2 John 1

2 John 1:1-13

2 John Chapter 1 2 John 1:1-13. “The elder to in elect lady* and her children, whom I love in truth, and not I only but also all who have known the truth, for the truth’s sake, which abideth in us, and it shall be with us for ever. Grace shall be with you, mercy, peace, from God [the] Father and from Jesus Christ the Son of the Father, in truth and love. “I rejoiced exceedingly that I have found of thy children walking in truth even as we received commandment from the Father. And now I beseech thee, lady, not as writing to thee a new commandment but that which we had from [the] beginning that we should love one another. And this is love that we should walk according to his commandments. This is the commandment even as ye heard from [the] beginning that ye should walk in it. Because many misleaders went forth into the world, they that confess not Jesus Christ coming in flesh. This is the misleader and the antichrist.

Look to yourselves, that we may not lose what we wrought but receive full reward. Every one that goeth onward and abideth not in the doctrine of the Christ hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine, he hath both the Father and the Son. If any one cometh to you and bringeth not this doctrine, receive him not at home and greet him not; for he that greeteth him partaketh in his wicked works. “Having many things to write to you, I would not with paper and ink; but I hope to come unto you and to speak mouth unto mouth that our joy may be made full. The children of thine elect sister greet thee.”

• There have existed from post-apostolic times till our day all sorts of differing views as to this address: Some for Eclecta as a proper name; others for Kyria; a third class for “the church” in more senses than one adumbrated thereby, to say nothing of the Virgin Mary. It appears to me that it was a living sister in Christ to whom the Holy Spirit would have the apostle write without giving her name; and that her “elect sister” in the last ver. (13) strongly confirms this, as it explodes the notion of “the church,” which pleased Jerome (Ep. 123 ad Ageruchiam), the Schol. i., in Matthaei and Cassiodorus; and among moderns, Calovius, Hammond, Michaelis, etc. I am disposed even to think that the more literal rendering was really intended “to an elect lady,” etc., though I shrank from acting on what seems not to have occurred to any one else. It ought to strike any careful reader of Scripture as remarkable, that we have an apostolic epistle avowedly addressed to a lady and her children. Considering the reserve of the apostles and the unusual character of such an address, surely we ought to inquire why the Holy Spirit here departs from His ordinary way, and the more so as the first Epistle of John is so expressly general and large; for it is addressed, if to any, to the whole family of God. It has no local association, nothing personal in the usual sense of what is individual, that is to say, belonging to specified persons. 1 John is so open as to take in every member of God’s family wherever they may be, more so than any other save perhaps the Epistle of Jude. Yet the same John, and it would seem at a subsequent time, was led by the Holy Spirit to address one individual, and this not a man but a woman and her children too. Later still he writes to a man in his Third Epistle, and we may readily see the propriety both of this and of the topic there handled for his good and ours. His name is given, but in the Second Epistle before us the lady is addressed as such without indicating her name, wherein we may perceive a delicate suitableness. Although no doubt the lady’s need was met, nevertheless she was spared needless pain and publicity, whilst an Epistle inspired and of the utmost value was meant for saints then and at all times. At any rate these are facts, and we are entitled to form a judgment which none need accept who are not convinced that the explanation fairly approves itself to their intelligence. We have a brief letter, but one of the most solemn Epistles in the New Testament, more fundamental than the very interesting and instructive one addressed to Gaius afterwards. Yet this was written to a lady and included her children. Reasons therefore of permanent and urgent importance must have outweighed ordinary considerations for the Holy Spirit through the apostle to send such a peculiarly serious Epistle to the elect lady and her children; and so we cannot but discern from its contents. For they entirely corroborate this fact, that the Holy Spirit went out of His ordinary path, and here for reasons of commanding moment addresses a lady and her children, making them immediately and in the highest degree responsible to act on the truth conveyed in this letter. A true Christ or a false one was in question. In all the Bible what is more important than that, especially since the manifestation of the Christ? Before He appeared it was the enemy’s aim to occupy the minds of believers with present and subordinate objects. But now the true Christ was presented according to promise, now the Son of God was attested with irrefragable testimony and in personal grace and truth, and has given understanding that we should know Him that is true, Himself too declared to be “the true God and life eternal.” It was a bold step of Satan who knew this well, to engage professing Christians to falsify the truth about Christ, to make an idol against Christ, as of old he made idols against Jehovah, when He dealt with Israel after the flesh under law. For one so subtle it became, now that the Son of God had come in grace and truth, a congenial enterprise to decry the truth as but elementary, and to present a wholly false Christ, so as to pollute the source of all blessing, and destroy souls misled to the wrong Christ instead of the One not only true but the truth. This is exactly what Satan was there and then attempting by the many antichrists, and it is what accounts for the extraordinary appeal of the Holy Spirit in this Epistle. “The elder,” says the apostle. Thus does he descend from the first place in the church of God, which he was fully entitled to fill, but love instinctively takes the more excellent way, and here the Holy Spirit inspired it for the special need. So the apostle Paul did now and then; and so did our apostle in all his Epistles. It is thus we have God teaching us even by the smallest change in scripture, by everything said and by everything not said, something more perfectly than in any other way. Hence we may not doubt that there was a particular wise and worthy reason why the apostle John should introduce himself under the name of “elder,” rather than apostle, both to the elect lady and to the beloved Gaius. Yet observe another point. He does not say to the well-beloved lady. Some Christians are fond of warm expressions to individuals without any sufficient occasion for them. It is not a good habit, particularly where a lady is in the case. There is no indiscretion in so writing to a brother. When one thinks of what men and women are, one apprehends the wisdom of God that “the elder,” old as he was, avoids these terms to the lady, and sets a good example to others in this respect. Had he ever so holily done otherwise, many would have imitated him. But, as it stands, all was wisely ordered; and it is well for us to profit by what we read here. “The elder to an elect lady.” He is careful to write with respect but without adulation. There is no commending of himself, no self-seeking. He might be considered cold rather than erring on the score of strong expressions. “The elder to an elect lady.” Her position was not slighted, but what both valued was the title of divine grace, not what she owed to providence. She was elect of God, one chosen in Christ by and for God Himself. What consideration is nearer to the heart purified by faith? The apostle was led to use the term which owned the sovereign action of God.

