a gospel of aspirations. Youth is the time of hope. Youth is the time of ambitions. And the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ recognises that, and will never laugh at the young Joseph because he has dreamed that other sheaves are coming and bowing down to his sheaf. But remember, boy, the sheaves will never bow down to your sheaf unless you take off your coat, and sharpen your sickle, and get to work. Life is not simply to be dreamed away. (E. A. Stuart, M. A.)
The Father and His children
Having shown what God is, and what follows from that, what Christ is, and also what follows from that, St. John now tells his readers what by the grace of God they themselves are, and what follows from that. St. John’s description of Christians.
I. In their unity, or as to the things they have in common.
1. A common life (verse 12). “Children” is one of the standing terms in this Epistle for all Christians of all ages and ranks; and the great truth to which this term witnesses is the kinship of all Christian people.
2. We are all feeble in power, partial in knowledge, fractious in temper, imperfect in all things. If Newton at the height of his career felt himself a child strolling on the shore of a fathomless sea; if St. Paul at the height of his inspiration felt that his views of truth were imperfect, “for now I know in part, and prophesy in part”; if Michael Angelo at eighty said, “I carry my satchel still”--still like a little child going every day to school to learn a new lesson; if J.R. Green, with all his mine of knowledge, said, “I shall die learning”; surely, then, we must feel that the term “little ones” is no piece of apostolic play fulness, no mere pet name prompted by St. John’s great love, but a strictly accurate description of us all.
3. Faith in His name, i.e., in Himself, as revealed by Him self to us--is the first religious act of man. Forgiveness in His name is the first religious gift of God. Faith and forgiveness constitute the first act of reciprocity, of give and take between God and man. Now forgiveness of sin is the third fact common to all Christians. All Christians are akin. All are imperfect. All are for given.
4. To know the Father means to live in direct personal communion with the Father--personally to love Him, to obey Him, to draw near Him in prayer and praise. To live with regard to God not like an orphan whose father is a mere memory or a hearsay, but like a child whose father is alive and at home, who sees him every day, knows him better and loves more as each day passes--that is the crowning feature of the Christian life.
II. In their variety.
1. Knowledge is the feature of age. “I write unto you, fathers, because ye know.” You cannot begin your Christian life with knowing; you must begin with believing. Life--only a life of action for God can change belief into knowledge.
2. Young men, there is a fight before you. Mrs. Oliphant, in one of her weird stories, tells of a secret chamber in a haunted castle, where dwelt for ages a bad ancestor of a lordly race, keeping himself alive by unholy arts. Every heir of that house on his twenty-first birth day was compelled to enter the chamber alone and meet the temptations of this evil man. One by one they fell into the snare; till one came who discarded the sword given him, and met the tempter in God’s name, and conquered. Well, that weird ghost story is our own life story. All men and all women meet that spectre. We would protect you young folk; we would save you the temptation in the wilder ness; but it may not be. Hell will assault you at every point of your nature. Now a young man’s strength in that dread hour depends on how much of God’s Word he has in him. (J. M. Gibbon.)
Christians as little children
St.John here considers the children of God, whom, as previously, he calls little, not contemptuously, but in reference to known infirmities, abbreviated knowledge, and feeble progress. The greatest saint, after all, is but as a little child, as it respects attainments in virtue and knowledge. As a giant, beside a pyramid of Egypt, is but as a pigmy; and the whole earth, compared with the universe in which it rolls, but a small planet; and its loftiest peaks as mites on its surface when compared with its bulk; so God’s worshippers, compared with Him, the Omniscient, the Omnipresent, and the Eternal, are as nothing. The wisest are the most humble, because they know how little they know, and how much of truth there remains to be known; which, as an ocean, lies before them in fathomless depths. Like those who climb mountains of ashes, who slide back as they make the progressive step, so we, through defective education, and from our own negligence, have to unlearn, as well as to learn; and, after all, are but learners still, and but as children, who are apt to stay, liable to fall, and who require continually to look up to the All-wise and All-good. To little children, even the babes in Christ, St. John proclaims the most consoling truth, viz., that their sins are forgiven. Our blessed Lord authorises us to be happy, when it is thus with us, saying, “Be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee.” To have our sins forgiven is to have life indeed; all are most miserable till then, however unjustly gay or blindly secure. (John Stock, M. A.)
Young Christians to be cared for
The true pastor careth for every member of Christ’s body committed to His trust. He does not regard the cedars and the oaks only; but also the tender plants and shrubs in the garden of the Lord. (John Stock, M. A.)
Because your sins are forgiven you for His name’s sake--
God’s glory in the forgiveness of sin for His name’s sake
“For His name’s sake!” These petitions which occur frequently in the Book of Psalms have been granted to the very letter. “For Thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity. Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of Thy name. Deliver us, purge away our sins, for Thy name’s sake.” You must be aware that the expression “the name of the Lord” is used frequently in Scripture to denote, generally, His nature and attributes. Indeed, “the name of the Lord” is put virtually for God Himself; so that what is said to be done for the sake of His name might be regarded as done for His own sake by God. And you will find that when employed as a motive or reason, there is a prevalence in God’s name which is assigned to no other plea.
