Effective Prayer

John finally states the pastoral goal of the entire letter: believers in the Son are meant to know they have eternal life. That knowledge does not produce passivity but confidence before God in prayer. Asking according to God's will rests on the assurance that He hears, and hearing implies that believers already possess what they have asked of Him. The paragraph shows that eternal-life assurance and dependent prayer belong together.

I¹³ have written these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life. ¹⁴And this is the confidence that we have before Him: If we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we already possess what we have asked of Him.

John then applies prayer to the difficult reality of a brother seen in sin. He encourages intercession for sin not leading to death and says that God will give life in such cases, while declining to urge prayer in the same way concerning sin that leads to death. He immediately clarifies that all unrighteousness is sin, even though there remains a distinction within his warning. The paragraph calls believers to serious, discerning intercession rather than careless simplicity about sin.

¹⁶If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he should ask God, who will give life to those who commit this kind of sin. There is a sin that leads to death; I am not saying he should ask regarding that sin. ¹⁷All unrighteousness is sin, yet there is sin that does not lead to death.