We Are The Children Of God

November 30, 2016

We Are The Children Of God

And he has given us this command:

Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.

1 John 4:21

In the concluding verses of chapter four, John is using his repetitive style because he wants the church to not just mentally assent to the command to love one another, but to truly live out this command in their daily lives. The Apostle James emphasized this teaching as well: “I will show you my faith by my good deeds.” (James 2:14-20) So also the Apostle Paul, “Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus . . .” (Philippians 2:4-5 NRSV)

Could it be any clearer? “But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. We love each other because he loved us first” (1 John 4:8, 19).

Over the centuries the church has legislated love and purity: do this, don’t do that; say this, and don’t say that. These rules missed John’s point entirely. When you are in a relationship where you love, and you are loved, you do not need rules to tell you to be faithful. Your life is shaped by love, and your fidelity is a natural fruit of your love. Your love not only shapes your life in your loving relationship, it shapes your life entirely. Your love overflows into all the people you encounter.

John is showing us that God meets our every need to be loved, accepted and to be valued. When we open ourselves to this love of God, His love overflows out of our lives and into the lives of others.

Bottom line? If you tell your spouse you love them, and then neglect the needs of others, you are “a liar and (are) not living in the truth.” (1 John 2:4)

God’s love for us was not just empty words. Christ died for us. Our love for others should not be just empty words. We are the children of God.

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Following the Lead of the Holy Spirit

November 29, 2016

Following the Lead of the Holy Spirit

If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person?

1 John 3:17

John is teaching the church that because God loves His children, His children love others. Because of the love of God, “Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters” (3:16). (We know John didn’t divide his letter into chapters and verses and number them. Even so, the similarity between John 3:16 and 1 John 3:16 is quite stunning!)

Verse 17, quoted above, makes it clear that John is concerned that we are called to work out Jesus’ command in our everyday life, not just in extraordinary times. In the passage, 1 John 3:11 – 4:6, John shows how the Holy Spirit enables us to respond to the needs of our brothers and sisters. I witnessed this recently when friends, upon the prompting of the Spirit, called members of our church who they knew may be in danger of an approaching wildfire. As a result of that call, my friends drove to the house in danger and moved many of the valuables back to their own home, out of harm’s way. A simple act, yes. But also evidence of how the Spirit moves within us to fulfill Jesus’ command to love one another.

This passage also contains a promise we never, ever want to lose sight of: “the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world” (1 John 4:4b). Of all the voices vying for our attention, we can rest assured that God will enable us to hear His voice! Hallelujah and Amen!

Sē’lah

<><  <><  <><  <><

(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

For We Will See Him As He Really Is

November 28, 2016

For We Will See Him As He Really Is

See how very much our Father loves us,

for he calls us his children,

and that is what we are!

1 John 3:1a

John’s appeal to the followers of Jesus is to live our lives today in the same manner in which Jesus lived his life. Like Jesus, we too are the children of God; thus John calls us to live our lives in the light of this magnificent relationship. John’s ambition for the church reminds me of a teaching aid my friend, Dick Brown, passed on to me. H³ is his aid, and it stands for the three H’s: Hunger for God; Hatred of sin; and Heart for people. All three of these are present in John’s letters. In this letter, John uses the word love twenty-six times: twenty times in chapters three and four. Eight times John discusses belonging. Do we belong to God, or to the world, to truth or to a lie? Over and over again, John stressed that a Christian is in God and God is in the Christian. John wants Christians to be fully grounded in their identity: “See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are!. . .  Dear friends, we are already God’s children” (1 John 3:1-2).

John not only sets high his expectations for the followers of Christ, he also points us to the truth which enables us to embrace these expectations for ourselves: God “has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is. And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as he is pure” (1 John 3: 2-3). Do you see the connection? John believes we will see Jesus, face to face, and that when we do, we will be as he is. Spend some time with this truth. One day all of the weaknesses of our flesh, all the temptations and struggles we encounter today that tarnish our lives, all these will be gone! We will see our Lord and we will be as he is! John was persuaded that this truth will motivate us to incorporate the H³ into our lives as we long to be made pure, just as our Lord Jesus is pure. How is this possible?

The more we keep our eyes on Jesus, the more we realize “God is working in (us), giving (us) the desire and the power to do what pleases him” (Philippians 2:13).

Sē’lah

<><  <><  <><  <><

(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

We Enjoy the Eternal Life He Promised Us

November 25, 2016

We Enjoy the Eternal Life He Promised Us

So you must remain faithful to what you have been taught from the beginning. If you do, you will remain in fellowship with the Son and with the Father. And in this fellowship we enjoy the eternal life he promised us.

1 John 2:24-25

While reading John's epistles it is very helpful to remember that in the New Testament, “life in the age to come” is the literal translation of the phrase “eternal life.” One of the core foundations of the church is a belief that God is going to establish His Kingdom on earth in the 'age to come.' In this Age to Come, everything will be made right, and truth and justice will flourish. God's Kingdom will be new life on earth, as the paradise God intended. This life in the Age to Come began on Easter Sunday when God's promise was fulfilled in the resurrection of Jesus, the Messiah. God has opened the doors of this age, His Kingdom, to everyone. John's purpose in this letter is to edify the believers and to encourage them to seek to live the life in Christ now, as they prepare for the full revelation of God's Kingdom. From John's perspective, as well as that of the other writers of the New Testament, if we will focus ourselves on fulfilling Jesus' commandment to love others as He has loved us, we will have a full plate. Literally, we'll have all we can say grace over.

Here, in the end of 1 John 2, the word, antichrist is introduced. John is the only writer in the New Testament to use the word antichrist. He uses it twice in chapter two, once in chapter four and once in his second letter. John uses the word in a generic way to refer to people who deny the humanity of Christ and for those who break fellowship with the church. In either case, John is asserting that the antichrist is denying the sacrificial work of Jesus to establish His church. In response to those who deny the complete work of Jesus, John reminds the disciples of Jesus that we have received the Holy Spirit who lives within us. The Spirit teaches us everything we need to know. (1 John 2:26-27)

For John, the bottom line is quite simple:

Remain in fellowship with Christ.

Sē’lah

<><  <><  <><  <><

(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.