These things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you
I.
The danger (1Jn_2:26). The term employed is most significant of danger “seduce you.” Those to whom he refers would come to the disciples not as open enemies, but as professed friends. The history of the Church furnishes a melancholy illustration and confirmation of these remarks. Satan appears sometimes under the guise of an angel of light. Assaults are again made on the passions and the appetites and the peculiar propensities of men, so as to entice them from the paths of purity and propriety into forbidden courses.
II. Such being the danger of disciples, the apostle next instructs them wherein their safety lies (1Jn_2:27).
1. The security of the believer is at once ascribed to the grace of the Holy Spirit. No being but the Spirit of God can keep the soul. Our own strength is weakness, and our wisdom folly.
2. The very promise of the Spirit is made in the text, which encourages us to confide in Him. He “abideth in you.” There He is with His unerring wisdom to guide in every movement.
3. Observe next how independent He is said to render the man in whom He abideth. “Ye need not that any man teach you; the same anointing teacheth you of all things.” This certainly does not mean that he is made presumptuous and unwilling to be taught by others, as though he needed not their help. He is engaged in teaching the very persons whom he congratulates as independent of human teaching. Nor is there any inconsistency between his views and his practice. He taught the disciples, and they were grateful for his instructions, and were much edified by them. Yet, supposing him to be withdrawn from them, it did not follow that they must remain in ignorance. The Spirit could teach by hint or without him. Even an apostle could not open the mind to apprehend a single truth unless the Spirit employed and blessed him.
4. It is, therefore, declared that he is safe. “Ye shall abide in Him.” Seeing the Spirit abides in him, he shall abide in Christ.
III. This leads us to consider the apostle’s view of the believer’s duty (1Jn_2:28). It does not follow that because the Spirit abides in us, and maintains His own work, we are set free from any responsibility. Rather, it is the very reverse. Since the Spirit dwells in us, we are the more called upon to be diligent and faithful. We are left without excuse, seeing we are under the power of Him who is infinitely wise, and powerful to direct and sustain us.
1. In order to preserve the health of the body we use the utmost diligence to procure necessary food, and so should we do for the soul.
2. As we freely use the food we have secured for the body, so let us do with our spiritual food.
3. As when we have partaken of the food which our industry has provided, we employ our strength in the active duties of our calling, so let us be diligent and active in serving God.
IV. The reasons assigned and the motives urged. “That when He shall appear we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming.” The fact is assumed that Christ shall appear, and two most solemn reflections are founded on it. Christ will appear. This is the plain and repeated testimony of the Divine Word. Well may we cry, “Who shall stand when He appeareth?” The two cases described in the words before us reveal how it shall be in the solemn hour.
1. Some shall have confidence. They believed in Him. They continued in Him. They see the Lord in the air, and, raised from the grave, they go to meet Him with gladness. Of all beings He is the very one they are most desirous to behold.
2. How awful it will be to be ashamed in that day! Ashamed of unbelief! Ashamed of sin! Ashamed of ourselves! Ashamed of slighted opportunities, neglected privileges, and lost souls! (James Morgan, D. D.)
But the anointing which ye have received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you.
The guileless spirit, through the abiding Messianic unction and illumination of the Holy Ghost, abiding in Christ, so as to have confidence at His coming
I. The provision made for our abiding in him is the “anointing which we receive of Him abiding in us.”
1. It is in us; it is an inward anointing. Not with oil on the head, but with the Holy Ghost in the heart, we are anointed; as He from whom we receive the anointing was Himself anointed.
2. This anointing is permanent--“it abideth in you.” It is not a fitful emotion or wayward impulse, a rapture of excitement, alternating perhaps with deep depression. It partakes more of the nature of a calm, constant, settled conviction. There may be more or less of the vivid sense of this anointing, at different seasons and in different circumstances; the signs of it may be more or less clearly discernible, and the hold we have of it in our consciousness may be more or less strong. But it “abideth in us,” keeping God and eternity still before us as realities, in our sorest trials and darkest horn’s, causing us, as we fall back upon it, like David in his recovery from doubting despondency, to exclaim (Psa_77:10).
3. This anointing is sufficient in and of itself; its teaching needs no corroboration from anyone; it has a Divine self-evidencing power of its own that makes him who receives it independent of human testimony: “ye need not that any man teach you.”
4. The teaching of this anointing is complete and thorough, all embracing, all-comprehensive; “it teacheth you of all things.” It is not partial or one-sided, as human teaching on Divine subjects is apt to be, but full-orbed, well rounded, like a perfect circle. It needs the Divine anointing of which we speak to teach, to unfold, to exhaust, all that is in the song of the angels, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”
5. Finally, this anointing “is truth, and is no lie.” It carries with it, and in it, an assurance not to be called in question or shaken--an assurance, one may say, infallibly sure.
II. The motive urged for your abiding in Christ is the hope or prospect of “His appearing,” “His coming.” It is urged very earnestly and affectionately. John might have kept to the mode of address which he has been using, and to which in the next verse he returns; as an apostle exhorting his disciples, a teacher instructing his scholars, speaking authoritatively or ex cathedra. But when the end of all comes in view he cannot separate himself from them. We are to be together with the Lord, you and we--you disciples and we apostles; you scholars and we teachers. And for this end we would have you to abide in Him, that we may have confidence together when He appears. Let me be ever asking myself, at every moment, If He were to appear now, would I have confidence? If He were to come into my house, my room, and show Himself, and speak to me face to face, would I have confidence? Could I meet His look of love without embarrassment? Only if He found me “abiding in Him”; doing whatever I might be doing “in His name, giving thanks unto God even the Father by Him”; only if He found me keeping Him in my heart. (R. S. Candlish, D. D.)
