GET REAL
Part 5
Chapter 7: Purity
Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore, the world does not know us because it did not know Him.
1 John 3:1 NKJV
In this verse, the phrase ‘manner of love’ comes from a Greek word meaning “from what country, race, or tribe”. In other words, God’s love is totally foreign to humanity unless it manifests through someone abiding in that love. So, this verse could read, “from what far realm?” “what unearthly love” or “how other-worldly?” because you will never find that quality of love here!
One of the results of this love in action is that we are called sons and daughters of God. John uses the word teknon which means “born children”. This echoes what Jesus said:
You must be born again…
John 3:7, KJV
This is the crux of everything John has previously been saying. You have either been born again, or you have not. If you have not, you will live a lifestyle of habitual sin. If you have, you will not live in habitual sin. Jesus told Nicodemus:

Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again [born from above, making God your Father], he cannot see the kingdom of God.
John 3:3, KJV
John tells us that the world does not know those who have been born from above because it did not know Jesus, the One sent from above. While the world may recognize us as Christians, it has no understanding or appreciation of the nature of believers since unsaved people have never had a relationship with or knowledge of God. As far as the people in the world are concerned, children of God might just as well have come to earth from a strange planet. As Jesus said:

If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
John 15:18, NKJV
Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.
1 John 3:2 NKJV
The phrase when He is revealed refers to the rapture of the Church. John might as well ask, “What shall we be like following his appearance?” None of us know the answer to that question. What we will be when he returns has never at any time been fully explained or shown to us. The use of the word ‘what’ suggests something unspeakable, something akin to the likeness of God. We do not yet know what we will be; we know only that we will be like him. The Apostle Paul wrote of our coming transformation:

For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.
Philippians 3:20-21 NKJV
Here, ‘transform’ comes from the word meaning “to change in appearance,” and conformed means “having the same form or shape; to be like.” John uses the Greek oida for know, meaning “full and absolute” knowledge. Though we cannot comprehend exactly what this means, we are certain that when he appears, we will be changed in appearance, taking on the same form or likeness as Jesus.

And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.
1 John 3:3 NKJV
When John says all who have this hope in him, the word translated ‘in’ is epi, which means “upon.” Our hope is fundamentally resting upon the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. The term ‘purifies himself’ here, means the hope of one day being like the Lord Jesus arouses the determination to be pure like him. This brings into play the will of the Christian, which carries that resolve into action. In utter dependence on the Holy Spirit, the Christian puts sin out of his life and keeps it out. Next, John launches into the topic of that sin:

Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness. And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin.
1 John 3:4-5, NKJV
‘Commit’ here is in the verb tense that means to do something habitually. God is saying that it’s utterly incompatible to be a child of God and maintain a lifestyle of habitual sin. The word translated ‘lawlessness’ in this verse is anomia. Nomos is the Greek word for law, and the “a” in front of it means literally “no law.”
Sin and lawlessness are identical. Then the phrase ‘take away’ comes from a word meaning, “to lift and carry away.” We see the same Greek Word used here when Jesus cleared the vendors out of the temple in Jerusalem:

John 2:16 And He said to those who sold doves, ‘Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!

Just as those vendors carried away the tables, sheep, and oxen out of the temple, Jesus carried away our sins from us, never to return! Next, John addresses a key to freedom from sins pull:

Whoever abides in Him does not sin. Whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him.
1 John 3:6, NKJV
John is not teaching here that a child of God never sins, but that a born-again child of God does not habitually sin like the unsaved. He or she is not turned toward sin like the unbeliever.
Then the word ‘seen’ here means “to see with discernment.” The person living in continual sin has not seen and discerned who Jesus truly is and turned to Him.
1 John 3:7 Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous.
The word ‘deceive’ means “to lead astray.” Don’t be led into believing that someone who habitually practices sin is saved. The message of false teachers that a person can live in sin and still be saved is a lie. Next, John once again gets really real!

He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose, the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.
1 John 3:8, NKJV
Anyone who is continually doing sin, that makes sin his business or practice is ‘of’ (Greek word ek, meaning “out of” or “sourced by”) the devil. This person has not been born again. His sinful tendencies, issued from the totally depraved nature inherited from Adam, find their ultimate source in the devil who brought about the downfall of our first parents. Jesus said to the Pharisees:

If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; nor have I come of Myself, but He sent Me. But you are of [Greek ek] your Father the devil, and the desires of your Father you want to do…
John 8:42-44, NKJV
John uses the word ‘destroy’, which is from a word meaning “to loosen, dissolve.” Jesus has loosened and dissolved the works of the devil. By his blood on the cross, he has paid for sin, made a way of escape from the enemy of men’s souls, and defeated the purposes of the devil. By that blood, Jesus will soon bring about Satan’s complete downfall when he returns and casts the enemy into the lake of fire.