Wildfire podcast is an extension of Wildfire Ministries, an organization that has a focus of igniting men and women of God into a deeper discipleship with Christ, instilling them with a passion to radically and relentlessly pursue Christ wherever that leads, that God's truth will spread like a wildfire.
Third John.
The saying great things come in small packages comes to mind when I think about Third John.
I feel like Third John is a good book to study if you, like myself, struggle to read long passages of scripture, because once you have read these 15 verses, you have finished a whole book of the Bible.
I would highly recommend getting your Bible or Bible app out and follow along.
The book of Third John is a letter written by John, one of jesus' 12 disciples, to a man named gaius who was a member of a church that was overseen by John.
We learn about three Christian men in this book, gaius, Diotrephes and demetrius.
gaius and demetrius provide imitative examples, and Diotrephes serves as a not so imitative example.
First, we learn about gaius.
John begins by commending gaius for his hospitality towards friends and strangers.
In fact, John was told of gaius' faithfulness to the truth by fellow believers.
gaius demonstrated his faith in verse 3, extended hospitality to all in verse 5, and loved others unconditionally in verse 7, which makes him a great example to all Christians.
Side note, when I study different passages of scripture, I usually turn to different versions to gain a greater perspective.
When reading verse 5 in the message version, when speaking about extending hospitality, John says, you make faith visible.
How awesome is that?
Next, we learn about diotrephus, who would be somewhat of a troublemaker.
Now, diotrephus was a Christian and a very prominent member of the church.
However, he strove to create problems among the church's members.
We can pull six different things from only two verses about diotrephus.
Firstly, he was a very proud man.
In verse 9, it says, who loves to have first place?
This is wrong because pride blinds us to the fact that it was God who gives everything that we have.
Pride can also cut us off from others as we begin to become arrogant and egotistical, and we become someone that no one wants to be around.
In Mere Christianity, CS.
Lewis says, as long as you are proud, you cannot know God.
A proud man is always looking down on things and people, and of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you.
Secondly, unlike gaius, Dioctree Feast was very unwelcoming to fellow believers.
We are told to have fellowship with other Christians in 1 John 1,7, but if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of jesus Christ, his son, cleanses us from all sin.
Fellowship encourages us to grow in our faith.
The third statement about Dioctree Feast is that he used malicious words in verse 10.
So what does malicious mean?
It means intending to do harm in simple terms.
Dioctree Feast was a gossip.
As Christians, we should strive to only allow good things to come out of our mouths.
As the saying goes, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.
Another thing that Dioctree Feast did was prevent others from showing hospitality to others.
It is already wrong that he, a Christian, was not welcoming to others, but he was telling others to do the same.
Remember, kindness is a fruit of the Spirit, Galatians 5.
Dioctree Feast wanted people to follow his poor example, which is just another aspect of his pride.
He loves to have first place, remember, in verse 9, and he wants others to aspire to be like him.
Finally, and probably the most extreme, he excommunicated people from church in verse 10.
In this case, we can see Dioctree Feast making a bad decision because people wouldn't follow his bad decision.
However, we can look at this as a good thing.
We can clearly see that Dioctree Feast constantly acts in defiance to God, and it is definitely better for believers to have no association with someone like this, unless they are praying for them or evangelizing to them.
John then goes on to write to gaius about a man named demetrius.
John only mentions demetrius in one verse, verse 12, but we can learn quite a bit about him.
demetrius had a good reputation among believers, accepted God's truth and walked in faith.
But what does this mean?
John 14,6 says, jesus told him, I am the way, the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through me.
If we are walking in the truth, then we are walking in the way of jesus and striving to become more Christ.
This means reading the Bible, studying it and ultimately putting into practice daily.
As I mentioned previously, demetrius had a good reputation among believers, much like gaius.
To maintain a good reputation, we should want to be more like jesus and walk in the truth.
Proverbs 22,1 says, A good name is to be chosen over great wealth.
Favour is better than silver and gold.
When you come to the end of your life, how do you want to see the life you lived?
Do you want to see a life of love for material objects, or do you want to see a life of love for God and others?
What can we learn from these three men?
Well, from gaius, we can learn to be hospitable, loving and committed to truth.
From Diatrophes, we can learn to be modest, have fellowship, to be truthful, to be kind, and to be God-fearing, as evidenced by his poor example on how we should do the opposite.
And finally, from demetrius, we can learn to strive to be Christlike and reputable.
A verse that perfectly sums up 3 John is verse 11.
Dear friend, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good.
The one who does good is of God.
The one who does evil has not seen God.
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