Tuesday, January 17, 2023

1 John 5:14-15

 “And this is the confidence that we have before him: that whenever we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in regard to whatever we ask, then we know that we have the requests that we have asked from him.”

— ‭‭1 John‬ ‭5‬:‭14‬-‭15‬‬


I don’t like discussing verses like this. We either end up talking in circles (making no sense to those who don’t understand Christianese) or talking ourselves into a corner/ a position that can’t be defended based on other passages or basic theology.

Surrounding verses (and overall themes of John) emphasize this word “know” bc of the heresies/opponents that John is attacking. Can talk about that in a passage of chapter 2 (probably vv 18-19). But other paragraphs in ch 5 seem to be closing thoughts and somewhat disconnected.

Grammar: v. 14 is third class condition. Present tense with ean is general present. This is why NET translated as “whenever.” V. 15 is first class condition, even though it still has ean (this is rare). 1st class is assumed true for sake of argument—never translate as since, even if the protasis (first half of conditional) is actually true. This would ruin logical force of conditional. 

At first glance, it seems John is saying the same thing twice in back to back verses. Would need to do deeper study to see if v 15 has slightly different/deeper meaning. Point is we have confidence that God hears us and that we will receive what we ask because He hears us.

Because of the conditional, there’s probably good grounds for emphasizing that phrase “according to His will,” but per my previous posts, it always seems like a cop out in Christian circles. Either the praying person isn’t spiritual enough, didn’t pray right, had wrong motives, etc. On the flip side, I thought God always hears His children…or anyone praying for that matter.

1 John 3:21-22 help understand this passage, since key terms are repeated: confidence, prayer, obedience. There must be some connection with obeying God’s will (i.e., the commandments, which for John is love) and knowing God’s will. Again, this also attacks the lifestyle and teaching of the opponents.

We could also use the following v. 16 to narrow down the “requests.” Not saying this is all that John means by “asking,” and I’m not trying to limit God by any means in order to, again, talk in circles or back into a corner. But John may be at least focusing here on one particular request: praying for those living in sin, which may end up leading to their destruction.

In either case, John must be making a point to his audience that they need. Maybe opponents are feeding more lies. We need more study on the book and context as whole before making blanket statements. We know what prayer is and God’s character. We know we pray and don’t get everything we ask. We don’t need to call anyone or anything a liar.

We don’t need to accuse solid Christians or having terrible motives or living in sin or not knowing God’s will. Maybe we can pray for God’s kingdom and spiritual maturity in ourselves and others, not so much physical things.

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