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Welcome to Daily Drive Time Devotions and our study together through the letter
of First John. Hi, this is Pastor Tom Holliday and we are in chapter 3 of First
John this week. Going to be beginning with verses 1-3 today, incredibly
encouraging verses about what God has done in our lives.

In fact, let me start by reading those verses. First John 3, 1-3, "How great is
the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of
God, and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it
did not know Him.

Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been
made known. But we know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall
see Him as He is. Everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He
is pure.

" These are verses all about what it means to be God's child. That's why they're
incredibly encouraging. What does it mean for you and I as we walk through this
world to be a child of God?

What does it mean for you and I to be able to call God our Father? Well there
are four things that are talked about in these three verses. What does it mean
to be God's child?

First it means that the Father's love is great. Secondly it means that the world
does not know us. Thirdly it means that there are things in our lives that have
not yet been made known.

And fourth it means that when we grow up, we're going to be like Him. That's
what it means to be a Father's child. When we grow up, we're going to be like
Him.

Let's cover each of those. First of all, it means that the Father's love is
great. How great is the love that the Father has, I love this word, has lavished
on us.

Lavished is this word that means an abundance, an overabundance of something in
your life, an over, over, overabundance of something in your life. God's love,
God's grace has been lavished on us as His children. And the first and the
greatest thing that it means to be God's child is that God is a God of love.

The first focus is not me, it's not you. The first focus when we talk about
being God's child is on God Himself. I wouldn't be a child of God except that
God decided to create me and then not only create me but reestablish His
relationship with me through Jesus Christ.

We are called children of God because God has a great love for us. You are
called a child of God when you come to know Him through His Son Jesus because of
God's great love for you. So take just a moment now in this day, whether you're
in your car listening to this or you're sitting at a computer or you're
listening to it through some headphones somewhere in the library or anywhere
else, take just a minute to rejoice in the fact that God loves you, loves you
more than you can imagine, loves you more than you could have ever hoped for.

That's what it means to be a child of God. That's the incredible and great
positive in being a child of God. Now, being a child of God doesn't have all
positives.

In fact, the next thing that John reminds us of is being a child of God means
that the world doesn't know us. The world doesn't know God. He's talking about
not just everybody in the world.

He's talking about, as we talked about last week, the world system, the without
God way of thinking in the world. And those in the world who don't know God
don't love people who are God's children. In fact, they want to reject those
kinds of people because, well, we always like people who are like us.

We don't like people who are unlike us. And John says very clearly here, the
world doesn't know us because it did not know him. How could you expect a world
that has rejected Jesus Christ and his love or someone that you know, let's make
this personal, who has rejected Jesus Christ and his love for their life to
understand your faith?

We think, well, if I just explain my faith to them, they'll understand and
they'll be rejoicing that I'm a child of God. If somebody's rejecting God in
their life, they're not going to rejoice that you're a child of God. It doesn't
make any sense to them.

It's confusing to them. In fact, it's often threatening to them. You have a
close friend.

You become a believer. You begin to follow Jesus Christ in your life and it
begins to change the way that you act. You're changing the way that you act
because you have a new relationship.

You have a new priority in your life. You're doing it joyfully. But your friend
who has not yet become a believer, they see you changing the way that you act.

You're not going to bars anymore. You're not watching the same kind of movies
anymore. The pornography that maybe you used to be interested in, you're not
talking about anymore.

In fact, you're beginning to reject in your life. All those things have begun to
change in your life. And your friend is threatened by that because he doesn't
want to change.

He doesn't want to change what he looks at. He doesn't want to change where he
goes. And he's thinking that you being a child of God, now you're going to try
to force him to change.

Now, the truth is, God doesn't force anyone to change. He invites all of us. He
doesn't force anyone.

But it's still threatening to those who have not yet become children of God. The
world doesn't know us. What does it mean to be God's child?

It means the Father's love is great. It means the world doesn't know us. But can
get to know him.

We're going to look at that later in this week. There's a third thing that it
means to be a child of God. It means that there are things in your life that
have not yet been made known.

Now we are children of God, he says in verse 2. But what we will be has not yet
been made known. What we're looking forward to in heaven, it's unknown to us.

Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13, "Now we see through a glass darkly, through a
mirror darkly. Then we shall see face to face. " It's almost like now that dark
glass, we see more of our reflection than the reality that's beyond it in heaven
and in eternity.

The truth of your life as a child of God is that there is a great deal of hope
right now, a great deal of change right now, a great deal of joy right now. But
there's also a great deal that has not yet been made known. And hope is hanging
on to what you don't know yet, trusting in him who said he will do it.

If you already knew it, Romans 8 says, if we already knew what it was, it
wouldn't be hope, it would just be knowing what was going to happen. No, we hang
on to it, not yet knowing all of it, but trusting him who said he would do this.
In your life, there are many, many, many, many positives that have not yet been
made known.

And you hang on to that and hope. But there are things that have been made
known. In fact, he says, here's one of them.

We know when he appears, we will be like him. That's the fourth thing. When we
grow up, we're going to be like him, just like the child of a parent.

You can look at the parent, you can look at the child, and you can see the
resemblance as a child. And you know when they grow up, they're going to be like
that parent. They're going to resemble them in appearance.

And oftentimes, you see they'll also want to do the same things. They'll have
the same interest, the same way of thinking. Same thing's true of you as a child
of God.

As you grow up, you become more and more like him. There's an incredible
statement in verse 2. We know that when he appears, Jesus Christ appears, we
shall be like him.

For we shall see him as he is. That is our greatest cause of hope. We shall be
like him.

Now catch this, because we shall see him as he is. Our greatest cause of hope is
that day. It's okay to look forward to tomorrow, to something that's happening
next year.

That's a good thing. But you can't build hope on that. Two reasons.

It's too unsure. You don't know if that event that you're looking forward to
tomorrow or next year is going to happen for sure. But there's also a second
reason.

Even if you're absolutely sure it's going to happen, it's not enough. It's not
enough. Any event that happens in this world, we all know it's temporary.

It's not going to last. I need to build my hope on something that is secure. A
foundation that's going to last forever.

And the fact that when he appears, I'm going to be like him, like Jesus Christ.
That is something to build my hope on. And that hope has a purifying power in
our lives.

Verse 3 says, "Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself just as he is
pure. " You want to live a life of purity in your thoughts, in your actions?
Hope has the power to do that in your life, to draw you toward a life of purity.

The hope of what you will be gives you strength to start living that way today.
You see, Satan wants you to look back to what you were so that you'll lose hope
and fall to temptation. God encourages you to look forward to what you will be
so that you will gain hope and purify yourself just as he is pure.

And what am I looking forward to? What's the key in this passage? The key in
this passage to hope, the key in this passage to change is its seeing.

We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he really is. One day when Jesus
comes again, I'm going to see him clearly for who he is. Now, through God's
word, I can begin to see who Jesus really is, but it's confused by my thoughts,
it's confused by my temptations, it's confused by my lack of knowledge, it's
confused by my selfishness.

I'm seeing through a glass darkly, but one day I shall see him face to face and
I'll be like him. You see him. I look forward to that day, but that does not
mean that today I can't start in this process.

You see, the better I see him now, the better I see Jesus for who he really is,
the love that he really has, the power that he really wants to give in my life,
the joy that he wants to be a part of my everyday life, the changes and growth
that he wants to bring about, the character that he has and how he wants to
bring that character into my heart and life, the better I see Jesus for who he
really is, the better I can begin to live that out of my life. So as we pray
today, let's take a moment to pray about who Jesus really is and ask Jesus to
help us to see him today. That's what we ask, Lord.

Jesus, help us to see you for who you really are in our lives today. There's so
many things we could focus on. There's a lot of things we have to do today, but
I pray, we pray together, that instead of focusing on just the events of our day
or just the discouragement or encouragement in our hearts, you'd help us to
focus on you, who you really are, what you really want to do in our lives.

Jesus, help us to see you today, to see your character, to see your truth, to
see your actions, to see your power, to see you as God in human flesh. And as we
see you, Lord, we pray that the truth of this verse would come about in one
small way, little by little in our lives today, that we begin to become more and
more like you as we look forward to that day when we will be like you, because
we'll see you for who you really are. We pray this, Jesus, in your name, amen.

Tomorrow, we're going to be looking at verses four through six, and we're going
to be talking about one final evidence that you are God's child.