I'm just coming to the end of a preaching series in 1 John. (11 sermons down, 1 to go on 1 John 5:13-21). This short letter will get another outing in September in a different context.
As I've preached through 1 John chapter 5, it has increasingly felt that this chapter has a summing up and drawing together function. The main threads of the letter come together.
- In 5:1-5, the various strands of an authentic response to Jesus converge. In separate paragraphs, John has already touched on love for other Christians, belief in Jesus the Christ and Son of God, obedience to God's commands and a holiness that distinguishes us from the world. In fact, he's dealt with each of these at least twice in the letter, and love has had 3 treatments. In 5:1-5, these 4 strands come back - all in the one paragraph, all so intertwined that they cannot really be untangled. It becomes clear that they are really strands of the one response, rather than 4 separate responses.
- In 5:6-12, the various strands of the authentic Jesus converge. John has already spelt out the importance of the apostolic eyewitness, the identity of Jesus as Christ and Son of God, the uniqueness of Jesus as the source of true life, and the death of Jesus as the way our sins are atoned for. In 5:6-12, all of these converge. And yet again, it becomes clear that these are simply facets of the Jesus of apostolic Christianity - you cannot arbitrarily separate these.
- In 5:7-21, John expounds the eternal life that we have in Christ. Again, nothing he says here is new. But he wants to reassure us of the fact we have eternal life, the promise of answered prayer, and the security of being in the eternal Son of God. I'm still working on this section for next Sunday, so perhaps I'll revise / sharpen some of this as I work on that text.
And so the letter draws to a close, as he recapitulates most of his themes and ties them all together.
What's worth noticing is how this relates to John's gospel. Readers of John will know that John states his purpose of writing in John 20:31:
… these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
There's a clear contrast here with 1 John. John was written that "you may believe". 1 John was written "that you who believe may know" (5:13).
However there's also a striking amount in common. If we break down John's purpose statement, it has 3 components:
- believe
- that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God
- have life in his name
If we break down John's conclusion to his letter we find 3 components:
- right response
- Jesus' identity as Christ and Son of God, who shed his blood
- the eternal life that comes in him
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