The First Epistle General of John

⭑ Unlocked Dynamic Bible :: World English Bible Catholic ⭑

- Chapter 4 -

Dear friends, many people who have a false message are teaching it to people. But you must think carefully about what you hear them teach, so that you may know whether they are teaching the truth that comes from God or not.

I will tell you how to know whether someone is teaching truth that comes from the Spirit of God. Those who affirm that Jesus Christ came from God to become a human like us are teaching a message that is from God.

But those who do not affirm that truth about Jesus are not teaching a message from God. They are teachers who oppose Messiah. You have heard that people like that are coming among us. Even now they are already here.

As for you who are very dear to me, you belong to God, and you have refused to believe what those people teach, because God, who enables you to do what he wants, is greater.

As for those who are teaching what is false, they belong with all the people in the world who refuse to honor God. That is why what they say comes from those same people, and those same people listen to them.

As for us, we belong to God. Whoever knows God listens to what we teach, but whoever does not belong to God does not listen to what we teach. This is how we can distinguish between people who teach truth about God, and those who deceive others.

Love Comes from God

Dear friends, we must love each other, because God enables us to love each other, and because those who love their fellow believers have become God’s children and know him.

God shows his love to people. So those who do not love their fellow believers do not know God.

I will tell you how God has shown us that he loves us: He sent his only Son to live on the earth to enable us to live eternally because of him.

And God has shown us what it means to truly love another person: It does not mean that we loved God, but that God loved us. So he sent his Son to sacrifice himself, in order that he, God, may forgive us when we sin.

Dear friends, since God loves us like that, we certainly ought to love each other!

No one has ever seen God. Nevertheless, if we love each other, it is clear that God lives within us and that we love others just like he intends us to do.

I will tell you how we can be sure that we are joined with God and that God is joined with us: He has put his Spirit within us.

We apostles have seen God’s Son, and we solemnly tell others that the Father sent him to save the people in the world from suffering eternally for their sins.

So God remains joined with those who say the truth about Jesus. They say, “He is the Son of God.” And so they remain joined with God.

We have experienced how God loves us and we believe that he loves us. As a result, we love others. Because God’s nature is to love people, those who continue to love others are joined with God, and God is joined with them.

We should love others completely. And if we do that, when the time comes for God to judge us, we will be confident that he will not condemn us. We will be confident of that because we are living in this world joined to God, as Messiah himself is joined to God.

We will not be afraid of God if we truly love him, because those who love God completely cannot possibly be afraid of him. We would be afraid only if we thought that he would punish us. So those who are afraid of God certainly are not loving God completely.

We love God and our fellow believers because God loved us first.

So those who say “I love God” but hate a fellow believer are lying. Those who do not love one of their fellow believers, whom they have seen, certainly cannot be loving God, whom they have not seen.

Keep in mind that this is what God has commanded us: If we love him, we must also love our fellow believers.

Beloved, don’t believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit who confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God,

and every spirit who doesn’t confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God; and this is the spirit of the Antichrist, of whom you have heard that it comes. Now it is in the world already.

You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world.

They are of the world. Therefore they speak of the world, and the world hears them.

We are of God. He who knows God listens to us. He who is not of God doesn’t listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.

Love Comes from God

Beloved, let’s love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

He who doesn’t love doesn’t know God, for God is love.

By this God’s love was revealed in us, that God has sent his only born(a) Son into the world that we might live through him.

In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice(b) for our sins.

Beloved, if God loved us in this way, we also ought to love one another.

No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God remains in us, and his love has been perfected in us.

By this we know that we remain in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.

We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as the Savior of the world.

Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God.

We know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and he who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.

In this, love has been made perfect among us, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment, because as he is, even so we are in this world.

There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has punishment. He who fears is not made perfect in love.

We love him,(c) because he first loved us.

If a man says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who doesn’t love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?

This commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should also love his brother.

Footnotes

(a)4:9 The phrase “only born” is from the Greek word “μονογενη”, which is sometimes translated “only begotten” or “one and only”.

(b)4:10 “atoning sacrifice” is from the Greek “ιλασμος”, an appeasing, propitiating, or the means of appeasement or propitiation—the sacrifice that turns away God’s wrath because of our sin.