7th April 2025

John is trying to paint a vivid picture of the Son of God. The NIV says that God appeared, he became visible. The NLT uses the word reveal, the ESV the word manifest. He had always been there, but our eyes, and may I say our minds as well, could not perceive his presence.  

This is why he is writing, to reveal what he has been given the privilege to do; to introduce the Lamb of God to the world. 

In the beginning mankind walked with God but over time the weight of sin blinded our eyes and minds. A false picture, a broken vision of God was painted by the damage sin had caused. This blindness kept us from knowing who God was and had kept us from a right relationship with the source of life; God is life itself.

It seems ironic that in our search for the good things in life, that we should run from God who is the creator of all things good, and to think that we could find life on our own. I am amazed at the ads that try to convince you that they know all the secrets that others do not want you to know about, a happy, healthy, pain-free and fat-free life that you can only get from their knowledge. That was the tactic of the snake in the garden of Eden. He basically told Eve that the true knowledge was hidden from her and that only he knew the truth. The result was that Adam and Eve both rejected life, God’s life, for death. We have been doing this ever since the garden.

Our job is to continue to reveal the truth about the goodness, faithfulness, and love of God, to a world that has been blinded by sin. We as the children of God can be a witness to the truth; that God is truth, God is life, God is love, God is light, and that God is the atoning sacrifice for our sins. We are told, ‘…The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.’ (1 John 3:8 NIV), and to reveal the truth and to redeem his children from the darkness of sin. God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all (1 John 1:5) and he reveals to us the truth of who he is and how he loves us. 

Now that we have tasted death, how glorious life has become to us. How precious and wonderful is our God who came down to us personally to reveal the truth, remove the darkness and lies, and to give us his forgiveness and his life. As it says in 1 John 1:4: ‘We write this to make [your] joy complete.’

Local congregation:
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Word of Life contact:
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