Overcoming the World
5:1 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. 2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. 3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. 4 For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. 5 Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
Testimony Concerning the Son of God
6 This is he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. 7 For there are three that testify: 8 the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree. 9 If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning his Son. 10 Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has borne concerning his Son. 11 And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.
That You May Know
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. 14 And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.
16 If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life—to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death.
18 We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep on sinning, but he who was born of God protects him, and the evil one does not touch him.
19 We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.
20 And we know 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, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. 21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols. (ESV)
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.
The entire book of 1 John is written to give us this assurance, and it is such an encouragement! A lot of people who I have talked to say that there is no way to know for sure where you’ll end up when you die. But we as Christians know that as long as we repent of our sins (verse 18) and put our faith in Christ (verse 11), we can be sure that if this moment were our last on earth, we would be with God. This should be a huge encouragement and a motivation to evangelize to those who have no such confidence and are instead hoping to make it somehow… and won’t, unless someone brings them this message.
3This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
John makes it so simple: we show our love for God by obeying His commands. So many people say that they do not want to become a Christian because there are too many rules and regulations to follow. This is not the truth! Once we are saved and given a new heart the Holy Spirit within us gives us the desire and ability to obey God’s commands. There is joy in being obedient to God, it is not a burden. Now that I have a daughter I rejoice greatly each time I teach her something new and she obeys me. She delights in my praise because she knows that she has pleased me. God is the same way with us. When we obey Him we give Him glory and show our love for Him.
14This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.
15And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.
I think sometimes we look at God like Pastor Mike often says as a “cosmic genie”. We think that we can ask him for anything we WANT and He has to give it to us because He is a good God who provides for His kids right?!
Well, the Bible teaches something a little different. Here we read that as we come to the Lord in prayer and with petition as we read in Philippians as well, we find that God listens and is faithful to answer us and give us what we ask “if we ask anything according to his will”. That is the clincher to the phrase and that is something we have to keep in mind. Sometimes we ask for things that we don’t receive and that isn’t because God is not listening but rather because
He has a different plan and purpose then what we might see right in front of us. Therefore when we pray let us pray with hearts of thanksgiving and with a motive of glorifying our Father in heaven.
NEW BLOG! :)
19We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one.
we are so lucky to be the children of God! when I thought about it was are so blessed to have been chosen by Him! this verse is so encouraging by reminding us that we are children of God, He is watching out for us, and we can do anything with Him. but the second part of this verse is also encouraging in a way, because the world in not of God, but they are of Satan. this is a sad fact, but also our mission. we should get out there with the love of God and spread the word, so that hopefully by His Will people will come to know Him.
19.) We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one.
Right on Cameron, it really is a blessing to be one of God’s chosen ones. You also made a good point about how the world is of Satan and our mission is to spread the Word of God to these people.
12He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.
I’ve always love this verse, not only because i’ve had to repeat it to my AWANA children over and over for memorization, but because it’s a great verse for encouragement and evangelism!!! We need to remember all the lost souls out there and be encouraged by this verse to evangelize more! :D
5 Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
This truth brings me comfort everyday. The battle is already won. Satan is already defeated because our Lord Jesus has overcome the world. And if anyone believes Jesus is the Son of God he too has overcome the world.
18We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the one who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot harm him.
I remember that in the book of Psalms that David wrote, David refered to Christ as his shield, and this verse reminds me of that, because us Christians who are born of God will be kept safe and protected from satan and we can’t be harmed by him.
12 He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.
I love how black and white John makes Christianity. If we do not truly know Christ or truly love him (which is displayed by us obeying his commands) then we do not have eternal life. It’s not some insane, outlandish set of rules we have to follow to obtain eternal life. We simply have to know Christ, his loving sacrifice, and his power to redeem our sins and we will be given life forever. What an awesome thought and what a simple message!!!
Great to see so you all starting your day off right…in the Scriptures!
18We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the one who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot harm him.
What a clarifying and comforting verse! Clarifying that we will be able to see a change in a Christian’s life because they will not stay in a sinful lifestyle. What comfort that once we are saved God keeps us safe from the evil one!
I wrote a new blog about “Youth Ministry.” Just click on my name to check it out!
2This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands.
5Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
These seem to be recurring themes in this passage. John obviously wants us to know that we have to obey God, and that if we believe in Him we can overcome the world. If we truly believe in God, we know that we can overcome our struggles in the world. But we also need to showe our devotion to God with obedience. I see a connection between the two. If we are obeying God, we are trying NOT to sin and are doing what’s right. If we are doing those things, we are overcoming the world, with Christ’s help of course. So if we obey God, we can also overcome the world at the same time.
