Good evening and welcome to eBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of 2nd John. Tonight is study number 6, and we will be looking at 2 John 1:3:
Grace be with you, mercy, and peace, from God the Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love.
We know that “grace, mercy and peace” are all central to God’s salvation plan. By expressing the desire that grace, mercy and peace be with the reader of this epistle, it is basically desiring the best for the individual, that hears this message of the Gospel, that they might be blessed with the salvation of God, that they might be blessed with the grace that is a gift of God and the mercy that God bestows upon undeserving sinners, and the peace, that is, the Lord Jesus Himself, that they might find peace between God and each sinner. This is the desire of the elder writing to the elect lady and it is the desire of God writing to mankind that will read this letter: May grace, mercy and peace be with you.
It is also a very familiar greeting that is found in other epistles. We are not going to look at every epistle, but we will look at three of them. In 1 Corinthians 1:3:
Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
It does not say “mercy,” but it has the other two elements. And also in Galatians 1:3:
Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ,
And in Ephesians 1:2:
Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Notice how in each of these epistles, these desired blessings are coming from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace equally flows from God and from Christ. Peace equally comes forth from the Father and from the Son. We are not surprised at this. There is an equality in the Godhead. It says in Philippians 2:5-6:
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
As Jesus said in the Gospel of John, in John 10:30:
I and my Father are one.
And so, we find here, in this second epistle of John, in 2 John 1:3:
Grace be with you, mercy, and peace, from God the Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love.
Some try to make Christ less than the Father, and as a result, less than God, because He is called “the Son,” in the Bible. They reason, “The son is not the Father and is not equal to the Father, so He is lesser than the Father.” The Father, they recognize as God, but they fail to recognize Christ as God. That might be the way they reason things, that might be their thinking, and it is the thinking of many, but that thinking is coming from a man who has a finite mind, a very limited ability to comprehend the Person of God.
We can only know what God would have us to know, and we cannot comprehend the enormity of His being, the greatness of His majesty, and how it is possible, that He, being one God (as He insists throughout the Bible), is also three Persons.
But whether we comprehend it as men, or not, does not change the fact that the Bible teaches this, and we read for instance, in Isaiah chapter 9, in that wonderful verse that we often hear around Christmas time, we read in Isaiah 9:6:
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
Again, this descriptive language, these names, are being applied to the child (to the Son), that is given. So the Son is the mighty God. The Son is the everlasting Father. We can never understand that, how they are Three Persons, but One. We cannot separate one from the other. We dare not try. That is meddling in spiritual things that we have no business meddling in. We just accept what the Bible says because we trust the Bible and everything it declares.
Let us also turn to a couple of other verses, in which God clearly says that the Son is the eternal God Himself. In Revelation chapter 1, it says in Revelation 1:6:
And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
The only way to understand this is to realize that God, who is referred to here, in Revelation 1:6, is the Lord Jesus Christ and Christ is Son to the Father, therefore “unto God and his Father.” Now we have harmony with all else that the Bible says.
Let us turn to one other place which also teaches the eternal nature of the Son, the deity of Christ Himself. That is in the Book of Hebrews in chapter 1, and it says in Hebrews 1:5:
For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?
So God is explaining that this is the relationship between Himself and the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. He will be the Father, Christ will be the Son, and then a little further down in Hebrews 1:8, it says:
But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom.
So unto the Son, the statement is made, “Thy throne, O God.” Clearly, without mistake, without the possibility of error, the Father is speaking to the Son and He is calling Him “God,” because it is a fact that the Lord Jesus is God in the flesh, God who entered into the human race and became man. This is the Person of Christ and is why His people worship Him, pray to the Father and to the Godhead. We pray to the Person of God and we recognize Christ as eternal God.
We are going to continue on. We could talk about the Trinity and the incredible, wonderful nature of God for quite some time, but we want to continue in our study of 2nd John.
And it says in 2 John 1:3:
Grace be with you, mercy, and peace, from God the Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love.
That is, this epistle (letter), that the elder is writing unto the elect lady and her children, and we know that spiritually, it is God writing to His people, the elect, that this epistle is being written in truth and love.
Like anything else in the Bible, we want to check out those words. We have already seen the tremendous emphasis that the LORD has placed upon truth in verses 1 and 2 of this same epistle. And now again, in verse 3 we are reminded of the truth. And who is the truth? John 14:6 declares that Christ is the way, the truth and the life. He is truth. There is none other. Things that are true concerning the person of God or Heaven or eternal life, religious things, spiritual things are all centered on Christ. He is the truth and the way to Heaven is through the truth. A lie will not get anyone to Heaven and that is why the way to destruction is broad.
