FAMILY LIKENESS

OPENING PRAYER:

Jesus, I love You. I want to see Your face. Reveal Yourself to my heart today.

READ: 1 John 2:28 – 3:10

God’s Children and Sin

And now, dear children, continue in him, so that when he appears we may be confident and unashamed before him at his coming.

If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone who does what is right has been born of him.

See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.

Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God. This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister. 1 John 2:28 – 3:10

REFLECT:

Pause and think about God’s extravagance. The Bible uses words like “inexpressible” and “surpassing,” (Ephesians 3:20).

Lions and tigers may look cute and cuddly when they are small, but in time they will attack and kill without compunction. Their behavior is a key indicator of their predatory nature.

A key indicator of whether a person is a child of God is their behavior, says our passage. Christlikeness, doing what is right, goes hand-in-hand with having been born of God. So much so that, when ultimately Christ appears in glory and we, as children of God, see Him in His purity, we shall be “like Him.” Meanwhile, we can be found making our lives fit for His presence.

The other side of the coin is also true. Habitual and characteristic sinning are incompatible with being a child of God. It indicates rather an affinity with the devil, who “has been sinning from the beginning” (3:8). All sin in our lives needs to be confessed and abandoned before it gets more of a hold on us. To conquer sin was precisely why Christ came.

To “lavish” or “bestow” (KJV) are beautiful words for describing God’s love in making us His children. Being born of Him makes a profound difference to a life. So profound that it will show in a person’s behavior.

APPLY:

How does it make you feel to know that you will see Christ “when He appears” (3:3)? Excited? Anxious? Will you allow Christ to work in you until your greatest desire is to be more like Him?

CLOSING PRAYER:

My Jesus, I want to be like You, but I cannot make myself holy. I need You every moment of every day. Have Your way in me.

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