This image is of a mountain top trail in La Gomera, Vallehermoso in the province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife of the Canary Islands, Spain. The mountain falls away on both sides of the trail which narrows in the distance. Have you ever been on a mountain top when night was falling? There is such beauty at sunset, but also an ominous danger lurking. How are you going to survive the long cold night? Should you dig in and weather the storm or will you be able to climb down safely without falling?
John the apostle wrote the letter of 1John to encourage believers in Jesus, warning them that a long dark night was ahead of them. They would face the temptations of the world, and there were those who had abandoned Christ and become false teachers denying His message of love and forgiveness. Here are my verse by verse reflections:
1 John 2:12 I am writing to you, dear children, because your sins have been forgiven on account of his name.
Again I find myself captivated by the awesome importance of the name of God, Jesus, that we have been given. “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we will be saved” (Acts 4:12). Satan likes nothing better than our culture’s use of “Jesus Christ!” as a curse word.
1 John 2:13 I am writing to you, father’s, because you know him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one.
Overcome in this case (Nike the Greek root) means victorious. This spiritual truth needs to be remembered. We know the eternal one! We have defeated the enemy. We are forgiven.
1 John 2:14 I write to you, dear children, because you know the Father. I write to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you are strong and the word of God is living in you, and you have overcome the evil one.
It is interesting to realize that the old men who received this letter, the fathers, likely did know Jesus personally. But to say to children, who had never seen Jesus personally, that they know the Father, is encouraging to all of us born generations later. We know the Father!!!
1 John 2:15 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in them.
There is a temptation to be too attached to this world. If the two key commandments are to love God and love people, then loving animals, food, cars, movies, our jobs or physics needs to take a distant third place. God made an amazing world, but beware: idolatry is alluring.
1 John 2:16 For everything in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, comes not from the Father but from the world.
Here is an unholy Trinity of worldly desires. Lord help us to control our desires!
1 John 2:17 The world and it’s desires pass away, but whoever does the will of the Father lives forever.
“Lives forever” is literally “abides into the age (to come)”. Jesus talked about the end of the age, that the world would not always be as we see it now. There is something grander than we can imagine coming. Do we want to be stuck on the ground that we know, like the caterpillar, or do we want to let go of the “worm thoughts” and become a butterfly?
1 John 2:18 Dear children, this is the last hour; As you have heard, the Antichrist is coming. Even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour.
False teachers still abound who deny Jesus. But the Holy Spirit dwells in us and testifies to the truth. Jesus came, lived, loved, died and came back to life conquering death. In his name we too are reborn. When we read “last hour” we think, phew, we have almost made it through! But that is a misreading. The “last hour” of a day, in Jewish thought, is at twilight before the night begins. So the idea that it is the “last hour” does not mean that the the light is about to appear and make everything right, but rather there is a long dangerous night ahead! This is why John is warning about deceivers and antichrists and advocating that we stay firm in resolve.
1 John 2:19 They went out from us but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.
Charlatans can be hard to recognize. Often we have to wait and see whether they endure to the end. False convictions don’t sustain.
1 John 2:20 But you have an anointing from the Holy (one) and all of you know (the truth).
I like the idea of a Holy Spirit coating, like oil poured upon us. “Anointing” is the Greek word “chrisma” used 3 times in this book (but nowhere else). This is to smear with an ointment. I have put parentheses around words that are not explicit in the Greek. As a result of the Holy Spirit’s “icing,” our mind is made new, renewed in the knowledge of our creator.
1 John 2:21 I do not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie comes from the truth.
Jesus is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6). We know Jesus and his Spirit leads us into all truth. We can completely trust everything he says.
1 John 2:22 Who is the liar? It is whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a person is the antichrist – denying the Father and the Son.
Don’t bother acting like you are my friend if you diss on my wife or kids. God is no different. Don’t pretend to love him and yet deny his beloved Son. Do you want to honor God? You show it by the way you esteem Jesus.
1 John 2:23 No one who denies the Son has the Father; he who acknowledges the Son has the Father also.
When I think about Peter’s denial of Jesus I see how easy it is to fail the test. A moment of fear, a moment of hesitation due to embarrassment… “You don’t really believe that do you?” Lord let the true conviction of my heart overcome my weakness!
1 John 2:24 As for you, see that what you heard from the beginning remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father.
A big part of remaining faithful is remembering all that God has done. How easily we forget. We need to record and retell the stories of our faith, when God showed up and met our needs in big and little ways. It helps me to hang on and believe when times are tough.
1 John 2:25 And this is what he promised us – eternal life.
The Jews waited a long time for this promise. .. the Messiah. We too are waiting for his second coming. But he will come. God is faithful.
1 John 2:26 I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray.
I find it sobering to realize the extent to which we are caught in a battle for the hearts and souls of people. There is intentionality in “trying to lead astray”. Where am I being led astray?…
My thought right now is religious legalism. God is slowly opening my eyes to the extent to which I put myself under the law and falsely believe that my effort is required rather than simply God’s goodness, love and grace.
1 John 2:27 As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things, and as that anointing is real not counterfeit – just as it has taught you, remain in him.
The Holy Spirit shows us how to stay connected to the vine, that is Christ, drawing on his infinite resources, allowing his abundant life to be lived through us. We do not need instructions, a law, or a human instructor because our guide lives in us, empowering us to live for God. The Spirit in us can protect us from people who desire to lead us astray if we just listen and obey Him.
1 John 2:8 And now, dear children, continue in him so that when he appears we may be confident and unashamed before him at his coming.
This “continue” is the same as the word “abide.” The promise is that we will be able to speak “plainly/publically/freely” (translated confidently) without “having been put to shame in separation from him when he is revealed”. The only way to stand before God and speak unashamed is to be cloaked in the righteousness of Jesus.
1 John 2:29 If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone who does what is right has been born of him.
This is a rather profound statement. Jesus is the only path to righteous behavior. If someone consistently practices righteousness they are born again. Period. It is a miracle that only the Spirit of Christ in you can cause.
[1] Do Lemmings actually commit mass suicide? From the Encyclopaedia Britannica: “But the biggest reason the myth endures? Deliberate fraud. For the 1958 Disney nature film White Wilderness, filmmakers eager for dramatic footage staged a lemming death plunge, pushing dozens of lemmings off a cliff while cameras were rolling. The images—shocking at the time for what they seemed to show about the cruelty of nature and shocking now for what they actually show about the cruelty of humans—convinced several generations of moviegoers that these little rodents do, in fact, possess a bizarre instinct to destroy themselves.”
Atheist to Elder 