It can be frustrating to find ourselves constantly returning to struggles we thought we’d moved past. We meant what we said when we decided things would change. We’ve put in the effort, and we may have even made real progress. But when a hard week comes along, we wonder why the same things still lay claim to us. We’d like to know that these changes can last beyond the winds and storms we face.

God knows what it’s like for us to reach that point, and we can talk to Him about hopes and our failures, about the mountain tops we’ve been to and those places where we feel stuck. There’s reason to have hope for what comes next as we journey with Him, and it often begins with allowing Him into those parts of our lives we haven’t figured out how to really change … yet.

#Abide #FirstJohn #Overcomer #Overcoming

There’s probably someone we wish we found easier to love. We care about them (we really do!), but we’re tired of how things go between us or how they’ve acted in the past. We’ve tried to work through it, but we’re not sure what else to do. Being told to love them can feel like being asked to do something that’s just outside of reality for us.

In these moments, it’s worth asking how God meets us in the midst of it. He knows the whole story, including what’s been done to us and what we’ve done ourselves. We can be honest with Him about being hurt or angry or simply worn out. We may not know what needs to happen next, but we can trust that He cares about us and will help us find a way forward. In fact, he’s already shown us what it looks like to love the unloveable … and He continues to do it every day!

#Abide #FirstJohn #FirstLove #LoveFirst

It can be hard to know who or what to believe many times. Someone can speak with confidence, quote the Bible, or say something that makes sense to us, and then someone else uses the same Bible to say something very, very different. Since both claim to speak for God, we can find ourselves following whoever says what we want to hear or who says what they say the loudest or longest.

God knows how easily we can be misled, and He hasn’t left us to figure everything out alone. He’s given us more to go on than someone’s confidence or our own gut feelings. We can ask honest questions and face those questions without being afraid that everything we believe will fall apart. The God who wants us to know Him is able to help us find our way through the confusion.

#Abide #FirstJohn #CheckTheSource

It's hard to want good things for someone who's hurt us. Even if we can muster up a polite response when we see them, their very name can still bring up the same memories and the same pain. Before long, we can find ourselves almost consumed with keeping score so that we can keep our distance. Even when we have good reasons to be careful, we also need to ask what holding onto our suffering is doing to us.

God reaches into those parts of our lives that we'd rather leave in dark corners, including the weights we've carried and how we've learned to live with them. Even when our struggles and trauma are real, we can find hope in being loved by Someone who sees us fully and offers to walk with us in it all. We can bring everything we struggle with to Him, trusting Him to give us a strength beyond ourselves in order to step into a love greater than ourselves.

#Abide #FirstJohn #FromTheInsideOut

We can genuinely want to change ourselves and still find ourselves saying & doing the same hurtful things we have before. We’ll lose our patience, make an excuse, and then promise to handle it better next time … and then repeat the cycle. This can make it hard to be honest about ourselves with God. We know the parts of our lives we’d rather He didn’t see, unsure of what He’d do when it all comes to light.

Yet in these dark spaces, there is real hope for us. We can bring the things we’re tired of repeating to God, along with the fear that we’ve let Him down too many times because He does know what we’re facing and has shown Himself to be faithfully devoted to us even so. We don’t have to know how every part of our lives will change before we take a step toward Him. In fact, He’s already taken the first steps towards each one of us.

#Abide #FirstJohn #LoveLikeGod #FamilyResemblance

It’s hard to question the stuff we’ve believed for a long time. We might’ve learned it from someone we trust, or we might  just like the way it makes sense of our lives – or allows us to keep doing what we’re already doing. So when something challenges it, we can get pretty defensive before we’ve really considered the pushback. This happens with how we see Jesus, too. We can be sure we know Him and yet still have some things wrong.

What might we find if we were willing to let Jesus confront a few of our assumptions, especially those we might hold about Him? We might have some honest questions to work through or even admit that we’ve misunderstood important things. That can be uncomfortable, but really getting to know someone means giving them room to speak for themselves. And there’s good reason to give Jesus that same room.

#Abide #FirstJohn #TheDangerOFaDifferentJesus

We can spend a lot of time thinking about what would make our lives better. We tell ourselves we’ll be content once a few things fall into place … but getting what we wanted doesn’t always (or really even often) bring the relief we expected. Before long, we’re looking for that next thing that will be the thing, and the people and things we already care about can get less and less of our attention.

It’s worth asking why enough seems so hard to reach. We suppose that somehow that next purchase, success, or bit of praise will fulfill these longings like those that came before failed to do. God understands these hopes and the strain of trying to find them. They’re rooted in desires that are fundamentally fulfilled in something much grander, much more glorious that what we typically pursue. Bringing these yearnings to the One who ultimately completes them sets us on a path that can lead to true contentment.

#Abide #FirstJohn #ThePullOfMore #Identity #Contentment

If we’re really honest with ourselves, we don’t always act like the people we want to be. Even though we care about someone, we’re short with them. We want to be patient, but we get annoyed when things don’t go our way. We’re sincere in what we say we believe, yet our everyday choices can tell a different story.

This can all leave us wondering what a relationship with Jesus really means for normal life. What difference does it make when we’re running late, facing hardship, or dealing with someone we’d rather avoid? The Bible offers us a picture of what a faith that really makes a difference actually looks like. And it’s less complicated than we might try to make it.

#Abide #FirstJohn #BeyondLipService

We all have stuff we’d rather other people didn’t know. It could be something wrong that we’ve done, an unhealthy attitude we keep defending, a destructive habit we’ve learned to work around, or a host of other things. We can try to choose our words carefully, leave out certain details, or give explanations that make us sound a little better. Over time, keeping up this version of us can get exhausting. We want close relationships, but we’re afraid of what might happen if someone knew the whole story.

This very same fear can shape how we approach God, too. We may assume He’ll respond the way we expect everyone else to respond, so we keep our distance or promise ourselves we have to do better before we connect with Him. But, if we take a closer look at who He really is and how He truly sees us, we can discover that the connection we’ve been avoiding is one we don’t need to fear.

#Abide #FirstJohn #WhatWeTryToHide

Almost every day, we hear bold claims about what should make life meaningful, who can be trusted, and where real purpose and connection are found. Some of these sound convincing for a bit, but they can lead us to build our certainty on rather shaky foundations. What we need is something that can bear the weight of all that life throws our way.

John, a man who genuinely knew Jesus and was one of His closest companions, wrote several books that are found in our Bibles today. He penned these from a confidence in what he and many others had experienced firsthand. His words invite us to ask how truth reaches out to us, what it means to really belong, and why true joy grows when a life with God is authentically lived. What began as a personal account becomes an open invitation for us today, shaping how we know God and how we live with one another.

#Abide #FirstJohn #TheWordOfLife