For the Sake of the Name

3 John

Connection/Tension/Context

This is our final sermon from our series The Letters of John. It’s been a sweet journey together listening to this Apostle and servant from God as he has instructed our church. Like 2 John, this letter is about how we treat travelling missionaries who want to sleep over at our homes. And while that probably has never happened to most of us, the themes in this letter address our hearts today. This is still communication from God to his church to transform us.  

This letter is going to speak to God’s global purposes and his determination to rescue sinners.

Do any of you feel like you struggle to keep God’s glory and his purpose to rescue sinners forefront on your mind throughout the day?

Do you struggle to be passionate about God’s plan to rescue all kinds of people? Do other concerns and desires crowd out your heart and take your focus away?

If so, then all of us need this letter together. One problem we have is that our hearts are not yet like Jesus’s, and God has given us his word that they might be. So, we turn now to his book!

If you are visiting this morning and don’t yet know Jesus, we are so glad you are here. "I pray that as we learn about God's character today, he will give you a desire to know him even more." Let’s turn to 3 John. It’s close to the end of the Bible, just two chapters before Revelation, the final book. Again, we will have a 3 point outline. It’s

I.                  Live for spiritual children

II.                 Live for the nations

III.               Live according to good examples

 

Let’s begin with point 1, “Live for spiritual children.”

 

Revelation

I.                  Live for the sake of spiritual children (vv. 1-4)

1 The elder to the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth. 2 Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul. 3 For I rejoiced greatly when the brothers came and testified to your truth, as indeed you are walking in the truth. 4 I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

 

John refers to himself as “the elder” again, the term this church would have recognized.[1] However this time, he does not write this letter to a church, but to a single person named “Gaius.” Who is Gaius and why did John write to him?

a.      Gaius was someone John cared deeply about (v. 1, “whom I love in truth”). Three times in this letter, he refers to him as “beloved” (v. 2, 5, 11), a term we could translate, “dear friend.”[2]

b.      Gaius was a faithful believer who was “walking in the truth” (v. 3). He was also likely a leader in the house church John is referring to in this letter (since John chooses to write to him).

c.       Lastly, he also seems to be a disciple of John’s- that is, someone John led to the Lord or someone John brought to Christian maturity (or both). We see that in verse 4 when John writes, after writing about Gaius’s faithfulness, that, “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.”

In that verse, John opens his heart to us to show us something great about the Christian life. To follow Jesus is to pursue joys that are higher than the pleasures this world offers. We get to enjoy spiritual delights such as enjoying time in the presence of our Father.

And here, John points to one of the highest joys a Christian can have on this side of eternity: experiencing their spiritual children growing mature and persevering in following Jesus. Now, he’s seeing the fruit of his labor as his spiritual child brings life and blessing to the church he is leading through a crisis. John is witnessing more happen for God in the world than he could ever accomplish alone because someone else he raised up is serving God.

As a parent, your heart swells when you first hear there is a child on the way, swells when that child is born, swells when they first learn to sit up or crawl, and so on. You get such joy because you’ve participated in creating and sustaining the life of another human being.

And yet, the miracle John has participated in here, or making a spiritual child, is greater still. In becoming a natural parent, you participate in creating and sustaining a life that lasts for seventy or eighty years. In becoming a spiritual parent, you participate in creating and sustaining a life that lasts forever and can do the same for other people. This is why we live for spiritual children.

Also, the greatest fear a parent has is that their child be harmed or killed, especially when a parent knows they are in a dangerous situation. Gaius was in a spiritually dangerous situation, facing threats from within and without, and yet, God kept him safely walking in the truth, and John is so happy! 

