The principles of all genuine fellowship with God
1 John 3:21-24 Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him.And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.
I wanted to include the last couple of sentences from yesterdays study so that the thought would flow more clearly for us today. It’s so much easier to read things in context. I’ve underlined the portion for today.
John had just told us that a confident and effective prayer life is founded on obedience to God. Now he sums those up by saying that God’s command is a combination of our faith in Jesus and the acting out of that faith in love toward each other. He also reminds us that these commands are not from him, but are rather from the Lord Himself.
John 14:12-15 I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father.You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.“If you love me, you will obey what I command.
What John tells us here is also backed up by the other apostles:
1 Peter 3:12For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”
James 5:16Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.
James 1:6-8 But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord;he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.
I would like to address one thing here that is often misunderstood. I know I too misunderstood what this was saying for a very long time. With the word of faith heresy that’s going around it makes it even easier for people to misunderstand this. John, Peter and James are saying that we must have faith when we pray. They are talking about faith in Jesus, and faith in who Jesus is, and even faith that your prayer will be answered, but NOT faith that you are going to get what you ask for. God is not a vending machine or a slot machine that if you put in the right combination of things that you will always get what you want. To me the perfect illustration of the correct way to pray in faith and even to live in faith is the example of when Peter walked on the water to Jesus. Do you remember the story?
Matthew 14:28-31 “Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”“Come,” he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus.But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!”Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?”
This is one of my favorite stories and it awes me every time I read it. Notice that the disciples are frightened at first when they see Jesus walking to them on the water. It’s night time and the seas were rough so it was hard for them to see. They aren’t sure who it is and their first thought is that it might be a ghost. Jesus calls to them and tells them it’s Him so they won’t be afraid. That’s when Peter replies, “if it is you Lord, then tell me to come to you on the water”.
Notice that Peter isn’t asking Jesus to “let him walk on the water” or to give him the “power to walk on water”. He says “if it is you”, tell me to do this. Peter was putting all his faith in Jesus, not in some miracle or in himself or in an answer to prayer or anything else; just in Jesus. Jesus goes along with him and tells him to come to Him, and Peter steps out on the water and begins to walk to Him!!!! Can you even imagine that???? How awesome that must have been! Remember now, the waves were rough, and it was dark. We’re not talking about daylight on a calm sea! (although that too would have been a miracle!) Suddenly, when he’s already within arms length of Jesus, what does Peter do? He takes his eyes off Jesus and instead begins to focus on the wind and the rough seas! As soon as he does that, doubt overcomes him and he begins to sink! So Peter calls out, Lord! Save me!, and of course Jesus immediately—did you notice that? He immediately reached out and saved him!
You’d think after his disciple accomplished the miracle of walking on water, even a little ways, that Jesus would congratulate him, but instead Jesus rebuked him and said, “why did you doubt?”
This is what Jesus and the disciples are talking about when they talk about having faith when you pray. Peter did not have or need to have faith that he could walk on the water. He had faith in Jesus that Jesus could cause anything to happen that He wanted, including making him walk on water and so he did. It was only when he took his eyes off Jesus, when he took his focus off Jesus and put it on his surroundings and what he was doing that he started to sink because doubt crept in.
So our faith is to be in God, that God will always do what is right and good; and that He will always answer our prayers; that Jesus is who He says He is and that He can do all that He says He can do and that He will do it. Do you see the difference?
John puts it pretty straight forward in the verses we’re studying when he says we obey His commands and His commands are to believe in Jesus and to love one another. Then when we are living right, in a close personal relationship with the Lord, being obedient to Him, we wouldn’t dream of asking Him for something that wasn’t His will. Therefore since we are praying according to His will, just as we are living according to His will, then He will give us what we ask for.
That’s what this entire letter has been about so far; explaining the difference between those who are really saved and who are living in a close relationship with the Lord and those who are simply pretending to and explaining how we can tell the difference between them. He explains both what the true Christian looks like as well as what someone who is just pretending looks like, and encourages us to continue to grow in Christ always becoming closer to the Lord. He uses this letter both to teach us how to discern the false teachers that had crept into the church and to reassure us that we are saved and can rest secure in our salvation, and to encourage us to continue to grow in Christ.
Finally in today's verses he reminds us yet again that those who are being obedient are abiding in God and that God is abiding in them and that we can be assured of this because of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us. This is just like what Jesus told us:
John 15:5-8 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you.This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
Notice that when Jesus talks about this He says too that He will give us whatever we ask when we are abiding in Him. He clarifies what that means with the next sentence, because if we are abiding in Him, then the things we ask for will be to the Father’s glory and we will be bearing much fruit for Him both through our lives and through what we ask for. It all ties together and cannot be separated.
