Today Our Daily Bread 1 John 5

This passage is taken from Rock Church's monthly schedule for Daily Bread reading- The comments are from Lena's Journalin'. Lena's personal comments on the scripture passages of the day...


1 John 5:1-21
Obedience by Faith
1 Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him. 2By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments. 3For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. 4For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world--our F15 faith. 5Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
The Certainty of God's Witness
6 This is He who came by water and blood--Jesus Christ; not only by water, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth. 7For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. 8And there are three that bear witness on earth: F16 the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree as one. 9If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which F17 He has testified of His Son. 10He who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony that God has given of His Son. 11And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. 12He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. 13These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, F18 and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.
Confidence and Compassion in Prayer
14 Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him. 16If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin which does not lead to death, he will ask, and He will give him life for those who commit sin not leading to death. There is sin leading to death. I do not say that he should pray about that. 17All unrighteousness is sin, and there is sin not leading to death.
Knowing the True--Rejecting the False
18 We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps himself, F19 and the wicked one does not touch him. 19We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one. 20And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life. 21Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.
Footnotes F15: 5:4 M-Text reads your. F16: 5:8 NU-Text and M-Text omit the words from in heaven (verse 7) through on earth (verse 8). Only four or five very late manuscripts contain these words in Greek.F17: 5:9 NU-Text reads God, that. F18: 5:13 NU-Text omits the rest of this verse. F19: 5:18 NU-Text reads him.

~Lena’s Journalin’~
Ever just love someone’s child because you love them, or you love their friends and are open to their friends, because you are open to them?
This is how God thinks- We are fam-i-ly…..Family is family, not by choice, but by what is, and since love is a decision we can decide to love our families or not. Since the love of God is not based on merit, but on choice, then we can choose to love the people for who they are, not what they do or do not do.
So, we are in the family of God, God is our Father, we say we love Him, because we realize the magnitude of His great love that drew us to Him. We were drawn to Him and into His great family, because we love Him, we choose to come to Him and into His family (kind of like choosing to marry). What we get afterwards, we did not necessarily count on, but it is always a package deal, as God is unselfish. He loved us as we were, when we came to Him (and that may not have been a very pretty picture at all), yet He choose us before we were ever born, before our personality was formed and molded by our world, He chose to love us. He chose to take us into His family, to keep us in His heart, to call us His own. If we can grasp this people drawing love, we will do the same for others in word, thought and deed, because we decide to. This shows we really are acting like God would and can be associated with Him as He is.
Do you love God? Love His kids. What if they don’t deserve it? What if they are bad or are not acting as we expect them to act or they are hypocrites or don’t live the Bible? Whoa!!!! Whoa now, Do we? Really the only way I can say I am perfected is by following Him, the only way I/we can even be Christians is by Christ who strengthens us.
So, How did we come to God? His love drew us to Him. He didn’t ask me to be perfect first. His love drew me into His perfection, which is well able to change me into His image. This is a great amount of mercy that has been extended towards us, we also should learn how to extend it to others at all levels. Just because I’m 20 in the Lord and you’re 6, does not mean I have something on you and I’m allowed to be pioused and judgmental about where I am and where you should be. Love covers a multitude of sin. Are we seeking the Lord? Are we growing in Him? Then let’s love one another where we are and encourage one another to go on towards more perfection. Who is our enemy anyway? People? No, our enemy is who God’s enemy is, we have entered covenant with Him, what is His is ours, as well as what is ours is His. We love those He loves and we engage ourselves in war against “those” He despises. Satan, the spirit and father of evil and darkness is God’s enemy, not people.
God loves people, satan hates them-Do you see his characteristics that try to weasel their way up into our faith walk? Identify the enemy for who he is, uncover his works in your own life and combat them with spiritual weapons of spiritual warfare. The greatest weapon God gives us is His grand love. His weapons are not the same as his enemy’s weapons. The enemy’s weapons are based in the sense realm, only because he knows where we live and the things that affect us naturally. We have to step up and get the view of the war that God has and fight as He fights.
So, your brother in the faith of Christ Jesus does you wrong, talks bad about you, when you did not deserve it at all. Satan wants you to fight your own kingdom brother, he wants you to use one of his weapons for this fight- hatred, self-defense, unforgivness, etc….Do any of those tools ever work? Yes, they do, they work for satan to plot us against the war we are supposed to be involved in, which is God’s, they work to destroy our faith in God and His Word, they work to bring us outside of the war we enlisted in and bring us back over to his “side”. They work very well, there is a definite strategy with his tools of warfare. If he can kill, steal or destroy within, he’s won more than half the battle. On the other-hand, on the kingdom of God side, If my brother offends me (which happens regularly) and I forgive him , or I bless him purposely, or I forgive Him, I have joined God against His enemy-satan and we take ground back from His enemy!
Bearing witness? We are bearing witness everyday of our lives, especially if we have said we are His. Do we allow the work of the Father God and his great drawing love to capture us? Do we allow the saving work of his Son Jesus to change us? Do we allow the great inward ongoing work of the power of the Holy Spirit to keep us, teach us, and lead us? We cannot live out a faith in God and pick and choose, we have to live and receive the “whole package”.
Why would it end here by saying- keep yourselves from idols? Because idols are just other images that we follow after, put before our eyes as models. If we do not take in and belong to all of God- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, there are other’s we are serving, others that are taking up that space in our lives set apart by God for Himself and the working of his Spirit.
I beg you, in your journey of eternal life with God- Love!
Love God- Love People
Love Be! Amen.
Change your known world, when you do you wil change atmosphere’s, situations, hearts ( it always starts with our own), even the spirit realm will be effected as they see a people with revelation willing to see what is going on and full well knowing what’s up, they engage themselves accordingly –on and with purpose.

Romans 16:19-20
19 For your obedience has become known to all. Therefore I am glad on your behalf; but I want you to be wise in what is good, and simple concerning evil. 20 And the God of peace will crush Satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.

Acts 17:6
6 But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, "These who have turned the world upside down have come here too.