1 John 4:15
Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
In the early Church, a “confessor” was someone who had gone on declaring their faith in Christ even under torture. Confessors were, so to speak, living martyrs. They had not been killed by their persecutors, only maimed, scarred or crippled. But the central thing about them was that they had shown by their confession that they meant business when they said they believed in Jesus. It is this sort of commitment that today’s verse alludes to when it speaks of “confessing” Christ. John knew whereof he spoke. His own brother James had been in his grave (thanks to the murdering sword of Herod Antipas) for many decades by the time John wrote. And he had seen many of his fellow Christians made into human torches by Nero, or beheaded, crucified, beaten and rejected—a fate he stood in continual danger of himself. But he gladly chose it because he knew his Lord Jesus had confessed his love for all of us on the cross, not only in words, but in blood. Today, confess your faith in Jesus and make it count.
