1 John

I want to share with y'all (whoever reads this) what I am studying in God's Word. Recently I read the book How to Study the Bible by John MacArthur - a very good book, I highly recommend it. In it, he suggested that you read through the Old Testament in one year (approx. 20 min. a day) and for the New Testament read a book for 30 days straight and take a note card and write the major theme of each chapter, and switch between a short book and a longer book. He also said that for the longer books, you can split them up into different sections, for example the book of John can be split up into 3 sets of 30 days - 7 chapters per set. By studying this way you obtain a greater understanding of the book as a whole.

So, in saying that, I started with 1 John. What's 1 John all about? Basically, it is about living as a believer. It talks a lot about the characteristics of God's children. For example, the children of God:

• keep God's Word and commandments - 2:3
• loves his brother - 2:10
• does not love the world - 2:15
• does the will of God - 2:17
• practices righteousness - 3:7
• does not make a practice of sinning - 3:9
• confesses that Jesus is the Son of God - 4:15
• overcomes the world by faith - 5:4

Just think about this for a second... practicing righteousness. First of all, what does it mean to be righteous? To be righteous is to walk uprightly or in a right relationship with the Lord. In Romans 4:3 it says "Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness." It goes on to say in verse 5 that "the one who does not work but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness." Now, justified means to be declared righteous, and verse 5 says that God justifies the ungodly and their faith is counted as righteousness - notice at the beginning that it is to the one who does not work - it's all about faith. (but we'll talk more about faith another time). So back to practicing righteousness, only those who believe in God can walk uprightly with Him. If you look at 1 John 3:10 it says "By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God..." So practicing righteousness is an obvious character trait that marks a believer.

I also noticed how many times the word or any form of the word "abide" was used. It is used 19 times and referenced twice. That's a lot for only 5 chapters! There was abide in Him, in the light, in you, in the Son, in him, in death, in God, and in us. This goes along with the characteristics of believers because often it would say something like - whoever does this abides in God - marking it as a characteristic of a believer.

Anyway, that's just a little bit of what I've been learning. As I continue studying and meditating on God's Word, I hope to grow closer to Him and have a greater understanding of Him. He is all I need and live for.