I. You cannot mark more distinctly the alteration wrought by Christ on human condition than by representing Him as placing us in such a position that we can ask God for His own sake to pardon iniquity. It is true that prayer, from its very nature, must correspond to the dictates of the Divine attributes, or the demands of the Divine glory; in other words, what our necessities impel us to ask, must be just what God, in compliance with His own properties, can be ready to bestow; else there is no hope of the acceptance of our petitions; but that this should be possible in respect of the forgiveness of sin is a marvel which overwhelms us, even when familiar with the scheme of redemption. The glorious, the stupendous thing in this scheme is, that it consulted equally for God and man; that it made the Divine honour as much interested as human necessity in the granting of pardon to all who would accept. Justice itself, holiness itself--these not only permit our pardon, they demand our glorification. In short, we can not only ask God to forgive in the hope that His compassion may incline Him to show favour, we can take the bold and unassailable ground of asking Him to forgive “for His name’s sake.” When the Psalmist asked for forgiveness, he asked it for the sake of God’s name. Indeed, the Psalmist was not privileged to “see the things which we see, or to hear the things which we hear.” He may not have been allowed to discern the exact process; but, in common with other patriarchs and saints under the old dispensation, he had reached a firm assurance that God stood pledged to provide a ransom; that, therefore, the Divine honour was indissolubly bound up with the pardon of sin. And this sufficed. But if David, living only in the twilight of revelation, taught only through the mysteriousness of prophecy and type--if he believed that pardon might be asked for the sake of God’s name, shall not we acknowledge the fact--we, “before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth Crucified amongst us”--we, who know that “God hath made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him”--we, who are taught that “all the promises of God are yea in Christ, and in Him amen”?
II. Consider more particularly the comfort derivable from this great truth, that it is “for His name’s sake” that God forgives sin. And we may here say, that since God forgives sin for His own sake, there is no room whatever for fear that our sins are too great to be pardoned. We may even go so far as to declare, that if it be always for the sake of His own name that God acts when pardoning iniquity, then the greater the iniquity the greater the reason why He should forgive. David would seem to have felt this when he prayed--“For Thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my iniquity, for it is great.” Human sinfulness has been turned into the widest field for the display of Divinity, so that on the arena of this ruined creation there may be such a manifestation of all that is majestic in Godhead as should serve to make it a theatre of instruction to the highest order of being. And we cannot hesitate to maintain that it is the greatness of moral evil which has made His interference so honourable to the Almighty. It was a case, if we dare use the expression, worthy the succours of the Godhead. When a Manasseh, who had sinned beyond all that went before, is forgiven, and Paul, who had thirsted for the “blood of the saints,” is reconciled unto God, we feel that every attribute which pardon glorifies must be glorified in the highest possible degree. If He was glorified in stilling the tempest, He must be most glorious when that tempest is fiercest. And though when the transgressor remembers that his sins have been numerous and heinous, or that his iniquity has been specially flagrant, if he had to ask forgiveness for his own sake, he might well be discouraged, yet when he calls to mind that if God forgives at all, He must forgive “for His name’s sake,” it should not be the greatness of his sin which can withhold him from prayer. The bitter impiety of the reckless is not more offensive to our Maker than the suspicion that He is unwilling to receive back the prodigal. Such suspicion throws doubt upon the truth of His Word; and what can be imagined more derogatory to the honour of God? You are expressly told that God “willeth not the death of a sinner,” but rather that all would repent and live. Is this true? God saith it. Will you deny it? Will you falsify it? Yet you do if you fear to come to Him, because you know, because you feel that your transgressions are great, that your offences are multiplied. Whom did Christ die for? The guilty. Whom does He intercede for? The guilty. “The name of the Lord,” saith Solomon, “is a strong tower.” If so, why should we not “flee to it and be safe,” forasmuch as to “little children” an apostle could say, “Your sins are forgiven you for His name’s sake”? (H. Melvill, B. D.)
For His name’s sake
Living in the joy and light of the Divine Fatherhood, the Apostle John had come to regard all disciples of Jesus as children; and as the beauty of a child is in its childhood, its littleness, its unassertiveness, its dependableness, the apostle seems to have a delight in speaking of the disciples of Jesus as little children, remembering doubtless the little child that Jesus took and set in the midst of those disciples who were wrangling about greatness and place and position. I think there is much of instruction, and no little of comfort for us if only we will try and see things as the Apostle John sees them. He acknowledges the dark fact of sin, the bright fact of forgiveness, and the brightest of all facts--that forgiveness is based on the relation which Jesus Christ has established between Himself and us. One is weary of hearing of secular education as a cure for the sinfulness of man’s nature. I am sure that an eloquent writer of our day is right on this--that if the influence of the outpoured life of Christ were withdrawn from our world, sins would not only increase incalculably in number, but the tyranny of sin would be fearfully augmented, and it would spread among a greater number of people. It is a new disposition, a new heart which man needs, and the outpoured life of God in Christ is necessary to produce that; as necessary to produce it as the outpoured radiance of the sun is necessary to produce the fruits of the earth by which our physical nature is sustained. Therefore it is that the Apostle John goes far deeper than to connect the forgiveness of sin with repentance for sin; he connects it with the relationship we sustain to Christ and the relationship He sustains to us. Some one asks--why is it necessary that Jesus the Christ of God should put Himself into the relations towards us which have been established, in order that the Everlasting Father may forgive sins? Why cannot He say to the sorrowing man, “I forgive you,” and have done with it?
1. There are reasons in His own nature. When God undertakes to forgive sin He pledges Himself to rescue the forgiven man from his sin. In a word, He undertakes to regenerate his nature, to renew it so that he shall eventually live the unsinning life. And in order to that, Jesus Christ and His work are necessary.
2. There are reasons in the nature of man. To forgive a sinner and leave him to the helplessness which has come from his sin is only half forgiveness. Man needs to be brought into such an understanding of God and into such a love of God that he will hate to sin against Him. In order to that, Christ Jesus and His sacrifice of Himself are necessary.
3. There are reasons, too, in the Divine government. It must be made universally evident that there is no righteous reason for rebellion against God on the part of any. (R. Thomas.)
