1 John 2:1-10 NKJV
2 My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 2 And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.
3 Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. 4 He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him. 6 He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.
7 Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard from the beginning. 8 Again, a new commandment I write to you, which thing is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining.
9 He who says he is in the light, and hates his brother, is in darkness until now. 10 He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him.
People, mistakenly, think that there’s freedom in vagueness. But in reality freedom comes when stark contrasts are drawn out and a firm conviction is taken. Within these few verses of John’s Epistle, he is fighting against the philosophies of his day, so he is inspired to take on the validity of one’s religion — that is, knowing that your belief is the true belief.
Who is to say, after all, that ours is a certainty superior to that of others? Meaning, are we Christians merely because we are born into Christian families? If we had been born Jews or Mohammedans, would we not feel just as certain and believe that we are just as right in feeling that we know God? Is the whole of the religious confession an entirely subjective consideration, unproved, unprovable, especially to those of a more objective “scientific” persuasion?
We may feel that ours is an awareness of, a connectedness to, God. But how are we to know whether feeling corresponds to reality? Feelings, after all, are fleeting and untrustworthy! No amount of clearness or strength in the experience itself can guarantee its validity, any more than the extreme vividness of a dream leads us to suppose that it is anything but a dream.
No experience of God is valid apart from what we know from the light of His Word, from His love, which becomes our love. John crushes those who made a specialty of knowledge, as men today in a different way boast of their ‘science.’ There are no shades of gray. There is only light or darkness, love or hatred. Some may find this absolutism discomforting; but it, at least, has the virtue of putting the issues in the most basic and starkest possible terms — and it brings one to actually be free through faith in Christ’s fully atoning merits for them.
When we confess that God makes Himself known in the person and work of Christ, then we have known and know Him according to His revelation. God, through His Word, is the One who gives the certainty — and He gets all of the glory!
Let us pray: Lord, thank you for the certainty from Your Word. Amen.