Love Me True

A Reflection on the Second Reading for Sunday, April 14th, 2024:
Third Sunday of Easter

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1 John
​2.1-5

​My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.

Now by this we may be sure that we know him, if we obey his commandments. Whoever says, “I have come to know him,” but does not obey his commandments, is a liar, and in such a person the truth does not exist; but whoever obeys his word, truly in this person the love of God has reached perfection. By this we may be sure that we are in him.

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

In the Second Reading for this Sunday, Saint John seems to identify two kinds of liar: someone who says they don’t know God when they do, or someone who says they do know God when they don’t.

Jesus Himself tells us the first way when He says, “You do not know Him [God], but I know Him. And if I should say that I do not know Him I would be like you, a liar.” (John 8:55) And on the flipside, St. John says today in his First Letter, “Whoever says, ‘I have come to know him,’ but does not obey his commandments, is a liar.” (1 John 2:4)

It is very important for us, Saint John seems to be saying, to know the hallmark signs of a liar, because the liars wield power over one of the most influential aspects of us poor sinners’ lives: happiness. Since the serpent first suggested Eden’s tasting menu of figs, the greatest lie we all fall for is “I know the secret to happiness” (that is, if those words are coming from anyone but Jesus).

Nobody *thinks* they want to be lied to. But again and again, lies seem so much happier than the truth. If I ask you if you liked my last Ora blog, I want you to tell me you loved it and I’m your favourite. Also I am witty, cool, and have great fashion sense.

While saying this would make me briefly happy, it also of course would mean I was believing a lie. Saint Augustine, musing on whether anyone would prefer to have their joy based in falsehood rather than truth, says, “They no more hesitate to say they prefer to have joy in truth than they hesitate to say they desire to be happy.” As we all learned from The Truman Show, living a lie is actually Hell. If nothing is true, nothing has meaning. If nothing has meaning, then we spiral into nihilistic despair.

But Christians know that the way to happiness is a truth-illumined life. (See what I did there?)

Saint Augustine in his Confessions said, “Wheresoever I found truth, there I found my God, truth itself, and since I first learned the truth I have not forgotten it.” When you’ve found God’s commandments written on your heart, it’s like finding a pearl when shucking oysters: you never forget that you found it. It becomes your most prized possession. No other oyster will ever be as good again. 

“Joy in the truth is the happy life,” says Saint Augustine. When God’s love-filled commandments are your pearl, your happiness can never be taken from you. “When they love the happy life, which is no different from joy in the truth, then indeed they love the truth as well.”

Truly happy people love truly. Truthfully happy people love truth. Truth makes loving people happy.

True.


Kate Mosher

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