The Firewall

2 John 1

2 John 1

In this letter, John is continuing one of his main themes from 1 John, that of Christians loving each other.  He also reiterates the definition of love from 1 John 5:3, that love is obeying God's commands.  The second part of this letter is devoted to warning the reader that any teacher that teaches that Jesus did not come "in the flesh" to earth is "the deceiver and the antichrist" (v 7).  Hospitality is not to be offered to these teachers, as this would make the host party to the teacher's sin.

Tomorrow we'll tackle the last letter in this series, 3 John.  Thanks for reading today!

God Bless,
Jason Chaillou
thefirewall@comcast.net

An Introduction to 2 John

An Introduction to the Book of 2 John

The book of 2 John is the second in a series of three letters written by the Apostle John.  At thirteen verses it is the shortest of the three, and in fact, is the shortest book in the entire Bible.  2 John only contains the introduction: "The elder", leaving some doubt as to the authorship of the letter.  However, the similarities between this letter and John's other writings are too great to assign the authorship to anyone else.  The letter is addressed to "the chosen lady and her children", which more than likely, was a reference to a sister church to the church at Ephesians where John was possibly serving as an elder.  As with 1 John, this letter is dated between 85 and 95 AD.

Much like 1 John, the theme of 2 John is love; specifically loving each other.  John also takes time to warn his readers about false teachers, and instructs the readers not to help such teachers.

Read this book as the short letter that it was written as; try and see it as a whole work, and not a collection of individual verses.  And remember John as a wise elder, passing on his wisdom towards the end of his life.

God Bless,
Jason Chaillou
thefirewall@comcast.net