Day #361

Sermon - Audio
2 & 3 John - Reading
2 & 3 John - Audio

Daily Insights - Please Comment

2 & 3 John

2 John

v. 1 – The elect lady and her children probably refers to a local congregation and its members.

v. 6 – The commandments that the readers have heard from the beginning must constantly steer their lives. Commandment (singular) probably refers to the love commandment introduced by Jesus. (John 13:34-35)

v. 7-11 – John spoke strongly against the false teaching that Jesus had not come in the flesh. The deceivers were Docetists who denied the reality of Christ’s human nature.

v. 12 – Doctrinal deviation threatens the joy of the church because it destroys unity and imperils the approving presence of Christ in personal lives and the corporate assembly.

v. 13 – Children of your elect sister are the believers in the congregation from which John writes.

3 John

v. 1-4 – The recipient of the letter Gaius faces a troublemaker named Diotrephes. John encourages Gaius to remain steadfast in the face of opposition.

v. 3 – Apparently John had been visited by Christians from Gaius’s church, who told John of Gaius’s faithful Christian life.

v. 8 – John affirms Gaius’s work on the behalf of faithful laborers, even though they are “strangers”. Not everyone is called to go minister elsewhere. But all Christ’s followers are called to play their part in this enterprise.

v. 12 – Normal postal service could not be entrusted with Christian correspondence like this letter. So someone like Demetrius served as courier.