Insurance coverage has become a hotly debated topic in our country today. Regardless of your views, you probably recognize its value when surgery is necessary, or your house is damaged by fire or flood. During such crises, you find some level of peace when your policy covers the cost of surgery or rebuilding your home.
We often approach biblical assurance in much the same way.
We are looking for some deeds of love in our policy statement of faith that assures us against future calamity or judgment. This way of assurance often leads to hopelessness if you are constantly looking for enough deeds to assure your heart of God’s love. Alternatively, some will drift to the other extreme and confidently place their policy booklet of faith in the filing cabinet and neglect love altogether. This leads to unfounded optimism because it leaves us without the witness of the Spirit (I John 3:24; 4:12 – 13).
The apostle John however will focus our attention to the root and fruit of love whereby we may assure our hearts before Him in love (I John 3:19).
What Is Biblical Assurance of Salvation?
“In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother” (I John 3:10).
The two distinguishing marks that separate God’s children and the devil’s is righteousness and love.
The apostle joins them with the negative conjunction “neither” (and, also, even, too, etc.) establishing the necessity of love with righteousness to assure our hearts before him (I John 3:14). This bond is grounded upon the Spirit’s work in the new birth and the principle of life or seed He implants within the sinner (I John 3:9).
Assurance then is based on the certainty of the Spirit’s work in applying redemption and thereby breaking the power of canceled sin. Indeed, Jesus Christ came to release us from the devil’s captivity (I John 3:8b, II Timothy 2:25 – 26) and sin’s dominion, not sin’s presence. Therefore, John concludes that if righteousness and love are lacking in the same way they are lacking in the devil (I John 3:8) then the Spirit’s power is not present.
The Root of Assurance Is Christ's Righteousness
How then can we hope to find assurance by practicing righteousness and love? What does John means when he writes,
“he that doeth righteousness is righteous even as he is righteous?” (I John 3:7)?
At first glance, it may appear that John is suggesting to perform righteousness in order to become righteous.
There have indeed been some who have adopted this wrong interpretation. If this were true, John would be careless in contradicting Paul in Romans 3:11 where he writes “there is none righteous no not one.” How can scripture both assert that none of us are righteous yet we become righteous by practicing it?
Notice the words, “even as he is righteous.” Like Paul in Romans 3:21-22, John is not pointing to a human righteousness (that doesn’t exist) but a divine righteousness outside of ourselves. Although there is none righteous, John leads us to the One who is righteous in I John 2:1,
“My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
John grounds his theology of assurance on the righteousness of Jesus Christ alone for salvation. The sinner who trusts in the justifying righteousness of Jesus Christ and hopes in Him has the right to be called a child of God (I John 3:1 – 3, John 1:12). This right, or privilege, means that you should consider yourself to be righteous, pure, and sinless just as Jesus is righteous, pure and sinless before God. There is nothing more that must or could be done to secure your righteousness before God legally. No deeds, prayer, Bible reading, love toward your neighbor could increase your righteousness position before God in Jesus Christ.
Can Christ be any more righteous than He is? Can He improve? Then you also cannot be more right or improve in your right standing before God. As Paul wrote, “And ye are complete in Him” (Colossians 2:10). The power to practice righteousness AND love others is being assured by faith in Jesus Christ for your salvation and hoping in Him for the future. Have you trusted in His righteousness?
What Cain and Abel Teach About Assurance by Faith
“Not as Cain who was of that Wicked One.” (I John 3:12)
While assuring God’s sheep, John will highlight Cain as a model of unrighteousness and therefore lacking in love. Why did he slay his brother, John will ask. Answer: because his own works were evil and his brother’s were righteous.
Be careful here. If we use the assurance method above we may draw the wrong conclusion. After all, when Cain offered the fruit of the ground to God was he not showing love? From the human perceptive, it looked noble and right but from the divine all Seeing Eye of God, we know from scripture otherwise (Genesis 4). His works, his act of worship in bringing fruit to God, were evil according to John, but why?
