Day #360

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1 John - Reading
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Daily Reading: book of 1 John

1:1–4 Prologue

These verses, one highly compressed and complicated sentence in the Greek, form a prologue to the whole. John outlines some of the ideas he will develop as the letter unfolds.

1.1 From the beginning shows that the gospel is no afterthought. It was always in God’s plan.

1.2 John has the habit of emphasizing an idea by the simplest of devices, repetition. Here he begins a little aside by taking up life, the last word of v 1, and repeating it three times in three lines. He is clearly referring to the coming of Jesus who could describe himself as ‘the life’ (Jn. 14:6).

1.3The basic idea in fellowship (Gk. koinōnia) is that of possessing something in common. Christian fellowship means sharing the common life in Christ through the Holy Spirit. It binds believers to one another, but the important thing is that it binds them also to God.

1:5–2:6 Fellowship with God

John has made it clear that his purpose is to bring his readers into fellowship with God and with other believers. He proceeds to deduce from the nature of God the conditions of fellowship.

1:5 God is light. To say that God is light is to draw attention to his uprightness, his righteousness.

1:6–7 The first error. He deals with three obstacles to fellowship, the first of which centres on the claim that we have fellowship with God. Words alone do not bring fellowship with God. More than a comfortable religious feeling is needed. We must test our feelings by the revelation God has given. T

1:8–9 The second error. 8 John puts the second error simply: if we claim to be without sin. This speaks to our sinful nature.

1:10 The third error. The next supposition is that we have not sinned. This speaks to the specific sins we commit in our daily lives

2:1–2 The propitiation for sins. When we sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense. The term propitiation means the removal of wrath There is a divine wrath against all sinand forgiveness does not mean ignoring this. Propitiation, the turning away of anger, is not the whole story of Christ’s saving work, but it is a genuine and important part of it

2:3–6 Obedience. 3 Now comes a test by which we can know whether, in spite of our failures, we are in right relationship with God, and this test is whether we obey his commands

2:7–17 The new commandment

2:7–11 Loving and hating. The command to love was first fulfilled by Christ. Our attitude to other people shows whether we are in the darkness that is passing away or in the true light that is already shining. To live in love is to walk in the light.

2:15–17 Love for the world. 15 Do not love the world, he says, and some see a contradiction here with ‘God so loved the world’ (Jn. 3:16). But that passage speaks of God’s love for all people, whereas this one is concerned with setting one’s heart on worldliness.

2:18–19 Many antichrists. 18 John sees evidence in the appearance not simply of the antichrist, but of many antichrists. The early church clearly expected that a mighty figure of evil, the antichrist, would appear at the end of time. His concern is for his readers, and he stresses for them the fact that the spirit of antichrist is already abroad. The situation is the same today. These many antichrists had been members of the church. They had belonged to the visible organization, but John is quick to say they did not really belong to us.

2:20–21 Knowledge of the truth. 20 You have an anointing from the Holy One is another way of saying that all have received the gift of the Holy Spirit.

3:11–18 Love one another

3:11–15 The opposite of love. 11 Again John insists that love is the first command, and is at the very heart of the Christian message. The love—hate contrast continues; life and love go together.

3:16–18 Love is practical. 16 We can know what love (in the specifically Christian sense) is only because of what we see on Calvary, where Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.

3:19–24 Confidence

John reassures sensitive consciences. Believers should live before God not in trembling anxiety, but in calm confidence for all who keep his commands, live in him, and he in them. This mutual indwelling is another characteristic theme of this letter. How do we know that it has taken place? By the Spirit he gave us. The Spirit is given (not earned), and the Spirit gives assurance.

4:1–6 The spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood

How can believers tell those who are truly inspired from those who falsely claim that the Spirit is in them? The problem was not new, for there were false prophets in OT times, and again, Paul had had to give a ruling on when a person was speaking ‘by the Spirit of God’ (1 Cor. 12:3).

If the Spirit of God is in the person to inspiration he will affirm that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. It is not simply that Jesus took human nature, but flesh (cf. Jn. 1:14; 2 Jn. 7).

4:7–21 God is love

Love is very important for John and he puts emphasis on it throughout this letter. Here he does this by drawing attention to the fact that love is rooted in God, who is, in fact, love.

