God wants us to know we’re forgiven, that he doesn’t hold our past sloppy attitude toward him against us, because truly knowing we’re forgiven is God’s second evidence that we’re on the path to eternal life in our lifetimes now (1 John 5:13).

Which is why he had John the Baptist go “into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,” Luke 3:3. God wanted these people to know they were forgiven, which was remarkable, because they were Jews, the one group of people on the planet whom God had set apart to obey and trust him, and they’d totally blown it. But here was God offering them the chance to repent and start afresh, knowing their sins had been forgiven. 

It prepared the way beautifully for Jesus and his amazing healings, which he did “so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins,” Matthew 9:6. God had given Jesus the power to do these healings so people would know they were forgiven. In healing them he was giving them a fresh start, just like John had been baptizing people to wash away their past to give them a fresh start. The purpose of John’s baptisms and Jesus’ healings was exactly the same, therefore, to help people truly know they were forgiven. 

And the same thing happened when people were “cut to the heart” on realizing they’d been complicit in the killing of Jesus in Acts 2:36-37 – because Peter’s response in verse 38 was, “Repent and be baptized,” grab the chance to put that ghastly mess and all that guilt behind you, “so that your sins may be forgiven.” Because that was the whole point of Jesus dying, so they could start afresh, knowing to the bottom of their socks that their sins had been forgiven, forgotten, and washed away in his blood.

Paul wanted to get that same point across too, telling his fellow Jews in Acts 13:38, “Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you.” And why was that important for them to know? Because this was the path God had laid out to eternal life, and believing it would put them on it (48). 

God also provides one more piece of evidence to help us believe we’re on the road to eternal life, adding up to “three that testify” to it: “The Spirit, the water and the blood”….(next blog)

The first evidence God presents to help us know we have eternal life in his Son is the testimony of changed lives, which began with John the Baptist telling people, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near,” Matthew 3:1-2.

And people “from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole nation of Jordan” found themselves doing just that – they repented – “confessing their sins” (5-6), burying their past in baptism, and wanting to gear their lives to “fulfilling all righteousness,” as Jesus put it in verse 15, meaning live totally from that point on as God would want them to. 

All of which God got started in people through John in preparation for the arrival of his Son (3), because this would be his first real, live evidence (or testimony) of what he’d sent his Son for, to get us humans on the path to eternal life in our lives now by this amazing new desire we find in ourselves to tune our lives to him. 

And it’s all God’s doing. It was he who got John the Baptist yelling out to people in Luke 3:9 that “every tree not producing good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.” Because that’s what got their attention in their terms back then to set them on the path to eternal life – just like millions of people ever since who give their testimonies of how God got their attention, and the response it created in them. 

And a response like those in John’s day too, who on hearing John found themselves humbly asking, “What should we do then?” Or like the people in Peter’s day, who on hearing from Peter in Acts 2:37 that they’d been complicit in killing Jesus (36), “were cut to the heart,” and they too asked, “What shall we do?”

And all beautifully crafted by God to get them started on the road to eternal life in their present lifetimes, and in such a way that looking back they’ll realize it was he who did it, because it was so perfectly tuned to their situation, just as it was in John’s day to get through to people then. 

For some it’s sudden and dramatic, for others quiet and gradual, but God’s purpose is the same, to get us on the road to eternal life and to help us know we’re on it (1 John 5:13), by first of all bringing us to the point of repentance and wanting to change our lives, but also in “Knowing we’re forgiven”….(next blog)

In 1 John 5:9 John writes about “the testimony of God” – a testimony being an ‘authoritative declaration of truth’ – which in God’s case is based on one simple point, verse 11, that he’s “given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.”  

Which seems like an impossible thing for us humans to grasp, so if God was hauled up in court and asked point blank, “Come on, how on earth can we possibly know in our busy, limited, physical lives in this world that we have eternal life” – what would his answer be?

According to John, God’s answer would be along the lines of: “Well, of course you can know you have eternal life; I gave it to you in my Son. So look no further than him for the evidence you need that it’s true.”

Which is exactly what John does. In verse 5, he zeroes right in on “Jesus being the Son of God,” describing him in verse 6 as “the one who came by water and blood – Jesus Christ.” So if God was speaking, he’d say, “Look, I gave you evidence in physical terms you can understand – water and blood,” both of which featured strongly in Jesus’ life, and clearly for a jolly good reason that relates perfectly to us knowing for certain that we have eternal life. 

Jesus’ arrival on the scene, for instance, “came by water.” In Matthew 3:13, “Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John.” And John knew who Jesus was, openly claiming in John 1:34 that “I have seen and testify that this is the Son of God.” 

So here we have the Son of God coming to John to be baptized in water. Which shocked John because he was baptizing people “with water for repentance,” Matthew 3:11, and what did Jesus need to repent of? But Jesus said, “Go ahead and baptize me to fulfill all righteousness,” because that’s where the path to eternal life begins, in us humans fulfilling all righteousness, or obeying all God’s requirements. 

Which was exactly why people were coming to John to be baptized, to “confess their sins” (6), and “produce fruit in keeping with repentance,” Luke 3:8, and start new lives obeying God (10-14). In Jesus being baptized along with them, therefore, he was confirming this as the right place to start, because it’s in “The testimony of changed lives” that God presents his first evidence of eternal life being in his Son….(next blog)

In 1 John 5:5, John asks, “Who is he that overcomes the world?” And his answer is: “he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.” But why the need to “overcome the world,” first of all?

Because as John made clear in the story of Cain, there’s an “evil one” whose sole intent is to create a world of death on this planet, by getting us to hate each other. It started with Cain hating his brother so much he killed him, and it has continued ever since, resulting in billions more people dying – and the wrecking of marriages, family relationships and friendships – because of the same hate, jealousy and explosive anger Cain had. 

But fortunately, 1 John 3:8, “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work,” enabling us, therefore, verse 14, to “pass (or move away from) that world of death to life,” where instead of hate “we love our brothers.” And in so doing we “overcome the world” of hate and death that the evil one infects our world with. 

But why do we need to “believe that Jesus is the Son of God” for this to happen? Because, John writes in 1 John 4:15, “If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God.” 

For us to love and not hate we need “God to live in us and us to live in him,” enabling us to live in his world of love, not the world of Cain. But how did God make that possible? Verse 14, “the Father sent his Son to be the Saviour of the world.” It was in his Son that he set in motion the switch from hate to love (1:9).

It is the Father’s “command” in 1 John 3:23, therefore, that we “believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded,” because what Jesus did in love for us, and the love he taught us to live by, is what the Father set in motion to combat what the evil one set in motion in Cain. 

In his Son, therefore, the Father has provided us with “victory over the world” (5:4). And we experience that personally in what the Father also set in motion in his Son, which is the giving of his Spirit (3:24), because the Spirit “in us is so much greater than the (evil) one who is in the world” (4:4). In his Son, therefore, the Father is telling, showing, and living in us what he created us for. Or as John puts it, “Jesus is God’s testimony”….(next blog)

In 1 John 3:14, John tells us “We know we’ve passed from death to life, because we love our brothers.” 

From the very beginning that point was made clear too, when Cain murdered his brother (12). If Cain had loved his brother, Abel would not have died the way he did. Nor would billions of other people since then, who’ve also been killed and murdered by their fellow humans. 

Loving one another, therefore, seems such an obvious way of putting an end to hate and murder, so this entire planet can “pass from death to life.” Something really disturbing must’ve happened to Cain, then, for him to dismiss the obvious and justify murdering his brother. 

John’s explanation is that “Cain belonged to the evil one” (12), and that’s what led to “his own actions being evil” – unlike Abel who did what he did because it was the right thing to do (12). Which set a pattern from that time on, so “we’d know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are” (10), because “everyone who does what is right has been born of God” (2:29), whereas “anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; neither is anyone who does not love his brother” (3:10). And Cain was guilty of both. 

It’s also those two things – love for our fellow humans and doing what is right – that noticeably work together on our everyday human level too, because those who act on the basis that “it’s the right thing to do,” are also most likely to be the ones you can depend on to do a good job. I remember one plumber who did an excellent job for us, and then, days later, I noticed he’d done several other jobs that needed doing too, without charging us.

That’s love, compared to the person who skimps on a job, or scams, cheats and lies – actions that are evil and hateful like Cain’s. And that really concerns John, because “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and no murderer has eternal life in him” (15).

So “Don’t be like Cain,” John writes in verse 12, because being stuck in an evil, hateful, dead end life is not what the Father sent Jesus to us for. Jesus came to move us from hate to a life of love instead, the key to which, according to John, is believing “Jesus is the Son of God”….(next blog)

In 1 John 4:12, John writes that “No one has ever seen God, but if we love each other, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.” 

