seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
1 John 5:1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well. 2 This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands. 3 In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, 4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. 5 Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
6 This is the one who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ. He did not come by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. 7 For there are three that testify: 8 the[a] Spirit, the water and the blood; and the three are in agreement. 9 We accept human testimony, but God’s testimony is greater because it is the testimony of God, which he has given about his Son. 10 Whoever believes in the Son of God accepts this testimony. Whoever does not believe God has made him out to be a liar, because they have not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. 11 And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. 14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.
16 If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death.
18 We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the One who was born of God keeps them safe, and the evil one cannot harm them. 19 We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one. 20 We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.
21 Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.
a. 1 John 5:8 Late manuscripts of the Vulgate testify in heaven: the Father, the Word and the Holy Spirit, and these three are one. 8 And there are three that testify on earth: the (not found in any Greek manuscript before the fourteenth century)
This is a heavy message... the commentary is even hard to read. So this is from the easy English site. It's never hard... because it's easy... right?
The false teachers tried to divide Jesus from the Christ. In their opinion, Christ was God but Jesus was only a man. They taught that God could not die. Therefore the Christ did not die. Those who think like this are not born of God.
To be born of God we must believe that Jesus is the Christ. We must believe that he came to earth. He was both God and man. We must believe that Jesus the Christ died for us. But death was not the end. Jesus Christ rose from death to life. He had achieved what he came to do. He rose from death to prove it.
We must believe that Jesus is the Christ. This is more than just to agree with the mind. We must trust in him. We must accept what he has done for us. As we trust in him, he will change us. God gives us a new life. This is the new birth, when we are born of God.
We can know that we love God’s children. We do so when we obey God. God has given this command to us. We must love both him and his children. If we love God then we must love other Christians as well. We cannot love God if we do not love his children. It is not possible really to love his children if we do not love God.
Love for God is this, that we obey his commands. This is how we express our love for God. If we love God, we will obey his commands. This is the essential result of our love for God.
His commands are not too difficult for us. They are not too hard because God makes us able to do them. We love him, so we desire to do them. The Christian likes to do whatever God wants.
We can obey God because we have overcome the world. We trust in Jesus. This gives us success in the struggle. We overcome because we are born of God. Because of the birth from God, we overcome the world. This new birth is the event that frees us from the world. This new birth takes us away from the rule of the devil. This new birth makes us children of God.
It is our faith that wins. Faith is our trust in Christ and what we believe. We believe that Jesus is the Christ. And we believe that he is the Son of God. We trust him to save us and to keep us from all evil. We expect him to do all that God has promised. This belief and trust leads to the defeat of the world. By our faith we overcome the world.
Only those people who trust in Christ overcome the world. To win in this fight we have to believe in Jesus Christ. We believe that he is the Son of God. He is God and he became a man. As God and man, he overcame the world. Nobody else can give us the power to win in this struggle. We trust in Jesus. Then we share in what he has done. So, he makes us able to overcome.
The water and the blood refer to the baptism and death of Jesus. Jesus the Son of God came by the water of baptism. That is, he went through baptism to start his work. Jesus the Son of God came by the blood of his death. That is, he finished his work here on earth by his death. He went through death and rose again from the dead.
Jesus did not come by water alone. That is by baptism. But he came by water and blood. This shows that Jesus the Christ actually died. Jesus and the Christ are one person. The false teachers said that the Christ left Jesus before death. They thought that the Christ, as God, could not die. But Jesus Christ is both God and man and he died for us.
Our belief is that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. We agree that this is the truth. We know in ourselves that it is true. God’s Spirit is in us. He is the witness to us of the truth. We have an inner certainty that Jesus is the Son of God. We believe what God has said about him. We know that it is right to believe in Jesus.
God has said that Jesus is the Christ. He also said that Jesus is the Son of God. Some people do not believe this. They deny that Jesus is the Son of God. They do not agree that he is the Christ. So they behave as if God tells lies. They act as if God’s words are untrue. They have refused to believe in God and in Christ.
To receive the Son is to receive the Father. To deny the Son is to deny the Father. Nobody can both accept God and deny his Son.
John is coming to the end of his letter. He gives his purpose for all that he has written so far. He wants all the Christians to be sure about life. They have the true life in Christ. He feels that they lack confidence about this. He wants them to know that they do have eternal life. He wants to increase their trust and confidence in Christ.
Eternal life is not just a future life that has no end. It is life of a better quality, which we can live now. We are sharing in the life of Christ.
To believe in the name means to trust the person. They trust Jesus who is the Son of God.
We can ask God for anything that he wants. Then we know that God hears us. He listens to our prayers. We can be certain about this. If God hears us, he will answer our prayers. He may not answer at once. But we can be sure that the answer will come.
Christians are not perfect and they do sin. When we see a Christian sin, we should pray about it. We have a duty in love to look after such a person. It should be our natural reaction to pray. This is for sins that do not cause death.
The promise is that God will answer the prayer. He will give life to the person who has sinned. He will forgive the sin. There is a part of death in all sin. Sin in a Christian breaks the unity with the Lord. That person needs God to forgive the sin. Then the unity with the Lord will return.
