"By this we may be sure that we know him, if we keep His commandments" (v.3).

John has a great deal to say about this relationship between our knowledge of God and our faithfulness in keeping His Word. Paul wrote of our having the "witness" of the Spirit, the inner consciousness that our acceptance by the Father is a very real thing, a consciousness that can only be ours if we truly are led by the Spirit of God. "As many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the Sons of God …but you have received the spirit of sonship" It is that Spirit that bears witness with our own spirit that we are the children of God and therefore joint heirs with Jesus Christ (Rom. 8. 14-17). John's mind here in this chapter is running along similar lines. If we have truly entered into covenant relationship with God and have genuinely come 'into' Christ, seeking more and more to give His Word full scope and full play in our lives, then we shall have the witness within ourselves that we are His in truth, that we 'know' God. It may not be a thing we can define in so many words; we may not be able to express or explain the intellectual basis of our acceptance with Him to others or even to ourselves, yet nevertheless we shall know that we know God. This is not a matter of mere blind credulity, or even wishful thinking. Those who have truly entered into the secret place of the Most High and now abide under the shadow of the Almighty have a perception and knowledge of spiritual things that gives them a realization of the presence of God. This cannot be the portion of one who has never passed through that experience. Where there is positive knowledge the mind no longer needs the benefit of argument or debate, the appeal to logic or to reason. These things are the steps by which knowledge is ‑ in this material world ‑ normally attained. When we have achieved this the means becomes superfluous. Our knowledge of God is the result of experience after entry into the consecrated life, and when once we know Him there can on longer be any question about the matter - we know that we know Him.

Perhaps John had another thought also in his mind at this point. Perhaps he wanted to stress the fact that our confidence in this respect must rest upon our keeping of God's commandments as distinct from any other code or rule of life. Greater liberty is accorded to Christian believers as compared with that allowed their Jewish brethren in the previous Age. Their freedom from the Law of Moses, obligatory upon Israel, might very well persuade some, that notwithstanding our covenant with God and our acceptance of the consecrated life, we are left to formulate our own code of conduct and our own laws of right and wrong. In fact that kind of heresy did make its appearance among the early Christians after the passing of the Apostles and wrought much harm. The fact is that despite our having been given a considerable measure of self-determination in many aspects of the Christian life, we are morally bound to keep a Divine law that is really far more stringent and soul searching than was the Mosaic law. After all, that was a fairly simple system of prohibitions and injunctions. It was either "Thou shalt not do this" or "Thou shalt do that". The law of the New Creation, although not defined in words as was the Law of Moses, is really more strict. It demands a far higher standard of conduct than did its predecessor, and a far more wholehearted life of consecration and devotion to God. It demands all that the Christian has to give, and it is only when we have given our all, and then receiving it back at the Father's hands, proceed to use it in the furtherance of His interests, that we really do begin to "keep His commandments".

There was a time in the history of Israel when the people rejected the idea of responsibility to a central authority and a common law. The chronicler said of that time "In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes". (Jud. 21. 15). It was a time of unprecedented disaster for Israel, a period of anarchy and lawlessness, of apostasy and consequent captivity, repeated time and time again. It was only relieved by occasional terms during which the people repented of their excesses, and cried to the Lord, and were heard, delivered, and restored to their own land. Sickened at last by their own weakness they petitioned for kings to rule over them that they might have an ultimate standard of conduct to which all must conform. Men are making the same mistake today. The old acceptance of Divine authority and Divine law as the standard for men, no matter how imperfectly understood and insufficiently kept, has been repudiated. Now, every man is a law unto himself, and the world is lapsing into anarchy in consequence. We, who look for a day of world conversion in the Age to come, know full well that such conversion will not be effected by leaving each man to the unrestrained exercise of his own fancies and desires. However well intentioned or well-informed they may be, everyone needs the jurisdiction of a perfectly incorruptible and all-embracing educational system that will brook no disobedience. The salvation of men will depend, not on keeping commandments of their own devising, but on keeping God's commandments. When, by reason of adequate discipline, they have a complete understanding and knowledge of those commandments, they will be free to accept or reject, by the exercise of their own wills, the alternatives of life and death, good and evil, that will then stand placed before them.

So then with us now, the wonderful freedom which is ours in Christ does not include freedom to frame our own code of laws, our own set of commandments. If we know God, then we realise full well that there is no alternative to the laws that He has set before us for our own well being. It is in the sincere and unreserved acceptance of those laws into our hearts, and the application of them in our lives, that we shall find the realization that we know God and are known of Him. The witness of the Spirit, speaking as it were with our spirit, will assure us of that.

