December 24, 2016 Bible Study — Love Our Fellow Believers

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 John 1-5.

    The central point of this letter, to which the writer keeps coming back, is that if we truly believe in Jesus we will love our fellow believers. God has given us the opportunity to know Him through Jesus. If we know God we will obey Him and His first and primary command is to love one another just as we love ourselves. All other actions grow out of that love. If we love our fellow believers we will be careful to take no actions which might cause them to stumble, which might cause them to sin.

    Which brings us to the writer’s other main point, we have all sinned and we will probably sin again. However, Jesus will plead our case before God. This does not mean that we can go on sinning with impunity. Each time we sin it causes harm to ourselves, to our relationship with God, and to our relationship with our fellow believers. If we truly love God and our fellow believers we will desire to have as positive a relationship as possible with them. Therefore, our love for our fellow believers should provide us with incentive to put sin behind us and to resist temptation.