Was it the wrong type of sacrifice? There are feasible views on the deficiency of Cain’s sacrifice relating to the kind (fruit of the ground) and quality (not his best). However, what set Abel’s offering/works apart from Cain’s was not the kind nor quality of sacrifice but a heart of faith in the coming sacrifice.
Hebrews 11:4 states,
“By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.”
God’s acceptance of his gifts was owing to the heart of faith in which it was offered. Abel’s sacrifice did not make him righteous. Rather, his sacrifice gave witness to the righteousness he had by faith in the coming Messiah (Genesis 3:15). His offering was based on the righteousness of One that was coming and not his own. How can this reality give me assurance?
Faith Produces Genuine Love
By faith Abel was resting in the promise afar off concerning a sin-bearing sacrifice that would come (Genesis 3:15, Hebrews 11:13) on his behalf. This reality empowered him with a strong assurance. This is the foundation and reason God accepted his offering and not Cain’s.
Faith receives the revelation of God’s fullness and therefore does not bring sacrifices to God in order to provide (John 1:16) or boast before God (Romans 3:27, I Corinthians 1:29) but offers spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ (I Peter 2:7). By faith, his sacrifice was not offered to ensure the future but by being assured that the future Messiah foretold in Genesis 3:15 would die and take away His sins!
Cain on the other hand was of that wicked one and therefore his works were motivated by self-seeking desires (John 8:44) rather than God glorifying faith. How does faith then yield love for a strong assurance?
Love Gives Believers Assurance
According to John, living in love toward one another assures us that we have passed or changed from death to life (I John 3:14). This life of love, however, is more than being alive and doing benevolent deeds. Otherwise, assurance could be expanded to all religions and much of the world’s population during any given natural disaster.
The scope of assurance in John’s first epistle travels exclusively along the pathway of Jesus Christ when it comes to love.
“Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (I John 3:14).
John unites love for the brethren with knowing the love of God in the cross of Jesus Christ. Many non-Christians know and believe the death of Jesus Christ as a historical reality. While the historicity of Christ is important, this knowledge alone cannot (and must not) provide any assurance unless it is known and embraced by a personal faith in Jesus Christ for salvation. This is where faith becomes crucial in the kind of assurance that yields love toward others.
The only pathway that genuine love travels is the way, the truth and the life of Christ in coming to God the Father (John 14:6, Galatians 5:6). This is so vital to assurance that John calls into question the love of God within where compassion is lacking without, “…how dwelleth the love of God in him?” (I John 3:17c).
Contextually, this love is not merely human emotion or feeling but specifically knowing the love of God in the revelation of the cross, the gospel of Jesus Christ (I John 3:14, I John 4:7 – 10).
Likewise Paul writes in Ephesians 4:17,
“That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love…” (Ephesians 3:17).
Like John, Paul’s prayer for the church is a deeper assurance by knowing more of God’s love in Christ experienced by faith in Him.
Assurance by the Holy Spirit
Why would someone who has this world’s goods shut off his affections or compassion toward the brethren? The word "goods" is translated from the same Greek word for "life" in I John 2:16, meaning livelihood. This word is used in Luke meaning one’s possessions. The pride of life or our livelihood and possessions is the same as the goods being withheld in 3:17.
When comparing I John 2:15-16 with 3:17 it becomes clear that the cause of withholding goods is that the love of the world and its goods has taken hold of the heart (I John 2:15).
Here is where John unlocks the power of love and assurance, namely, the love of God dwelling within. What breaks the power of this world’s attraction? What will release us to give the best of our goods like Abel? What will empower you to love and then assure your hearts before Him? It is the love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which was given to us (I John 4:13, Romans 5:5).
And be assured, our experience of the Holy Spirit filling us with love happens as we look by faith upon the revelation of God’s love in the cross (Romans 5:5 – 6, II Corinthians 3:18, I John 4:14 – 16).
Dear friend, beware of faulty methods that offer insurance with no hope but lay hold of Christ for your assurance by faith alone. May the Holy Spirit flood your soul with an unshakeable confidence in Christ that you may show compassion and love towards others.
We often approach biblical assurance in much the same way.
