The Path Toward Maturity

Lord, we come before you. Asking Lord, that you might help us to quiet our hearts before you. We come before You, Lord, acknowledging the fact that we have sinned and we have fallen short of your glory. And so we come to you, Lord, not in our own righteousness.

But we do come to you, Lord, in the righteousness of Jesus. We come to you, Lord, by way of the blood of Jesus, by way of his sacrifice on our behalf, we come to you, Lord, in faith, knowing that it is not by works of righteousness, For we have none. But we come to you on the basis of the righteousness of Jesus Christ, and we thank you, Lord, that we have access to you, and we pray, Lord, that with the time that we have, Looking at your word and considering your word together, Lord, we pray that you would, just open the eyes of our hearts, you illuminate your text for us and help us to lay hold of not just what you say, but to lay hold of you, the one who would speak to us, help us to find ourselves worshiping you, that we would be in, in awe of you.

That Lord, we would be blown away by your greatness.

Reveal Yourself to us. And we pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Have, have you ever been lost?

Think back to a moment in life in which you felt lost. Maybe you were lost in the sense that you did not know how to do something, or maybe you were lost in the sense that you did not know how to get to a destination that you were needing to go to. So have you ever been in your car, for example, on your way to a place and all of a sudden it's like you're not sure of where you are going? Has it ever happened to you?

And I know that some of you are probably thinking that I've got my iPhone on me. I never get lost. My ever so faithful and trustworthy iPhone always tells me where I need to go. It's just as easy as plugging in the address and bam, she gets me there.

But what, what if your, your battery goes dead? What if your phone runs out of power? That recently happened to Marcy and I, a few weeks back, we were on our way to Brooke Vincent's wedding and everything was going fine. We had the address plugged into the iPhone and we were heading to where we needed to go, cruising along the 210, no worries at all.

Then all of a sudden about 3 miles before we get to the off-ramp, and at least we knew where the off-ramp was, but 3 miles prior to the off-ramp, her phone died on us. And so I immediately went into prayer mode just trusting God and thanking Him for His sovereignty and just knowing that all would be well. Is that true? to my shame, it wasn't.

I actually began to stress out a little bit inwardly. I began to panic because as it was, we were already pushing it for time and darn it, we were gonna be late now. And so here I am trying to think of what are we gonna do, what are we gonna do? So I pulled out my own iPhone and I thought, uh-huh.

no problem, I'll just plug the address into my own iPhone. No worries. And so I handed the phone over to my wife and she's trying to plug it in and she's having a hard time, plugging. Finally she gets it and then, and then it's not telling us where we need to go.

I'm like, give me the phone. And so I take the phone from my wife and I try to do the same thing and I'm, oh lo and behold, it's not going to tell us where we need to go, and here we are lost. We we know where we need to go, but we're not sure how to get there and I have no clue what the place that we're going to looks like, no clue. And so, here I am with iPhone in hand and my hand on my steering wheel and I'm just like, What are we gonna do now?

Well, I looked to the side of me and thankfully, as we were on the off-ramp and getting right to the place where the light was, so we were about ready to stop, I saw Justin Chow and Amanda Yen, and I thought, oh, great. And so like I, I rolled down, my, well, my wife did, or maybe I did, I don't remember, but one of us got the window down. We didn't roll it down, we actually pushed the button and it went down. So the window goes down.

And, and there's Justin Chow, and, and, and he said to me, he says, hey, hey, pastor, with this big Cheshire cat grin on his face, ear to ear, just all smiling. It is illegal to be on the phone while you're driving. Thank you, bro. I did.

I thanked him for his exhortation, and then I kindly asked him if he would allow us to follow him, and he did, and we got to the wedding safely in one piece, and we got there in a timely enough manner. The wedding had not started before we got there, so I was feeling pretty good. Well, my point here is to illustrate how important it is to know where we are going. It is important to know where we are going and to have clarity regarding how to get there.

