TO KNOW:
ETERNAL LIFE IS WITHOUT PLANETARY ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Monday,
December 14, 2015
1John GW 3:1-15 Consider this:
The Father has given us his love. He loves us so much that we are actually
called God's dear children. And that's what we are. For this reason the world
doesn't recognize us, and it didn't recognize him either. Dear friends, now we
are God's children. What we will be isn't completely clear yet. We do know that
when Christ appears we will be like him because we will see him as he is. So all
people who have this confidence in Christ keep themselves pure, as Christ is
pure. Those who live sinful lives are disobeying God. Sin is disobedience. You
know that Christ appeared in order to take away our sins. He isn't sinful. Those
who live in Christ don't go on sinning. Those who go on sinning haven't seen or
known Christ. Dear children, don't let anyone deceive you. Whoever does what God
approves of has God's approval as Christ has God's approval. The person who
lives a sinful life belongs to the devil, because the devil has been committing
sin since the beginning. The reason that the Son of God appeared was to destroy
what the devil does. Those who have been born from God don't live sinful lives.
What God has said lives in them, and they can't live sinful lives. They have
been born from God. This is the way God's children are distinguished from the
devil's children. Everyone who doesn't do what is right or love other believers
isn't God's child. The message that you have heard from the beginning is to love
each other. Don't be like Cain. He was a child of the evil one and murdered his
brother. And why did Cain murder his brother? Because the things Cain did were
evil and the things his brother did had God's approval. Brothers and sisters,
don't be surprised if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from
death to life, because we love other believers. The person who doesn't grow in
love remains in death. Everyone who hates another believer is a murderer, and
you know that a murderer doesn't have eternal life.
Another
way I have been taught to advantage Scripture is to read it backwards beginning
with the last verse in section being studied.
Reading
v.15 several times, I take note of the little “is” and realize John is not
saying “has murdered” for that would be contradictory of God’s all encompassing
forgiveness. He is speaking of not occasion (Which would discount Paul
completely. Acts8:1-3; 9:1-2), John is referring to present tense active as in
continuous murderous frame of hateful mind; this personally so as result,
indication and allowance of never having been born-again, thereby being sans
redemptive “the mind of Christ”. (Jn.3:3; 1Cor.2:15b; 2Cor.5:17; 1Jn.3:6,
8)
Certainly
nothing to boast of, but a proof of knowing eternal life is that as a youth
taking offenses real and imagined I entertained rancorous murderous thinking.
(Obviously other thoughts deterred me, including knowing I wasn’t smart enough
to pull it off and then more-certain capital punishment.)
Continuing
studying from last to first, pondering my past to present, I remember my
horrible offense oft taken being lack of recognition, something now expected,
and accepted.
To know
Christ is to know contrast glorious.
EBB4
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