Three Hearts in Third John (Part 4).

The Heart of Diotrephes

This is the Heart of Preeminence

“I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth us not” (3 John 1:9). We do not know a lot about the man named Diotrephese. He was possibly a preacher or an elder. He and Gaius were part of the same congregation. What we do know about him as revealed to us in the Bible is everything that we need to know. John starts out by saying how he wrote to the congregation but Diotrephese did not “receive” the letter. It is thought that Diotrephese destroyed the letter once it was brought to the congregation. We are told that he “loveth to have the preeminence.” The idea here is that Diotrephese sought to have superiority over the rest of the congregation. He wanted to be placed upon a pedestal above all others. While Christ is the head of the church (Eph. 1:22-23), Diotrephese wanted that position. This idea is furthered by the fact that he destroyed the letter which John wrote. Christ had given authority to the apostles (Gal. 1:1, 11, 15-24). By destroying the letter, he was showing that he refused to accept such an authority.