It is easy to go that way, because the world is full of deceit and lies: religions that lie, other Christian gospels that lie. Satan has tried his best to assault the truth, to confound the truth, to hide the truth, to make it impossible for man to discover the truth, because the last thing he wants is for an individual to walk the way of truth, to follow Christ and to leave the kingdom of darkness, to come out of the dungeon of being in bondage to sin and Satan, and to become free in the truth. Satan wanted nothing to do with that. He fought every inch of the way against that.
And how did he do it? For those on the outskirts, he developed false religions: Buddhism and Hinduism and the Muslim religion and other religions, too numerous to name. These were to satisfy the people of various lands. “These are your god! These are the way to Heaven.” Many were content with this, although none of those ways ever brought a single soul into Heaven or enabled a single person to experience salvation. Yet, many died in a contented state, thinking that because they had followed the way of their religion, this would take them into the presence of God, into Heaven. But it was a lie. It was not the way of the truth, and therefore, they died believing a lie.
But Satan was not satisfied with that. No; how could be allow the Christian Gospel to multiply and to cover the earth, as the churches were entering every nation and churches were popping up on so many street corners? This was too much to risk. It was far too risky to have the Light of the Gospel shining so brightly into the dark world, so he sowed tares amongst the wheat. He had his emissaries and his people enter into the churches and congregations. And what was their mission? What was the task that was assigned to them? To hide the truth, to confuse the truth, to bring up all sorts of teachings that were far from the truth, and they did an excellent job. This is why churches teach contrary to one another.
You have a Baptist Church that teaches one way about baptism and another church that teaches another way. You have the Presbyterian Church that teaches one way of salvation and a denominational church that teaches another way. And you have the Catholic Church that says itself is the authority over the Word of God and the Pope is God’s voice on earth. And add to that a 1,000 more, and all declaring different things and the teaching of the Bible being confused and mixed up.
And on top of this, we entered into a day when Bibles themselves began to be multiplied and various manuscripts were used to produce translations. These translations were designed to make the publishers rich, to make money for individuals, and now Bibles were filling the market place that said different things. You had “The good news for modern man,” that updated the ancient language of the Scripture into everyday speech, and of course, perverted what the Bible actually said, and many other translations twisting and turning and changing the Word of God. Satan up to his usual typical efforts, just as he did in the garden of Eden, when he said to Eve, “hath God said,” and he sowed doubt in her mind, that what she had heard from God was actually what she had heard, and she began to wonder in her mind, as she listened to the words of the devil.
And so too, the modern world of our day is lost in confusion, lost in a sea of lies and in a sea of deceitfulness concerning the Word of God. Where is it? As Pilate said, “What is truth?” And the world has no idea. They have no idea that there is a “truth,” there is a “way,” and it does lead to life and that “way” has always been the same. It has never been changed or altered. It is stedfast, unmoveable. It is the way of the Gospel, as declared in the faithful Bible and the way of God, the way of the Lord Jesus Christ, this is the truth. He is the truth, that the epistle of 2nd John is written to the readers in Him and love, in truth and love.
Christ is truth, but what of love? It says in 1 John 4:14-15:
And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.
Let us stop there, because we just talked about Christ as the Son (the Son of God), that it is necessary to “confess that Jesus is the Son of God,” it says in 1 John 4:15, and that would include the fact that He is Eternal God Himself, as we saw in those verses we read earlier.
Going on in 1 John 4:16:
And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
Here is the Bible’s definition of love. What is love? God is love. He is the one that personifies and embodies love itself. Can a man love another apart from God? In an earthly way, it is possible to have affection, to have feelings, to have care and concern for others, yes, but as far as the actual Biblical definition of love, it is an impossibility for a man to love a woman or for anyone to love anyone else, apart from God. True love, Biblical love, is to love an individual in God, through God, and by God.
So, the child of God loves his family, he loves his wife in desiring the best for her, in Christ, he loves his children in bringing the Gospel to them, because God is love and when we share the Word of God with others, we are sharing love. We are acting in love and bestowing love to others, irregardless of what the particular Scripture is that we are dealing with.
So God is love, Christ is truth, and Christ is God, and therefore, 2nd John, this epistle, is being written to the reader, in the Lord Jesus Christ, in God Himself. This is coming forth from Him, to each individual that would read the Holy Words printed upon these pages.