We need to know where we are going, and we need to know how it is that we are going to get there. I remember back in my college days, I was in a fraternity, again, to my own shame. I admit I was in a fraternity. These were in my BC days, so that qualifies it a little bit.

But in my fraternity days, I remember one of the things as a pledge that I had to memorize was a quote, and the quote says this, He who goes on a path, not knowing where he is going, how will he know when he gets there? He who goes on a path, not knowing where he is going, how will he know? When he gets there. The idea implied in this quote is that we must have a sense of where we are headed.

We must know where we are going, i.e. we need vision. We need vision, we need a clear picture of what it looks like and the path that takes us there. When talking about Christian maturity, we must arrive at a sense of what it looks like and the path we are to take to get there.

In our passage this morning, John helps us to understand these things. He gives us a vision for maturity along with the stages that lead there. If you would open up in your Bibles with me then to 1 John chapter 2, beginning in verse 12. Open up in your Bibles with me to 1 John chapter 2, beginning in verse 12, I would like to read this passage to you.

John says these words to his readers by way of extension, he speaks these words to us. These are God's words through John to us. I am writing to you, little children. Because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake.

I am writing to you fathers because Him who has been from the beginning. I am writing to you young men, because you have overcome the evil one. And now he takes us through a 2nd time. We jump into the 2nd round here, and he essentially repeats and in some instances elaborates upon, he says, I have written to you children because the Father.

I have written to you fathers because Him who has been from the beginning. I have written to you young men, because you are strong. And the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one. The message this morning is entitled, The Path Towards Maturity.

The path towards maturity, 3 stages in the Believer's life that lead to maturity. And so just to let upfront, we are not going to take these stages in linear fashion. We are not going to take these stages in chronological order. We're gonna follow John's lead here because what you will come to discover is that in each round, what John does is he starts, as we would think he would start with the child, but he immediately goes to the father in the faith.

And then from the father in the faith, he backtracks and he takes us to the bridge that takes us from childhood to fatherhood. He jumps into, manhood, strong young manhood, and so we're gonna follow it in the progression that John takes us as we look at this passage this morning. So we've got stage number one, it is childhood, becoming a child in the faith. Again, please take note of John's affirmative tone throughout.

In every address here as he speaks to the children, as he speaks to the fathers, as he speaks to the young men, each and every time he is affirming them, he is affirming who it is that they are in Christ. He is making sure that his readers know that they are in one of the three categories, if you will, that either you are a child child in the faith, you are a father in the faith or you are a strong young man in the faith. And so there's a tone of affirmation that comes through.

This is meant to be an encouragement to his readers, and he does this prior to getting into the commands that he will issue forth in this book, the first of which is, do not love the world, do not love the world.

And I think it's important for us to keep in mind this affirmative tone, this encouraging tone, but again, listen to what he says in the first round, he says, I am writing to you little children because your sins are forgiven for his name's sake. And then in the second round, he says, I have Written to you children because the Father, because the Father. Well, let's consider then the marks of childhood. Let's consider this stage in the life of a believer.

Some of us are children in the faith. And there are others who aren't children in the faith anymore, but we have progressed to one or another stage where we're either young men or, or, or we are fathers in the faith. Ultimately the goal, the dream, the desire is to get to the place where every single one of us gets to that place of fatherhood in the faith. But let's consider the marks of childhood as we begin.

A child in the faith knows that he is forgiven. He knows that he is forgiven. Now think about that, OK, what, what, what a blessing it is to hear from John, to hear from God through John. And to his readers by way of extension, what a blessing to hear that your sins are forgiven.

This is critical to the child of God. This is critical to the person who is a child in the faith, to know and to not doubt and to not question that his sins are Forgiven. Now I am not saying that he will never question. I am not saying that he will never doubt, but what I am saying is that John wants for his readers to know that you are in fact children of God.

You are children in the faith, and that your sins are indeed forgiven. Your many sins are forgiven. And your countless sins have been forgiven you on account of his name, for his name's sake. The idea is that your sins are forgiven on the basis that the Lord Jesus Christ has forgiven you, purchased you through his own blood, and you stand before him as forgiven as a child of God.

