Thoughts From the Bible

Read I John 5: 20-21- God was thinking of us when He put His plan of life together for us. He knew the world would be offering us so many different distractions. He also knew we would need to know more about His principles and God knew we needed encouragement to not lose sight of Him. In verses 20 and 21 John wrote, “And we know that the Son of God has come, and He has given us understanding so that we can know the true God. And now we live in fellowship with the true God because we live in fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ. He is the only true God, and He is eternal life. Dear children, keep away from anything that might take God’s place in your heart.  

 Read   I John 5: 16-19- Think about this short passage of scripture God has given us through John. The scripture points out the reality of sin, but it also points out our role in acting on another person’s sin. Verse 16, “If you see a fellow believer sinning in a way that does not lead to death, you should pray, and God will give that person life. But there is a sin that leads to death, and I am not saying you should pray for those who commit it.” Our responsibility is to know God’s word well enough to recognize sin and then it is our responsibility to pray. That’s it. It is not our job to intervene in these cases. Our intervention is through prayer. As John writes, there is a sin that leads to death. This is the sin of Satan. It is denying the reality of who God is and working to battle the Holy Spirit or deny the Holy Spirit. We are human. We are going to make mistakes and we are going to sin. Denying God and denying who God is can lead to death.

Read  I John 5: 13- 15- Do you pray? When you pray, are you asking God for anything? Most of us spend a lot of our pray time asking God for things. It may be something for us, it may be something for others. We do need to be sensitive to what we ask of God. Look at this passage John wrote. Verses 13 through 15, “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.” First, it’s clear that if we believe in God, John says we will have eternal life in God. Second, it says God hears us when we ask of Him things that please Him. Not everything we ask of God actually pleases Him. We need to be sensitive about what we ask of God. We need to know God knows what we need. He also knows what we want and there is a definite...

Read I John 5: 11-12 - There are many in society today who want to placate every religion in the world. They want to work to make everyone with a spiritual focus to believe their ideas of God and spirituality are good enough and all roads lead to one unified God. In this passage John makes a clear delineation in who people should believe in. Verse 11 and 12 , “And this is the testimony, that God gave 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.” This is what Christianity is based on. This is the path as outlined by God in the Bible. All the different activities of the Bible point to this one truth. According to what the entirety of the Bible portrays is one path to one God. As Christians, we need to be confident in our knowledge of the Bible and believe in by faith. The power of the Holy Spirit has shown our spirits the truth in the Bible and the one path to gain eternal life in God, ...

Read  I John 5: 6- 10 - Belief in God is one of faith. We have not seen a tangible God. We haven’t heard tangible voices. We also must believe Jesus Christ was the Son of God. People did see Jesus. People did walk with Jesus. Historians reference the acts of Jesus and his presence among people. So, in one way, God was seen and heard by thousands but that was 2000 years ago. Do we still have the faith to believe Jesus was part of the Trinity? After reading through the Bible multiple times and studying the Bible for many years, I have decided God is real and Jesus is part of the Trinity. I don’t want to be one of those who are exposed in the second part of this verse in I John 5:10, “All who believe in the Son of God know in their hearts that this testimony is true. Those who don’t believe this are actually calling God a liar because they don’t believe what God has testified about His Son. ”

I John 5: 1-5- God has made this very easy for us if we will read, listen, study and accept what He inspired John to write. God has given us the very basic guidelines how to live a Christian life. Read verses 1 and 2 , “Everyone who believes in that Jesus is the Christ, has become a child of God. And everyone who loves the Father loves His children, too. We know we love God’s children if we love God and obey His commandments.” Many people want to lean on the first part of this short passage. As the old song says, “All we need is love.” Love is all we need in the beginning but then comes part two. We will obey God’s commandments. By faith, Christians believe both the Old Testament and New Testaments are inspired by God and constitute our guidelines for living the life God wants us to live. One thing I am finding is that studying the Bible and learning about God’s commandments and guidelines for our lives should be a slow process. Not a process we try to force feed ourselv...

Read  I John 4: 18-20- We are very materialistic, and many people have a very difficult time believing in something they cannot see or touch. In this passage, John addresses that very thing, verses, 20 & 21, “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? And He has given us this command; those who love God must also love their fellow believers.” John saw Christians going at one another. The past is checkered with Christians doing this in spite of being well educated in the teachings of the Bible. We can disagree with others without allowing those feelings to develop into hate. We can be hurt by people in the church, but John is showing us we cannot hate these people and still claim to be Christians. This is something we need to be aware of and work very diligently to not allow in our lives. There will be times when we are challenged to live the Chri...

