“See how great a love[1] the Father has bestowed on
us, that we would be called children of God; and we such we are. For this
reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we
are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know
that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He
is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is
pure.”
How often do we pass over the
word “Father” without recognizing its import? John’s introduction (1:1-4)
contains the words, “…and indeed our fellowship (koinonia) is with the Father,
and with His Son Jesus Christ. These things we write so that our joy may be
complete.”
Jesus came so that we might
know the Father, live in deep intimate relationship with the Father, and in so
doing know the joy of Jesus and the Trinity (John 15:11). John and his
associates found joy in writing, in communicating, in sharing, the life “that
was manifested” (1 John 1:2) in the hope that others would be drawn into the
koinonia, communion, of the Trinity (1 John 1:3).
How often do we say the Lord’s
Prayer (Matthew 6:9 – 13) and do not linger in the first word, “Father”? Do we
consider what Jesus says just before verse 9? “So do not be like them [those
who do not know the true and living God]; for your Father knows what you need
before you ask Him.” Those who do not know the true and living God, but who
worship other gods, think that they must get the attention of their gods, that
they must placate and satisfy their gods, that they must appease their gods,
that they must do something to get their gods to act. But Jesus says that “your
Father knows”.
Why does our Father know? Because
our Father loves us and He therefore pays attention to us. In the midst of the
insanity of our culture our Father knows us and loves us and pays attention to
us. Yes, because God is God and is therefore omniscient, He knows all things,
but the word “Father” conveys a relational knowing – He knows us as our Father,
not as solely the Creator of the universe. I do not understand this mystery, but
it is portrayed in Scripture. We can cry unashamedly, “Abba! Father!” (Romans
8:15; Galatians 4:6), for though God is indeed the Creator of all there is,
through Jesus Christ He is also our Father, and we can therefore say, “See how
great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of
God; and such we are…”
John emphasizes the relational
reality of our familial bond with, “and such we are”, or with the simple
literal “we are” – we are His children, we are, we are, we are. How many times
must we repeat “we are” until we begin to see the deep-space reality of what
has happened on this planet and in our hearts? God has come back to the “Silent
Planet” (to borrow an image from C.S. Lewis) to bring His children back to
Himself. How powerful is His love? How desperately pursuing is His love? What
great lengths will His love go to rescue us?
We were dead in our sins, we
were His enemies, we were laden with sin and death, we were wicked, yes wicked.
To see the love of God we must see our hideous condition, and if we attempt to
mitigate our condition as if to say, “We weren’t all that bad,” we might as
well say that Jesus didn’t need to come and die because there was another way –
and that the love of God is not all that magnificent and humbling.
To rescue the innocent is one
thing, to rescue and die for the guilty and wicked is quite another. But in
Jesus Christ the children of God are brought back to their Father and “we are”
now His sons and daughters, “we are” now saints in Jesus Christ. We know that
since we had nothing to do with this great rescue and redemption that we can
rest secure in our Father’s amazing love. This is “a great love”, a love that
we are called to pass on to others just as John passed it on – and passing it
on means living in relationship with others, for in loving relationship with
others we know loving relationship with our Father, and in loving relationship
with our Father we know loving relationship with our brothers and sisters.
There is no one we will meet
today who does not need to know the love of God. Today we will meet those
living in vibrant relationship with our Father, then we will meet those who
belong to the family but have little awareness of who Jesus Christ is and who
they are in Him, then we will meet those who think some semblance of religion makes
them something they are not, and then we will meet those who have embraced the
lies of this age and think and live as if nothing matters, and then there are
those who are simply hungry for love and peace and hope. We have the Father’s
love to give to all, we have a drink that forever satisfies, a bread that fills
the soul.
Jesus says to all, “Come.”
What do we say?
If we will holistically know
the Trinity as our abiding place, and if we will live in the awareness that the
Trinity abides in us…what might today look like? It will look like Jesus walking
the earth.
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