“Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” (1 John 5:1-5)
These days it seems we are bombarded by a flurry of distressing news. Violence and hatred are running rampant. Some people think they possess the moral authority to dictate right and wrong for everyone else and spew their distorted truths over the media while inciting others to violence and incivility. Their authority for making such pronouncements comes not from God from from their own sinful imagination and warped soul.
Yet we who have faith in Jesus find truth and the good news in the word of God and in His church. We can take comfort in these beautiful words from the Apostle John. John reminds us that we can have confidence in approaching God with out concerns and fears because he has given us eternal life through Jesus Christ. This eternal life is guaranteed us by faith in Jesus Christ. We believers have victory over sin and death. All the violence and sinful hate speech is not something God approves. He calls us to shun such practices. He calls His own to love and serve Him. And we can because Jesus has overcome the world.
We are called to love and serve Jesus by loving our fellow Christian brethren with compassion and kindness expressed in godly words and deeds. This is because those who reject Jesus, who espouse violence and selfishness cannot find comfort here because they have been blinded by sin and by Satan. It is our calling to present the gospel to them that their blindness may be removed by faith in Jesus. So even though the violence of the nations and the ungodly trouble us daily making it seem as though evil has the upper hand, we must always recall we have victory and truth through the Word of God by faith in Jesus.