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1 John 3:1 and 3:11-24 from The Message Bible
What marvelous love the Father has extended to us! Just look at it – we’re called children of God! That’s who we really are. But that’s also
why the world doesn’t recognize us or take us seriously, because it has
no idea who he is or what he’s up to.
The way we know we’ve been transferred from death to life is that we love our brothers and sisters. Anyone who doesn’t love is as good as dead. Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know very well that eternal life and murder don’t go together. This is how we’ve come to understand and experience love: Christ sacrificed his life for us. This is why we ought to live sacrificially for our fellow believers, and not just be out for ourselves. If you see some brother or sister in need and have the means to do something about it but turn a cold shoulder and do nothing, what happens to God’s love? It disappears. And you made it disappear.
My dear children, let’s not just talk about love; let’s practice real love. This is the only way we’ll know we’re living truly,
living in God’s reality. It’s also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it.
For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves. And friends, once that’s
taken care of and we’re no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we’re bold and free before God! We’re able to
stretch our hands out and receive what we asked for because we’re doing what he said, doing what pleases him.
Again, this is God’s command: to believe in his personally named Son, Jesus Christ. He told us to love each other, in line
with the original command. As we keep his commands, we live deeply and surely in him, and he lives in us. And this
is how we experience his deep and abiding presence in us: by the Spirit he gave us.
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