God hid chosen her out of all her natural associations, and the apostle delights to recognise that she was brought even on earth into new and divine ones. How blessed to know that so it is still for every true Christian! But even in these introductory words we may notice how true each Epistle is to God’s object in it. The aim here is to guard the elect lady and her children from the seductive snares of an antichrist. The aim in the Epistle to Gaius is to encourage him in the face of obstacles to persevere in the path of grace as he had begun. “Elect” brought God before the lady, as “The beloved” cheered Gaius not to mind the frowns of Diotrephes. People often grow weary in well-doing when they find themselves deceived by those whom they might have lovingly served, and ruffled a little by the criticism of such as habitually oppose without any serious effort to help in difficulties.

These enigmas Christ enables us to solve. “The elder to an elect lady and her children.” Who can doubt in ordinary circumstances that, when the apostle John saw these children, he accosted them affectionately, and that they knew his tenderness of feeling for them. But he was writing on a very solemn subject, in presence of which a lady and her children of themselves dwindle into insignificance, were it not for the Lord’s name, and the title grace had given. Here the apostle puts before them in the most forcible manner their obligation to care and jealousy for the glory of Christ. It admitted of no compromise. Satan’s undermining of the truth of Christ was a fact going on then. They were in danger; the apostle knew it, and writes to put them on their guard.

Everything usual became subordinate to God’s honour in the case. It is now a question of a real Christ, and John has before him their danger of unwittingly slighting Christ’s glory. Therefore his words are comparatively few, plain and decided. He soon reaches the point, and he speaks in a manner that ought never to be misunderstood by any Christian. He does, however, assure them of his love in truth; for this failed wherever Christ was lost. “Whom I love in truth.” Oh how weighty and searching! It was not because of personal qualities that he loved.

He may have seen ever so much sweetness in them; but of this he says nothing, only of “love in truth.” This goes beyond loving “in the truth”; he loved “in truth.” No doubt they had the truth. While of course there never can be truth without the truth, in truth means truly. The apostle felt it of importance, in the midst of hollowness through waning of the truth, to assure them of divine reality in his love. They were souls whom God had brought to Himself through the truth; “And not I only but also all who have known the truth.” What a wonderful thing it is to count on the love that is of God in such a world of vain show as this! John can warrant every Christian’s love without any modification. As having Christ their life, he can assuredly count that every Christian loved this elect lady and her children, as he himself did. His apostolic authority in no way hindered his loving these children with their mother - They were God’s children, and not merely hers, whom he says “I love in truth;” and he could say further that not he only loved them but also all those who have known the truth. Are not these the links to rivet and value, dear brethren?

The apostle then could count upon all those that knew the truth loving the lady and her children in truth. It could not be without life in Christ, and the Spirit given to us after redemption to carry it out in the face of all obstacles. Seen in the fullest perfection in Christ, it is reproduced in the Christian. “For the truth’s sake, which abideth in us, and it shall be with us for ever.” This is a very striking way of speaking of the truth. The apostle here personifies the truth as Paul did the gospel in Phil. 1. The apostle was a minister of the church as well as of the gospel, and although he wrote of the church as none ever did, nevertheless he preached the gospel too as no other ever preached. He delighted in the glad tidings of God’s grace and of Christ’s glory. He never set either against the truth of the church. On the contrary, he ministered both in the depth of grace and in the height of glory.

He felt as the apostle John here expresses it “for the truth’s sake which abideth in us, and it shall be with us for ever.” Neither would have said this for any Christian institution however significant. An institution has its place which none can despise or overlook but to their real loss; but what is it compared to “the truth”? The institution is only for a little, and might terminate for ever in a moment. But the truth! Why, it abideth in us, and it shall be with us for ever. It is meant to have growing power over the heart all the time we are here below; and we shall only have it perfectly to enjoy in heaven and through eternity. Then follows his suited salutation, “Grace be with you, mercy, peace:” “Grace,” the fountain of divine love toward sinners; “peace,” the fruit of Christ’s work for believers, both generally wished to the saints; “mercy” meeting individual need in weakness and trial. So here it is for the elect lady and her children. We can see its suitableness here, for the very writing to her and them implies it. Whenever we think of ourselves individually, the need of mercy from God is felt. When we speak about the church and her privileges and the height of glory to which she is destined in and with Christ, the need is swallowed up in the glory of God’s grace. But the individual has wants still calling for “mercy” in evident ways. Grace and peace are for the church as a whole while here below. “Grace shall be with you, mercy, peace from God the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ the Son of the Father,” must have been all the more cheering to the lady and her children, as it took the form of an assurance rather than a wish or prayer. “The Son of the Father” is also said here only. Why? The denial of His glory by the enemy was answered by an unusual assertion of it. The Spirit of God waves the bright banner in Satan’s face for the strengthening of this Christian family summoned to stand loyally. “The Son of the Father!” What a glorious title! Christians are often called sons and children: none but our Lord is called “the Son of the Father.” All is assured to them in truth and love. He alone secures.

