The Outliers

Mitchell, Brody, Shannon, and Shelby

Reading through and confessing the struggles I have had with this letter has fleshed out my understanding of it as a whole, and I can be at peace with the questions I had before. This letter isn't as legalistic as it first seem, even though it's very easy to quote it out of context if you wish to hold guilt over someone's head, because it's inevitable that we'll all accuse someone sometime of not being loving while using vaguely defined criteria that wouldn't personally incriminate us.

The letter isn't about exposing our sinfulness in order to explain to us why we need to repent. Unlike Jesus' most famed opponents, John isn't writing against Pharisees. Instead, he's arguing with off branches of the Christian faith – inspired by Greek teaching – that would eventually turn into historic sects known as Gnosticism and Marcionism. So John isn't using the law to expose the hypocrisy we all have when we live by the Law, and he isn't defending Grace specifically, although it does become an indirect issue.

The main question was whether or not Jesus actually physically died for our sins, and the implications that has for one another. The great “therefore” of this letter is in our views on others with relation to our service to God. To a Greek thinker, it would be tempting to suppose that serving people would get in the way of serving God. In fact, any material pursuit would take away from service to God, and that service to God had to be done in the mind. Mind over matter. To love people would be to love them at the expense of God, and to acknowledge the world would distract from acknowledgment of its Creator. So John writes an Ethics 101 for them and gives them a refresher in old Jewish ideas, dating all the way back to Genesis, that love of God's creation naturally flows from love of God, and that no one can say “They're more preoccupied with loving God than with loving people.”

Does that sound familiar? It's a criticism that the church gets in our current culture all the time. “They love God more than they love people.” And John says, quite simply, that if God is properly understood, that will not be the case. Loving God and His children go hand in hand. Furthermore, when John writes of the new command (2:8), beyond what has existed from the very beginning, it isn't so radically different, and in fact I had a hard time pointing out exactly what it was, since the whole while he still speaks of love. It seems to me that the new command, to hope in Christ, solidifies his point, because Christ's incarnation proved that God so loved the world that He was willing to become a part of it. Surely this should prove that a Christian, logically, had every reason to live as Christ did. We were meant to be in this Creation (Genesis 1:28), and the natural birth and death of God Himself should prove this beyond all doubt.

It is very difficult to live the same way knowing this. More importantly, thinking that people do not matter to God creates a problem, because it insults the finished work of Christ. It insults it – to the point where the logical outworking of this is to conclude that Jesus was not the Messiah.

Our logical understanding of what is right and wrong, then, should flow from that fact. We are to live as Jesus did, and how did Jesus live? In his epistle, John doesn't go into as much detail as he did with his gospel. What he does say about Christ focuses on the incarnation, and while not mentioning any specific works He performed, he lets it hang. If Christ was incarnate, he loved people. It was a Godly love, but also a very human love, and a physical love. Jesus did more than just give people faith; he gave them life. Spiritual? Certainly. John 4:14. At the same time, Jesus reached down, made physical contact with the pus-covered skin of lepers, and physically healed them. He gave them physical life. Hence 1 John 3:18 – love if more then just an abstract spirituality, but something you do.

Many critics of Christianity criticize us, and rightfully so, for “giving people Bibles instead of bread.” While the importance of spiritual food cannot be neglected, I think that I do often see a natural tendency of some people to focus only on that to the exclusion of loving people with a physical love. This attitude naturally occurs even in people who believe in Christ's death and resurrection, as most Christians do. Yet, our attitudes toward that historic, physical event, and the works of Jesus haven't changed since the time of the epistles. That pattern, to only care for people's physical needs, is something we struggle with today just as much as we did yesterday. “Every 30 years, there's a new humanity.”

So we give them Bibles so that they may have living water. Yes, it is true that this living water gives them eternal life. No, they don't always accept it. They may be skeptical. For that reason, we often help them physically, help them out on their worldly problems, but only as a precursor to sharing the Bible with them. Are we ever actually sincere about it? With a legalistic framework, no. We care about results, about means to an end. Nothing is ever free to happen spontaneously.

