September 18th, 2013
Today’s reading from Encounter with God

Arrogance-free Certainty

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Opening Prayer

Father, Your love for me is based on Your character, not on my performance. I praise You for Your amazing love.

Read 1 John 5:13-21

[13] I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. [14] This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. [15] And if we know that he hears us-whatever we ask-we know that we have what we asked of him. [16] If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. [17] All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death. [18] We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the One who was born of God keeps them safe, and the evil one cannot harm them. [19] We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one. [20] We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. [21] Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. All rights reserved throughout the world. Used by permission of International Bible Society.

Meditate

“Our sin is rebellion against God: the willful desire to run our own lives, to shape our own destiny, to live by our own strength and grit. Our sins flow from the headwater of that separation” (Lloyd John Ogilvie).

Think Further

Throughout this epistle John calls believers to test the authenticity of their faith: what they believe and how they act. He does so to reassure, not to undermine. In the searchlight-like beam of John’s tests, believers affirm that, yes, we do believe and trust Jesus (13,20); we do feel repulsion towards things that grieve him (18); we do feel drawn to love and pray for others (16). That furnishes renewed confidence that God is indeed at work in us; that this world is not our true home, and the ruler of this world (19) no longer dictates our lifestyle and future. As he has always done, the evil one manipulates and presses believers to doubt God’s word, thereby luring them into sin by minimizing its significance (Gen. 3:1-7). The true believer, however, retains unshakeable confidence: here, specifically, confidence in prayer. We must never allow the wonder of access to God in prayer to become commonplace. Confidence that he listens and answers is one of the greatest privileges of adoption into his family.

Another evidence of true Christian faith is that when we witness sin in others it causes us to pray for the person who has fallen. Grace produces compassion, not coldness, towards those who fail, in a true expression of that love for others that suffuses John’s writing. This has a sobering aspect, however. We pray for sinners, but there is a place that some can go that seems to put them beyond prayer. A consistent and determined unwillingness to recognize Jesus, a blasé approach to sin and lack of demonstrable love of others may put one in a place where forgiveness is beyond reach. In proper fear, let us tear down every idol that would usurp Christ’s throne and worship only him (21).

Apply

“I have prayed for you … that your faith may not fail” (Luke 22:32). Pray that prayer for someone you know who needs it.

Closing prayer

Lord, at times I have accommodated sin in my life and have settled down with it. Bring any sin to my consciousness; accept my confession and forgive me.

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