The Joshua Victor Theory

  Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen. In 1 John 5 let’s consider how you’re “Children of New Life.” We’re familiar with our old life under sin and the condemnation of the law. Our daily experience in a broken world. Old life is as familiar as worn-out shoes. But Christ calls us to a new life. Learning, growth, and a new identity. Children of God are born for a new life. 1 John teaches our new life centers around simple things: faith, love, and the true confession of Jesus. First, in v. 1, John writes: “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him.” Believing in Jesus as the Christ and loving God the Father are marks of the children of God. Believing and loving. We don’t become children of God by doing those things, but because Christ first loved us, and by His own will, we were born of God (John 1:12-13). We become who we are by being...

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. As we’ve been reading through the book of 1 John these past weeks in church, the themes of faith and love have echoed again and again. Last week it was about hearing God’s Word of Truth and believing and confessing Jesus in the flesh. It was about God’s first-love coming to us, and producing love in us in return. Building on that same thought, that faith and love are inseparable, today we hear in 1 John 5:1: “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of Him.” This is family-talk. It’s saying that we are children of God, born of God because we’re believers in Jesus Christ. As part of God’s family we love both our heavenly Father and other believers born of Him as well. Church, your fellow Christians, is your family. Even if your natural family is no longer living or is far from you, your fellow believers are God’s famil...