5 Smooth Stones

would not receive him. There are two dynamics working here, the arrogance of Diotrephes and the humility of John. The name Diotrephes means nourished by Jupiter or blessed by Jupiter, which is the Roman or Latin equivalent of the Greek god Zeus. In only two verses directly dealing with Diotrephes, the apostle John points out at least seven major descriptions of this leader; 1) he loves to be fi rst or preeminent (vs9); 2) he rejects the apostolic leadership and their teams (vs9); 3) he maliciously spreads gossip and false accusations (vs10) 4) he withholds hospitality from other believers with whom he disagrees (vs10) 5) he requires others to follow his poor example and forbids them to follow or fellowship with others (vs10) 6) he excommunicates or shuns anyone who disagrees or crosses him (vs10). 7) he sets a bad example and in fl uence for the church (vs11). This spirit is led to high places as sure as goats prefer pinnacles to view from. We recently have the example of a major European leader rise to power stating that he would reign as a “Jupiterian” president – “a remote, digni fi ed fi gure, like the Roman god of gods” [Reuters 1]. Similarly, in the United States we were subjected to a president who accepted his presidential party nomination on a stage copy of the Pergamon altar to Zeus, now in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. In both cases these politicians were presented as god-like, but quickly proved to be ungodly in their governance. I mention this as a note as my purpose is to spotlight this spirit functioning in the church. As I am interested in identifying this spirit working in the church, I am also searching for hints in Scripture regarding how to overcome this spirit’s in fl uence and, ultimately, defeat it in our present-day churches. With such a short epistle it is logical that we would look deeper into what the apostle John has wri tt en in order to allow the Holy Spirit to reveal strategy for dealing with this type of situation. In other epistles John wrote, and especially in the book of Revelation, John often placed information in his writings which need to be extrapolated to understand additional infor mation hidden “between the lines.” Scripture says that it is, “the glory of God to conceal a ma tt er and the glory of kings to search it out” (Proverbs 25:2). As I began to investigate Third John for information on how to deal with this spirit, I had this search in mind.

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