The way we may be sure that we know Jesus
is to keep his commandments.
John was not saying that everything was ultimately reducible to moral compliance. He was not suggesting that what mattered was to work at at following the rules, and that we could count this, somehow, as a relationship. Instead, he meant that our ability to keep the commandments is a function of how close we are to Jesus. We can be sure that, if we are keeping his commandments, it is only by his grace at work in us.
Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not keep his commandments
is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
There is no real faith which does not work in love. Faith always brings obedience with it. How could we claim to believe Jesus and ignore the things he tells us? Faith without works is not only dead but hypocritical.
Beloved, I am writing no new commandment to you
but an old commandment that you had from the beginning.
The old commandment is the word that you have heard.
What of us when we fail to live up to the high standards of the Gospel? What of us when the truth we know and claim to believe makes us hypocrites? When this happens, because it will most certainly happen, let us return to what we had from the beginning, the word that we heard.
What we need is for our relationship with Jesus to be so real that it transforms us. We need the content of our faith to be more than mere data, more than mere abstraction, so that by it our minds can truly be renewed and we can be transformed (see Romans 12:2).
But whoever keeps his word,
the love of God is truly perfected in him.
We are called to hear his word and to keep it. We are called to be doers of the word and not hearers only (see James 1:22). But Jesus himself is the Word, and our response is never anything other than a response to him. The words telling us to love of brothers and sisters are old in one sense. But when Jesus speaks them they are new, because in response to him we can actually keep them.
And yet I do write a new commandment to you,
which holds true in him and among you,
for the darkness is passing away,
and the true light is already shining.
Moral and ethical data cannot renew our minds no matter how much we rehearse them. If we go that route we will find ourselves only increasing frustrated. Only Jesus is able to give the grace to live out what he commands. And so we keep his word. It never becomes just a generic word that we keep. It is always his word. And we do not just receive it once. But we keep it. We bring it before our minds again and again, speak it when we are tempted to doubt or despair.
It looks like this:
Lord, in you we are not in darkness. Lord, in you we can and do love our brothers and sisters.
It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit
that he should not see death
before he had seen the Christ of the Lord.
When we keep the word we can have a faith like that of Simeon, who was able to remain righteous and devout even while he waited, even before he could see the results, before the fruit of his desire could be realized. He was in the right place at the right time because it was not merely law that he followed but the Holy Spirit.
We find ourselves at a place much like Simeon while he was waiting. We have the words of Jesus given to us by the Spirit pointing toward fulfillment, toward salvation prepared in the sight of every people, toward the light which while finally and completely reveal Jesus to the nations. John wants us to ask ourselves and be sure, 'Do we know him?' Even now, while we wait, even before we see the fulfillment, 'Do we know him?' We do if we keep and cling to his word. If we allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit into the temple, as Simeon did, we too will not merely claim to know him but will actually recognize him when he comes to us.
“Lord, now let your servant go in peace;
your word has been fulfilled:
my own eyes have seen the salvation
which you prepared in the sight of every people,
a light to reveal you to the nations
and the glory of your people Israel.”
Simeon's piety may have looked like mere legalism to an outsider who didn't see his heart. He may have seemed aloof or distracted from things that others considered more real or pressin to so-called realists. Legalists probably wouldn't have been satisfied either, thinking of all of the better possible uses of his time. But Simeon's was a faith that kept the word, that clung to it so much that he recognized that word when it became flesh and was brought to him by Mary and Joseph. It was no new commandment, but in the flesh of that babe it was very new indeed. This newness is our hope as well.
Sing to the LORD a new song;
sing to the LORD, all you lands.
Sing to the LORD; bless his name.
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