Just like Peter, John was one of the closest disciples of
Jesus. John walked and talked with Him for
the entire three years of His earthly ministry.
He wrote this, his first letter not long before his death in Ephesus,
probably in the late 80’s or early 90’s A.D.
You will notice that there are no personal references in this letter,
indicating that it was most likely intended to be circulated among all the churches
in Asia Minor. That was a large area
covering what is now Turkey, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, and
Syria.
Who is the most reliable source of information about
anything but an eyewitness? In his
introduction, John reminds his readers that what he has to say can be trusted
since he was with Jesus from the very beginning of His ministry, and he is
telling them what he heard, what he saw, and what he touched as he lived and
worked with Jesus, The Word of Life:
We proclaim to you the one who existed from
the beginning, whom we have heard and seen. We saw him with our own eyes and
touched him with our own hands. He is the Word of life (1 John 1:1).
If you will look back at the Gospel of John (see my
12/1/2014 post) you will recall that in that book John also referred to Jesus
as The Word. Notice the similarity in
these two passages.
In the beginning the Word already existed.
The Word was with God, and the Word
was God. He existed in the beginning with God.
God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The
Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to
everyone. The light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness can never extinguish it (John 1:1-5).
John came right out and told his fellow believers why he was
writing to them:
We are writing these things so that you may
fully share our joy (1 John 1:4).
He wanted his brothers and sisters in
Christ to have the joy that comes with the assurance that their sins had been
forgiven and that they could truly enjoy fellowship with God and with each
other. John used several contrasts
to teach his readers, including us, about relationships. He contrasted light and darkness, truth and
falsehood, life and death, righteousness and sin, love and hate, fear and
victory to show us that we have a close relationship with God. That relationship was made possible by Jesus
whose blood cleanses us from sin:
This is the message we heard from Jesus and
now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all (1
John 1:5).
If we claim we have no sin, we are only
fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. But
if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us from all wickedness. If we
claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that his word
has no place in our hearts (1 John 1:8-10).
My dear children, I am writing this to you
so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who
pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly
righteous. He himself is the sacrifice that
atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world (1 John
2:1-2).
That relationship with God will produce a
life that reflects the Light that is God:
And we can be sure that we know him if we
obey his commandments. If someone claims, “I
know God,” but doesn’t obey God’s commandments, that person is a liar and is
not living in the truth. But those who obey
God’s word truly show how completely they love him. That is how we know we are
living in him (1 John 2:3-5).
If anyone claims, “I am
living in the light,” but hates a fellow believer, that person is still living
in darkness. Anyone who loves a fellow believer is
living in the light and does not cause others to stumble. But anyone who hates a fellow believer is still living and walking
in darkness. Such a person does not know the way to go, having been blinded by
the darkness (1 John 2:9-11).
A relationship with God will produce a life that is not
focused on this world, but rather on the Kingdom of God:
Do not love this world nor the things it
offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father
in you. For the world offers only a craving for
physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our
achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this
world. And this world is fading away, along with
everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live
forever (1 John 2:15-17).
Those who have a relationship with God will
not be fooled by false doctrine, because the Holy Spirit who lives in us will show
us the difference between the truth and a lie:
The Holy One has given you his Spirit, and
all of you know the truth. So I am writing to
you not because you don’t know the truth but because you know the difference
between truth and lies. And who is a liar?
Anyone who says that Jesus is not the Christ. Anyone who denies the Father and
the Son is an antichrist (1 John 2:20b-22).
I am writing these things
to warn you about those who want to lead you astray. But you have received the Holy Spirit, and he lives within you, so
you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you
everything you need to know, and what he teaches is true—it is not a lie. So
just as he has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ (1 John 2:26-27).
The relationship believer has with God is
that of a child. We are God’s children,
and He loves each and every one of us:
See how very much our Father loves us, for
he calls us his children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to
this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know
him (1 John 3:1).
God’s children do not live a sinful
lifestyle. We are not without sin, but sin
is not our pattern for life. We do not “keep
on sinning:”
Dear children, don’t let anyone deceive you
about this: When people do what is right, it shows that they are righteous,
even as Christ is righteous. But when people
keep on sinning, it shows that they belong to the devil, who has been sinning
since the beginning. But the Son of God came to destroy the works of the devil.
Those who have been born into God’s family do not make a
practice of sinning, because God’s life is in them. So they can’t keep on
sinning, because they are children of God (1 John 3:7-9).
God’s children will love each other as brothers and
sisters. True brothers and sisters,
members of the family of God, will not be like Cain, who killed his
brother. In the same way that Cain hated
his brother, Abel, because Cain was evil, the world will hate us because the
world is evil:
This is the message you have heard from the
beginning: We should love one another. We must not be
like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and killed his brother. And why did he
kill him? Because Cain had been doing what was evil, and his brother had been
doing what was righteous. So don’t be surprised,
dear brothers and sisters, if the world hates you (1 John 3:11-13).
God showed how much he loved us by sending
his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through
him. This is real love—not that we loved God,
but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins (1
John 4:9-10).
Dear friends, since God loved us that much,
we surely ought to love each other. No one has
ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is
brought to full expression in us (1 John 4:11-12).
God’s children are fearless! We have nothing to fear in death, and we have
nothing to fear in life since our focus is on His kingdom and not this world:
And as we live in God, our love grows more
perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him
with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world. Such love
has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for
fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his
perfect love (1 John 4:17-18).
For every child of God
defeats this evil world, and we achieve this victory through our faith.
And who can win this battle against the world? Only those who
believe that Jesus is the Son of God (1 John 5:4-5).
John concluded his letter by reassuring all
believers that they have eternal life and that God hears our prayers when we
ask for anything that pleases Him.
Therefore, my prayer this week is that you have the relationship with
God that John wrote about. I pray that
you will spend eternity in Heaven with Him and with all those who believe in
Jesus, The Son of God, The Word of Life:
I have written this to you
who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know you have
eternal life. And we are confident that he hears us
whenever we ask for anything that pleases him. And
since we know he hears us when we make our requests, we also know that he will
give us what we ask for (1 John 5:13-15).
All Scripture references are from the New
Living Translation.
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