The anointing by Christ
I. This anointing is a gift. It is “the anointing which ye have received.” It is contrasted in the context with the transient possessions of worldly men. To these, what seems to be solid melts into air; what seems to be permanent vanishes away.
II. This anointing is a heart-cleansing gift. Those who have it mortify the deeds of the body through the Spirit (Rom_8:13), and purify themselves even as Christ is pure (chap. 3:3). Not through any natural power of willing and working, but through the Spirit, they are able to do these things.
III. This anointing is a heart-enlarging gift. A man’s calling and election once made sure to his own mind, the sphere of his studies becomes enlarged. It is not written, One thing have I desired of the Lord that I may be saved, but (Psa_27:4).
IV. This anointing is a heart-cheering gift. It is the oil of gladness (Psa_45:7), the oil of joy (Isa_61:3), the source of joy unspeakable, never-ending, and glorious (1Pe_1:8).
V. This anointing was a gift divinely given to Christ. As to His human nature He was richly endued. The Spirit of God rested upon Him (Isa_11:2; Joh_1:32-33). He was therewith anointed above his fellows (Psa_45:7)
VI. This anointing is a gift divinely given to His people. It is “the anointing which ye have received of Him”--not only as a proof that they are chosen in Him before the foundation of the world, but also as their instructor and guide (Eph_1:4; 1Pe_1:2).
VII. This anointing is a distinguishing gift. It “is the anointing which ye have received.” As the anointing under the law, which is no doubt alluded to in the text, was of a sweet savour, so we, as many as are anointed with His Spirit, are thereby made a sweet savour of Christ (2Co_2:15). As that anointing oil was sprinkled upon Aaron and his sons (who represent the Church, as pointedly distinguished from the rest of the congregation), so Christ sends the comforter to His disciples, whom He pointedly distinguishes from the world (Joh_14:16-17). As the anointing oil was forbidden to be poured upon the flesh of man (Exo_30:25-33), so the Holy Ghost cannot be received by the world, which, in the present dispensation, “seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him.”
VIII. This anointing is a permanent gift. It is “the anointing which abideth in you.” It is permanent as opposed to those proffers of grace, so called, which, depending on the volition of the creature, are worse than precarious. This distinctive mark cannot suffer abrasure or be blown away. Its permanence is chiefly shown by the vitality of our union to Christ (Joh_15:5), by the reality of our participation in the Divine nature (2Pe_1:4), by the eternity of the life of which the Spirit is the demonstrator and source (1Jn_5:11), and by the stability of the covenant under which that life is promised (1Jn_2:25).
IX. This anointing is a truthful gift. It is truth. It is truthful as opposed to those false misgivings, whether from the flesh or the devil, which frequently trouble the Christian. It is truthful, also, as opposed to the shadows of the law. It is truthful, also, as opposed to the lies and hypocrisy of false professors.
X. This anointing is a sufficient gift. Giving sufficiency to that spiritual judgment, that noble and inestimable endowment, which alone can distinguish truth from error. (The Evangelical Preacher.)
“Teacheth,”
That was a true word spoken of the prophet (Isa_54:13). It is certain that the amount of peace which we enjoy will be largely in proportion to the amount of teaching which we receive, and appropriate, at the hands of the Lord. As the many objects of fear which, in the mind of the savage, people all lonely places, disappear when he is instructed in truer science, so do doubts and misgivings vanish as the soul comes to understand its true standing in Jesus. It is very beautiful to remark the direct teaching agency of the Lord in this passage, and to remember that it is vouchsafed to all His children. He takes equal care over each. He perhaps takes most care over the stupid ones, putting the lesson in successive modifications, that it may be brought down to their capacity. It is His chosen business to make you know His will, and if He cannot do it in one way, He will in another. But as the Psalmist very fitly says, we are oftenest taught by chastening (Psa_94:12). If you have been praying to know more of Christ, do not be surprised if He takes you aside into a desert place, or leads you into a furnace of pain.
1. Christ teaches by the Holy Ghost. It is unmistakable that He is referred to in the reference to the anointing which we have received. The Holy Spirit is, so to speak, the medium by which Jesus dwells in the surrendered heart, and operates through it and in it.
2. This teaching is inward. There are doubtless many lessons taught by Providence. But, after all, the meaning of outward events is a riddle, until He opens “the dark saying on the harp.” And the teaching is therefore so quiet, so unobtrusive, so hidden, that many an earnest seeker may think that nothing is being taught or acquired, as the months go on. But we cannot gauge the true amounts of progress which we are making from year to year--the teaching is so thoroughly a secret matter between God and the Spirit. But when some great crisis supervenes, some trial, some duty, and the spirit puts forth powers of which it had seemed incapable, there is a swift discovery of the results, which had been slowly accruing during previous years.
3. The main end of this teaching is to secure our abiding in Christ. “Even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in Him.” All Christian progress begins, continues, and has its fruition here. Severed from Jesus we can do nothing. Abiding in Jesus we partake of “the root and fatness” of His glorious life. All His fulness slowly enters into us. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