4:7–12 Love one another. 7 John reinforces let us love one another with the reminder that love comes from God. Love, as Christians understand it, is not a human achievement; it is divine in origin, a gift from God. If anyone loves in this sense it shows that that person has been born of God and knows God. 8 The negative underlines the point: Whoever does not love does not know God. The reason for this is one of the greatest statements in the whole Bible: God is love. This means more than ‘God is loving’ or that God sometimes loves. It means that he loves, not because he finds objects worthy of his love, but because it is his nature to love. His love for us depends not on what we are, but on what he is. He loves us because he is that kind of God, because he is love.

10 The real meaning of love and the real source of life are discerned only in the cross. It is not that we loved God.We find it in that God loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice The mainspring of our love for other people is the divine love shown to us in Christ’s atoning work. Christians should love, not because all those they meet are attractive people, but because the love of God has transformed them and made them loving people. They should love now not because attractiveness in other people compels their love, but because, as Christians, it is their nature to lov

4:13–16 Living in love. 13 John has already told us that it is ‘by the Spirit’ that we know that ‘he lives in us’ (3:24). He now adds the thought that we live in him. Both are important and both are emphasized in this letter. The love of God is never demonstrated in such a way that the worldly-minded have to see it. It is the people of faith and the people of faith only who see it. John repeats the great thought of v 8, God is love, and he draws the conclusion that to live in love is to live in God. To love sinners is never a human achievement and where this is found it shows that God is present.

4:17–21 The perfecting of love. 17 The presence of God in us is the way love is ‘perfected among us’ (nrsv). This is with a view to confidence on the day of judgment, and confidence on that day is the ultimate in confidence. In this world we are like him: we are children of the Father and Jesus is our model. The world did not welcome Christ and it does not welcome Christ’s people. But on the day of judgment the Judge will understand all.

5:1–5 Faith’s victory

The thought of love leads to that of relationship to God, and that in turn to victory. Love and faith are closely connected (cf. 4:16), and the believer overcomes the world. Faith trusts Jesus as the Christ, a truth insisted upon throughout this letter, and the believer who so trusts is born of God. The confession that Jesus is the Christ is not the result of human insight, but of a divine work in the one who makes it (cf. 1 Cor. 12:3).

5:6–12 The witness to the Son

Since a right view of Jesus matters so much it is important that it be attested. John cites some of the testimony that establishes who Jesus is.

6 That Jesus came by water surely refers to his baptism, and likewise blood to his death. At his baptism he heard the heavenly voice and he solemnly entered his life’s work. Some heretics apparently held that the divine Christ came on Jesus when he was baptized, but left him before his death. John contests this with his emphasis on blood: not by water only, but by water and blood. It was (and is) this that is the heart of the gospel. There are in fact three that testify. The Spirit is listed first, perhaps because he has just been mentioned, perhaps because he is a person and thus a more explicit witness than water or blood. The inner witness of the Spirit, and all that is involved in Christ’s baptism and his death are not three unrelated items. Together they point to one great act of God in Christ for our salvation.

5:13–21 The knowledge of eternal life

John’s gospel was written so that its readers might believe and so have life (Jn. 20:31). By contrast this letter was written to readers who already believe in order to give them assurance, the certainty that they have eternal life. John brings this out as his letter draws to a close.

5:13–15 Confidence. 13 This letter is written to you who believe; it is not an evangelistic tract, but a letter to Christians. There has been a good deal about knowledge and now we find that the whole is written so that you may know that you have eternal life. Assurance of salvation is important, important enough to have caused this whole letter. This is the only place in the letter where the writer speaks of believing in the name of Jesus, i.e. in his full person, all that the name stands for.

14 John moves to confidence in prayer. He sees prayer as having a wide scope for he speaks of asking anything, but he immediately qualifies this with according to his will. Prayer is not a device for inducing God to change his mind and do what we want. It must be offered in accordance with his will if it is to be effective.

5:16–17 Prayer for wrongdoers. 16 An abrupt change leads to the forgiveness of sin that can be brought about by intercessory prayer. John distinguishes between sin that leads to death and sin that does not (though he does not say what the difference is). He begins with the direction that when we see a brother sin a sin that does not lead to death we should pray for him.

Edited from D. A. Carson, New Bible Commentary : 21st Century Edition