And so when you think about this child in the faith, it is important to understand that such a person has in fact arrived at a place in his life where he knows, he knows, I have failed. He says to himself, I have not lived according to God's design and his purpose. I have not lived my life for the purpose of His glory. You see, the child in the faith has come to this point in which he has seen himself as a sinner.

He knows that he has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. He knows without question that he has violated the commands of God, and he knows that because of these things that he is deserving of judgment and Condemnation. He knows that he has committed sins of commission, meaning he has done things that he knows he should not have done, and he also knows that he has committed sins of omission, meaning he has failed to do those things that he should have done. When he looks at his life and he takes inventory, he knows without question the child in the faith has come to.

that point where he, he came to know without question that he was damned, that he was doomed, that he was separated from God, and that he was in the domain of darkness, like he just knows that by the Spirit of God convicting him, by the Spirit of God helping him to see these things, he arrives at a place where he senses. I am ruined. I am I'm done. Yet this person, this child in the faith, has also come to a place in his life in which he has repented of his sin.

And he has embraced Jesus as his savior. He has been converted and is therefore a child of God, a child in the faith. He is a person who enjoys his salvation, and he knows God to be his father. That takes us to that next point there.

A child in the faith knows he is forgiven on account of his name. A child in the faith also knows the Father. He knows the Father. Now this speaks of intimate knowledge of the Father, not perfected knowledge of the Father, but he knows him in a personal sense.

He knows him in a relational sense, and the thing that he knows him as is he knows him as His Father in heaven. Remember when Before I came to faith in Christ. In my college days, I was, and many of this, but just living a life of sin to my own shame. I was addicted to drugs, smoking marijuana, and taking speed on almost a daily basis, always looking for my next high.

I, it's amazing to think I even got into college. I, I would drink alcohol occasionally, but my drug of choice really was marijuana. I remember also being involved in sexual immorality. And just yielding myself over to sin.

And, and, and God had no place in my life. I was oblivious to the reality of God. But then somewhere along the way, it was there in college, in a secular college of all places, that God saw fit to begin to get a hold of my heart. And God revealed to me the fact that Christianity were true.

I came to a place where I had no doubt. I knew without question that Christianity were true, but I had yet to be born again. You see, it's possible to believe the truth and yet to be born again. I had yet to be born again, and it was not until I heard the gospel, it was not until I heard that sins could be forgiven.

It was not until I came to understand that he came not for the righteous but the unrighteous, that a glimmer of hope came my way. A ray of hope entered into my darkness. And I remember being there at the conference way back in 1991, and for the first time in my life, the gospel just began to register for me. And I believed I came to faith, and everything changed.

Everything changed. It was then that I became a child in the faith. I knew my sins were forgiven. And I knew the father.

And I know that many, if not almost all of you can testify to that yourselves. Praise God. Your sins are forgiven. And you have come to know the Father.

Essentially what John does is he lays a gospel foundation upon which to build. It's not that we will ever deviate from this, but we will build upon this as we will see as we continue on in the message this morning. I would submit to you then that as a child of the faith and throughout the rest of our lives, the gospel must be deeply embedded into the framework of our being. We must know the gospel, embrace the gospel, experience the gospel, grow in the gospel, and learn how it is, how it is related to everyday living and flesh it out in reality, in the reality of our lives.

This is the first stage. It's the stage of childhood. It's a wonderful stage to enter into the kingdom as a child of God, as a child in the faith, but we're gonna move on then to the next stage, and it really isn't the next stage because John's gonna jump ahead to fatherhood. The stage of fatherhood.

Stage 3, fatherhood. In his first round, fatherhood is where he goes. In his second round, fatherhood is where he goes. And so we're gonna follow his example and we will address fatherhood before we address manhood.

Stage 3, fatherhood becoming a father. in the faith. Why does John fast forward to fatherhood? He wants to provide his readers by way of extension us.