Without Him we never could have been brought out of darkness into the light of God. To Him we are indebted for the knowledge of the Father and of Himself. He was the fulness of truth and love, and has by His grace and work made us to know, possess and enjoy it all in our souls. “I rejoice greatly,” he continues, “that I have found of thy children.” He does not say thy children, and why? Because there may have been one or more of them who not yet had confessed the Saviour and Lord. Possibly one or more might have slipped under the evil influence of the misleaders. He, for some sufficient reason, only goes so far as to say “of thy children walking in truth.” This is the grand point, because of a necessary limitation even then, not merely knowing the truth but “walking in truth,” or as the same apostle says in the Gospel, “he that doeth the truth” (John 3:21). But he proceeds, “According (or, even) as we received a commandment from the Father.” As some Christians are apt to think that a commandment must necessarily be legal, it is well they should be disabused of the mistake. No one speaks more of commandments than our Lord, and this too in the Gospel of John, who repeats the same word frequently in these Epistles, wherein the law is completely left behind and never alluded to. There the Son of God shines as nowhere else; yet the Son of God loved to speak of commandments both for Himself and for us on principles wholly distinct from the law, as in John 10:18, John 12:49, John 13:34, John 14:15; John 14:21; John 14:31, John 15:10. And why so? Because He had taken the place of man, that is, of entire dependence and even obedience. Albeit the Son of the Father, He emptied Himself, taking a bondman’s form as He took His place in the likeness of men; and being found in figure as a man He humbled Himself, “becoming obedient unto death, even death of the cross.” It was not that He gave up or could give up Deity, but He renounced the glory proper to His personal dignity in order to vindicate God and bless man; and in order to accomplish this work, He as the perfect servant, He a dependent man, received everything from God His Father. Consequently, as is said of Him in Ps. 40 “Mine ears hast Thou opened” (or, dug) in becoming incarnate. More than this, His ear was open daily, morning by morning, as in Isa. 50, He listened to what His Father had to say. Finally, as the true Hebrew servant, Ex. 21, instead of going out free, He abides servant for ever, of which the ear bored before the judges was the sign, to the Lord the still deeper sign of death.

Such was He alone. But we, once lost sinners, by faith have received the life of Christ, as well as the anointing of the Holy Spirit; we love His commandments, as He loved His Father’s; and we are thus meant to show forth His excellencies. For what else are we left here? The Lord Jesus always hung upon the commandment of His Father. In Him the love and the obedience were absolutely perfect; and we follow Him, but Oh how unequal are our steps! The Lord Jesus learnt obedience by the things that He suffered. We learn to obey, judging our reluctance; and the Holy Spirit makes it liberty through the grace of Christ. He learnt obedience because, as God, it was quite a new thing to Him. We have to learn it because we are naturally disobedient, which is quite another thing. By grace we love the word, and honour the God that loves us with all our hearts. Now we thankfully receive a commandment of the Father.

Is there anything good that is not based upon divine authority? And the blotting out of divine authority would be an unutterable loss. No doubt there is more than authority, there is divine love; but while love was ever in God and manifested to us when godless and evil, we when converted always begin with divine authority and submissiveness of heart, horrified at our old rebellious spirit. In conversion a man truly submits to God for the first time in his life; and this, as God wills, in bowing to the Lord Jesus. “And now I beseech thee, lady, not as writing to thee a new commandment, but that which we had from the beginning, that we should love one another” (ver. 5). On this, one may say the less because we have had it so much before us already. Still it is always good to remind ourselves, not only of its being a great characteristic of the new nature and of divine teaching, but of its inseparableness from obedience, an equal characteristic of being begotten of God, as we have it laid down in ver. 6: “And this is love that we should walk according to His commandments.” It is only the wicked self-will of fallen man that he seeks to sever. Not only are both God’s commandments, or Christ’s as is true also, but they are identified in these striking words so far that they are inseparable from the life we have in Christ. And again in the rest of the verse all are bound together in what Christ enjoined on His disciples. “This is the commandment even as ye heard from [the] beginning that ye should walk in it.” These words “heard from the beginning” are carefully annexed; and the reason is to remind all then, as now that the injunction was from the time that Christ was manifested here. Adam was the beginning of the human race on earth. But Christ is the beginning for the Christian: with Christ came grace and truth, and the spring of Christian obedience and mutual love. Before Christ came and was manifested here below, how could anyone know the truth about Him? The faithful surely looked for His coming for blessing to man and the earth; but how little was definite to their faith? All distinctness was reserved for the future. Worldly minds thought of Him for their own earthly and human aspirations; but those born of God had more or less the prospect of faith only in the revelation of God.

Still before Christ came even the saints could not but be more or less vague in their anticipations. But when the Son of God came manifested in flesh as foretold, grace and truth came in Him; and the light judged everything inconsistent with God’s nature, and the truth manifested every one and thing as it really is. “This is the commandment, even as ye heard from [the] beginning, that ye should walk in it.” But the worst evils pressed now on all sides. Satan, not content with corrupting, was now denying the truth by those who once professed it. Hence the urgent call to assert it plainly and act faithfully more than ever. “Because many misleaders went forth” (not exactly “entered,” as in the Rec. Text and the A.V.) “into the world.” They had once been in the church, and they went forth to pursue their unhallowed work of defying God’s word and denying the Son. “Entered the world” in no way expresses the fact, nor has it any just sense. They left the Christian confessors when duped by Satan to deny the truth of Christ. They bear the awful character of misleaders “that confess not Jesus Christ coming in flesh.” “This is the misleader and the antichrist.” In the Epistle of Jude the deadly evil was from such being within, though they set themselves up apart there; but the Epistles of John contemplate a later day, “a last hour,” when they went out to resist as open antagonists.

