The Letters of John
the NIV
APPLICATION
COMMENTARY
From biblical text … to contemporary life
GARY M. BURGE
Dealing with conflict paralyzes most of us. It is painful because if we are honest and confront people with their misbehavior, relationships may be ruined and in some cases whole communities fractured. In a church context, the paralysis is the same. There are occasionally those who step forward with alluring influence and erroneous teaching, and they gain a following. Our impulse is to correct them gently and heal what divisions may have occurred so that the community will remain intact. The unity of the body of Christ is often foremost on our minds.
These verses are interesting because John has experienced precisely this sort of conflict. His church has been ruptured by members who have departed—members who have split the congregation—because they saw things differently. But although the situation is painful, John is not paralyzed by it. He interprets it and tells the remaining members of his congregation how to address it.
(1) Building an eschatological climate. Throughout history the church has often suffered the assaults of heresy and persecution and tried to interpret them eschatologically. That is, when the Christian life begins to bear the weight of these troubles, when signs of tribulation increase, life is approximating the climate that characterizes the end of time, and therefore the church takes hope and is warned. We can graph the church’s life as an irregular line that moves between eras of comfort and eras of persecution. This cycle has repeated itself for centuries, and in some cases Christians have misunderstood their histories, urging an apocalyptic message that the end is at hand.
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