He wants us to have a vision of what maturity looks like before he addresses the critical stage that serves as the bridge between childhood and and, and fatherhood. He's going to address that bridge on the other side of addressing fatherhood. Listen to what he says then to the fathers in the 1st and 2nd go around, he says, I am writing to you fathers because Him who has been from the beginning. And what is very interesting here is he doesn't change it.

In the second go round, it's the same thing. I have written to you fathers because Him who has been from the beginning. Him who has been from the beginning. This is a father in the faith, and the first thing that I would like to underscore is the fact that the Father in the faith has significant impact.

That is what is implied by the term father in the context here. John is affirming to the fathers in the faith who are amongst his readers. He is affirming to them the fact that they are fathers in the faith and as such, because they are fathers, they have a significant impact. That is the word to, to focus our attention on is impact.

Impact. They are making a difference. And in this passage, he does not refer to these as old, weak, decrepit, balding men. Like myself, The picture he wants to paint for us is that of a strong, a strong guy who has advanced to the stage of fatherhood, and he's a father with influence and impact in the prime of his life, making a difference in the lives of others.

Consider that the father has been through the various stages himself. He's been through the various stages. He was once a child in the faith. He was once a strong young man.

But he has come to a place in his life, to a season in his Christian experience in which he is now a father in the faith. What is implied by this, the father gives birth to offspring. The father gives birth to offspring. What does it mean to be a father in the faith?

It means that you're making a difference in the lives of people. It means that you are coming alongside people, building relationships and seeking to build them up in the gospel. What does it mean to be a father in the faith? It means that you give birth to offspring.

It also implies, I think that you raise the offspring. You don't just give birth, but you also seek To raise. That's what fathers do. Fathers seek to raise their children, and in the spiritual realm, spiritual fathers seek to raise their children.

John himself says, I have no greater joy than this to know that my children are walking into the faith. He seeks to make a difference, he seeks to have impact, and as such, John himself is a model of what it means to be a father in the faith. So the father raises offspring. Remember about some 19, maybe 20 years ago when I first came to Cornerstone, there was a man who used to attend this church, one of the elders, and some of him, named Ron Needham.

And As a child in the faith, I needed a little bit of direction. I needed for someone to come along and to take some interest. I had not seen Christianity fleshed out in my upbringing. I had no clue really what it looked like, and I needed for a father in the faith to come alongside and to invest and, and to teach and to just let me share with him.

Him share with me and kinda live life together if you will. And so this elder Raw Needham, set it up to where we would meet for, for several years. I don't remember exactly how many years it was, but we met almost every single week and always at his home, and a lot of times he would have the most wonderful dinners prepared for me, and there would be times when it would be just me and him. And I'd be able to share with him and, and some of the struggles I was having and maybe some of the questions, and he in fact would be open to me too, and he would share with me some of the struggles that he had.

There would be times in which I would come to his home and, and his wife Emily was there too, and, and there's a couple of things just by way of visual image that I will never forget. I will never forget. Remember one time we're eating dinner across from, I'm eating dinner across from Ron and Emily and like he has one of his romantic moments. If you guys know Ron, how he would once in a while have one of those romantic moments.

I felt like I didn't belong, it's like, oh my goodness. He looked at Emily in the eyes and with a Cheshire Cat grin, smiling from ear to ear, heart filled with joy, he just talked to her about how beautiful she was. I, I had never seen that. I had never heard my dad look at my mom in the face and eyeball to eyeball tell her how beautiful.

How beautiful she was. I needed to see that. Another thing, another image that comes to my mind is I just, I just, I remember Ron when his mother-in-law got to the older season of her life and she was very old and just, she needed a lot of help, but just, he was always so faithful to bring his mother-in-law from the car, through the parking lot, onto the sidewalk, through the doors and come and sit down right there. it takes quite a lot sometimes to show that care for an in-law.

And sometimes in-laws can't be the easiest people in the world to get along with. And as I'm dealing with issues as a married man, even with my, with my own. Mother-in-law And as she's getting older. And as it seems as if she's beginning to lose her memory a bit, this, that and the other.