One that enters the church of God, and takes his part for a while in it as a Christian, goes out a great deal worse than when he, however bad, came in. He now hates the truth, and those who cleave to it. It becomes his active business to mislead the saints, defame the truth, and deny Christ. Here, we learn, went out into the world “those that confess not Jesus Christ coming in flesh.” Christ’s coming is now expressed in the abstract present, rather than as the perfect of 1 John 4:2 (the present result of a past action). This makes no difference practically for the truth, which in both cases is the confession of His person thus qualified. Accordingly, as there so here, to leave out the words “that is” gives the force better than in the Authorised and the Revised Versions. The truth of His person these misleaders did not believe. They do not confess Him. Not that they denied necessarily the historical fact of His birth, but they did not confess Christ’s person coming or come in flesh.

For the deep and wondrous truth is that He who was the Son of God from all eternity should so come. Such is the confession of all who have life and are anointed by the Spirit of God. He might have come as an angel or in any other way possible, but for God’s will and glory He was pleased to come in flesh. This the misleaders opposed. It is the confession of Him whose divine and human natures united in one person. It is not all that Christianity means, but it is its basis without which redemption is impossible.

For one not to confess Jesus thus come is to be the misleader and the antichrist. “Look to yourselves that we may not lose what we wrought, but may receive full reward,” or wages (ver. 8). It is not only an earnest caution but an appeal to love thoroughly in our apostle’s manner as in 1 John 2:28. Not seeing this, old copyists and modern editors and translators lost its point, and reduced it to a common-place. The Authorised Version, after the commonly received text, has excellent support, and yields an eminently touching reference. “Look to yourselves that we,” not ye, “may not lose,” etc. It is an affecting draught on their love. So 1 John 2:28 appealed to all God’s family, as here the apostle to an elect lady and her children. “Whosoever transgresseth” does not express the sense the law has nothing to do with it, therefore the word “transgress” is a bad one. It should be, “Everyone that goes onward,” or “beyond” the truth of Christ. It is a further blow at those enamoured of progress, as if revealed truth could be like a human science susceptible of development. On the contrary, he who is not content with the truth which God has given in Christ, who. therefore goes beyond that truth, really abandons and loses the truth for phantoms of man’s mind. “Everyone that goeth forward and abideth not in the doctrine of the Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine, he hath both the Father and the Son.” Whatever may be the pretensions to higher light or truth, whatever may be his confidence in these new-fangled notions, he who goes forward out of the inspired word into ideas of his own head or imaginations of others “hath not God.” He is out of all present relationship with God even of the most distant sort. Whereas “he that abideth in the doctrine [of the Christ] he hath both the Father and the Son” - the highest, deepest, and most intimate revelation of the Godhead. “If any one cometh to you and bringeth not this doctrine, receive him not at home and greet him not; for he that greeteth him partaketh in his evil works.” Now here is one of the most distressing duties that ever was or can be laid on a Christian; and it is laid on the lady and her children peremptorily. Take this illustration. Many years ago a dear friend of mine fell into trouble through being in a Christian assembly which evaded judging similar error. This sister came to live where the assembly did judge the evil thoroughly; but she was slow to allow her responsibility as to it, pleading that she was only a woman, and what could she say or do? Such excuses may sound fair and fine; women might thus act laudably in matters wherein they are not so reserved as they might be. Who expected or hoped to see the evil to be duly judged on that ground?

I reminded this “elect lady” of 2 John. This silenced her, for she was intelligent and experienced as well as God-fearing. The issue was that she stood convinced of having shirked her bounden duty. Where the doctrine of Christ is at stake, one must not hesitate: compromise is treason to the Lord; and if we are not true to Christ, we shall never be true to anything that God has revealed to us. The honour of God is centred in Him through whom grace and truth came to us. Therefore if one come, not bringing this doctrine, even had he been once the dearest Christian friend on earth, she and her children were under the most solemn obligation to ignore him for Christ’s sake. Here lies the present call of God. If he does not bring the doctrine of Christ, close the door, have nothing to do with an antichrist. To those who do not value Christ’s name and word it must seem outrageous, especially in these liberal days, where man is all and Christ is little or nothing; and even professing Christians are so ready to say nothing about it. “What a pity to disturb unity by these questions!

Is it not their chief duty to hold together and avoid scattering which is the shocking evil? Besides, he is such a nice and dear brother, who may see fit to give up his little notion if you do not fan it into a flame.” These are the neutrals, more dangerous than even the beguiled misleaders. No, my brethren, we owe all through grace to the Son of God and the Father who sent and gave Him. If there be anything to which we are called as Christians to be resolute and unbending at all cost, it is where the glory and the truth of Christ is undermined and overthrown. The closing verses (12 and 13) are a fine testimony to the holy but hearty love which bound the early saints together, as we see here between the aged apostle and this Christian household. “Having many things to write to you, I would not with paper and ink; for I hope to come unto you, and to speak mouth to mouth that our joy may be made full. The children of thine elect sister greet thee.” We can gather, alike from his hope of his coming and from his greeting, how fully the apostle counted that those addressed would lay to heart and carry out without fall his exclusion of one false to Christ and going about to ensnare others into his wicked works. There was no threat of consequences beyond the warning that compromise in such a case is to have fellowship with the evil-doer. Nor is there any effort to effect compliance with the injunction by appeals to his own place, or to their intimate friendship hitherto. It all depends on what grace has made us feel to be due to Christ. For even the youngest may be unwavering, when others who for the time ought to feel far more deeply have tampered with little evils, and thus grown insensible to the infinite worth of Christ, playing the amiable where the sternest decision is due to His name. For it is really a question between the Son and Satan.