Sometimes I feel that we give them spiritual water and not physical water in hopes that they will die soon and get it over with. Writing in prison, Paul felt that way about himself (Philippians 1:21). Then, of course, if those people do end up living longer, then it's for the greater utilitarian good. The Gospel gets spread. We're happy for that. Never mind the fact that physical life is also good in its own right, and physical death is jut as unnatural as spiritual death (Compare Genesis 1:31 with Genesis 3:19). Yet, if they don't receive Christ? Are we still happy for them? No, we're disappointed, because to us, our physical love meant nothing, and those improvements we made to their lives apparently had no ultimate meaning. We can't be happy for that. We only ever allow ourselves to be happy for their physical life if it contributes directly to their spiritual life.

Except John is eschatological. Everything has an ultimate meaning, because our works are reflections of the Coming Kingdom. They are very real manifestations of it. So John believes that yes, you can be happy for someone's physical well-being. Unconditionally, you can be happy when a rich man gives to the poor (3:17). Even if the poor man doesn't receive Christ, the Kingdom nonetheless became more real through the rich man's actions. Is spiritual death still a tragedy? Yes. John writes so that they may have eternal life (5:13).

The question we naturally have, then, is “How do we then prioritize our actions? What is our game plan for living? What play shall we make in order to love properly?” To which, John doesn't give them the luxury of an instruction book. He says, quite simply, to have faith and be guided by the Spirit. Believe in Jesus, and have eternal life. Then, in its own mysterious ways, the Spirit moves you. You will feed others with both spiritual and physical food, and it will be out of love, not an ethical theory that constantly second-guesses itself.

Now look at this from another angle. This letter applies to more than just Platonism influenced theologians who reject the physical world. Even more fundamental to who we are, even more dangerous to our ability to accept Jesus at face value, is our lingering suspicion that His work wasn't enough. “Yes, he covered my sins in order to get me into the door, but if I'm not careful, I can lose that Grace!” Like an elephant in the room, we always stand in the shadow of a monolith of Law. The old legalist always tells us “You're not good enough. You ought to. You have to. Why don't you try harder? Do more? Love more? After everything He's done for you!”

We know instinctively that this is wrong, but sometimes we look at the Bible and have trouble seeing how it doesn't fit in. Letters like this, after all, implore love. Doing more. Walking the walk.

So legalism takes this and implies it, and in Jesus' name for good measure.   It will go out, and love people.  You know how this often turns into?  Spiritual policing.  Often times, a savior complex. We'll help other people out, and then give them spiritual instructions. Pretty soon, the height of our “loving” consists of doing nothing to help them physically because we're doing them a favor by focusing on their spiritual needs, which consists of, among other things, of prodding them to see to the worldly needs of others.

Or it may not lead to that at all.

Legalism might lead to the same fruits as Platonism, but sometimes it doesn't.  Sometimes it's smarter than that.  It looks at these verses, and figures out the wisdom behind them.   Therefore, there are legalists who never get any rest, because we always sacrifice we for others, outwardly content but unwilling to admit to ourselves that it will never be enough. If we're lucky, we will collapse and have to confront the reality, that our love isn't sufficient, and that we never loved in the first place.

Hence, the two main points of the letter.  When I looked at an introduction to 1 John in one of my Bibles, the commentators summed it up similarly:

“The First Letter of John has two main purposes: to encourage its readers to live in fellowship with God and with his Son, Jesus Christ, and to warn them against following false teaching that would destroy this fellowship. This teaching was based on the belief that evil results from contact with the physical world, and so Jesus, the Son of God, could not really have been a human being. Those teachers claimed that to be saved was to be set free from concern with life in this world; and they also taught that salvation had nothing to do with matters of morality or love for one's fellow-man.”

More or less, I would say that I agree with the commentary.  It explains why his direct references to Grace-centered theology are brief, why he illustrates a conflict between the clearly righteous and the clearly wicked instead of a conflict between the “righteous” and the outcast “sinners”, as Jesus often did.  And now, I find myself in a full understanding of this letter.

Or do I?

Because, you see, there are a few passages that brought up outlying questions not answered right away within the main narrative of the letter. I didn't have answers for these, and they present enough of a challenge for me that I decided to take an extra few days to digest them and mull it all over in my mind.