Death and life here refer to the spirit of the person. There is a sin, which brings death to the human spirit. This sin refuses to agree that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. The person who does this sin does not trust in Christ. He does not receive life from Christ. Such a person refuses to believe what the person knows to be true. To continue in this sin will lead to death. John does not advise us to pray for those who do this sin. He doubts that such prayer will have good results. He does not forbid such prayers. But he does think that they are a waste of time.
John has made a distinction between sins. Some lead to death and some do not lead to death. This does not mean that some sins are worse than other sins. The false teachers may have taught that not all wrong actions are sin. But all wrong thoughts and actions are sin. All sins are serious. We must not think that any are not bad.
Anything that takes the place of God is a false god. Christians must guard themselves from such false gods. So many things would tempt us away from the real God. The false teachers tried to do this by their wrong ideas about the Christ. We need to be careful that we remain in the Lord.
Yesterday I figured out that the humans in the early church just didn't buy that Jesus the Messiah... born in Nazareth.... survived the Cross.
I've seen TV shows of people who have survived execution. According to the TV cowboy shows all cowboys had to be great shots.... I mean who could shoot a rope in half every time? In Salem, Mass., I heard they devised a sure fire way to tell the witch from the innocent. They tied them in a dunking bucket... and dunked them in water. If they lived... they must be a witch.... and they were burned at the stake. If they died... ooops... they were innocent. I saw one movie... the guy was supposed to be electrocuted.... but it didn't work.... and the guy returned to a life of crime.... but the guy was "depressed" all the time.
I read in one of the commentaries that the Persians were even crueler than the Romans. The Persians put their criminals on a pole.... hung them through the gut.... like a popsicle. The Romans were a little more civil. They simply nailed or tied their criminals to the cross. They used a cross rather than a pole, however. It seems the Persian way would leave no survivors.... having a big popsicle stick shoved up into a body was more deadly. But the criminal who was hung on a Roman Cross died slowly.... of suffocation.... because of the way they were tied.... or nailed.... and it was a slow agonizing death.
Both the Persians and the Romans planted their crucifixions right outside of town.... a warning.... behave or .....
John says Jesus had witness almost constantly for the years He was here. People were on the river bank when Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist. People heard God say.... "this is my son". There were witnesses. While He was preaching and teaching.... there were witnesses. When He pulled a dead man out of a tomb.... stinky.... there were witnesses. While He was feeding the masses.... there were definitely witnesses. When He healed a blind man... there were testifying witnesses. When He dumped the tables of the money changers in the Temple.... there were witnesses. When He rode the donkey into Jerusalem... while the people sang Hosanna and laid palm branches on the path for the donkey to travel..... there were definitely witnesses. When the people got stirred up and yelled "crucify Him".... there were witnesses. When they beat Him..... When they put Him on trial... When Herod demanded that He perform tricks for him.... When Pilate washed His hands.... there were witnesses.
When they hung Jesus on the cross.... there were witnesses. When they shoved that sword in His ribs and He didn't flinch.... they knew He was dead... and therre were witnesses. While they were taking Him off the cross... a deal was made to allow the body to be placed in a borrowed tomb..... and there were witnesses. When they placed Him in the tomb.... it was too late in the day to embalm Him.... but a Roman Guard was put at tomb.... a stone was rolled across the entrance and sealed with the Roman emblem..... and there were witnesses. When the women came back to finish the embalming.... three days later.... He was gone... and there were witnesses. When He appeared to others.... living humans.... not just descendants of Jacob.... not just the disciples.... but strangers... reported seeing Him alive.... and the Apostles were surprised to see Him cooking a fish dinner for them on the shore... before He went back to Heaven..... there were witnesses....
John says there were witnesses from the time He was Baptized to the time He was crucified. He did so many unbelievable things.... walking on water.... calming waves... quieting the wind... bringing humans back from the grave..... literally..... a stinky embalmed man came back to life and walked out of the tomb... days after his death... bloated and stinky.... Jesus brought him back to life.... in front of witnesses.
So why.... why would anyone not believe that He could survive the Roman Cross?
But... there were some people who were saying that there was no way any human could survive the Roman Cross.... so Jesus must have been God.... not a human.
If He was just God though.... what's the point? It's no big deal for a God to survive... they created death... they control death.... but when a human survives death it's a big deal. Jesus didn't just survive the Roman Cross.... He conquered death. He also conquered the human excuses. Jesus had to be All Man.... so He could conquer temptation.... that way no human could look God in the eye and say "you don't know what it feels like to be tempted.... you are God"..... because Jesus was tempted..... a lot.... more than you and I.... Still there are some who still say He didn't survive the Cross.... and Walk out of the Tomb.... and Cook a fish dinner... and then Ascend.... They said it back in John's day and they are still saying it. But there were witnesses.
Anyone who doesn't believe that.... well they are calling God a liar. They are siding with the humans that put Jesus through all of that..... and well.... they aren't invited to Heaven.