Read  I John 4: 13-17- John gives us some good information as he writes about God’s love for us. In verse 17 John writes, “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.” More than anything, God wants us to love the people in our lives. It is clear in this chapter how important our love for others is to God. There is also this important point. We will stand before God one day and if we let love rule our behavior, we can stand confidently yet humbly before God. No one can imagine what that experience will be like, but we all need to know we will stand before the God of love, and He will be interested in how we allowed love to live in our lives.

I John 4: 7-12- This whole chapter speaks to God’s love for us and what our love for others should look like. I think there is a view of love that we should take to heart. God loved us first. If we believe all the Bible contains , we know God is omniscient and knows who we will be as people. He demonstrated His love for us first, knowing the good things and the bad things about us. We are to love other people first just as God loved us first. There are those who will say that other people need to earn our respect or prove themselves to us before we decide to like them. We should be very glad God did not put that requirement on us. We should learn to love and respect first. We should stand prepared to love someone quickly not reticently. We then can act to support that person and assist them in life, just as God did for us when He loved us so much, He gave His Son as a sacrifice for us. I John 4: 9-10, “God showed how much He loved us by sending His one and only Son into ...

Read I John 4: 4-6- Verse 4 in this chapter is one of the most often quoted verses in the Bible. There is a reason for that. This verse acknowledges how great God is. It acknowledges how immense His love is for us. It acknowledges there is more than one spiritual force working in our world yet, God is even greater than any other spiritual force. It would do us all good to simply read this verse and think on this verse and let it sink into our souls and find a permanent place within us. This is a note about God that can give us comfort and peace when we need it. “But you belong to God, my dear children, you have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world.”    

Read  I John 4: 1-3- John did not have his head in the sand. There were people in his time who looked to take advantage of Christians and who worked to weaken the new Christian community. John addressed it in verse 3, “But if someone claims to be a prophet and does not acknowledge the truth about Jesus, that person is not from God. Such a person has the spirit of the Antichrist, which you heard is coming into the world and indeed is already here.” John’s message to Christians when he wrote this epistle, is a warning for us also. We need to weigh the words of people who claim to be messengers of God and let the Holy Spirit guide us in our acceptance of their messages and test those messages against the entirety of the Bible and God’s principles in the Bible. That is another reason why we must study and know the words God has given us so we can test those around us and be able to know God’s heart in our matters of life .

Read I John 3: 21-24 - “And this is His commandment; we must believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us.” Verse 28 is simple. It tells us we should love one another as Jesus commands us to do. So many are talking about love today. What they are really saying is this, “If you agree with me, then that shows you love me. If you agree with how I want to live my life, then you love me. If you don’t agree with me and how I live my life, then you don’t love me.” John is telling us to love each other first, not conditionally. Jesus wants us to love first. That does not mean we do not love someone if we stand on Biblical principles and challenge someone to live according to those principles. We need to be careful in standing on those Biblical principles because we are all human and have all fallen short in some way, but we cannot use that as an excuse to not work to live as God would have us to live. There should not be contention i...

Read  I John 3: 16-20 - Jesus set an example the vast majority of us will not ever be asked to meet. Jesus loved us so much He gave His life for us. We are challenged though to give to others who are in need. This passage is clear to guide us in another we to live our lives, “We know what real love is because Jesus gave up His life for us. So, we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. 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? Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. Our actions are a symbol of our commitment to Christ and our love for others. Our actions do not gain our salvation though. Our commitment and love come first; our actions are our byproduct of love for others.

Read I John 3: 11- 15-   There are anti-Christians in our society today.  These individuals and groups want to see Christianity diminished to the point of having no effect on society. Why?  These people do not want Christianity to call attention to their behaviors they inherently know are wrong but they don’t want to give up because of the darkness in their own souls.   John shows us we have a responsibility in this situation.  Verse 14 says, “ We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death.”   Even in the face of those who would work toward our demise as Christians, God is showing us it is our responsibility to continue to love those who are against us.  This is no passing thought.  It is a thought that requires our attention and in many cases, our work.  It is not always easy to love someone who is working to do us harm.  Th...

Read  I John 3: 7- 10- People who live their lives opposite the teachings found in the Bible many times are quick to tell others they should not be judged. Their behavior is theirs to make and another person does not have the right to judge their behavior. John has written about this very distinctly in verse 10, “So now we can tell who are children of God and who are children of the devil. Anyone who does not live righteously and does not love other believers does not belong to God.” Others should be able to judge us by our behavior. Others who know us should readily know where are hearts lie. People in free societies have allowed the loosening of their morals and personal principles to shade their religious beliefs. They look for approval of their personal decisions even though their behavior is not righteous and opposite of Biblical principles. We need to learn to be honest with ourselves and know we need to live righteous lives.