While there’s so much more to say here, we must move on. Yet, this first point, living for spiritual children is going to lead us to the second point Living for the nations. A desire to see God’s family grow is necessarily going to lead you to care about all kinds of people in all kinds of places. Let’s move on to point 2,

II.                 Live for the nations (vv. 5-8)

Now John is going to transition the main purpose for which he wrote. It’s not entirely different from what we just mentioned (of having spiritual children), but rather an expansion of it. God’s family is meant to include every kind of person from every place on earth. It should certainly include our children, our neighbors, and it should also include people from tribes and cultures far away from here who have never heard the name of Jesus. This desire for them to be followers of Jesus inspires this next section of his letter. He writes next,

5 Beloved, it is a faithful thing you do in all your efforts for these brothers, strangers as they are, 6 who testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their journey in a manner worthy of God.

Now, John writes about what specifically he admires and affirms so strongly in Gaius. He serves and supplies the needs of travelling missionaries who go out to spread the message of the gospel. We know that because John clarifies that “they have gone out for the sake of the name” in verse 7.  

John affirms Gaius for his work of supporting those spreading Jesus’s glory throughout the world. His efforts likely included showing hospitality and letting these travelling teachers stay at his home. There were not hotels and inns like we have today, so travelling teachers depended on the hospitality of local Christians.[3] John mentions that these travelling teachers were “strangers,” showing even more clearly how selflessly he served.[4]

Showing hospitality to our brothers and sisters in Christ is a sweet practice we should practice. Yet, there is something even deeper going on here. Letting these missionaries stay at his house would have been the way Gaius supported their work both economically and emotionally. These missionaries would have experienced his support personally for their labors as well as having their physical needs met. The example we receive from Gaius is that faithful Christians provide emotional and economic support to those bringing the gospel to the nations.

John wants their support for these missionaries to be full. He encourages Gaius to send them in a manner “worthy of God.” That is, he sends them with what they economically, spiritually, and emotionally need to complete their journey. To send someone in a manner “worthy of God” is the strongest way John could say, “make sure to do this well.” The God we are serving together and the message they are bearing determine the level of importance we place on their journey and how enthusiastically we support them.

We, likewise, should try to send missionaries out from our church, “in a manner worthy of God.” Next, John is going to get deeper into why we should prioritize focusing our hearts and finances on these people and this purpose:

7 For they have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles.

a.      The reason a missionary leaves home and goes into the unfamiliar and uncomfortable is “for the sake of the name.” The name in this verse is the name of Jesus, which is who John commonly refers to when he uses the phrase “name” (see 1 John 5:16).

Someone’s name is associated with their reputation and fame. A “big name” is someone whose fame and reputation has spread to many people.

We all know (at least in our heads- may we also grasp this in our hearts) that seeking fame for our own name is a vain and fleeting goal. Yet, there is one person for whom seeking his fame is a worthy task that we will never regret. As we have seen through John’s letters, Jesus is the perfect rescuer of sinners, and thus he alone is worthy of worship and glory. So, it’s good for us to devote our lives to seeing that he gets it from all kinds of people. When we seek glory for ourselves, we are glory thieves- we are taking what rightly belongs to king Jesus. 

Missionaries aim at the very same thing God’s heart aims at, his global glory spreading throughout the whole creation bringing worship, life, and happiness. We have tried to aim our entire church community at the very same target. That’s why our vision statement (where we are trying to go) is,

Our vision is to glorify God by multiplying worshippers of Jesus and healthy churches in the Twin Cities and beyond.

We want to multiply those who behold God’s glory here because this is where God in his wisdom placed us. Yet, we don’t want to stop here because his worthiness demands worldwide worship and until that task is done we must not rest. We must not only seek to follow Jesus in everyday life here, we must also seek to send out laborers to places who don’t yet know the name of Jesus.

Some of the boldest and most courageous missionaries since the Apostles lived in the 1700’s. Some of the greatest of that generation of missionaries was those who belonged to the Moravian missions movement. Two of their number were John Dober and David Nitschman who felt a call from God to preach the people in the West Indies in the gulf of Mexico to preach to African slaves who were enslaved by an atheist man and had no other way of hearing about Jesus.

