On Saturday, John told us about the importance of love in the Christian life. Today, we find another equally important emphasis – the need to cling to the truth about Christ.

And this makes perfect sense. After all, how can you love anyone without knowing him or her? So, how can we possibly love Jesus without knowing the truth about Him?

And that truth is truly amazing. In verse 22, John reminds us that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the ruler God promised would come to reign over all the earth. He also reminds us that Jesus is the Son of God, and that if we want to have a relationship with God, we must first draw close to Jesus (v. 23).

But how can we be sure all these things are true? After all, John makes it clear that there are plenty of people who tell all sorts of lies about Jesus. Some say that the material things of this world are all that are really important (vv. 15-17). Others deny that Jesus really is God’s Messiah (v. 22). From John’s time to ours, there have always been people who set themselves up in opposition to Jesus, wanting to take His place as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords (v. 18).

So, how can we be sure of the truth about Jesus? Well, at the beginning of this letter, John points to his own eyewitness testimony, and that’s a great place to start. Moreover, Jesus Himself said that all the Scriptures testify about Him, predicting and explaining the way He would save the world by dying for all His people and rising from the dead.

But in this passage, John insists that there is another witness to the truth of Christ – the Holy Spirit who lives within all those who belong to Jesus (v. 20). He is the One Who helps us understand the Word of God when we read it, and He gives us the certainty we need to believe the Word and live according to it.

So, let’s all resolve to spend more time in God’s Word. But let’s also pray that God would fill us with His Holy Spirit so that we might understand what we read, so that the Word might bear fruit in our lives, and so that we might be drawn into a closer relationship with God.

I John 2:15-27 (ESV)

15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
16 For all that is in the world– the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life– is not from the Father but is from the world.
17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.
18 Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour.
19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.
20 But you have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all have knowledge.
21 I write to you, not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and because no lie is of the truth.
22 Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son.
23 No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also.
24 Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father.
25 And this is the promise that he made to us– eternal life.
26 I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you.
27 But the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie– just as it has taught you, abide in him.