Assessments
This week's study is on 1 John 2:3-6:
It's the season for year-end assessments now. People are consolidating initial self-judgments that will lead to new year's resolutions. Companies are compiling indicators to produce their year-end reports. The accountants are closing the books. But how can we assess ourselves as Christians? How can we measure whether we're on track? Luckily John tells us.
John says we can tell that we're good Christians by whether we live the way God wants us to live. Someone who says they're a Christian but just does whatever they want is a liar. They may even be lying to themselves! If you don't do any Christian things, like no praying, no church or other Christian relationships, no acts of love towards the needy, no honesty, nothing like the stuff listed as the fruit of the Spirit, what evidence is there that you are a Christian? How can you say you know God, without ever interacting, and without any outward sign of having been touched by such a powerful being?
If someone said they were the French ambassador, but they didn't speak a word of French, didn't have a French passport, couldn't name any of the cities or regions in France or foods people eat, didn't know any French history, or have any diplomatic skills, and nobody at the Embassy had ever heard of them, you would probably call that person a liar! And yet there are "Christians" who claim to be God's representatives on Earth without knowing Him or living the way Jesus lived.
John says that a person who lives the way God wants them to live is someone in whom the love of God has been perfected. In other words, this is the intended result of a relationship with God, that a person would be changed and perfected over time. If someone offered you a dessert in which a certain baking technique had been perfected, you would expect it to be pretty good, right? Or at least you'd expect to be able to recognize the technique if you were familiar with it. If God's love is perfected in us, it should be sweetly evident.
Disobedience is a lack of love. If you invited a friend to live with you and they never paid the bills, and never cleaned up their dishes, and ignored you when you wanted to talk, and kept breaking your things and eating all of your food, that "friend" doesn't care about you at all. They only care about their own needs and desires and nothing else. In our disobedience, are we like that roommate: in it for the eternal roof over our head and the free miracles, but not so into the house rules or the person making the sacrifices for us to be there?
Jesus: Hey we haven't talked in awhile, how about dinner together tonight?
Us: Yeah, about that. My girlfriend is coming over so if you could find someplace else to be, that'd be great. Also we're out of beer and toilet paper.
John also says if we reside in God, we'll find ourselves doing some of the same things that Jesus did. If you take a vacation with somebody and every time you make plans to do something they take off to do something else, that person probably doesn't like you. Yes, you agreed to go on the trip together, but are you really together if you never do any of the same things? If we're more interested in seeing the sights than we are in sharing his suffering, is love really perfected in us?
Jesus: Take up your cross and follow me.
Us: Yeah, I'm just going to go lay on the beach. You have fun.
So, in this season of closing old accounts and opening new ones, ask yourself whether you are living as Jesus lived, as God wants you to live. If not, you have some resolutions already made up! In either case, we can always do better, and his grace and love and patience gives us the space we need in order to get there.
Now by this we know that we have come to know God: if we keep his commandments. The one who says “I have come to know God” and yet does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in such a person. But whoever obeys his word, truly in this person the love of God has been perfected. By this we know that we are in him. The one who says he resides in God ought himself to walk just as Jesus walked.
It's the season for year-end assessments now. People are consolidating initial self-judgments that will lead to new year's resolutions. Companies are compiling indicators to produce their year-end reports. The accountants are closing the books. But how can we assess ourselves as Christians? How can we measure whether we're on track? Luckily John tells us.
John says we can tell that we're good Christians by whether we live the way God wants us to live. Someone who says they're a Christian but just does whatever they want is a liar. They may even be lying to themselves! If you don't do any Christian things, like no praying, no church or other Christian relationships, no acts of love towards the needy, no honesty, nothing like the stuff listed as the fruit of the Spirit, what evidence is there that you are a Christian? How can you say you know God, without ever interacting, and without any outward sign of having been touched by such a powerful being?
If someone said they were the French ambassador, but they didn't speak a word of French, didn't have a French passport, couldn't name any of the cities or regions in France or foods people eat, didn't know any French history, or have any diplomatic skills, and nobody at the Embassy had ever heard of them, you would probably call that person a liar! And yet there are "Christians" who claim to be God's representatives on Earth without knowing Him or living the way Jesus lived.
John says that a person who lives the way God wants them to live is someone in whom the love of God has been perfected. In other words, this is the intended result of a relationship with God, that a person would be changed and perfected over time. If someone offered you a dessert in which a certain baking technique had been perfected, you would expect it to be pretty good, right? Or at least you'd expect to be able to recognize the technique if you were familiar with it. If God's love is perfected in us, it should be sweetly evident.
Disobedience is a lack of love. If you invited a friend to live with you and they never paid the bills, and never cleaned up their dishes, and ignored you when you wanted to talk, and kept breaking your things and eating all of your food, that "friend" doesn't care about you at all. They only care about their own needs and desires and nothing else. In our disobedience, are we like that roommate: in it for the eternal roof over our head and the free miracles, but not so into the house rules or the person making the sacrifices for us to be there?
Jesus: Hey we haven't talked in awhile, how about dinner together tonight?
Us: Yeah, about that. My girlfriend is coming over so if you could find someplace else to be, that'd be great. Also we're out of beer and toilet paper.
John also says if we reside in God, we'll find ourselves doing some of the same things that Jesus did. If you take a vacation with somebody and every time you make plans to do something they take off to do something else, that person probably doesn't like you. Yes, you agreed to go on the trip together, but are you really together if you never do any of the same things? If we're more interested in seeing the sights than we are in sharing his suffering, is love really perfected in us?
Jesus: Take up your cross and follow me.
Us: Yeah, I'm just going to go lay on the beach. You have fun.
So, in this season of closing old accounts and opening new ones, ask yourself whether you are living as Jesus lived, as God wants you to live. If not, you have some resolutions already made up! In either case, we can always do better, and his grace and love and patience gives us the space we need in order to get there.
Comments
Post a Comment