And as my wife and I are talking together and thinking about, would the Lord have at some point for her to come into the home. I think of Raw Needham. And I think of the care that he, from what I could tell, showed towards his mother-in-law. Fathers in the faith are invaluable.

To the life of the church. Fathers in the faith are indispensable. Fathers in the faith are needed. And so a father in the faith has significant impact.

The Father in the faith is a man who knows God. He knows God. Underline that, underscore it, and just emphasize that he knows God, but note what he says. You have known Him who has been from the beginning.

The father in the faith has advanced from childhood. The child, he knows his sins are forgiven, and he knows his father, but the Father in the faith, his knowledge of God has been expanded upon. His understanding of God has been intensified and increased. He knows him who has been from the beginning.

Yes, he knows him as his Father in heaven, but his knowledge of him has grown, it has developed, it has ripened in time. And one of the marks of a father in the faith is that he knows God. He knows God intimately, he knows God truly, and he understands how God intersects life. And he has walked in such a way to where he has walked by faith in this God whom he has come to know for who he is in reality.

John's description of the knowledge that the Father has regarding his God is informative. It indicates that his knowledge of God has been greatly expanded upon. And so like he, when, when, when you say to the child of the faith, God is holy, like you'll understand that maybe to a degree, but really his emphasis tends to be on the Father, but like the Father and the faith, all of these words that go Into a description of who God is, there's a greater sense of just understanding and comprehending those things.

And it's just not mere intellectual head knowledge, but he knows this from the very depths of his being, because he has seen it fleshed out in his life.

He has seen God in his life and in the lives of others, and he just knows there's a sense of confidence that such a man has in God. God is holy. He is almighty, all powerful, everlasting from beginning to end, Thou art God. He is infinite, He is triune.

And the man of God who has arrived at the place of being a father in the faith, he just, he knows these things, he, he understands, he grasps these things, and they mean something to him. His triune God is therefore a relational God to exist in the context of joy. He is all powerful. He is all knowing, he knows everything from beginning to end.

There is absolutely nothing that has ever happened that he was not aware. Off he is ever faithful, despite the fact that in my youth, I had gone astray, this, that and the other, and God has seen fit to always bring me back to himself. My God is faithful. He is wise.

If it were up to me, if I could go back and change the course of my life, and if I would have known what I know now, that he would have brought me to, I wouldn't have done it, but my God is so wise so as to not, not inform. of what his plan for me is, and so he brings me through the ups and downs of life. He allows me to experience pain and suffering and trials, and there's the ups and there's the downs, but along the way, I look back and I realized, what, this is what my plan was, but this is what God's plan was, and I know with absolute confidence that God is wise and he knows that his plan is the best.

I know that his plan is the best plan.

He is wise, he is pure, he exists in in approachable light, he detests evil, he is just, patient, merciful, loving, compassionate and kind, and the father in the faith knows these things. And he understands how God relates to his life concerning this particular passage. I want to read. from Professor John Coe, professor at Talbot School of Theology, not the same John Coe that has been here to preach, a different John Coe.

But regarding this passage, listen to what the professor says. Most commentators say that this may have something to do with coming to know the sovereign God who rules over history from the beginning. In the case of the spirit. Spiritually mature, they have seen God work His will in their lives.

He has taken their spouses, friends, and children. He has worked in a way that has seemed confusing at times. In any case, these spiritual fathers and mothers have come to recognize through time that God is God of their lives, that God's will, not their own, is the central reality. He can do as he pleases and is in fact invited to do so.

He can do as he pleases, and he is invited to do so. Come what may, come hell or high water, I trust in your sovereignty, you can do whatever you want, Lord. My only request is this, that at the end of the day, I exalt you, you can do whatever Whatever you want, you can run me through the mill. It's OK.