When they couldn’t find any other way to the West Indies, they sold themselves into slavery so that they could board a ship that was headed to their destination. As they left their loved ones and families behind on shore, it is said they called back to them “May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of his suffering.”[5]  

I hope that we don’t have to send people out in the same way or into circumstances that difficult, yet I want us to seek to have the same burning heart of passion for the global glory of God among the nations. Whether we stay or go, God wants our hearts to burn with passion for his global reputation. He wants us to make that the reason we’re alive.

 

b.      Now let’s talk more about the people to whom we are sent. John writes about these missionaries that “they went out, accepting nothing from the Gentiles.” This is a strange statement. Who are the Gentiles and why did they not accept anything from them?

First, “gentile” is somewhat of an unfortunate word. Who has ever met someone and thought, “oh, there’s a gentile?” In the Old Testament, a “gentile” was someone from another nation outside of Israel- those outside the community of God’s people. In the New Testament, the “gentiles” would be those outside of the church. The church is the multi-ethnic people of God who trust Jesus, and the “gentiles” are those who don’t yet belong to God’s new people.[6]      

I think a more helpful word to use here would be “nations” rather than “gentile.” “Gentile” is an older English word that refers to this same reality but is not as clear today.

The word “nations” brings us back in the story of the bible to the beginning to the tower of Babel. At this point in the story, people were already separated from the garden, the source of life. Rebelliously, they tried to build their own source of life apart from God, the city and tower of Babel (Gen 11:4). God justly responded by confusing their language and scattering them over the face of the Earth (v. 9). This vast multitude of different cultural and ethnic groups make up the nations we experience today.

The separation of languages and cultures brings about yet another degree of separation from the source of life and lostness. Yet we know that from the beginning, God’s heart has been to rescue these nations. In the very next story in the Bible, God calls Abraham and gives him promises that will result in international blessing for all the families of the world (Gen 12:1-3).

Today, that source of international blessing has arrived. It is no longer a place (the garden) it’s a person and a message (Jesus and the gospel). And, Jesus has commanded that his message would cross geographical and cultural boundaries so that all the nations could know and praise him (Matt 28:18-20).

In fact, the only way for the gospel message to go forward in this age is for people to cross cultures, learn new languages, and bring the gospel to new nations and peoples in loving, meaningful ways- because people sacrificially did this is the only reason you or I are Christians at all. We would know nothing of Jesus, nothing of his gospel, and be utterly dead in our sins and trespasses were it not for missionaries. And the challenge of this text is that there are still people groups living in that same state today. There are a lot of things in our world today that should break our hearts, yet nothing more than the thousands of cultural groups in the world who have never heard the name of Jesus or have little or no or little access to the gospel.[7]

Likely that reason that they were to “accept nothing from the nations” is that they didn’t want to come among people in a confusing manner. That is, sharing with them a message of abundant life but also having such lack that they had to beg for food, water, and shelter.[8] In the same way, we should also supply the needs of our missionaries, as John writes in the next verse,

8 Therefore we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth.

Now, it has been famously said that you either, “go, send, or disobey.”[1] All of us should pray about whether the Lord wants us to leave this land for lands with less access to the gospel. And, in the meantime, all of us should eagerly look for ways to support our brothers and sisters who have gone through prayer and financial giving.

Whether or not we’ve taken the step yet to go, all of us are called to join the global quest for God’s glory. All of us are called to be a part of the missionary movement. The way to participate in the movement if you haven’t yet gone is to pray and to give. That’s what John means when he says, “we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth.” We become fellow workers with those spreading the truth of the gospel when we support them and send them in a manner worthy of God.

So, what’s one way you can do that? The best way is to support missionaries from our own church family since we have a special partnership together in the gospel. Many of you support Beth Lane and her work in Scotland. We’re also going to have the opportunity to hear from another family whom we have a unique opportunity to support right now. They are praying about visiting a country with 85 million souls and 85 different ethnic/linguistic groups (think nations). Of these 85 different ethnic groups, 57 are unreached, meaning that they have no meaningful access to the source of life- that’s almost 70% of the people groups in this country.[9] Oh, how we should want to support them because of our burning zeal for Jesus and our compassion for these people who live in spiritual darkness.

