John states, "We write this to make our joy complete" (NIV). We examine the difference between happiness and joy and see that this complete joy is God's desire for us. How do we experience this joy? John gives us a key word in his letter which we will see many times in this series. That key word is "know". We will begin to see how joy comes in knowing and we will build on this theme of "knowing" all through 1 John