You can have, you can, you can have people cast their stones at me, you can have people insult me. It doesn't matter. I don't care whatever, as long as if at the end of the day, by God's grace that you give me what I need so that I can exalt you in the midst of the difficulty. That is a mark of maturity.

We have a few examples from the Bible that I would like to direct you to. Joseph is an example of a man who knew God. And I submit to you that we see from Joseph the marks of fatherhood. Betrayed by his brothers, left in a well to die, and then his brothers have a change of heart and decide rather to sell him into slavery.

He eventually became the head of the household of the wealthy Potiphar. However, he was falsely accused by Potiphar's wife of making spoils. and he was thrown into prison. He remained there for years because of his ability to interpret dreams.

He would eventually become Pharaoh's right-hand man. He would wisely save Egypt from famine as a result of stockpiling food during the time of plenty. When famine hit, Joseph's brothers came to Egypt for assistance. In all of those years, it would have been very easy for Joseph in his heart of hearts to think to himself, To hell with my brothers.

To hell with him. And here come his brothers. Coming for help, coming for assistance, and they initially failed to realize that they had come begging their own brother for food. Eventually, Joseph would reveal his true identity to his brothers.

Read it with me, please, in Genesis 45, beginning in verse 1. Listen to what Joseph, does, how he responds. In Genesis 45:1, it says that Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him, and he cried, Have everyone go out for me. So there was no man with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers, he made himself known to his brothers, and he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard of it.

Then Joseph said to his brothers, I am Joseph. Is my father still alive? But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence. Then Joseph said to his brothers, Please come closer to me, and they came closer and he said, I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt.

And now do not be grieved, don't be grieved or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. That is maturity. That is a demonstration of a Father in the faith, for the famine has been in the land these 2 years, and there are still 5 years in which they will be neither plowing nor harvesting, and God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant in the earth and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. God had a purpose, God was in charge, God.

was in control. And even though you guys threw me into the, into the well and sold me into slavery, it was all part of the plan of Almighty God. And so don't fret, don't worry, don't stress. God is the one who is orchestrating the events of human affairs in the lives of people so that he may accomplish his purposes.

He says, now, therefore, it was not you who sent me here, but God. And he has made me a father to Pharaoh and Lord of all of his household and ruler over all of the land of Egypt. Hurry, hurry and go up to my father and say to him, thus says your son Joseph, God has made me Lord over all of Egypt. Come down to me, do not delay, and you shall live in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your children and your children's children and your flocks and your herds, and all that you have, there I will also provide.

For you, for there are still 5 years of famine to come, lest you and your household and all that you have the impoverished, and behold, your eyes see and the eyes of my brother Benjamin see that it is my mouth which is speaking to you. Now you must tell my father of all of my splendor in Egypt, and all that you have seen, and you must hurry and bring my father down here. Then he fell on his brother Benjamin's neck, and he wept. And Benjamin wept on his neck.

And he kissed all of his brothers, and he wept. On them. And afterwards his brothers talked with him. That's maturity.

It is to be able to look at your so-called enemy in the eye. And to love that person. It is what we've been talking about for weeks now underneath the ministry of Pastor Milton. When we talk about forgiveness, you want to arrive at the place of maturation.

The path to get there has something to do with forgiveness. Forgiveness intersects the reality of Almighty God. And the gospel And so we continue on in the book of Genesis chapters later. The father is going to die.

Jacob dies. And on the other side of the death of the father, the brothers of Joseph are concerned that he would hold a grudge, right? Oh no, Dad's dead. Now, Joseph's really gonna let us have it.

They were stressed. Listen, To how Joseph speaks to his brothers, and as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result to preserve many people alive. My God is sovereign. My God ordained it.

He orchestrated it. He is sovereign over every single detail. Every single instance of life is filtered through the hands of the Almighty. And so John moves from beginning to end.

From child in the faith to father in the faith. He does not go in the order that we might expect. We have considered childhood fatherhood. John then brings us to the bridge that gets us from the one place to the other, and so we'll take a look briefly at this stage.

