In I John 5:13, John reveals his purpose for writing this letter - "to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life." You can be confident, assured, convinced of this truth!
I also like John's definition of eternal life in vs. 20, referring to Jesus: "He is the true God and eternal life." Speaking for those who have come to know and fall in love with Jesus Christ, we agree that He is eternal life!
Reading I John in this way (immediately after John's Gospel) impressed upon me the consistent threads that draw the two books together. There are far too many echoes of the Gospel (especially here in chapter 5 taken in hand with John's account of the Last Supper) to seriously doubt that these were not composed by the same author.
We have in John the testimony of a man who was a first-generation follower of Jesus - an eyewitness - who heard Him, touched Him (I John 1:1), and followed Him faithfully for decades. What an inspiration that continues to be!
Verse 17 raised some questions.
ReplyDelete"All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death."
That is an intriguing nugget. I would guess (again, without consulting the commentaries) that John is referring to the sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit which was identified by Jesus as the "unforgivable sin." It would make sense to me that is what John is talking about when he says, "There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that he should pray about that."
ReplyDeleteOr perhaps this is where Roman Catholics get their idea about the distinction between mortal and venial sins? I am not an expert in this area (I mean in differentiating between types of sins, not in sinning itself. I am quite an expert in that.)
Thanks for your feedback. I will accept your explanation as authoritative.
DeleteSike! But I will read about this some more. Thanks for pointing me in a direction.