Jesus’ counterterrorism agents

2 John 7 For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist. If Jesus Christ wasn’t God in the flesh, then His commandment to love as He loved wasn’t authoritative. In the community to whom John wrote, there were deceivers. These were perhaps itinerant false teachers. Perhaps John was alluding to a contrast between he and the apostles, who had been sent out by Jesus into the world and these deceivers who had been commissioned by the devil, the great deceiver. They simply would not acknowledge the virgin birth, the deity of Jesus as God’s Son, His atonement for sin, and the resurrection, all of which are essential doctrines of the Christian faith. There are those today who call themselves Christians yet who do not acknowledge that Jesus Christ was God in flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist. Certainly John’s readers believed what the apostle Paul wrote to the Philippians about Jesus. “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Phil 2:6-8). This is the truth, and anyone who denies it is trying to deceive you or lead you astray. If Jesus Christ isn’t God, then there’s no need to heed Jesus’ commandments. However, if He is God, then His commandments are life-changing. They are life-changing because those who receive His commandments also receive His life for the enabling power to love as He commanded. Love characterizes their lives and thus their communities. As John wrote earlier, they love for the sake of the truth that Jesus Christ is God, coming in flesh. Their loves doesn’t only declare that He is God, but that He has risen and dwells within the body of Christ, the true church. That’s why all believers in Christ should live to love with Him. We are Jesus’ counterterrorism agents in this world. Exposing and casting down the lies of the deceiver, the antichrist.