3 John

Bible Passage:  3 John

3 John is the shortest book in the Bible and with only one chapter. Elder John wrote this letter to this person called Gaius. In this letter, he praises Gaius and Demetrius but warns of Diotrephes.

What are Elder John’s praises to these good Christians?

Gaius

• He walks in the truth
• He has good testimony from the brethren
• He is faithful in loving the brethren and strangers

Demetrius

• He has a good testimony from all
• His is a testimony of the truth

“I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.” 3 John 1:4

Elder John says he has no greater than joy than to hear that his children walk in the truth. What is walking in the truth? It can be likened to practicing the Word of God. Elder John being the older one and who guided Gaius expresses his heart felt joy that Gaius was walking in the truth.

Walking in the truth has quite a few aspects to it.

1. Seeking to understand God’s Words. Understanding of Jesus and His love for us
2. Keeping God’s commandments of loving man and loving God
3. Spiritual nurturing of one self. To be holy just as God is Holy.
4. Preaching the Truth to others for salvation

In the aspect of love, Elder John praises Gaius for his faithful love of the brethren and strangers. It is out of Gaius love for mankind that he looked after the brethren and strangers in need. In church, we often hear that the church lacks love in some way or another. Sometimes we may hear from brethrens that they feel no warmth in the church. Others may give the reason, or excuse that the church is big and that is the norm.

Regardless how people feel or want to defend that the church has love, we should humbly strive forward in loving our brethrens more since none of us are perfect in love. More importantly, we should take the step forward to really care for the foreign brethrens and for the truth seekers that come.

Elder John gives the encouragement that if we send them (foreign brethren or workers) in a manner worthy to God, we will do well. This reminds me of the story of how Abraham welcomed the three visitors. As the host, he offered the best to these visitors even though they were strangers. I could say that was first class service! In so doing, he actually entertained angels and the Lord God!

“Let brotherly love continue. Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some have unwittingly entertained angels.” Heb 13:1-2

Recently, my wife and I had the opportunity to send off a brother from overseas. We also had the opportunity from God to bring this brother out for meals and to allow him to taste some Singapore food. Actually, he did not want anybody to send him off as he is shy in nature. However we felt that we could send him off given that we live only 10min from the airport. So despite him keeping the secret very tightly, we still went to the airport. We guessed which airlines he would take and ‘strategically’ position ourselves at the counters. Surprisingly that day the airlines were delayed for many hours and this brother did not know. We gave ourselves 5min to wait for him at one of the airline counter, seeing that many of the passengers were not informed of the delay. Amazingly, he appeared within 5min! He was pretty shock to see us as he kept a close secret on his flight details.  However, we thank God that we were there. God gave us the chance to bring him to our house to wait for the airplane and in the process He gave us an opportunity to be hospitable to this foreign brother. If we were not there, this brother would have to wait more than 6h by himself!

Being well traveled myself, waiting 5h or more in the airport without anything to do except staring at the walls is difficult. Indeed we felt joy to be able to help out this foreign brother. While I was in USA for half a year in 2004, I have also experienced the love showered from the brethren there; this love can be infectious for the good course. Once we have experienced such love, we would like to share that love with others.

Lastly, what does Elder John say about Diotrephes?

• He loves to have the preeminence among the brethren
• He does not receive Elder John and other workers
• He uses malicious words to criticize workers of God
• He prevents other brethren from being hospitable to these workers of God
• He does evil and is not of God

Diotrephes is a stark contrast to Gaius and Demetrius. This person loves to have the preeminence among the brethren. What is preeminence? It means surpass and be distinguished. He could be likened to the Pharisees who love to bask in the limelight of being more holy or superior to others. Not only being proud Diotrephes does not receive workers of the truth, speak evil of them and even prevents other brethren for being hospitable to these workers.

Elder John warns us not to do evil like Diotrephes. Pride is evil and from the devil. Ironically, pride can get puff up when one walks in the truth more. When one feels that he is righteous in keeping the Word, he may downplay the grace and mercy from Jesus. In the process one can become self-righteous and start to criticize other brethren for their weaknesses. For example the Pharisees pride themselves as Abraham offspring. They pride themselves for receiving the law of God and for keeping the law in the physical sense. However, what does Jesus say of them? Jesus calls these people as whitewashed tombs and hypocrites.

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” Rom 3:23-24

Probably a way to keep ourselves from being proud is to constantly remind ourselves that we have been justified freely by His grace. It is not of our good works that we do that we are justified but it is purely the mercy of Jesus on us. Once we are able to humble ourselves, we will be able to serve others and to love the brethren and strangers more.

May Jesus, the author of love and truth help us to walk in His truth.