How he looked for fidelity to Christ is made very plain, in that when he comes unto them, he speaks of their joy being made full. This he could not hope for if he stood in doubt of their fidelity. But it may be well to add here that nothing can be less of the Spirit of God than to apply to minor differences of a disciplinary sort the rigour which is an absolute duty where it is a question of the true Christ or a false. Such a mistake is turned by the great enemy to the scattering of those whom Christ died to gather together in one. Even doctrine in general, unless fundamental, is not a Scriptural ground for so extreme a course. Still less is it due to a difference about the institutions of Christianity, whether baptism or the Lord’s Supper. But the doctrine of the Christ does claim the allegiance of every saint; and he who undermines His person is to be discarded not only publicly but from private recognition at all cost.

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There is this peculiarity about the second Epistle of John, that it alone of all the inspired communications is directly addressed to a woman, and not this only but also to her children. There are certainly good but special reasons for a course so exceptional. We know how much the word of God, not to speak of every spiritual instinct, would lead a Christian woman however gifted to seek a place of retirement and of unobtrusive service. We feel how all that is blessed of God’s grace, and I may add of God’s gift, is only so much the more set off when woman, while thoroughly using whatever the grace of the Lord entrusts to her, understands nevertheless the place in which it has pleased Him to put her here below. Yet here we have one of the most stringent epistles the Holy Ghost ever wrote addressed to a woman — the elect lady — and to her children, as the immediate objects of it, — not to an extraordinary apostolic commissioner, nor an elder, nor an assembly, still less an assembly with bishops and deacons. Why so? Because there was a question before the Holy Ghost of such unspeakable urgency and magnitude that all considerations must give way to it. God so ordered things that the Epistle should be sent to a woman originally, for the very purpose of showing that, whatever may be the ordinary ways of God in His church, there are occasions and seasons in which the very foundation of His grace and of His moral glory must be maintained at all cost. Wherever this ’ is the case, no excuse can be tolerated on the score of sex or youth.

Do not tell me that it is only a child or a woman. If Christ is in the question, all else must give way. Nor is this a sacrifice but real gain. What has been remarked may serve to show us the all-absorbing consequence of what the Holy Ghost here takes in hand. Christ was undermined by those who held His name. It was a question of a true or of a false Christ. Sex was nothing now, youth not more to be considered — all very important when things flow on regularly and in their ordinary channels. We all know how unbecoming it would be for either the one or the other to be put forward, still more to put themselves there; but the Holy Ghost addresses Himself to them here. And we shall see, as is always the case, that what might seem an anomaly in the word of God, when properly looked into, will prove to be full of grave instruction for all our souls. No other conceivable address would have been so appropriate for the second Epistle of John. Had the present been written in general terms, like the first Epistle, much would have been lost; just as, on the other hand, I could scarcely, for my own part, imagine the first Epistle written to the elect lady and her children. All is precisely as it should be. There we find points of universal interest to the children of God, and it is a question of addressing all this family, fathers, young men, and babes. But here, where the tide of evil was now setting in strongly, where searching enquiries must be on foot, where not the ordinary evils only were increasing in an ever and rapidly accumulating volume, but the deepest peril for the basis of all our hopes, the warning is addressed fittingly both to the family and to individuals. Where the first Epistle noticed these things in a general way to all, here we come to greater precision in the evil, and here too we have to do with particular persons. How often one has heard it urged that it is not for a woman to take upon herself to judge, and that no wise man can mean to say that these are questions for children — that they are points of delicacy which most of all require deep theological knowledge and mature judgment; and would you expect the assembly of God to judge such matters? But the Holy Ghost here appeals to a woman and her children, and they are bound to judge; if they do not, Christ is set at nought for their own ease. It was now a question of Christ — the Christ of God. We shall see all this more clearly as we proceed. I am only now endeavouring to show the beautiful appropriateness of that which to a superficial eye might. seem somewhat out of order in the address of this Epistle. “The elder unto the elect lady and her children, whom I love in the truth; and not I only, but also all they that have known the truth.” This is another very characteristic point in the second Epistle of John. Indeed it runs all through John. In the Gospel, as we know, Christ Himself is set forth expressly as the truth; and then his Epistles, as we have seen and may yet see, abound in the same tenacity to what was revealed by and in Christ. Here we find it still. It is interwoven into the very salutation of the epistle — “The elder unto the elect lady and her children, whom I love in the truth.” At once the issue is understood. What was at stake is here before the mind of those who read so remarkable an address.

If Mary, about to become the mother of Jesus, might wonder at the singularity of the angel’s salutation, assuredly this was meant to search the conscience and stir the souls of the elect lady and her children, when an inspired apostle addresses to them a communication of unwonted solemnity. How great the grace of Christ, and infinite the condescension, that shows how precious is every believer to Him! We find nothing like this in any of the preceding epistles, as to the Galatians or the Romans, the Corinthians or the Ephesians, yet I do affirm that this is precisely what was wanted here. It was a more fundamental question, and the error more fatal. It was no defence or assertion of justification by faith. John is not setting forth the proper order of the assembly of God; nor is he leading the saint into the heavenly privileges of the individual or the body.

