“Here’s how we can be sure that we’ve truly come to know God: if we keep his commands. If someone claims, ‘I have come to know God by experience,’ yet doesn’t keep God’s commands, he is a phony and the truth finds no place in him. But the love of God will be
perfected within the one who obeys God’s Word . We can be sure that we’ve truly come to live in intimacy with God, not just by saying, ‘I am intimate with God,’ but by walking in the footsteps of Jesus. Beloved, I’m not writing a new commandment to you, but an old one that you had from the beginning, and you’ve already heard it. Yet, in a sense, it is a new commandment, as its truth is made manifest both in Christ and in you, because the darkness is disappearing and the true light is already blazing. 1 John 2:3-8 TPT
How can we be sure that we belong to God? We come to know Him through love. Not only in our relationship with him, but according to his Word, love for our fellow Christians. We are told to follow in the likeness of Jesus, to function in the midst of each circumstance in a loving manner.
In this passage, John is stressing the importance of love. Within the church, we are to love and respect one another in order to grow. This love is one of the most important components of the Christian life. This passage gives two ways to know that we belong to God, one being that of doing as Christ says, and the other being for us to live as he wants. His desire is for us to continue to seek Him within the asking.
Heavenly Father, help us to remember the importance of love, that for our Father, as well as for our fellow Christians, and through it all to be ever so thankful.
In Christ Love
Margaret