The Love God has IN us
“And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has in us” (1 Jn. 4:16).
That is the verse that God pointed out to me on New Year’s Day. I spent 2 weeks meditating on 1 Jn. 4:15-19 (and the contextual verses around them). Now, six months later as I go back through my journal, I realize I am not living out of the joy those verses brought me at the beginning of the year.
So, I am looking at them again today because I want to live by the joyful truth these verses reveal, and which I think is the point of v. 16.
15 If anyone confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God resides in him and he in God. 16 And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has in us. God is love, and the one who resides in love resides in God, and God resides in him. 17 By this love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, because just as Jesus is, so also are we in this world.
Bless John’s heart (as we say in the South). I don’t think Greek was his first language. His Greek is simple but rather confusing with regard to prepositions and clauses. I always like to pull out my NET Bible when I read John’s letters because it has tons of the translators’ notes that are helpful with his somewhat circuitous writing style. For example, the translators’ notes explain that in vs. 17 the word “this” in “By this love is perfected” could (1) refer to “confidence in the day of judgement,” or (2) it could refer to “in that just as Christ is, so also are we in the world”, which is the way the NIV translates it. But due to a bunch of Greek grammar stuff I don’t have space to explain in this brief blog, it is actually more likely that it is referring to the preceding verse (4:16) meaning: “By this i.e., by our residing in love so that we reside in God and He resides in us, is love brought to perfection with us.” Which then lines up with the section right before (v. 12) that says if we love one another God remains in us and His love is brought to perfection in us.
So, here’s my point... I want to be perfected, to know and believe that God loves me so much that He has literally implanted His love in me. It just isn’t something He feels toward me. He has put it in me. Imagine if you could literally take a piece of your love and implant it in your child’s heart on their first day of kindergarten (or their first day of college). We can’t do this literally for our children, but God can. And so, He does. The sheer thought of this makes me want to break out in praise. Glory!
The question vs. 16 poses is this: if I know and believe it, do I live like it? Do I feel empowered to be the person He created me to be because of it? Oh, how I want to! May it be so, Lord.
What about you?
