Lord, Increase Our Faith, To Pray

10.16.22 1 John 5:13–15

13 I have written 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 that we have before him: 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 also know that we receive the things we have asked from him.

Lord, Increase Our Faith, to Pray

When you write a text to someone it might be different than an email. When you have a full keyboard you can perhaps afford to be a little bit more wordy. But when you’re dealing with a little screen you tend to get to the point as quickly as you can, sometimes by even using abbreviations for words. You have a singular approach to the text, and that’s it.

Throughout John’s letter you can see the one main purpose he had in writing this epistle and the one main audience. The audience was for those who believed in Jesus. The purpose was so that they would KNOW that they had eternal life in Jesus. He wanted them to have CONFIDENCE in their salvation, which would then overflow to confidence in their PRAYER life.

John says, I have written these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God. Why doesn’t He just say “Jesus?” Why “the NAME of the Son of God?” He seems to be putting an emphasis on the divine connection of Jesus when he calls him the “Son of God” and His reputation as that Son” You see, there was a group of people by the name of Gnostics who said something to the effect that God had entered Jesus during his baptism and then left Jesus during his crucifixion. This simply wasn’t true. God took on flesh from conception and continues to have flesh as the resurrected Christ. So with this confusion about who the Son of God actually was and what He did as God, it led to a confusion in faith as well. If Jesus only died as a man, then He didn’t die as our God and as a substitute for mankind. Some people didn’t know exactly WHAT to believe about Jesus and who He was. Without confidence in what the truth really is, that leads to a lack of faith. So John wrote to combat these lies with the truth.

The devil is the king of confusion. How did he lead Eve into sin? He questioned the Word of God. Did God REALLY say? Pilate asked the question, “What is truth?” The conversation continues today, “Who can really say what is right and wrong? Who can truly define what a man or a woman is or what marriage is either?” Well, God says. “But that’s centuries old, written by a bunch of old white male bigots. What makes YOUR truth any better than MY truth?” So there is no authority in the American mind. There is no truth. I can define who God is by what I THINK God would do or wouldn’t do. There can’t be hell. There can’t be judgment. There can only be tolerance and acceptance. I can be my own god and master my own destiny. These are the devil’s lies to our society. Why believe in anything but yourself? It leaves no room for repentance and no room for faith in a Savior from sin.

Throughout John’s letter you can note how CONFIDENCE in Jesus is a key theme. He speaks in terms of truth and lies, something that our society doesn’t believe in. Listen, for instance, to 1 John 1:9–2:2 -

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar, and his Word is not in us. 1 My children, I write these things to you so that you will not sin. If anyone does sin, we have an Advocate before the Father: Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. 2 He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the whole world.

Notice also how John speaks of Jesus atoning sacrifice on the cross. He didn’t just die for BELIEVERS. He died for the ENTIRE WORLD, for all people of all time. What a comfort! I think of some of these people who have been exposed to embarrassing sins on video. That video will be public for the rest of their lives and bring shame. Yet if they go to the cross, they have forgiveness. They can find mercy, because Jesus died for them too. Even if they can’t forget it, and even if the world will never forget it, God promises that Jesus paid for it and it is done for those who believe in Jesus. That’s the CONFIDENCE that God wants sinners to have - that they can go to Jesus with ANY sin - because He really already paid for ALL of them.