Believe In The Name

1 John 3:23 ESV says, “And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us.” John was there when Jesus taught them his new command to love one another. The significance of that command sunk in because John mentions it over and over in his writings.

This verse is Christianity 101: love God and love one another. It is simple but no less profound. Clear enough for a child to understand, but so all-encompassing that it requires a lifetime of surrender to live out.

I love the way God designed the kingdom like this. For a brand new believer, the call is the same as for a seasoned saint. The mark of maturity then becomes less about the complexity of our faith or the extent of our religious knowledge, and more about our faithfulness to these simple commands.

These two lead down very different paths. Following a life of complex religiosity will give intellectual depth but spiritual hollowness. Following a life of faithfully believing in the name of Jesus and operating in love will result in a deep and abiding closeness with the Father.

At the end of our life, do we want to be full of information and arguments won, or do we want to have stories of loving others and an intimacy with God that thins the veil between heaven and earth?

To be clear, I am not renouncing theological or scholarly pursuits. I am not trying to downplay the important place tradition has in our faith. I am, however, pointing out that Jesus himself gave us a clear and simple command which John echos here. If we want to live in freedom, we have to abide. We abide when we keep his commands. And all of these commands flow from faith in the name of Jesus and the commitment to love.

Will you follow the way?

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