A Perfect Description of Assurance

By this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.

1 John 2:3

To know God is the reason and purpose for which we were made. Jesus said, “This is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (Jn. 17:3).

But John goes even further. It’s not only that we should know God, but that we should know that we know Him. “By this we know that we have come to know him” (1 Jn. 2:3).

That’s assurance: To know that you know God. To know that you are not self-deceived. To know that your faith is genuine. To know that God is yours and that you are His forever.

If God has used another person to show you the way, you may wonder, Do I really know God for myself? Or am I just living off someone else’s experience? God has promised that each of His people will know Him directly. “No longer shall each one teach... saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me” (Jer. 31:34). Your knowledge of God will not be secondhand. Take in the joy and blessing of this promise.

Then John states this glorious promise in another way. “By this we may know that we are in him” (1 Jn. 2:5). The gift of assurance is not only to know that you know God but to know that you are in Christ. But how can we know that we are in Christ?

John is not telling us how a person becomes a Christian. He is writing to Christian believers, and he is telling us how we can know that we truly are in Christ. What we have here is a perfect description of assurance: to know that you know God and to know that you are in Christ.

Reflect on the glorious promise that you are His and He is yours forever.