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CrossWay Church
June 29, 2025 3 John 9-14
Locations & Times
CrossWay Church Battle Ground
311 N Parkway Ave, Battle Ground, WA 98604, USA
Sunday 9:00 AM
3 John 9–14: Imitate Good, Avoid Evil
I) The Purpose of the Letter: Imitate Good, Not Evil
A) The Apostle John writes to his beloved _________________ Gaius.
B) In the first half of the letter, John _____________ Gaius for his Christlike behavior.
C) John expresses deep _______________ and concern for Gaius.
D) He urges Gaius to continue _________________ what is good and to avoid what is evil.
Who are you imitating in your daily life—on social media, at work, in your family?
II) Diotrephes: A Negative Example to Avoid
A) Pride: Loved to be ______________.
1) Pride is _______________ to see in ourselves, but easy to spot in others.
2) Pride is one of the greatest ____________ of the Christian life; humility is one of our greatest allies.
3) Pride ______________ our relationships and hinders the unity of the church.
B) _____________: Spoke maliciously against others
1) Slander involves speaking ____________ about someone in a way that unfairly damages their reputation.
2) Slander ___________ trust and destroys community.
C) Rejection of Authority and __________________.
D) Exclusion and Intimidation: He ________________ faithful believers from the church for disagreeing with him.
E) John saw the need for a public confrontation with Diotrephes due to the disruption he was causing in the fellowship.
III) Demetrius: A Positive Example to Imitate
A) He is well _______________ of by church and its leaders.
B) Lived a life of _______________.
IV) Christians should strive to follow Christ's example.
Lewis Smedes, Love Within Limits: Realizing Selfless Love in a Selfish World: “Pride in the religious sense is the arrogant refusal to let God be God. It is to grab God’s status for one’s self. In the vivid language of the Bible, pride is puffing yourself up in God’s face. .. Never does pride want to pray for strength, ask for grace, plead for mercy, or give thanks to God. Pride is the grand illusion, the fantasy of fantasies, the cosmic put-on.The fantasy that we can make it as little gods leaves us empty at the center. Once we decide we have to make it on our own, we are attacked by the demons of fear and anxiety. We are worried that we cannot keep our balance as long as we carry no more inside our empty heart than what we can put there. We suspect that we lack the power to become what our pride makes us think we are. So we learn to swagger, to bluff, to use symbols to cover up our fears that we lack substance. We force other people to act as buttresses for the shaky ego that pride created by emptying our soul of God.
CS Lewis, Mere Christianity: Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more than the next man. We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but they are not. They are proud of being richer, or cleverer, or better looking than others. If everyone else became equally rich, or clever or good-looking there would be nothing to be proud about. It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest.
I) The Purpose of the Letter: Imitate Good, Not Evil
A) The Apostle John writes to his beloved _________________ Gaius.
B) In the first half of the letter, John _____________ Gaius for his Christlike behavior.
C) John expresses deep _______________ and concern for Gaius.
D) He urges Gaius to continue _________________ what is good and to avoid what is evil.
Who are you imitating in your daily life—on social media, at work, in your family?
II) Diotrephes: A Negative Example to Avoid
A) Pride: Loved to be ______________.
1) Pride is _______________ to see in ourselves, but easy to spot in others.
2) Pride is one of the greatest ____________ of the Christian life; humility is one of our greatest allies.
3) Pride ______________ our relationships and hinders the unity of the church.
B) _____________: Spoke maliciously against others
1) Slander involves speaking ____________ about someone in a way that unfairly damages their reputation.
2) Slander ___________ trust and destroys community.
C) Rejection of Authority and __________________.
D) Exclusion and Intimidation: He ________________ faithful believers from the church for disagreeing with him.
E) John saw the need for a public confrontation with Diotrephes due to the disruption he was causing in the fellowship.
III) Demetrius: A Positive Example to Imitate
A) He is well _______________ of by church and its leaders.
B) Lived a life of _______________.
IV) Christians should strive to follow Christ's example.
Lewis Smedes, Love Within Limits: Realizing Selfless Love in a Selfish World: “Pride in the religious sense is the arrogant refusal to let God be God. It is to grab God’s status for one’s self. In the vivid language of the Bible, pride is puffing yourself up in God’s face. .. Never does pride want to pray for strength, ask for grace, plead for mercy, or give thanks to God. Pride is the grand illusion, the fantasy of fantasies, the cosmic put-on.The fantasy that we can make it as little gods leaves us empty at the center. Once we decide we have to make it on our own, we are attacked by the demons of fear and anxiety. We are worried that we cannot keep our balance as long as we carry no more inside our empty heart than what we can put there. We suspect that we lack the power to become what our pride makes us think we are. So we learn to swagger, to bluff, to use symbols to cover up our fears that we lack substance. We force other people to act as buttresses for the shaky ego that pride created by emptying our soul of God.
CS Lewis, Mere Christianity: Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more than the next man. We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but they are not. They are proud of being richer, or cleverer, or better looking than others. If everyone else became equally rich, or clever or good-looking there would be nothing to be proud about. It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest.