John continues with his themes of love and obedience, but provides us with some important lessons:
- Not only are we God’s children, we are His little children. That emphasizes our need for obedience.
- We are also to imitate and follow Jesus. Jesus was without sin, which is why He could be the sacrifice for our sins. We should practice righteousness, just like Jesus is righteous.
- However, one day we will finally be without sin, because we will see Jesus and be transformed!
- We follow God by showing love to our brothers and sisters in Christ. When we hate fellow believers we act like Cain, and that makes us guilty of murder (Matthew 5:21-22). It also makes the devil our father!
- And our love needs to be active, not just verbal. We need to be willing to sacrifice for other believers.
- The indwelling Spirit sanctifies our conscience so we can trust it to guide us and show us when we aren’t doing what is right.
- When we are in a right relationship with God (which starts with belief in Christ and continues with our love for believers) we can expect our prayers to be answered. That’s because we will be asking for the right things! It’s when were not in a correct relationship that we ask for the wrong things (James 4:3).
1 John 2:28 may be one of the most sobering passages in Scripture: “And now, little children, remain in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence and not shrink away from him in shame when he comes back.“
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