I was going to do one more blog about health care, but I was getting bored. Also, my mind keeps wondering off to I John 4, and so that what I want to talk about that for a while. Here are verses 7 & 8 in the English Standard Version:
“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
The question I want to pursue for the next several weeks is simple: “Could this verse mean what it seems to mean?” Because it seems to say that whoever loves is a born-again Christian. This brings some very difficult questions to mind, such as “What about faith?” Since the rest of the New Testament places so much emphasis on faith, and since this passage seems to foist love in the place of faith, aren't we obligated to reinterpret this passage so that what it seems to mean on the surface is not what it actually means? Another obvious issue: “Doesn’t everyone love?” I mean, after all, we can all think of evil people who love their mothers. So doesn’t that make this verse irrelevant at best, and absurd at worst?
I’ll say two things by way of introduction. First, I do believe that it does indeed mean exactly what it seems to mean: those who love are born again, and those who don’t love are not born again. One way I will try to establish this conviction is by showing that this is not some renegade verse in the context of the New Testament. Rather, it helps us make sense of every other statement in the New Testament – perhaps for the first time! I love verse 8 because I can picture John sitting there after writing verse 7: “whoever loves has been born of God…” He twirls his quill pen for a minute, and then realizes that his future commentators might screw up his meaning, so he adds verse 8: “Anyone who does not love does not know God…” By expressing this same idea in the negative, he has covered all his logical bases.
Second, I will admit that it is not immediately obvious how this verse is reconcilable with the “football game verses.” For instance, John 3:16 seems to say that belief or faith is fundamental to the “born again” formula. I, however, believe that John 3:16, among many other passages, has not been interpreted correctly by those who refer to themselves as “born-again Christians.” So in the next few weeks, I want to show how I John 4 is the key to opening up the New Testament, and why the New Testament as a whole supports the message that only lovers are born again. So get ready for plenty of heresy the next few weeks!