Outlier No 1:

1 John 5:3-4

3 In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, 4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.

What specific commandments is he referring to here? Whatever he's talking about, it isn't burdensome. It's easy. Except keeping ever last letter of the Law is impossible, therefore by definition not easy. And if you try to convince me with that cop-out that need to obey the spirit of the Law, “Love God and thy neighbor,” stop it. It says right here that if one truly kept the spirit of the Law, he would also keep the letter of the Law. Which we don't do.

So that are these “easy” commands? Could they be the sacraments? Is he referring to baptism, confession, and confirmation unto faith?

The commandments have to do with something worldly, because of v. 4. They overcome the world. It is easy – nay, inevitable. The fourth verse takes what the third verse said and escalates it. Could this escalation suggest that he's merely speaking with hyperbole?

Curious, I took my questions to Bible commentaries and looked online. I received several interpretations for these verses, but they weren't asking quite the same questions I was asking. Mostly, I just received Christian sabre-rattling. However, I did encounter Pulpit Commentary on Biblehub.com, which was the only comprehensible commentary it offered. While still not asking the same questions I was, it mentioned 

“These are the words, not merely of an inspired apostle, but of an aged man, with a wide experience of life and its difficulties. 'Difficult' is a relative term, depending upon the relation between the thing to be done and the powers of the doer of it.”

No, that still doesn't answer my questions. It actually gave me more, because I wonder how this affects how I read all of the other verses in this letter. How should I read this in light of John's age and experience? How is this letter different in tone than it might have been if he had written it on the day of Pentecost? What exactly were John's innermost attitudes? And really, is he being relative here? Is he merely saying that Christians generally sin less?

Shelby, you and I talked about this last night, and it helped to be able to personally go over this with one of you. If I remember correctly, you put it this way (and I paraphrase):

“Well, I can't follow the law, but because God has forgiven me, I'm freed.”

The emphasis (again, presuming I remember correctly), was on “being free.” Which again, is up to all sorts of interpretation. Still, I understand what you mean. We're saved by forgiveness – furthermore, forgiveness that has its roots in substitution. Because of substitution, any righteousness that God accredits to us becomes very real.

Furthermore, did John really just say that our faith needs overcoming? “Even our faith?” (I added the emphasis to the what I just read from the NIV, but as it turns out, the KJV emphasizes that word, too) So our faith is the hardest thing to overcome? I really assume that this means that our faith, in its most natural state, rejects Christ. So perhaps the revelation of the Person, presented to us as a physical historic reality, allows us to believe. It allows us to know (Take that, Gnostics!).

Is he saying that we don't need that much faith in order to be saved? That even a token of confession is enough to put us in right standing with God?

Maybe what he's saying is that it doesn't take much to get our foot in the door, after which point we're far more rooted than we realize. Pretty soon, we begin living with much more faith, although we don't feel it happening in us. Subjectively, we feel as doubtful as ever, but objectively, we'd be surprised at the people we've become.

Then there's the Good News translation, which I said that I've been reading in order to help make my way through, but I haven't been quoting it lately because it hasn't been my study version. In that translation, it says “And we win victory over the world by means of faith.” Several others say something to the extent of “And this is the victory that has overcome the world – our faith.”

At this point, I think it's essential to approach this verse by going all the way back to the original Greek, and that's beyond my scope.

Outlier No. 2:

1 John 5:6-8

6 This is the one who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ. He did not come by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. 7 For there are three that testify: 8 the Spirit, the water and the blood; and the three are in agreement.

What does it mean that he “came by” water and blood? That verb. That preposition. It makes no sense to me. It came completely out of nowhere, and there are so many ways I could take this, and each feels as if they would be as valid as the other. Whenever people say “The Bible clearly teaches this and is always clear,” I point out verses like this. No one can offer be an interpretation that I will accept as 100% doctrina infallibilis. If anyone looks down on someone else for having a different interpretation on that verse, then they are without humility.

Maybe I'm being too hopeless. Maybe the Christian community has a pretty solid consensus, coming from years of tradition, on what this means.

Except Pulpit Commentary says “Few passages of Scripture have produced such a mass of widely divergent interpretation.” Ergo, no consensus, and therefore any interpretation I gleam off it must be taken with utmost humility.