Christ was in question or nothing. Nothing, did I say? Worse than nothing. It was either the Christ of God in all His divine glory, or the greatest evil into which a man can possibly be plunged by the enemy. It was, in short, war to the knife — the great controversy between Christ and antichrist. Solemn to think and say, the self-same crisis affects every soul now present! I remember years ago reading a book by a celebrated character, who has now passed away from the scene, in which he dared to raise the question whether there was any particular sign in 2 or 3 John,* why they should be accepted as divinely inspired, more than such compositions as the pastoral letters of Ignatius. It was not that the writer took the place of being an infidel: in fact he was Rector of the English College at Rome, and since a Cardinal in this country. This dreadful feature of ecclesiasticism is not so uncommon to find; namely, an infidel argument under the cowl of a monk or in the lips of their most learned professors. Therefore one must not be surprised if one ever so eminent ecclesiastically gave the plainest evidence that he had no faith in the word of God, that he did not participate in its power. Thus the strongest form of the assertion of church authority may really betray under its robes no better than vulgar infidelity. He asked† how you would demonstrate from internal facts the inspiration of the second and third Epistles of St.

John, finding in them neither a prophecy nor anything else which could not have been written by a very holy and pious magi, without any aid whatsoever from inspiration! The same poisonous argument taints in a still baser and more audacious form Dr. Milner’s “End of Controversy:” indeed it pervades Romanism as a whole, and proves its essentially infidel character. *“I would ask you, for instance, how you would demonstrate (I will not speak now of the books of the Old Testament; I will take that for granted, from the historical evidence, that our Saviour and His apostles received them as sufficient to satisfy you with regard to them; but Christians are more particularly interested in the New Testament) how you would demonstrate from internal facts the inspiration of the second and third Epistles of St. John, finding in them neither a prophecy nor any thing else that could not have been written by a very holy and pious man, without any aid from inspiration. In some, indeed, of the Epistles of St. Paul you will find it exceedingly difficult to discover passages so decidedly proving a divine assistance in him who wrote them as to satisfy you that they were inspired.” — Lectures (p. 28) on the Doctrines and Practices of the Roman Catholic Church, etc. By the Rev. Nicholas Wiseman, D.D., etc. London: Hodson, Fleet Street. 1836. †In the corrected edition of this lecture I find, “What internal mark of inspiration can we discover in the third epistle of St. John to show that the inspiration sometimes must have been granted here? Is there anything in that epistle which a good and pious pastor of the primitive ages might not have written? anything superior (!) in sentiment or doctrine (!!) to what an Ignatius or a Polycarp might have indited?” (Lect. ii. p. 38, ed. 1836.) Truly “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God . . . neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” I think, my brethren, that our experience might supply ample ground for an answer, though probably not of such a character as would satisfy one who could make such an objection. There is a day coming when judgment will decide; but conscience, acted upon by the Holy Ghost, can form a conviction now — not of course infallibly, for God alone is or can be infallible — but adequately for the need of the soul. I do say, that the loss would have been immense if we had not had even these two Epistles, putting the matter on no higher ground than this. I need not say that I refuse to treat a question of scripture on a mere ground of utility. Still, we are certain that God has written nothing in vain; and if in a grave crisis of late any one scripture was needed and must have been missed, without which we might have found ourselves at a loss how to act firmly under as trying circumstances as ever befell any soul in this room, or any other, it would have been precisely the second Epistle of John. The apostle then lets them know that he loved them all in the truth; for a believer, young or old, man, woman, or child, is best loved, just for the sake of the truth. He that departs from the truth, what is he? A rebel. But they that walk in the truth, even were they children or ever so lowly, are precious to God; and His Spirit waits on such, and writes to them, and lays on them to decide before God, in their own sphere of duty, this most grave question: “Is my soul in communion with God about His own Son? Whatever may be the reputation of others, whatever my own weakness and call to walk humbly, do I feel that the one thine, which is to determine all others for me is the truth, the truth of Christ Himself?” If it be so, all else will in the main be right. Hence John writes to this effect to the elect lady, whom he loved in truth, and to her children.

