Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has become a child of God. And everyone who loves the Father loves his children, too. ² We know we love God’s children if we love God and obey his commandments. ³ Loving God means keeping his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome. ⁴ For every child of God defeats this evil world, and we achieve this victory through our faith. ⁵ And who can win this battle against the world? Only those who believe that Jesus is the Son of God.

Faith

Do you remember why John was writing this letter? He wrote it around the same time that he wrote his Gospel. During that time, a group called Gnostics were making a lot of noise. For this group, the pursuit of knowledge was more important than anything else. John’s gospel, and his letters, were a response to the gnosticism that was creeping into the church.

Gnostics would focus so much energy on gaining knowledge that they would neglect the people around them. Their spirituality was wrapped up in books, learning, and debating truth. They looked down on those who were less educated and saw them as also being less spiritual.

So, John comes along as says, “Guys, it’s rather simple. If you believe that Jesus was the Christ, you’re a child of God. And, as a child of God, all you need to do is follow his commandments. And that’s not burdensome. Because his commandments can be summed up in loving God and loving others. By the way, all of this happens through faith.”

Of course faith is having confidence in something you cannot fully see or know. In a way, it’s the opposite of gnosticism. Faith is accepting that God’s ways are beyond our ways and while we can love God with all we are, we will never fully know or understand everything there is about God. Salvation doesn’t come in knowing all about God, it comes from having faith that God knows everything about us and yet still loves us.

My prayer: Lord, you know that I love knowledge. I love to learn and discover new things. And in itself, that is not wrong. You welcome our desire to discover. In fact loving you with my mind is all about learning more. However, may my pursuit of knowledge never push away my pursuit of you. You are far greater than anything I could ever learn. Amen.

Until tomorrow.