It's not the last, it's the middle, it's the bridge. It is stage number 2. It is the stage of manhood, becoming a strong man in the faith. John does two significant things in his address of the young men.

OK, he saves his discussion of young men for last. And then he will elaborate on the young men more than he does the other two stages. There's a little more elaboration that takes place here. Why?

Well, he really wants to focus extra attention on the bridge that helps one get from childhood to fatherhood. He wants to focus extra attention. He knows that this is a critical stage. It is, it is critical in the progression towards maturity.

It is key. He knows that not everyone is a father in the faith, and so he's addressing the bridge that helps the child in the faith to get there, and he wants for their last thoughts regarding this whole pericopy to be that of the, the young man, the man, the strong young man in the faith. And, and having pondered a vision of fatherhood, John's readers should now be eager to better understand the bridge to get there, as you consider fatherhood, OK, how do I get there? What happens, what, tell me about the stage between childhood and fatherhood, and that stage is manhood.

In his first round, he says, I am writing to you, young man, because you have overcome the evil one. He's gonna restate that in the 2nd round, but listen, there's more than that that he says. He says, I've written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one. You are strong, he says, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one.

Please. Keep note that the strong young man in the faith has progressed from childhood. He knows his sins are forgiven. He knows the Father intimately, he has been and continues to be gospel saturated.

the strong young man in the faith, number 2 here is one in whom Christ dwells. You are strong, and the word of God dwells in you or abides in you is what he says. And so the idea that we, we need to get from that particular passage there is he's not talking about the words that Christ speaks. He's talking about Christ himself.

The Lagos. In other places where John writes, when John's talking about the words that Christ speaks, he uses a different word, oftentimes the word Rema, but in this particular passage, he's using the, the term Lagos. The Lagos abides in you. And, and, and if you consider the Gospel of John, where he says in the beginning was the Word, the Word, was with God, the Word was God, the Word was with God, but in verse 14, he says the Word became flesh, the Lagospel became flesh, it's a reference to Christ.

And the idea here then is the idea that, that the Word of God abides in them. The word of God abides in you. It is Christ. Christ abides in them.

OK, so, so they live out of the overflow of the reality that Christ is in them. They live in such a way to where when when attack comes their way, they respond not in the power of the flesh, but by the power of the spirit, they respond in a Christ-like manner. They live in such a way to where it is evident that they are crucified with Christ, and they no longer live, but Christ lives in them. And so these strong young men are strong in part because, because of Christ and the difference that he is making in their lives.

Moving on to the third subpoint here, the strong man in the faith has overcome evil or the evil one. most translations, have it translated as the evil one, but the idea here has to do with evil in general and even specifically the evil one, or you could say the devil himself. Think with me for a moment. Strong young man.

You have through your faith overcome the evil one. OK, what this indicates for us is the fact that when you consider the child in the faith, when a person comes to faith in Christ and he enters into that, that stage where he is a child in the faith, you can bet your last dollar that the evil one will do if he hasn't already done all that he can do in order to bring such a person down. Satan hates it. When a child of faith is basking in his forgiveness, and basking in the fatherhood of Satan, and he will go after that person.

John here says to the strong young man, you have overcome the evil one. He has done so through Christ. He has done so, over the course of time, just resisting the evil one and through the power of the Spirit, he has come to a place in his life in which he can be deemed strong young man. So just, just know, just understand that it is not outside of the realm of possibilities for the evil one to come along, especially with children of the faith, and he's not limited to just children, he'll go after anyone, but in particular, children.

And what you see here is the path to strong young men is a path that includes trial. And you see here once again, that God has a way of using trial to bring about his purposes. God has a way of using evil to bring about his purposes. You see, God is a God who is sovereign even over the evil that happens.

Just consider briefly with me, the Lord Jesus Christ. There he hung on the cross, bathed in his own blood, in pain and suffering, in agonizing physical torment. There he was experiencing separation from the Father, and that happened at the hands of evil men. And underneath the hands of evil men, God accomplished his purpose.

