Abiding in God and Abiding of God (1 John 4: 13-16)

 ABIDING IN GOD AND ABIDING OF GOD (1 JOHN 4: 13-16):

After writing about the need of loving one another, as one being received the love of God, Apostle John writes that by loving one another the believers know that they abide in God and God in them, because He had given them His Spirit. The person who had received and known the love of God should love another in order to be certain that (s)he abide in God and also that God really abides in. The Spirit of God has been given to all who believe in God with the true heart. The Spirit of God condemns and convicts a person when the person does something that affects another person either directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly. The person who abides in God will allow the Spirit of God to work in that person and thereby it could be testified that the person abides in God and also God abides in the person too.

The author continues to write that they had seen and testified that the Father had sent His Son to be the Saviour of the world and whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. Apostle John had been with Lord Jesus Christ during His ministry and would have certainly experienced, learned and verified that God the Father had sent Jesus to be the savior of the world who could forgive all the sins, accept the repentance, and help the people to reconcile with God. A person could confess Jesus as the Son of God only through God the father who had revealed Him to that person, thereby God abides in him. The person who had believed in the Lord Jesus received the Spirit of God by the eternal plan of God, thereby abides in God.

Apostle John further writes that because the believers have come to know and believe the love that God has for them. God is love and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. God is all-loving which complements His all other attributes. God is very gracious and considerate as the author writes that God abides in those who abide in God by following the Lord Jesus Christ. God abides in the believers who had accepted and confess that Jesus is the Son of man through Spirit of God, as God the Father, the Son and the Spirit of God are existing together with perfect unity and nothing could divide them.

Stimulations for Self-Reflection:

1.      How do the believers know that they abide in God?

2.      How God had given his spirit?

3.      What the author has seen and testify?

4.      How Jesus is the savior of the world?

5.      In whom God abides?

6.      Who can confess that Jesus is the Son of God?

7.      What believers could recognize about God?

8.      Who abides in God? How?

9.      How we can reflect our love for others?

10.  How we can be assured of the love that God has for us?