Prayer Restores Fellowship with God

Reading: 1 John 1v1-2v2

In John’s first epistle, he shows us how to walk in fellowship with God the Father. When the Lord Jesus came into the world, his perfect life was witnessed by John and his fellow disciples ^[1]. Jesus showed them that God’s true nature is light, pure and clean, but sin is darkness. When we are saved, that same light enters our hearts exposing our sinful nature and making us sensitive to sin. By faith, that light produces the life of God within us ^[2]. John challenges those who claim to be in fellowship with God and, at the same time, they are walking in darkness. Walking is an activity we do in a regular way; it takes us in a particular direction. Walking speaks of the habits of our life, what we do every day. As light and darkness cannot exist in the same place, so those who have that light within them should not be habitually sinning. We should, instead, be walking in the light by living holy lives. This is only possible because of the purifying effect of the blood of Christ through His sacrifice at Calvary. However, perfection is not possible while we live in these bodies. If we deny that we have a sinful nature, we are just deceiving ourselves. The secret of fellowship with God the Father is regular confession of sin. John’s epistle makes a big difference between the occasional sins of God’s children, and the habitual sins of an unconverted person. John opens the second chapter of his letter showing that Jesus is our advocate. He is constantly working to bring us back into fellowship with God and will do this until the day when he returns and makes us just like Himself – perfect. He also tells us that Jesus is the propitiation (mercy-seat) for our sins and this allows God to forgive His children if they sin. Confession is therefore an essential part of a Christian’s daily prayer life.