The Good News translation makes this less mystical and says: “Jesus Christ is the one who came by the water of his baptism and the blood of his death.” Except at this point, it isn't translating, but rather interpolating. This was, by design, meant to be an easy translation to read, and it tries to be user-friendly. That has helped me on numerous occasions, but it can be a fault. When a passage is genuinely challenging, it's better to admit that up front.

Just because the interpretations vary, though,, that does not mean I can't safely conclude certain truths from this passage. From everything John said thus far, we already know that what he's saying here is, if nothing else, a reminder that Jesus and Christ are one and the same. The eternal did not merely encounter the temporary, but became the temporary. This is his main treatise from beginning to end in the epistle.

Based on context, I can also further that point. In 5:7-8, he talks about testimony, and they all testify toward the same thing. That is: God has given us eternal life, and its source is through His Son (5:11). So I can safely say that these verses, in addition to giving us further reason to believe that Jesus is the Son of God, also reinforce the implications of His mission, i.e. the Gospel According to John 3:16.

Outside of that, the firmness of my interpretation isn't so firm as to call to mind Winston Churchill. In fact, I don't even have any specific interpretations, only speculation.

Questions like why John mentioned water and blood specifically. That refer to His baptism and His death. On the other hand, it could refer to the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist. It could also refer to the water and blood that poured out from His ribcage after one of the Romans stabbed Him. It could even refer to all of these things, and my experience shows me that poetry (and God) is most certainly capable of communicating multiple things with one statement.

It should be mentioned here that the Good News translation has the Imprimatur, which means that the Roman Catholic Church has officially authorized this translation. It does not have the nihil obstat, but nevertheless, the Church has endorsed it. So I would assume that this means that, according to Catholic tradition, “baptism and crucifixion” is the appropriate interpretation of this verse, or at least an acceptable one. As such, I give this interpretation heavy credence.

Still, wouldn't a better way of phrasing this be that “He came, was baptized, and crucified?” Instead, these translations and interpolations still say that He “came by water and blood.” I don't quite know that that means.

Whatever the case, 5:7-8 only makes this more confusing. The Spirit, water, and blood are in agreement. While the testimony of the Spirit inherently makes sense to us, how does the water and blood testify to Christ's identity and mission? If John were to point toward anything about the historic Jesus, the wouldn't the ultimate testimony be in His resurrection? The resurrection that he “saw and touched?” How exactly do these three testify, and why does he cite these testimonies specifically? After all, Jesus' baptism had given people such as the Gnostics to suspect that Jesus was a mere man with no divinity about Him, and that Christ descended upon Him in that incident. The baptism was an awkward and hard to explain incident that, in spite of the difficult questions it brought up, the disciples preserved through Gospel literature and tradition. That Jesus died was actually a reason why some would be inclined to not have faith in His identity, and that death really would have been pointless anyway if not for the resurrection. One of the false teachers that this epistle addressed was a man named Cerinthus, who taught that the divine entity and purpose of Christ came upon Jesus during His baptism, guided Him in His ministry, and left Him at the cross because Christ could not truly suffer death. So to the Gnostic, these historic events proved the opposite of what John is saying here.

While reading the paraphrasing Living Bible, I encountered a possibility. Though I again think it engages in just as much interpreting as translating, it says that three voices in each case testify: “The voice from the Holy Spirit in our hearts, the voice from heaven at Christ's baptism, and the voice before he died.” Holy Spirit – that one is self-explanatory. Voice from heaven: it's safe to assume that “This is my beloved Son” indicates that the voice in question comes from the Father. Jesus' last words on the cross were “Father, into Your hands I commit My s(S?)pirit,” hence, the final testimony.

In the Textus Receptus, which is the Greek print from which the Luther Bible, the King James Bible, and many other Bibles base their translations on, the text reads:

“ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, ὁ πατήρ, ὁ λόγος,καὶ τὸ ἅγιον πνεῦμα, καὶ οὗτοι οἱ τρεῖς ἕν εἰσι. καὶ τρεῖς εἰσιν οἱ μαρτυροῦντες ἐν τῇ γῇ,” or “in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit, and these three are one. And there are three that testify on earth.”

