And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.1
Knowledge of God the Father and Jesus Christ the Son is prerequisite to salvation. One cannot claim salvation apart from the Son, whom the Father loves—This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased.”2 Jesus fulfilled his mission from the Father—being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.3 To claim otherwise is to deceive oneself.
God demands perfection, which no one can attain—for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.4 Since God is both loving and just, he provided the perfect sacrifice which the law demands as retribution for sin. We are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.5
Our filthy, perverted minds have to be transformed.6 This renewal of the mind is accomplished by the washing of His Word. Jesus said, Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you.7
If you believe in his finish work,8 and repent,9 you are blessed by the Beloved and the Father adopts you as son.10 And in increasing measure would have the boldness to say, Now I know that the LORD saves his anointed; he will answer him from his holy heaven with the saving might of his right hand.11
I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.12
May the LORD answer you in the day of trouble! May the name of the God of Jacob protect you! May he grant you your heart’s desire and fulfill all your plans! May we shout for joy over your salvation, and in the name of our God set up our banners! May the LORD fulfill all your petitions.13 AMEN!
Notes:
1. John 17:3
2. Matthew 3:17 (Mark 1:11; Luke 3:22)
3. Philippians 2:8-11
4. Romans 3:23
5. Romans 3:24-25
6. Romans 12:2
7. John 15:3-4
8. John 19:30
9. Acts 3:19-20
10. Ephesians 1:3-6
11. Psalm 20:6
12. 1 John 5:13-15
13. Psalm 20:1, 4-5
