January 6

Beloved: Who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? This is the one who came through water and Blood, Jesus Christ, not by water alone, but by water and Blood. The Spirit is the one who testifies, and the Spirit is truth. So there are three that testify, the Spirit, the water, and the Blood, and the three are of one accord.

If we accept human testimony, the testimony of God is surely greater. Now the testimony of God is this, that he has testified on behalf of his Son. Whoever believes in the Son of God has this testimony within himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar by not believing the testimony God has given about his Son.

And this is the testimony: God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever possesses the Son has life; whoever does not possess the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you so that you may know that you have eternal life, you who believe in the name of the Son of God. (1 John 5:5-13)

The author of this letter appeared to affirm the full humanity of Jesus as the incarnation of God’s love.  Perhaps he provided this affirmation late in the first century to counter the belief that Jesus only was divine. This belief was part of an early form of Docetism in which Jesus only appeared to be human and was not really human.  The counter was that Jesus “came through water and Blood.”

Early beliefs about Jesus often clashed.  There was conflict and division in many communities that followed Jesus the Jew.  Now, we Gentiles tend to forget his Jewishness and often put more emphasis on his divinity and that which we call Christianity.

By the way, today is January 6.  Our flawed humanity was fully revealed and on display with the spilling of much blood and anti-Christ behavior on that fateful day in the Capitol two years ago.  Note the flag to the left in the above photo.  Shameful!

Deacon David Pierce