Where did that come from?

Have you ever asked someone that question? Maybe after they just blew up at you for no good reason? You found yourself the recipient of misplaced anger?

Jesus told us that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. So we can know where our heart is by the things we do and say.

The book of First John is written so that Christians may be sure of their salvation. The Gospel of John was written so that we may know Jesus is the Christ and thereby be saved, but this letter is written so that we can be certain of staying saved.

Apparently some teachers had begun persuading Christians that Jesus did not really have a physical body and that they had to have some special mystical knowledge (proto-gnosticism) in order to be saved. In order to restablish the Christian confidence in Christ alone, the letter of 1st John was written. We can have confidence in our salvation because Christ came in the flesh and his body rose from the dead and our lives have been transformed by this truth.

John wants us to.k ow that there are two groups: those who proceed from God and those who proceed from evil. John highlights this by using the Greek preposition “εκ” which means out of or amd is usually translated “from.”

John told us that love is εκ from or of God. Likewise those who are God’s people are described as εκ “of” or “from” God.

John wrote, “Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (1 John 4:7-8). We can know we are saved because, we proceed from God and that is demonstrated by the love for others.

John points this out again “God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his one and only Son into the world so that we might live through him. Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that he loved usand sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God remains inus and his love is made complete in us” (1 John 4:9-12).

In chapter five the love which is the sign of Christianity is further defined as keeping God’s commandments. “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father also loves the one born of him. 2 This is how we know that we love God’s children: when we love God and obey his commands. 3 For this is what love for God is: to keep his commands. And his commands are not a burden, 4 because everyone who has been born of God conquers the world. This is the victory that has conquered the world: our faith.” 1 John 5:1-4.

Two key phrases are used here “faith” (the Christian system) and love (keeping the commandments or covenant faithfulness).

Therefore, when we have been transformed in our lives by knowing Christ who was sent as God’s display of love so much so that we love God and others faithfully, we can be confident of our salvation which rests on Christ.