Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. (2) Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. (3) And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.

The first letter of John, disciple and intimate eyewitness to the earthly ministry of Christ Jesus was most likely written in the latter part of the first century when John was the sole remaining apostolic survivor. False teachers had begun perverting fundamental apostolic teaching threatening to destroy the gospel; instead of divine revelation standing over man’s ideas, man’s ideas judged (interpreted) Gods revelation and in particular the doctrine of true humanity of Christ. Such views destroy not only the humanity of Christ but by extension, the doctrine of acceptable atonement for our sins by the Christ, true God and true man. So John, at the end of his life, addresses the fundamentals of Christianity – he is returning to the basics of the gospel.
In our verses today, the apostle John points out that we are not merely called children of God but in faith in Christ we ARE children of God. By nature man is a CREATURE of God. It by unearned grace faithful man be ones a CHILD of God. This privileged Christian life is only a beginning – when Christ appears in the promised second coming in all His glory the faithful will be like Him. This passage is directed against the Gnostic false teachers who thought the body was evil and only the Spirit was pure – that the body was of no eternal importance. John insists that the Christian is on the way to seeing God and will be like Him; that God lavished His unimaginable love on man by sending Jesus – His only son – to save us from our sins while we were still hostile and by nature enemies of God. We are reminded that there is nothing man can do to earn this great gift because becoming a Christian is not a matter of our willpower but of God’s power

The tragedy in this world is those who knew Him not. Jesus came to His own and they did not know Him. For this reason, the world will not know the faithful also – but God will. I’m quoting from Paul’s letter to the Romans today, chapter 8: 31, What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? and Romans 8: 38,39. (38). For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, (39) nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen