1 John 5.20-21
“And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. Little children, keep yourselves from idols.”
These final verses of the epistle of First John are powerful. The word that John uses for “true” is the Greek alethinos. It means “real,” and in this brief passage John uses it twice to describe God the Father and once to describe his Son Jesus Christ.
Thus we can see that “real” dominates this final paragraph of John’s letter. It is John’s central message: God is real, and we can really know him. Through Jesus we are able to know truth about God, and we are able to know God personally and relationally. This is an intentional declaration in scripture, and it has profound implications not only for the 1st century, but for the 21st century, as well.
God is real and has created a real world with real cause-and-effect. There are real physical laws that govern the physical world, and there are real spiritual laws that govern the spiritual world.
God created mankind and placed man in the real world of cause-and-effect. God created man in his image, which man is a unique combination of the physical and spiritual. Our physical/biological nature is real, and our spiritual nature is also real.
God created man with the ability to make decisions that have real consequences in the real world. How we think, decide, and act has consequences in the physical realm and in the spiritual realm.
There is real evil in the world. Satan is real, and so are his demons, and they actively work against the purposes of God and seek to deceive and destroy the people of God.
Sin is real. Adam and Eve were deceived by Satan and rebelled against God’s law; as a result, the image of God in man was broken, and man became distorted by sin. All people have inherited this sin nature; it is real and it negatively affects every aspect of our lives.
Jesus is real. He is the eternal Son of God, and he became a man with a real body and lived in our world. He had a real job and did real work. “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1.14)
The truth is that God and his kingdom are real. The great question is: how will we respond?
More tomorrow …