Thank you, Living Bible. I can see why Rebekah likes you so much. Thank you also, Textus Receptus. That was actually quite helpful, even if it rendered some interesting thoughts I had rather obsolete. As in, I had some interesting thoughts on what the testimony of the blood might have meant, but now that I look at it, I think it might be incoherent.

1 John 5:6-8 provides possible proof of the early doctrine of the Trinity. While I can't prove that this is what it meant (there is still room for interpretation), the case seems solid enough, and it is interesting.

Independently, I considered certain other interpretations. For example, in context, John writes this immediately after saying that a follow-up question to the previous outlier of mine: “Who is it that overcomes the world?” Then he says, “Only the one who believes that Jesus is the son of God.”

Then we come to the current verses being studied. “This is the one who came by water and blood – Jesus Christ.” He did not say “Jesus Christ is the one,” but rather he tacked on the name at the end. The name is being used to define something. Already, we know that Jesus Christ can be equated with “the one,” but John placed Jesus Christ's name immediately after mentioning the water and blood, as if that was what he is equating with Jesus Christ.

Suddenly, I can see a different interpretation, that John might not have been talking about the Trinity in this, but instead of the sacraments. That is to say, Jesus is in baptismal water and is in the wine of the Eucharist. This just might completely explain what he means when the Bible says that he “came by” water and blood. Also of important note, it would also explain why he lists water and blood in that specific order; when I previously thought I saw a potential correlation between this and the phrase and the blood and water coming from the wound that he mentioned in his account of the Passion, I neglected to note the order – blood/water vs. water/blood – carried any significance. Thus, the Catholic teaching on baptism and the Eucharist might completely true on account of this verse.

This carries even more weight, because I did some research. Dr. Daniel B.Wallace writes of a textual problem with 1 John 5:7-8. The problem, to be frank, is that these verses were never in the eariest Greek manuscripts. Neither were they in the next generation of manuscripts that might have filled in the blanks memories preserved by tradition. In fact, these two verses, with all their potential to prove the earliest Christian doctrines of the Trinity, only appeared in the sixteenth century.

The manuscript used for the Textus Receptus were compiled by the Dutch Catholic named Desiderius Erasmus. He published in in 1516, not so shortly before the Reformation, which inherently had less authenticity than the church in Rome on account of starting its traditions afresh and independently centuries after the apostles stated the church – in person, and using more than just letters. The reason I say this is that the Textus Receptus was the first widely used manuscript to use verses 7 and 8! The earliest manuscript to include this is the tenth century codex 221, which included this verse in a footnote – and that footnote was added some time after the codex was originally recorded.

You could say that God corrected course and divinely preserved His Word through Erasmus by inspiring him to pick out an obscure addition to the first epistle of John and bring it back to the mainstream, because the very earliest manuscript would have used it. If you're a Biblicist, that's fair game. Go ahead. It's a matter of faith, and nothing I say is going to stop you.

Or you could agree with Wallace:

“In reality, the issue is history, not heresy: How can one argue that the Comma Johanneum [1 John 5:7-8] must go back to the original text when it did not appear until the 16th century in any Greek manuscripts? Such a stance does not do justice to the gospel: faith must be rooted in history. To argue that the Comma must be authentic is Bultmannian in its method, for it ignores history at every level. As such, it has very little to do with biblical Christianity, for a biblical faith is one that is rooted in history.”

I believe this to be true. It still raises questions, though. England became a superpower, and then America, and there's a wealth of English-speaking talent around the world. That's not including the other languages into which the Textus Receptus has been translated, but it provides a particular problem for the English-speaking world. What are the implications on our view of the Bible that something like this could happen, and that we still accept it? Does it imply that the Bible is fallible, or does it prove that it is living? Whatever the case, I think that it destroys some extremist views on the Bible, particularly among those who worship it in a similar manner that a Muslim worships the Quran.

“The irony is that their very clinging to tradition at all costs (namely, of an outmoded translation which, though a literary monument in its day, is now like a Model T on the Autobahn) emulates Roman Catholicism in its regard for tradition.”

When I read Chapter 5 without verses 7-8, it still makes sense. The flow is just as good, just as poignant, possibly even better, but I'm not going to make any final judgment on that. What I do know is that in this context (or lack thereof), 1 John 5:6 seems to err toward a sacramental affirmation rather than a trinitarian formula.