Some claim to "know Him" but may deceive themselves, as well as others, because they have not really entered into this relationship to God and are not doers of His will and cannot claim to keep His commandments. John has no doubt about the position of such and he has no intention of there being any misapprehension in the minds of his readers. "He that says 'I know Him' and keeps not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him" (v.4). In considering the forthrightness of a statement such as this we do well to remember that these men of the East were - and still are - accustomed to frame their sentiments in much more expressive and forceful words than we of the West might consider necessary or even proper. A good example of this is found in the Scriptural use of the word "hate", a word that will be considered later in this same chapter. Now here it is quite possible that John is not using the word "liar" in the bald, extreme sense that the same word normally bears among us today. His point is surely that the man who claims to know God but who is not doing the will of God simply is not speaking the truth. He may be quite unaware of the fact; in his own self-opinionated condition, his own egotism, or his own mere confident ignorance that he does know God, but in fact he does not. In consequence, says John, the truth is not in him.

Some are accustomed to speak of a believer as being "in the Truth" by which they mean that such has come to a knowledge of God's Plan and understands His purpose with the Church in this Age and the world in the next, and on that basis has become a consecrated footstep follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is one thing, though, to be "in the Truth" and quite another for the Truth to be in us. This latter demands a great deal more than an appreciation and understanding of God's Plan and acceptance of the call to consecration. It requires the devoted painstaking following of Christ in all things throughout life, fully allowing the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit in our lives and the continuous demonstration of the results of that work as the years pass. Later in the chapter John will be talking about the Word of God abiding in us. Perhaps it is something like that he has in mind here where he speaks of the truth not being in those who, despite their protestations, really do not know God.

'But whosoever keeps his Word, in him truly is the love of God perfected; hereby know we that we are in Him" (v.5). This is the other side of the picture. The outward evidence that a man is keeping the commandments, "his Word" is that in him the love of God is visibly manifest, quite apparently in process of being made perfect. This connection of love with the commandment is worthy of notice. The great aim and object of our lives is that we be made perfect in love. Love it was that caused the coming to earth of Jesus for man's salvation, the love of the Father and the love of the Son. Love it is that leads us to give ourselves to God, after having realised His own great love toward us.

Now we are to be made perfect in love so that we in our turn may be used to bring the blessings of salvation to those who, in the next Age, will need them so much. Paul, writing to Timothy, warned him against giving attention to fables and endless genealogies which give birth to unprofitable questionings and debatings rather than "godly edifying which is in faith". He told him that "the end of the commandment is love out of a pure heart, and a good conscience, and faith unfeigned" (1 Tim.5). The result of our keeping the commandment of God is that we are made perfect in love, made pure in heart. made sound in conscience, and genuine in faith. These are the characteristics of the disciple who "keeps His Word". In such an one truly is the love of God perfected.

Thus do we come to the climax of this lesson. Verses 3, 4 and 5 lay down the Divine principles regarding knowing God and show how easily we may be deceived if we are not perfectly sincere in our profession. John explains the difference between the one who knows God and keeps His commandments and the one who does not keep the commandments and therefore does not know God. Now comes the practical exhortation, the logical consequence of what has gone before. "He that saith he abideth in him ought himself so to walk even as he walked" (vs.6). The outward evidence that we are indeed abiding in Christ is to be found in the outwardly manifest fact that we are walking as Jesus walked. Now that does not mean that we must display before men and our brethren on all occasions, without ever failing, the same serene, unruffled composure the same complete freedom from hasty word and act, the same purity and nobility and majesty which Jesus Himself displayed to men during His earthly life. Not one of us can ever measure up to the fullness of that wonderful life or approach anywhere near it. But we can walk in the manner that He walked, so that men may take note that we have been with Jesus, and have, however imperfectly, learned of Him. We can so yield our lives and all our possessions and our talents and our influence to Him in glad consecration that it may truly be said we are "abiding in Him". Let it never be forgotten also that this abiding in Him brings the corresponding great joy of the knowledge that He is abiding in us. The visions of Revelation include the picture of One who stands at the door, and knocks. If any man will open the door, the Lord will come in and sup with him, and he with his Lord. This is an abiding together, we in Him and He in us. "Abide in Me"  he says "and I in you . . . He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without me ye can do nothing." (John 15.4‑5).

Our claim to know Him, and to be abiding in Him, then, will be evidenced by our keeping His commandments. The result of that will be our perfecting in love and in every good grace. The perfecting of ourselves in love will in turn be the evidence that we are members of Christ's body, of His Church. "If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love. . . this is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you." (John 15.10-12).

(to be continued)

AOH