We are looking for some deeds of love in our policy statement of faith that assures us against future calamity or judgment. This way of assurance often leads to hopelessness if you are constantly looking for enough deeds to assure your heart of God’s love. Alternatively, some will drift to the other extreme and confidently place their policy booklet of faith in the filing cabinet and neglect love altogether. This leads to unfounded optimism because it leaves us without the witness of the Spirit (I John 3:24; 4:12 – 13).
The apostle John however will focus our attention to the root and fruit of love whereby we may assure our hearts before Him in love (I John 3:19).
What Is Biblical Assurance of Salvation?
“In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother” (I John 3:10).
The two distinguishing marks that separate God’s children and the devil’s is righteousness and love.
The apostle joins them with the negative conjunction “neither” (and, also, even, too, etc.) establishing the necessity of love with righteousness to assure our hearts before him (I John 3:14). This bond is grounded upon the Spirit’s work in the new birth and the principle of life or seed He implants within the sinner (I John 3:9).
Assurance then is based on the certainty of the Spirit’s work in applying redemption and thereby breaking the power of canceled sin. Indeed, Jesus Christ came to release us from the devil’s captivity (I John 3:8b, II Timothy 2:25 – 26) and sin’s dominion, not sin’s presence. Therefore, John concludes that if righteousness and love are lacking in the same way they are lacking in the devil (I John 3:8) then the Spirit’s power is not present.
The Root of Assurance Is Christ's Righteousness
How then can we hope to find assurance by practicing righteousness and love? What does John means when he writes,
“he that doeth righteousness is righteous even as he is righteous?” (I John 3:7)?
At first glance, it may appear that John is suggesting to perform righteousness in order to become righteous.
There have indeed been some who have adopted this wrong interpretation. If this were true, John would be careless in contradicting Paul in Romans 3:11 where he writes “there is none righteous no not one.” How can scripture both assert that none of us are righteous yet we become righteous by practicing it?
Notice the words, “even as he is righteous.” Like Paul in Romans 3:21-22, John is not pointing to a human righteousness (that doesn’t exist) but a divine righteousness outside of ourselves. Although there is none righteous, John leads us to the One who is righteous in I John 2:1,
“My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
John grounds his theology of assurance on the righteousness of Jesus Christ alone for salvation. The sinner who trusts in the justifying righteousness of Jesus Christ and hopes in Him has the right to be called a child of God (I John 3:1 – 3, John 1:12). This right, or privilege, means that you should consider yourself to be righteous, pure, and sinless just as Jesus is righteous, pure and sinless before God. There is nothing more that must or could be done to secure your righteousness before God legally. No deeds, prayer, Bible reading, love toward your neighbor could increase your righteousness position before God in Jesus Christ.
Can Christ be any more righteous than He is? Can He improve? Then you also cannot be more right or improve in your right standing before God. As Paul wrote, “And ye are complete in Him” (Colossians 2:10). The power to practice righteousness AND love others is being assured by faith in Jesus Christ for your salvation and hoping in Him for the future. Have you trusted in His righteousness?
What Cain and Abel Teach About Assurance by Faith
“Not as Cain who was of that Wicked One.” (I John 3:12)
While assuring God’s sheep, John will highlight Cain as a model of unrighteousness and therefore lacking in love. Why did he slay his brother, John will ask. Answer: because his own works were evil and his brother’s were righteous.
Be careful here. If we use the assurance method above we may draw the wrong conclusion. After all, when Cain offered the fruit of the ground to God was he not showing love? From the human perceptive, it looked noble and right but from the divine all Seeing Eye of God, we know from scripture otherwise (Genesis 4). His works, his act of worship in bringing fruit to God, were evil according to John, but why?
Was it the wrong type of sacrifice? There are feasible views on the deficiency of Cain’s sacrifice relating to the kind (fruit of the ground) and quality (not his best). However, what set Abel’s offering/works apart from Cain’s was not the kind nor quality of sacrifice but a heart of faith in the coming sacrifice.
Hebrews 11:4 states,
“By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.”
