1 John 3:15 Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.
I have spent much of my life trying to grasp the intent of John in his first letter. Much of my early time in my faith walk centered on 1 John 5:13 as the purpose of the book.
1 John 5:13 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.
It seemed to my understanding John wrote it as a treatise for believers, to provide assurance of salvation based on an initial belief. He says it right in the verse! How could I deny John’s message?
Of course I read this passage over and over again with my Once Saved Always Saved (OSAS) glasses on, reinforcing my understanding of salvation being no more than a binding contract with God upon my initial faith. My eternal salvation hung on that night of Feb 19, 1981, when I bent the knee and confessed my sin, repented of my ways, and trusted in the Lord. After that night, my salvation was eternally secured, and praise God, He is faithful in every instance of my walk. He has been so good to me and my family, and provided all that we need and much of what we wish for. But I digress.
As I read this book of 1 John, I settled on a few of the favorite verses, such as 5:13, and of course 1:9, the great escape clause in the start of the book – you know, where we can get forgiveness by confession. I really liked that verse!
That was then and this is now.
As you may know, my opinion on the book has been tweaked, as I sought to understand the book through a series of posts a year or so back. For some background to my travels through this book I would refer my reader to 1 John – Testing to Know – Introduction.
Suffice to say, my general sense of the book is that John provides self tests for believers to check themselves out on as they walk with Jesus. John provides a number of tests – I think I found 12 within the book – to help believers understand that the Christian life is a provable, testable reality we can and should test and recognize within our lives.
Our verse above is the heart of such a test. I will refer to this short passage supplied, since it hits the point hard. Hate your brother – You ain’t got life. Now of course we all fall into sin, loosing our love for others as we seek our own ways, but this verse speaks of hatred as a verb, indicating an action performed by the subject, with the verb in its present tense, meaning it is a continuous action.
The verse prior speaks of those who do not love the brothers (believers) abiding in death. To abide, or remain in death. To choose to stay in the realm of death.
Love and hate are action words (verbs) that are being contrasted in this passage, and John is telling us the source of these decisions. If I hate, I am like a murderer, and abide in the realm of death. If I love, I have passed out of death, and abide in Him, having eternal life.
A believer who constantly, consistently and continually hates on a brother is living in a self deception that may one day be irrevocable. The hatred will be set in a stony heart, reigning over the life of the hater, a slave to the decision to hate. When this occurs is between God and the believer, and I am confident God provides abundant warnings (as John provides one here) to pull the believer back to life. It is the love of God continually inviting us back!
Is it not only right to love our brother and sister, to forgive those who may have hurt us, to mimic the Savior who forgave us our own sin?
Hatred is a choice my brother, and as we harbor this hatred, we may find it overpowers us, deadening our souls and forcing an abandonment of a faith that produces good things in our life. Good things such as….
- love
- joy
- peace
- patience
- kindness
- goodness
- faithfulness
- gentleness
- self-control
I have recently been in the book of Galatians, and as I was listening to the Message translation, I came across the same passage, yet with a non-standard list, it provoked me to reconsider the list of fruit for my own life. Consider.
- affection for others
- exuberance about life
- serenity
- a willingness to stick with things
- a sense of compassion in the heart
- a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people
- involved in loyal commitments
- not needing to force our way in life
- able to marshal and direct our energies wisely
We have a choice in our walk with God. To hate is to depart from God, for God is love. and to hate is to be of the devil. May we seek to love those we come in contact with, those who are a blessing, and to those who are not.
It is for us to enjoy the life of love, abandoning the act of hatred, along with the death associated with it.
May God teach us of His ways.
Thanks again for coming to visit. I hope you found something of interest in this post and would appreciate a comment, to begin a discussion. If you would like to receive daily posts from Considering the Bible, click on the “Follow” link below
Your message has been sent
Considering the Bible 