So perhaps one shouldn't interpret what John meant when this got written down. We should instead ask what the scribe who wrote that note in the margin meant. In which case, I think that the only way this detracts from the passage is that we have slightly less proof that doctrine of the Trinity dates back all the way to the original disciples.

Outlier No. 3:

1 John 5:16-17 

16 If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death.

Blips on my radar like this one occur because they tie directly into my curiosity with my background as a Catholic.  Its interesting that the main focus here is to ensure new believers, people who are weak in faith, that they may be relieved to know that not all sin will sever their relations.  But then, it could also be used as a basis for the doctrine of purgatory.  I could go into that subject, but instead I plan on taking this a different direction.

Last Sunday, I went to Immaculate Conception Church in Sioux City and spoke with a deacon there. He said “If this last week I had nothing but trouble and I said 'I renounce You, God!' which is a mortal sin, I would go to Hell. Except if the next day I said 'I'm sorry, please forgive me,' did I ever truly renounce Him?”

The Catholic Church teaches that there are two types of sin with regards to your salvation: venial and mortal. This more or less works as you would suspect it to work. That is to say, certain sins lead to death, and certain sins don't.

Of course, all sin leads to death. All sin is death. But to the follower of Christ, who is baptized in Him and communes in Him (whether we're talking about the physical sacraments or the spiritual act inherent in salvation itself), the situation gets somewhat reversed. Now, instead of leading to death, sin leads nowhere. Surely, it doesn't benefit us, and it is always harmful, but as a general rule, sin simply doesn't kill us anymore.

What, then, are these mortal sins? John doesn't elaborate. I checked out the Pulpit Commentary on this, and the opinion expressed there is that through his silence, John is discouraging people from coming up with any iron rules on what constitutes for one. What matters is the attitude the person has when sinning, and this can rarely be discerened by our fellow-man. Except a) it often can be for those who see clearly the works of the Holy Spirit, and b) what exactly are the underlying attitudes that lead us to Hell?

People often point to several different passages to suggest that certain sins are worse than others. They usually involve escalation and hyperbole (“It is better to do this than that”/“You think this is bad when that is actually worse”). These, though, usually only serve to point toward hypocrisy in the reasoning of people who judged themselves according to the Law. Escalation doesn't show us what the worst sins are, but rather asks the audience to ask questions about the big picture and what spirit we are guilty of. Simply searching for verses where Jesus mentions a specific sin and Hell in conjunction with each other doesn't work, either – all sin merits Hell.

This leads me back to my conversation with the deacon. According to him, Hell is a sign of God's mercy because, if he had renounced God and remained that way, he would have found that Heaven to really be Hell. Thus, God spares those who in their heart-of-hearts reject an eternal relationship with him by allowing them to simply die in their sins, the only real alternative. It's terrible, but it's necessary in order to keep free will.

Mortal sin is truly perverse, and it doesn't often feel that way. People often point to certain verses where there's an escalation of sin My belief on what constitutes as mortal sin comes from Mark 3:28-29, which came to my attention because my father would reference it often:

28 Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, 29 but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.”

The formula there is the same as used in 1 John: All sins are forgiven, except for mortal sin. Except Jesus gets specific. He says that there is truly on great condition, the Mother of all Sins. This is the sin that will ensure that you die in your sins if you commit it. The reason is simple, because he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit rejects His testimony, and whoever rejects the testimony will never have a heart fertile for accepting Christ's atonement. The Holy Spirit testifies so that you can come to forgiveness in the first place – so refusing to accept forgiveness for your sins is the unforgivable sin.

Grace.

It all comes back to Grace.

Because in spite of all the imperatives, all the implications of what a believer should be, all the statements that real believers get it right, John can't begin or end on those notes. When speaking solely of salvation, he simply must stay true the beautiful simplicity of it all: Jesus Christ pleads on the behalf of sinners, and the only way to not receive this forgiveness is to die rejecting it.

Remember, Jesus died for you. More importantly, He lived for you. Live, now, as someone who walks with a living God.

Pax vobis,

John Hooyer