On the one hand, then, we cannot see God. Only “God the Son who is at his Father’s side” has seen the Father in all his glory (John 1:18), because he is himself “the image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15), made of the very same ‘invisible stuff’ the Father is. 

But we aren’t, which explains why God communicated with humans in the Old Testament in ways they could see, like a burning bush, a pillar of fire, and walking and talking with people in a human form. He showed his back to Moses, but that was still visible, so it wasn’t the invisible God Moses saw. As humans we can’t even see the wind, let alone see God.  

Which leaves us in a quandary, because how can we know for sure that God exists if we can’t see him? Fortunately, Philip piped up for all of us when he said to Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father.” To which Jesus replied, “How can you say, ‘Show us the Father?’ Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me?” (John 14:8-10). It was the Father living in Jesus (10) and Jesus living in his Father (11) that would produce “the evidence” of the Father’s existence – which at that point in time was in the amazing “miracles” Jesus was doing (11). 

Which becomes a startling statement when reading 1 John 4:13, because it’s also God living in us and us living in him that produces the evidence of the Father’s existence today. But not in doing miracles like Jesus did. Instead, according to John in verse 16, it’s in “Whoever lives in love.” That’s what turns the lights on to seeing the invisible God today: it’s in humans living in love. 

And Jesus showed us what living in love means “by laying down his life for us” (3:16). We can live in love too then, John adds, “by laying down our lives for our brothers.” 

That’s the key to how God – who is love – becomes visible today: “it’s seen in him (Jesus) and in us” (2:8) – in Jesus making ‘the God who is love’ visible in what he did for us, and in us making ‘the God who is love’ visible in what we do for each other (3:17-18). 

And that’s important, because it’s also in our love for each other that’s also evidence that we’re “Passing from death to life”….(next blog)

When talking of the Spirit, Jesus says in John 14:17, “you will know him, for he lives with you and in you.” Clearly then, the Spirit will be doing some very noticeable things in our lives. 

Which John goes into more detail about in 1 John 4:2, when he writes: “This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: it’s acknowledging that Jesus came as a human being,” And why is that important? It’s because of who the human Jesus was, and why he came to us in human form. 

And John was in a position to explain that, having rubbed elbows with Jesus in his human form, and realizing, having seen and heard Jesus personally, that Jesus was “the Word of life,” 1 John 1:1 – meaning the one who’d lived forever with the Father, and to whom the Father had given the power to give eternal life to us (2).

So how did John grasp that? Well, again in his own experience, he realized it had been given to him, because he knew a lot of other people (“many antichrists”) who had no clue who Jesus was (2:18), some of whom also vehemently opposed the idea “that Jesus is the Christ” (22) sent by God to “forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1:9), so that we can have eternal life (2:25). The contrast was so huge, it was obvious to John that something special happens to those who realize (and believe) who Jesus was and why he’d come in human form.

John puts it down to “an anointing from the Holy One” (2:20). And while that “anointing you received remains in you,” verse 27, “you won’t need anyone to teach you because you’ll have all the truth you need.” And in saying that, John was simply quoting Jesus himself, who’d said that, “when the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth” (John 16:13).

The truth about what, though? The truth about Jesus himself: “the Spirit of truth will testify about me” (John 15:26), so we’d “know with certainty that he’d been sent by the Father” (17:8). But sent by the Father for what purpose? John 17:26 – “in order that the love the Father has for Jesus may be in us, by Jesus now living that love in us,” which he does through the Spirit (1 John 4:13). 

What the Spirit’s doing, therefore, is making God’s love real in us. But how do we “know with certainty” that we have God’s love in us? According to John, it’s by “The love we have for one another”….(next blog)

God’s purpose in creating us humans and giving us life is that we come to “live in love” as entirely and eternally as he does, which he makes happen in three ways: 

First of all, he tells us he loves us. All through Scripture that message comes through, from making us in his image to being our Father. That’s because, as John writes in 1 John 4:16, “God is love.” Everything he is and does is love. 

But how does God make us aware of that? By the second way: he shows his love for us, which he did by sending his Son, who in everything he said and did would make the love of his Father known (John 17:26).

And isn’t that how it works on our human level too? When a man seeks to live in love forever with a woman, he too does a lot of telling her he loves her – along with doing whatever it takes to show his love too. On our human level too, then, expressing and showing love are essential to making love happen. 