Nor was this affection of a personal or circumstantial character: “Whom I love in the truth; and not I only, but also all they that have known the truth.” The revelation of God in Christ does, by the Holy Spirit, bind together in love all who know the truth. It was on account of the truth that he now wrote — as it is said, “for the truth’s sake.” How unweariedly he puts forward that which was now to test them severally! (verse 2.) “For the truth’s sake, which dwelleth in us, and shall be with us for ever. Grace be with you, mercy and peace.” As has been often and truly remarked, where individuals are thus before the mind of the Spirit of God, the need of “mercy” is supposed and shown. “From God the Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love” — an expression found, as far as I remember, nowhere else. It was just in its right place here. Satan was undermining the glory of “the Son of the Father.” But if He be not this, how can I go to Him? How rest my soul, my all, on Him? How can God look to Him and His work for every soul that is brought to Himself? Hence the apostle’s source of joy. “I rejoiced greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth, as we have received a commandment from the Father.” Walking in truth is the result of having the truth. The truth produces truthfulness. The man who has not got the truth cannot possibly walk in truth, and will not long wear the semblance of it. To walk thus was the effect of the truth itself known: they walked in truth, “according as we received commandment from the Father.” “And now I beseech thee, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment to thee, but that which we had from the beginning, that we love one another.” It was the old, but ever new word: old, because it was manifested in Christ Himself; new, because it is true in us as in Him. Divine love flows from love, and reproduces itself in all who know Christ the truth. But what is love? “And this is love:” not independency of each other, not agreeing to differ, or any of those inventions of men which are not only a departure from the truth, but in point of fact morally evil and injurious. “This is love, that we walk after his commandments.” You cannot separate it from Christ; you cannot separate it from obedience. It is love in exercise, and it is also love that is communicated by faith in Jesus. “This is the commandment, That, as ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it.” Now he gives the reason why he writes thus solemnly to this lady and her children. “For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not Jesus Christ coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist.” “Many deceivers are entered into the world;” and therefore it is needful, yea imperative, to press the claims of the truth of God. “Who confess not Jesus Christ coming in the flesh.” It is put here rather differently from its shape in the first Epistle. There the allusion was to the fact, but this as stamping a permanent character on Christ — the Christ that came. Here it is not so much a question of His having come, but, as it seems to me, indicating if possible a deeper shade of infidelity. No doubt the same persons are referred to, but it would seem as having developed their infidelity rather more. For there is the rejection not only of the fact, but even of its possibility.

They conceived the thought that in some way or another it was derogatory to Him. They denied, some His deity, some His humanity. In commenting on 1 John 4:1-21, I have already remarked that “Jesus Christ come in the flesh” supposes neither His deity alone, nor His humanity only, but both, There is no propriety in the expression, it appears to me, unless it means both united in the same person. In point of fact it is the veering to one side or the other — choosing a part of the truth of Christ so as to set aside the rest’ that is so fruitful a source of error here and everywhere, though here most fatally. “This is the deceiver and the antichrist.” It is far worse than bringing in division and offence, bad as these are; nay, it is far more serious than even the undermining of morality, ruinous as this must be. To sap or corrupt morality is no doubt to destroy oneself, and perhaps often others; but this is to defame and degrade Christ, the Son of the Father. This, then, is a bolder effort of Satan, and therefore John calls one guilty of it not only “the deceiver” (every false teacher is more or less a deceiver), but in this case also “the antichrist.” Hence he calls them to look at home diligently lest they should stray. For God alone keeps the soul, and this by and in the truth. “Look to yourselves, that we lose not those things which we have wrought,” (of which the apostles had been the instrument,) “but that we receive a full reward.” Then he lays down the great principle in verse 9: — Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son.” It is a larger principle than simply denying Christ coming in the flesh. No matter where it is, or how it is, if you overthrow the person of Christ, you transgress the doctrine of Christ. In the seventh verse we had a particular case; but from it the Spirit of God rises up to this statement of truth which meets every such cue. “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ” (that is, in the teaching which the Holy Ghost has given in His word about Christ, not about His work, but about His person), “hath not God” in any sense or measure, now that Christ is preached. The greatest error about His work is not so directly fatal to the soul, because it does not so immediately assail the personal glory of the Lord Jesus. Here it is the doctrine of Christ Himself; and as one must beware of straying at first, let him also beware of not continuing in the doctrine of Christ. A man might have professed His name, and gone on some time with the assembly of God, accepted as a believer, or even a teacher; but if he does not abide in the truth of Christ, it does not signify what he may have been, it matters not in the least how much he may seemingly have been blessed, it is all over with him if he does not abide in the doctrine of Christ, and it becomes a necessity, not merely for the safety of oneself and others, but for God’s glory, which is concerned here more sensitively than anywhere else. “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God.” It might be said that at any rate a man might have the truth of the Old Testament, as there were such before Christ was manifested in the world; and if the person fails to enter into all the truth that Christianity has told out, can he be worse off than those who lived and died before Jesus came? The answer is that such special pleading is all in vain; he is incomparably guiltier and worse off, because now the standard is not what God once gave, but what He is giving now in a Christ fully revealed. Therefore it will not do to talk of what others knew not. This is an important practical criterion; because, although not to the same extent, it does meet the difficulty which people constantly allege founded on what their forefathers did — possibly excellent men — two or three hundred years ago. What is that to the present moment? If God by His Spirit causes His truth to reach us in a form and power suited to this day, if God brings it home more clearly on this point or that, these are the things which put the soul under a fresh responsibility; and this seems indicated in the form in which the Spirit of God deals with the error here. “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God.” It is not only that he lacks the blessedness of the Christian revelation, but he has not God — he has no part nor lot with God at all.

