MONDAY 27th
1 John 5:1-3
‘Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome.’
I remember when I was growing up on the farm that we had to often do jobs that we wish we didn’t have to do, but because the farmer was our dad, and we had to respect him and be obedient to him, we would do whatever he commanded us to do. Now I use the word commanded here because it helps to fit into the context of our verses today. See when our dad commanded (or instructed) us, because of the relationship between us it required obedience. I can still recall those Saturday mornings when perhaps we would have preferred to be playing or at least enjoying ourselves he would tell us at breakfast time that we were to go into one of the fields and do some thistle cutting. This meant having a ‘hook’ which was a sharp crescent blade on the end of a long handle or a ‘scythe’ and walking through the field cutting down the thistles, nettles or docks that had grown. You knew that by the time you had finished your hands were going to be blistered! It was tiresome and burdensome, and there were many other burdensome tasks we would have to undertake as well!
But when our heavenly Father instructs us to be obedient it should never be tiresome or burdensome, for we know that the end result of our being obedient to God is not blisters on our hands, but rather blessing from his hand! Looking back I didn’t necessarily obey my father out of my love for him, nor because he loved me, I obeyed because I had to or look out! But our obedience to our heavenly Father is totally based upon love, he loves us, we love him and therefore out of that love we want to obey him, because we want to please him.
In the context of this verse, our obedience toward God is shown by the love that we have toward each other ‘By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments’.
Again, as with so much of what John is writing to us about in this epistle, we each need to examine our own hearts, when we are called to love one another, do our hearts feel like mine used to when my dad would tell me to do the thistle cutting, ‘Oh no!’ or do we delight to obey, knowing that the command from God to love one another is not burdensome, the end result will be blessing and joy.
I mentioned in an earlier devotion that John uses words related to love, forty six times in this epistle, verse 3 in 1 John 5 is the last reference with it mentioned, but it has been a characteristic all the way through, the song says that it is love that makes the world go ‘round, well, the love that is of utmost important is God’s love, not so much that makes the world go ‘round, but needs to be shown the world ‘round, may we display it to those we are in fellowship with and also to those we see on a daily basis who as of yet have not come to know the love of God.