God is sovereign over evil. There is absolutely nothing that he is not in control of, and even the evil that happens in this world, don't ask me if I fully understand it, but I believe it to be true that he is sovereign over those things and he wishes to use those things for a purpose, and part of the purpose is, is that a person can get to the place of being a strong young man on his way to fatherhood. We saw it with Job. Right?

the story. Satan comes to the, comes to God and, he's looking to destroy someone and God says, have you considered my righteous servant Job? Have you considered him? My righteous servant Job?

And so Satan goes after him. Of course, he was limited in what he was allowed to do, but basically over the course of a couple of attacks, Satan inflicts a severe wound on Job, a severe wound. Loved ones are lost, his employees are killed, he loses his job, he loses his farm basically, he loses his income and he loses his health, right? He is in an absolute wretched and miserable position.

And yet it was God who gave permission for that to happen. And then here we have a righteous man, the righteous man, Job, a man who knew God, who at the end of the day, is able to speak words of faith about God. At the end of the day, Job said something to the effect of, of, I have heard of him with the hearing of my ear. Now my eye beholds him.

Therefore, I recant. There's a sense in which Job comes to an understanding and a knowledge of God that goes beyond what he had known before. There is a progression that happens in Job's life. There is a growth, and you see, Job was a man who, who was on the receiving end of demonic attack, and it's part of God's plan to help a person grow, and I would submit to you Job grew as a result.

and the church is the richer as a result because through Job we can understand the truth that God is God and he has the right to do whatever he wants and the only proper response at the end of the day is to rise up and to worship Him. That's part of what we learn through the book of Job. And it's not just that, it's not like God wants to destroy us or hurt us or ruin us. He's got a plan.

And the plan ultimately leads to the place where in his presence throughout all of eternity worshiping Him with, with, with intense joy, full of glory. That's the ultimate plan. so the strong young man in the faith has overcome evil. He has overcome the evil one.

So we've considered this path towards maturity. And we've got childhood, let's put it in order now. We've got childhood, we've got strong young men, you are strong. the word of God abides in you, you have overcome the evil one.

We've got fatherhood, him who has been from the beginning. And I think part of what, part of what God wants is he wants for us to have a vision for what it looks like at the end of the day. He wants for us to understand that the Father is a man who has impact. A father is a man who knows his God more fully than he did when he first came to faith, and he wants for us be reaching towards that goal and along the way he wants for us to understand that there is a season of strong young manhood and we must overcome the evil one through our faith in Christ and Him in dwelling and walk by faith, and this is the path that leads us ultimately to the place of maturation.

Just quickly by way of a few applications, I'm not gonna be able to flesh these out obviously, but number one, be rooted in the gospel. We see that implied with the child in the faith. Number 2, overcome evil. We see that implied by looking at the strong young man in the faith, overcome evil, overcome the attack of the devil.

Number 3, make a difference, make a difference, have an impact. We see that with the Father in the faith and we also see from the Father. Grow in your knowledge of God, but we see a progression of that, but it culminates in that Father who he knows him who has been from the beginning, and so grow in your knowledge of God. Lord, we just thank you so much for your word.

I pray, Lord, that as we take the time even later today to discuss these things in care group that That the interaction would prove to be helpful. That Lord, the time of fellowship would edify. I pray, Lord, for us as a body that you would just help us to gain ground. In our Christian experience that you would help us along the path to maturity.

I ask that you would help us, Lord, to be a people who would bask in the gospel, who would overcome the evil one, Lord, that we, that Christ, you would dwell in our hearts through faith, and I pray, Lord, that at the end of the day, This would be a church that would be marked by countless men and women who could be deemed fathers in the faith and who therefore are able to make a significant impact as they pour into the lives of others, Lord, and so help us all together to just grow in the grace and in the knowledge of Jesus, and help us to be conformed into the image of Him who is the ultimate mature one.

And as we worship you, Lord, we pray that you would receive our songs of praise, that they would serve as a sweet aroma to, to you, God. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.