God’s acceptance of his gifts was owing to the heart of faith in which it was offered. Abel’s sacrifice did not make him righteous. Rather, his sacrifice gave witness to the righteousness he had by faith in the coming Messiah (Genesis 3:15). His offering was based on the righteousness of One that was coming and not his own. How can this reality give me assurance?
Faith Produces Genuine Love
By faith Abel was resting in the promise afar off concerning a sin-bearing sacrifice that would come (Genesis 3:15, Hebrews 11:13) on his behalf. This reality empowered him with a strong assurance. This is the foundation and reason God accepted his offering and not Cain’s.
Faith receives the revelation of God’s fullness and therefore does not bring sacrifices to God in order to provide (John 1:16) or boast before God (Romans 3:27, I Corinthians 1:29) but offers spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ (I Peter 2:7). By faith, his sacrifice was not offered to ensure the future but by being assured that the future Messiah foretold in Genesis 3:15 would die and take away His sins!
Cain on the other hand was of that wicked one and therefore his works were motivated by self-seeking desires (John 8:44) rather than God glorifying faith. How does faith then yield love for a strong assurance?
Love Gives Believers Assurance
According to John, living in love toward one another assures us that we have passed or changed from death to life (I John 3:14). This life of love, however, is more than being alive and doing benevolent deeds. Otherwise, assurance could be expanded to all religions and much of the world’s population during any given natural disaster.
The scope of assurance in John’s first epistle travels exclusively along the pathway of Jesus Christ when it comes to love.
“Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (I John 3:14).
John unites love for the brethren with knowing the love of God in the cross of Jesus Christ. Many non-Christians know and believe the death of Jesus Christ as a historical reality. While the historicity of Christ is important, this knowledge alone cannot (and must not) provide any assurance unless it is known and embraced by a personal faith in Jesus Christ for salvation. This is where faith becomes crucial in the kind of assurance that yields love toward others.
The only pathway that genuine love travels is the way, the truth and the life of Christ in coming to God the Father (John 14:6, Galatians 5:6). This is so vital to assurance that John calls into question the love of God within where compassion is lacking without, “…how dwelleth the love of God in him?” (I John 3:17c).
Contextually, this love is not merely human emotion or feeling but specifically knowing the love of God in the revelation of the cross, the gospel of Jesus Christ (I John 3:14, I John 4:7 – 10).
Likewise Paul writes in Ephesians 4:17,
“That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love…” (Ephesians 3:17).
Like John, Paul’s prayer for the church is a deeper assurance by knowing more of God’s love in Christ experienced by faith in Him.
Assurance by the Holy Spirit
Why would someone who has this world’s goods shut off his affections or compassion toward the brethren? The word "goods" is translated from the same Greek word for "life" in I John 2:16, meaning livelihood. This word is used in Luke meaning one’s possessions. The pride of life or our livelihood and possessions is the same as the goods being withheld in 3:17.
When comparing I John 2:15-16 with 3:17 it becomes clear that the cause of withholding goods is that the love of the world and its goods has taken hold of the heart (I John 2:15).
Here is where John unlocks the power of love and assurance, namely, the love of God dwelling within. What breaks the power of this world’s attraction? What will release us to give the best of our goods like Abel? What will empower you to love and then assure your hearts before Him? It is the love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which was given to us (I John 4:13, Romans 5:5).
And be assured, our experience of the Holy Spirit filling us with love happens as we look by faith upon the revelation of God’s love in the cross (Romans 5:5 – 6, II Corinthians 3:18, I John 4:14 – 16).
Dear friend, beware of faulty methods that offer insurance with no hope but lay hold of Christ for your assurance by faith alone. May the Holy Spirit flood your soul with an unshakeable confidence in Christ that you may show compassion and love towards others.
Mike Stewart, Pastor | Heritage Baptist Church
Mike was born and raised in central Mississippi. After graduating from Mississippi State in 1986, God changed his course of direction with a deep conviction of sin and desire to follow Christ. He then met his wife, Peggy, while attending church in Cincinnati, Ohio. In 1998, he was ordained to the ministry in BelAir, Maryland, and ultimately moved to Huntsville, Alabama, to begin his first pastorate. In 2005, Heritage was formed and called him to be her founding pastor.