The Old Testament saints had God variously revealed. They received His word and rejoiced, according to the measure of their faith, in the truth as God then made it known to them. But now that Christ is come, now that the Holy Ghost has been sent down, now that the unfolding of Christ’s personal glory, of His exaltation, and of the infinite grace of His work, has been proclaimed, it is altogether hopeless to seek a cover of present unbelief under the ignorance of past years. It is the present unfolding of God’s mind that puts every soul to the test. Therefore not to accept it, and not to abide in it when it is received, to go back from it or to transgress, swerving to one side or the other, or abandoning it, comes to the same substantial sin and ruin. On the other hand, here. is the comfort for the elect lady and her children, and for any one else who cleaves to the truth. “He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son.” There is great blessedness in thus abiding, brethren; it is a grand thing not to be easily shaken, not to be moved to and fro by every wind of doctrine, more particularly in anything about Christ. Beware of this. Weigh seriously every thought, no matter from whom it may come — any word that even seems to turn you away from what you have, and to weaken the assurance you have from God. Never allow yourself to be shaken from old truth, if indeed you have it and know it. At the same time always hold your soul open for more; and take care that you do not confound notions you have gathered (perhaps from tradition, possibly from your own mind) with the truth of Christ, lest, when the tradition is touched, you may begin to yield to the spirit of unbelief, and either give up truth you used (or seemed at least) to hold, or burst out against the truth of God in others who know it better than yourself. In these things assuredly we need to have the promised guidance of the Holy Ghost. We cannot start or go on without it, nor would we do so even if we could. It is the very blessedness of our souls to be kept by so holy a guide and in safe companionship. But then, just as in our ordinary walk, if we live in the Spirit, we must walk in the Spirit; so also, if we have been taught of the Spirit, we must go forward and persevere in the Spirit. This does not in the smallest degree clash with “abiding.” The only way to be kept is holding fast what God has really taught us, yet using this as the groundwork for making progress. Such is the true way to “abide.” “He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son.” Now that the doctrine of Christ is fully brought out in the word of God, the more sure it is that there is nothing to add. Impossible to discover a truth of God that is not already in the Bible. But there is not a little to learn which, I am persuaded, is there already. We must not confound these two things. Who would assume that you and I know all that is in the Bible? If then a line of truth be pointed out anywhere in scripture, do not calumniously pretend that it is some further development, because you have been so dull as not to see it.

It is the very point of faith to know that as God Himself is infinite, so His word contains boundless riches for us. There is that which may by the Holy Ghost be always apprehended more and more fully; and yet after all it is the same holy deposit as was given to the Christian from the beginning. The apostle now comes to the practical consequence. He has laid down the principle in the ninth verse: now comes the practice. “If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds.” Mark how it is put. It is not — bring not the true humanity, or the proper Deity; because Satan might change the doctrine somewhat, so as to save appearances for the simple. Therefore it would not do merely to specify some one particular form of error, because then the devil would have only to evade that form, and there would be no resource. But here it stands firm yet comprehensive: if a man come to you, and does not bring this doctrine (that is, the doctrine of Christ do not you receive him. No matter what may be the particular manner in which the enemy has warped his soul, and through him dishonoured Christ; no matter what may be the peculiar nature of the false doctrine, — if a man come to you, and bring not the divinely revealed doctrine, the Holy Ghost’s teaching of Christ in the written word, — “receive him not into your house, neither bid him greeting.” That is to say, do not bid him a common salutation.

There is nothing about “God speed” in the word (χαίρειν), though “good speed” might be tolerable. The stronger terms are merely put in by the English translators. It was the ordinary form of courteous greeting every day. This is to my mind a serious thought. Do you think, my brethren, that we all follow this out as we ought? Are we not conscious of shrinking from the cost, and of a fear if not anxiety lest we should be counted uncourteous? I can speak for one certainly; and I doubt much whether in general we are sufficiently alive to the solemnity of what Satan is always pursuing. More particularly let me add, that we stand in a position, failure in which tends to expose all God’s children to the efforts of the enemy. There are none, I presume, whom he would so much desire to drag into the mire, and thus defile the name of Jesus. If then such an one come, of course without the doctrine, yet taking the ground of truth, you are to receive him not. Where? To the Lord’s table? No; this could not have been said to the elect lady and her children. The exhortation is quite independent of public fellowship. The question of the Lord’s table is not even raised.

They are not even to receive him into their private house, nor to accost him with common greeting. Why this most severe and peremptory exclusion? “For he that biddeth him greeting” (not so much as receiving him into the house, but interchanging words of courtesy with such a man, knowingly, of course, and deliberately) “is a partaker of his evil deeds.” You, as a confessor of Christ, put your sanction on this denier of Christ. You could not do worse except deny Christ yourself; indeed, in a certain sense you are more guilty than even if you were drawn for a time into the abominable thing yourself, because then you would be honestly acting out what you had been deceived by Satan into believing; but the more you hold the true Christ, if you tamper with those who do not, the more shameless you are in unfaithfulness to Christ. To some this may seem strong; but who has written it? who urges it? Is it a man without God? Is it not the Spirit of God who charges us in the name of the Lord Jesus thus sensitively to feel for the truth of Christ? Let us not be deaf to such a claim from such a person. Let us not reserve our warm feelings for our friends, and leave only indifference for the name of Jesus. He that greets kindly the man that brings not the doctrine of Christ is a traitor to Christ. Let me here repeat that it is not “God speed,” for this might give a false idea. It sounds as if we were wishing him well in his work. This would be commonly inferred by one unaccustomed to read the language of the Holy Ghost. But it conveys nothing of the sort — merely a Greek “good morning” — what would pass in the current language of the day among one’s fellows. He then who has anything to say to the defamer of Christ which could be fairly interpreted as a sanction, let it be ever so small, becomes a partaker of his evil deeds. It is not a question of being a partner in his evil doctrine. The elect lady and her children were of course believed to hold sound doctrine; but they are here peremptorily called to refuse any measure of countenance to one who did not bring the doctrine of Christ — not only not to receive him into the house, but not to salute him outside it. It was a part of the loyalty they owed to Christ. John concludes thus: “Having many things to write to you, I would not with paper and ink: but I hope to come to you, and speak mouth to mouth, that your joy may be full. The children of thine elect sister greet thee.” There was hearty love, but it was only in the truth, of which Christ alone is the test and obedience the effect.