And it never fails in kickstarting billions of marriages. Starry eyed couples fall in love and happily believe that with the kind of love they have for each other they will never fall out of love like other couples they know do. But then they discover to their shock and horror that the realities of day-to-day life in this world can make even their love wear a bit thin. The pressures of work, money, health and family troubles create tension and stress that can turn even their “unending love dial” to an icy cool. 

But fortunately, according to John, God has a third way to keep love alive: it’s by God living his love in us – the same love the Father and Son have together, that has kept their love alive forever. As John puts it in 1 John 4:12, “God lives in us,” because that’s how “his love (the love that lasts forever) is made complete in us.” Whoever has that kind of love, then, “lives in God,” verse 16, “and God in him.” What keeps love alive forever, then, is trusting God to live his love in us. 

But how do we know he’s living his love in us? John answers that in 1 John 3:24: “We know it by the Spirit he gave us,” and in 4:13, “We know we live in him and he in us, because he’s given us of his Spirit.” But how  do we know we have his Spirit? According to John, it’s by “What the Spirit does in us”….(next blog)

In 1 John 4:16, John writes that “God is love,” so we can happily assume that God loves us. But how do we know he loves us? 

John answers that in verse 9: we know because “God showed his love.” He proved it through obvious and loving action. Which makes sense, because how does a wife know her husband loves her? He can say he loves her, sing of his love for her, even write poems to express how much he loves her – just as God tells us he loves us and expresses his love in songs and poems in Scripture too – but the proof of the pudding is in love that’s shown in obvious and loving action. 

So how did God show his love in obvious and loving action? According to John in verse 9, it was by “sending his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.” 

In 1 John 1:1 John explains why that was the best thing God could do to prove his love for us. It’s because his Son is “the Word of life,” meaning the source of “eternal life” (2). Back in John 1:4, John had already made it clear that “in him (Jesus the Word) was life,” and in John 3:35, that “The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands,” so that “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life” (36). 

So when John writes that the Father sent Jesus that “we might live through him,” he meant “live eternally through him,” because in placing everything in Jesus’ hands, it included making Jesus the source of eternal life. In God sending Jesus to us, therefore, his purpose was obvious and loving: it was to bring us eternal life. 

And what better proof of God’s love could there be than that? Nothing could be more practical and comforting in this finite life of ours than knowing eternal life is ours too. Which was exactly John’s message in 1 John 1:2, that “we proclaim to you the eternal life,” and in 1 John 5:11, that “this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.” And in verse 12: “He who has the Son has life.”

So for simply believing that God sent his Son to give us eternal life, eternal life is ours already, and that’s God’s proof of his love. Clearly, then, he wants us to grasp that. But how? According to John, it’s by God now “Living his love in us” too….(next blog)

In 1 John 4:16, John boils life down to a simple formula, that “Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him” – and this, verse 17, is what God is “making complete (or fully developing) in us.”

God’s purpose in creating us humans and giving us life, therefore, is that we come to “live in love” as entirely and eternally as he does. That’s an amazing goal, so how on earth does he go about making it happen?

According to John, God does it in three ways, the first of which is telling us – as John does in verse 16 – that “God is love.” The starting point to living in love, therefore, is catching on to what God tells us about himself, that from top to bottom and all through his being, he is love.

Which may seem hard to believe with all the horrible things happening to us humans in this world, but it would give purpose to all that’s going on if we could see where it’s all leading – that it’s all been designed by a God whose life is love to help us see that life is love too. Which makes sense, because if we’re going to be living in his world forever where life is love, then life for us in this world must be preparation for it.  

Like, for instance, when we’re born, because even in our messy world millions of babies enter a world of love, in the loving arms of our exhausted mother, in the sparkling eyes of our relieved Dad, and the steady stream of aunts, uncles and other assorted relatives and friends all saying we’re the most beautiful baby who’s ever existed. And it all comes so naturally, so that, even if no one thought it at the time, this incredible little living being is already being given a taste of what God has intended for him entirely and eternally.

And hopefully, “life is love” continues for that child too. Which God also made easy, because he built into parents a deep and lasting love for their children. Which for the parents is marvellous preparation for the life God intends for them too, because as John writes in verse 7, “Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.” 

The love we experience so naturally, therefore, is God’s way of telling us he’s already “birthed” his very own self in us, so that we’re already on the way to living the life of love he lives, and intends for us forever. But how, then, does God make us aware of his love? According to John, it’s in “How God shows his love”….(next blog)