1 John 1: To Make Our Joy Complete

^“1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. ² The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. ³ We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. ⁴ We write this to make our joy complete.” -1 John 1:1-4

John did not teach from theory; he taught from experience. As an apostle of Jesus Christ, he spoke of a person he had physically seen, heard, and touched. This was not a God far off; this was God up close and personal. Jesus was both God and human, a perfect Creator who had walked among imperfect creatures, tempted yet without sin.

John called Jesus “life.” The life appeared–he had seen it; now he spoke and wrote of it. Why? To lead others to knowing Christ. In doing so, he would make their joy complete.

Still today, we who know Christ are called to speak of him to others for the same reason. When a person comes to faith in Jesus, it makes their joy–and ours–complete.

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Dillon Burroughs is the author and coauthor of numerous books and is handwriting a copy of all 31,173 verses of the Bible at HolyWritProject.com. Find out more about Dillon at Facebook.com/readdB or readdB.com.