‘Keep away from fakes!’ could hardly be a more suitable ending to this letter. All along, John has been wanting authenticity. He is looking for children of the true God believing in the real Christ, following genuine Christian teaching and showing practical love to their brothers and sisters.

John also wants them to have a sound confidence in Christ, and to know that the Son of God has given them eternal life (v 13) and does protect them in the world from the evil one (v 18). He wants their confidence to be in God who hears and answers prayer (vs 14,15). Although some of the language may seem obscure to us, verse 16 begins with a wonderful promise to keep on praying for those who have apparently rejected the faith. God does hear. The faithful praying for a son or daughter or friend sometimes sees its reward decades later!

John can’t resist a final warning against us kidding ourselves: all wrongdoing is sin, however Christian we may think we are (vs 17,18). But the good news is gloriously true. If we know the true Christ, then we know the true God, and this is eternal life (v 20), as Jesus said himself (John 17:3).

Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.’¹

John ends this theologically rich letter with an assortment of closing comments. Some are rather enigmatic, such as his discussion of the sin that leads to death. There is also a final encouragement about being in Jesus Christ and receiving eternal life and a rather abrupt ending exhorting his readers to keep themselves from idols. Before all of these, however, is a beautiful promise about receiving what we pray for from God.

Verses 14 and 15 are perhaps among the most abused verses in the Bible. People have used them to claim that they can confidently receive anything which they ask for from God. This actually misses John’s point – he clearly claims ‘if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us … we know that we have what we asked of him’ (italics added). The emphasis here is on God’s will, not our will. It’s important that we learn not to demand what we want but to ask God what he wants and then pray accordingly. By aligning our prayers with God’s desires, we can be utterly confident that he will hear us and that he will give us a certain answer.²

The painful part of this process is actually relinquishing our own rights and desires and being genuinely open to his will being different to our own. It’s OK honestly to express our heart’s desires to God, but we must remember that he sees a much bigger picture than we ever could; he alone knows what will truly be best. As we mature in faith, our hearts become increasingly transformed and our desires naturally align with his, so our prayers become more powerful and effective.

If you are wrestling with God, open your hands in prayer, in a physical act of letting go, and align yourself with God: ‘Not my will but yours be done’.³

¹ Ps 37:4  ² Cf 1 John 3:21,22  ³Cf Luke 22:39