I think when John wrote both this letter and the Gospel of John, he wrote from the perspective of someone who had seen a lot when it came to the church and faith. He saw the early church struggle. He saw the church have to deal with the fact that Jesus’ return was taking longer than expected. He saw that sin could infiltrate the church and throw people into spiritual depressions, confusion and even destruction. So, he ends the letter with a few words of perspective.

1 John 5:19-20

As the Apostle John finished up his letter to a struggling church, he makes a series of statements which need some clarification. Last week we looked at prayer and this week we are going to be looking at a sin which John says “leads to death” and that it really does not deserve to have a lot of prayer effort put into it. Does that surprise you? Let’s take a look.

1 John 5:16-17

Today we are continuing the letter of 1 John. In this last section, the Apostle John gives a series of quick teachings on issues which were, and continue to be, points of confusion and sometime contention within the church. The three areas he covers quickly are prayer, how to deal with a brother or sister who is sinning, what it means to be a child of God in a fallen world, and one brief sentence concerning idols. Today we are looking at prayer.

1 John 5:14  

The passage we are looking at today is a little bit confusing. Actually, it is really confusing! John leans heavily into the “testimony” which justified the character, nature, and even the mission, of Jesus Christ. When these verses stand alone, they can be hard to follow, at least they are for me – but when we reflect these verses back into John’s Gospel, we get the much deeper meaning to what he is saying. As we have been going through this letter, we have seen that John uses specific words and ideas. Today the word is “testimony”. 

1 John 5:7-8

The word “overcome” in the passage today indicates a continuous “overcoming” in a continuous struggle. This is important to understand. Until Christ returns to make all things new, or we go to him at the end of this life, we are involved in continuous struggle. There is never a moment of being able to put our feet up and say, “The battle is done and all is clear skies and easy days ahead.” That is for the time when all things are renewed in Christ. However, we don’t need to get depressed because with Christ it is a struggle in which we can continuously overcome.

1 John 5:5

In this passage today John talks about keeping commands. Like the word “love”, the word “command” in the Bible needs to be carefully understood because if it is misunderstood it can, like misunderstanding the word love, lead to a deep misunderstanding as to what the Apostle John is teaching. So, what does John mean when he writes:

1 John 5:3-4