February 10, 2022: Day 31 – I John and II John

We read the first two of John’s Epistles.  Keep in mind that one of the primary reasons that these epistles are written are in order to combat the heresy of arianism, which is a belief that Jesus was created by God, and so not God in God’s fullness.  As Trinitarian believers we consider that a heresy.  The opposite of that would be docetism that believes that Jesus was actually in spirit form while he was on the earth and not truly human but rather strictly divine and seemed to be human.

Wow, that is a lot of theology, but keep that in mind as you read I and II John as it takes us on a very clear course that not only defines Jesus as God, but also as fully human.  Chapter one identifies that sin should not be present in our lives once we accept Jesus as Savior.  A good reminder for all of us.  He says in chapter 2 that he is writing these things so that we would not sin.  But he also says in chapter 1 vs.4 that he is writing these things so that our joy would be complete  in Jesus.  

Chapter 4 is the most significant chapter on love that we have in the Bible.  Even more so than I Corinthians 13 which is primarily descriptive of love, here John gives us the origin and the reason for love and the purpose that it serves as well as a description.  We see that love originates and has as its standard the love that God has for us in that he sacrificed his own Son for our sake.  The love that we have for each other is important, but ought to be measured against the love that God has for us, which is incredibly sacrificial and not self-serving at all.  It is a difficult measuring stick to achieve.  

John’s second letter is only one chapter and is addressed to and “elect lady” who is thought to be a local church.  The new commandments that are given are actually old commandments which are to love one another and to reject false teachings.  Pretty much sums up all the readings.