Changed by His Love
1 John 2:7: Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard from the beginning.
John did not have in mind some new obligation which his readers had never heard. On the contrary the command foremost in his mind was an old one, which you have had since the beginning. No doubt John thought here especially of the command to love one another.
He emphasized his point by adding that this old command is the message which you have heard (the majority of mss. add again “from the beginning”). Whatever innovations the readers might be confronting because of the doctrines of the antichrists, their real responsibility was to a commandment which they had heard from the very start of their Christian experience. 1
Loving Him
Would you be willing to show His unconditional love to someone else today? Will you show it, even though they do not deserve it? Will you show it even though they may never acknowledge your love for them? Will you pray about His divine appointment waiting for you?
And now I plead with you, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment to you, but that which we have had from the beginning: that we love one another. 2 John 5
Loving Others
To love one another is to love someone the way He loved us.
Make Me Like You
Lord, thank You for the love you always had for us, even before the foundation of the world.
1. Walvoord, J. F., & Zuck, R. B., Dallas Theological Seminary. (1985). The Bible Knowledge Commentary.
