Do We Walk In The Light Of Christ Or Darkness?

Brothers and sisters, while many, many teachers of today use 'grace' as a covering for sin, Peter tells us we are not to sin. There is no excuse for sin, but if we do sin, we are to confess it and turn from it. Jesus' blood will cover it. Peter also makes it clear that if we persist in loving this world system, the Father's love is not in us. This is very sobering as so many are caught up in the love of this world. Many teachers are telling their listeners that it is God's will for them to be rich.

1 John 2  ISV

1My little children, I’m writing these things to you so that you might not sin. 

• Yet if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus, the Messiah,a one who is righteous. 2It is he who is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the whole world’s.

3This is how we can be sure that we have come to know him: 

• if we continually keep his commandments.
• 4The person who says, “I have come to know him,” but does not continually keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth has no place in that person.
• 5But whoever continually keeps his commandments is the kind of person in whom God’s love has truly been perfected. 

This is how we can be sure that we are in union with God:b 

• 6The one who says that he abides in him must live the same way he himself lived.

7Dear friends, I am not writing to you a new commandment, but an old commandment that you have had from the beginning. This old commandment is the word you have heard. 8On the other hand, I am writing to you a new commandment that is truly in him and in you. For the darkness is fading away, and the true light is already shining.

9The person who says that he is in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. 10The person who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no reason for him to stumble. 11But the person who hates his brother is in the darkness and lives in the darkness. He does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

12I am writing to you, little children,

because your sins have been forgiven

on account of his name.

13I am writing to you, fathers,

because you have known the one who

has existed from the beginning.

I am writing to you, young people,

because you have overcome the evil one.

14I have written to you, little children,

because you have known the Father.

I have written to you, fathers,

because you have known the one who

has existed from the beginning.

I have written to you, young people,

because you are strong

and because God’s word remains in you

and you have overcome the evil one.

15Stop lovingc the world and the things that are in the world. 

• If anyone persists in loving the world, the Father’s love is not in him. 
• 16For everything that is in the world—(1)the desire for fleshly gratification,d (2)the desire for possessions,e (3)and worldly arrogance—is not from the Father but is from the world. 
• 17And the world and its desires are fading away, but the person who does God’s will remains forever.

                      Be Thou My Vision