3This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome
i love how it says his commands are not burdensome
they really arent, yet being the spoiled humans we are, we think that his commands are hard to follow and that his commands are something that we can just put off for later because we would rather do “more important things” or because we just dont feel like obeying his commands at the moment.i am guilty at this!i think we as christians need to change our attitudes towards Gods love and fairly simple commands…
5Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
how uplifting is that! i love this verse because it is reasurring and i think it is a great verse to memorize because whenever we struggle with evangelism or being open about our faith, we can think of this verse:)
maranatha:)
3 This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.
^ If we’re claiming to be a Christian, we’re saying that we love God. This verse tells us that means we’ll obey God. The things that we do for the Lord everyday shouldn’t be just to “check the box” or because we “have to”. We should be overjoyed to do anything in the name of God. And in verse 4, we are reminded of the victory that will come in the end: overcoming the world… HEAVEN!!!!
14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.
^ Another verse about confidence!! Again, it’s so important that we are 100% confident that when we die, we’re going to spend an eternity with our Lord : )
2This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands.
3This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
Love is mentioned so many times in the book of 1 John. We need to make sure that as Christians we have an overflowing love from the heart. And as a result of that overflowing love we should be obeying Gods commandments. John makes it very clear that by obeying God we are showing that we love Him, this makes me think of how God interprets us disobeying Him. Obeying Him should be our first priority. I love how it also said that His commandments are not burdensome!! I love the analogy that Beth used about her daughter obeying her! This is so true, it is a blessing to know that the Father is pleased with us when we are obeying His commandments.
1Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well.
I agree with Bre on this verse because if God is love and we are his children we should be trying to be more like him.
13I 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.
It’s so great that God not only gives us salvation through Christ, but also makes sure that we know we have it and not live in doubt. If we have repented and put our faith in Christ we can have complete confidence in our salvation and take assurance when we see its fruit in our lives. Like Mike said though, we need to be bringing this message to others so that they may have the same confidence we have instead of living in doubt and eventually going to Hell.
16If anyone sees his brother commit a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray and God will give him 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 he should pray about that.
We need to be prayer warriors and keep our brothers and sisters in Christ accountable. Thank goodness Christ died for every one of our sins because every sin would lead to death. But now that we have the grace that the Father gave us we can ask for forgiveness each time we sin and strain to not sin again. Whenever we see a brother sin we should immediatly pray for them and keep them accountable so that next time they wont commit the same sin!
18 We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the one who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot harm him.
We truely know that we are christians if we do not continue to commit the same sins. Its plain and clear!
I loveeee this chapter (=
3This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, 4for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.
Back when True North started and Bobby preached on 1st John 5, he talked about how Christians are “overcomers.” In regards to obedience, we need to have the attitude that we want what God wants for our life. Following God is not a burden because we whole-heartedly want what He wants. As “overcomers,” we have faith in the fact that Jesus has already overcome the sins of the world. We are also presently victorious over the sinfulness of this world. Furthermore, we get to look forward to our reward in heaven. Only through Christ do we have the strength to fight to overcome sin each day.
1Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well.
When I am evangelizing I cannot tell you how many people use this verse as well as other verses to tell me that all you have to do is believe. Okay okay not a ton of people say this but many do.
they always say something like “Oh oh yeah I believe in God, and I am a good person! So oh ya ya I am good ya” and just the other day I saw this bumper sticker on this guys window that, said “If you believe in heaven, all you have to do is be a GOOD person to get there” and the ‘good’ was capitalized like that, and it was so sad to see and it broke my heart that people believe in that and the truth is hidden.
3 This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith
We cannot be of the world we have to overcome it which means saying no to our fleshly desires. A nonburdensome concept because if you are born of God you will overcome the world.
2This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands.
From Bobby’s Sermon last week, the whole “our hearts can decieve us thing”, really stuck with me. I wondered “How do I really know I love anyone?” and this verse has answered that. When in doubt, Read God’s Word!
3This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome
I really liked this verse…. It just points out two really tight things.
sorry..
first of all it shows us how we can love God. it says that we can show love towards God by obeying his commands. This is really cool to know that we can love God by just obeying his commands. And the other cool thing in the second part of the verse is that it says that his commands are not burdensome. This is really awsome to see cause it is saying that it will not be hard to keep Gods commands.. henceforth it will be easy to show our love towards God by obeying his commands :)
2This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands.
I agree with Bre, we should obey his commands and wanting to become more like him!