This letter then takes a turn to what feels a lot like a different subject matter, but is still relevant for what we’ve talked about so far.

III.               Live according to good examples (vv. 9-15)

9 I have written something to the church, but Diotrephes, who likes to put himself first, does not acknowledge our authority. 10 So if I come, I will bring up what he is doing, talking wicked nonsense against us. And not content with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers, and also stops those who want to and puts them out of the church.

11 Beloved, do not imitate evil but imitate good. Whoever does good is from God; whoever does evil has not seen God. 12 Demetrius has received a good testimony from everyone, and from the truth itself. We also add our testimony, and you know that our testimony is true.

 

I wish we had more time to explore the riches of these verses, but sadly we do not. The big point here is that John wants us to live according to good examples rather than poor ones. He says in verse 11, “Dear friend, do not imitate evil but imitate good.” He then lists the bad example of Diotrephes who seeks to make himself first (the exact opposite of seeking God’s global glory) and opposes these missionaries.

On the other hand, John provides the good example of Demetrius. We don’t know what Demetrius did to be a good example, only that he was one that was worthy of imitating.

When it comes to good examples of living for the name of Jesus among the nations, we have no shortage of good examples. In addition to many global minded people in our own church we can learn from (like the Schmidts, the Wilsons, Kristi Taylor, and alumni of Bethany school of missions), there are plentiful biographies of faithful people like William Carry, John Patton, and Amy Carmichael. Preparing this message has stirred me that I need to do more reading and pay attention to these examples.

If you find what I’m saying this morning really new and you don’t feel the passion yet that John does, that’s okay. Let’s just take steps together in that direction to care about what God cares about. One way to do that is to read the stories of those who “went out for the sake of the name.” If you would like a recommendation, please let me know and I would love to read a biography alongside you.  

 

Christ/Church

Near the end of his gospel story of Jesus’s life, John shares with us the identity of the first missionary and our connection to him. Here’s John 20:21,

21 Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.”

The modern word “missionary” comes from a Latin word meaning “mission” or “sending.” According to this verse, Jesus was the first sent one. He’s the first one who crossed cultures into a world that was unlike his own. He learned our customs, our ways of life, endured our pains, and ultimately died for our sins, to gather all his people to his Father. His lived, died, and rose again as the first missionary, the missionary from heaven who brought his people to the source of life- himself.

If you’re hear this morning, and you don’t yet know this Jesus who crossed worlds so that you would know him, please talk to me or someone else from our church.

Then notice our own identity in light of his identity, we are the sent ones whom the sent one commissions. All of us live like we are missionaries where we live, work, and play, some of us go to new nations and cultures without the gospel, and all of us pray and support that work as “fellow workers.”

Let’s pray together.

Reflection Questions

1.      Am I passionate about the nations knowing Jesus and receiving life?

2.      Am I engaging in supporting current missionaries through my prayer and financial gifts?

3.      Does God want me to take steps towards being a missionary that crosses cultures to declare the gospel?

Benediction

3 John 15 Peace be with you, church.

 

[1]  John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 19, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 225.

[2] Biblical Studies Press, The NET Bible First Edition; Bible. English. NET Bible.; The NET Bible (Biblical Studies Press, 2005), 3 Jn 5.

·        [3]  Findlay in John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 19, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 199–200.

·        [4]  Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset, and David Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, vol. 2 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997), 540.

 

[5] https://heartcrymissionary.com/mission-updates/gospel-driven-missions/

[6] John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 19, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 230.

 

[7] https://joshuaproject.net/

[8] John D. Barry et al., Faithlife Study Bible (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012, 2016), 3 Jn 7.

 

[9] https://joshuaproject.net/

 

[1] I originally heard this from John Piper