Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

John 20:31b

To believe that Jesus, God’s Messiah, God’s Son is here in me this morning as I write these words is truly amazing!  But true!  The key is to believe.  That is not simply some nod of the head and then getting on with life as it is, belief implies much, much more than that, it is life itself!

This is the final message of the Gospel of John.  But it is not the last we hear from this dear brother in Christ.  No.  We see him as a prisoner of Rome on an island of the Mediterranean Sea.  He is an old man. I suppose I could have expected John to throw up his hands in despair thinking, is this what believing is all about?  At the end of John’s Gospel the offer to believe is as clear as one can make it.  Fine.  Then, what happens when we truly believe?  All sorts of things, some magnificent, some very disturbing like seeing John, now an old man, as a prisoner of the Roman Empire on the small island of Patmos in the Mediterranean.

It is coming clear to me that belief in Jesus and who he is becomes the one unalterable fact in my life.  That does not mean that my belief is not tested – sometimes hugely. What It means is that I believe one thing, Jesus is mine and I am his!  Whether that belief brings joy or sorrow is not the point.  The point is, Jesus is exactly who he said he is no matter what.  I know no other way.

In this regard, nothing has changed. As it was for John it is for me.  As it is for Peter, it is for me.  May I never waver.  Jesus is in me to make sure of that!