This phrase from the first letter of St. John, which speaks of "knowing" and "putting our faith W' the love of God, expresses in short not only the fundamental experience of Jesus' first disciples, but also what can be the most important experience in everyone's life.
In St. John's writing the verb "to know" is not so much meant in the intellectual and theoretical sense, but rather means "entering into a living, personal, relationship," of which we become conscious and aware. This quite original kind of "knowing" contrasts with "believing," which is our response to God who shows himself. In this phrase it means in particular the grateful acceptance of God's love.
The experience of the first disciples, described here was first and foremost a real relationship with Jesus. St. John says: "God's love for us was shown by this-that God sent his only begotten son into the world, and that he gave his life for us." They had seen him and touched him, and believed in him, and he had formed a very deep relationship with them, which went even beyond death, after his resurrection and ascension.
Likewise the love of God is shown to us chiefly in Jesus. His coming, his death, and resurrection were passed on to us by those who knew him, but in addition he himself is still alive and present among us. The spirit he gave us also bears witness to this. If we know the love of God in and through Jesus, one result is the disappearance from our minds of that fairytale image of God, dressed up in one way or another with philosophical terms, which often blocks us. This is the image of the good and omnipotent guardian, an infinite and faraway being, an uncompromising judge, and so on. God who loves us is in fact so unreachable that he continually challenges our imagination, and yet is at the same time so close that each person can say he knows him. His love is infinite but has all the shades of tenderness of the human heart.
When you "know" and "believe" in this love, that is when you accept it and form a relationship with him, you can experience what is above all a discovery. You discover something which you already knew, but with quite a different awareness. This is a new, conscious, adult meeting with God. This meeting can happen at a different time for each person, in youth or later in life, or even at the end of your life, in widely varying circumstances, and in a particular way for each person.
At times it can mean holding on and believing in the dark. Very often, however, this discovery goes side by side with an interior experience of a relationship with God, which is strong enough to make all previous experiences in your life seem nothing. Believing in God's love means letting his love penetrate you, responding to it with your whole being, and opening yourself to the infinity of God and the particular of each man.
If people say that a relationship with God "alienates," it could be because they have never known, even indirectly, the authenticity of such an experience. This experience brings man the realization that the "armour" which hampered him is thrown off, and the "trap" he was caught in is sprung.
This discovery will grow, and be renewed, but it depends on us. In fact it goes alongside our discovery of the numerous ways in which God communicates with us, and grows as our faith becomes more robust, and as our hope and love are increased.
And in due course it is an experience which will undergo a severe test. We may for instance become convinced by the surrounding tumult that it is all an illusion. The growth of love never comes without moments of darkness, difficulty and weakness. But more often, it is when out of the blue we are struck by suffering, when the person closest to us dies or when we find ourselves faced by terrible injustice, catastrophes, or inhuman cruelty, and we ask ourselves in anguish, "How is this possible, if God loves us?"
Modern humanity has cruelly experienced this trial, being witness to the atrocities of war and concentration camps. And it is very difficult to find an answer for someone who does not know Jesus Crucified, who cries out with us his "Why?" to the abandonment by God. But if you know him, you know that God did not stand by and watch, he became man, and became involved.
And you know that Jesus was there beside every suffering man, in the cries of the wounded and in the concentration camps. There are men who found their faith in those places, and men like Kolbe, Bonhoeffer and many others, who witnessed in those places in an outstanding way that Love is stronger than death.
For each of us the moment comes when our "belief in the love of God" is put to the test. At that moment your reason will be of no use, for only the thought of Jesus Forsaken or of Mary standing at the foot of her son's cross, can give you the certainty that God loves you just the same. And though you do not understand, one day when the suffering has stopped, you will understand God's plan.
It is often only afterwards that you realize how then, during that test, like at no other time, something solid and eternal was being built inside you: a faith as immovable as a rock, and a strong love truly like the love of God.
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