1 Jhn Chap-1 Knowing the Father: Life of the Spiritual Son With Brenda Gray
2025 July 20th Streaming
In the beginning of both 1 John and the Gospel of John, John explicitly dictates the Son of God’s origins much earlier than being conceived by the Holy Spirit and Mary’s immaculate conception. Instead, John begins with the revelation that the Word (Jesus the first-born Son of God) and God the creator of everything are equal. John is not writing about something that he heard from someone else but, is giving an account of an event that that he was a direct eyewitness of the resurrected Christ. He spoke with Him, he touched Him, he ate with Him. He came in direct contact with “Eternal Life.” (1 John 1:1-4, Luke 24: 34-43, John 20:19-23)
John states that he wrote to give assurance of eternal life to those “who believe in the name of the Son of God” (5:13). The uncertainty of his readers about their Spiritual status was caused by an unsettling conflict with the teachers of a false doctrine. John refers to these teachings as deceitful (2:26; 3:7) and to the teachers as “false prophets” (4:1), liars (2:22), and antichrist (2:18, 22; 4:3). Docetism and Gnosticism while distinct, are related early heresies that challenged the view of Jesus’ nature in the church.
A brief review of the two false teachings. Gnosticism, with its emphasis on secret knowledge (gnosis) for salvation, often involved a dualistic view of the world, separating the material and the Spiritual realms. While Docetism, stemming from Gnostic ideas, specifically denied the true humanity of Jesus, claiming He only “appeared” to have a physical body and thus could not have truly suffered or died. Docetism and Gnosticism are not as widely accepted in the mainstream church today, but there is another false teaching that has been widely accepted within many churches and among many religions and that is “hybrid born-again believers.” False teachers and preachers have “pieced together” Old Testament Scriptures and New Testament Writings creating a false “hybrid born-again believer.” The “hybrid born-again believer” is someone who is considered “saved” through repentance, and has taken on the identity of Israel, (the Church being Spiritual Israel) and are waiting to be resurrected at the Second Coming of Christ. Due to the lack of or incomplete knowledge of Spiritual birth, many do not understand their New Spiritual Identity as a Spiritual Son of God the Father and continue trying to live in grace plus works hoping to “make it to heaven.”
Sadly, many do not understand that Spiritual birth is the access to “Eternal Life.” Not just living forever with “God” but related to God as Father.
John 17:3 “And this is eternal life, that they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.