1 John 4:7-21: God is Love

Beloved, let us love [1Pl Pres Act Subj] one another, for love from God is [3S Pres Act Indic], and every loving-one [Nom MS Pres Act Part] from God has been born [3S Perf Pass Indic] and knows [3S Pres Act Indic] God. 8The not-loving-one [Nom MS Pres Act Part with me] does not know [3S 2 Aor Act Indic] God, for God love is [3S Pres Act Indic]. 9In this is revealed [3S 1 Aor Pass Indic] the love of God in us, for his only begotten [3S 1 Aor Pass Part] God has sent [3S Perf Act Indic] into the world in order that we might live [1Pl 1 Aor Act Subj] through him. 10In this is [3S Pres Act Indic] love, not that we have loved [1Pl Perf Act Indic] God but that he has loved [3S Perf Act Indic] us and sent [3S 1 Aor Act Indic] his son to be the propitiation concerning our sins. 11Beloved, if in this way God loved [3S 1 Aor Act Indic] us, also we ought [1Pl Pres Act Indic] one another to love [Pres Act Inf]. 12God [Acc] no one [Nom] at any time has beheld [3S Perf Mid Indic]. If we love [3S Pres Act Subj] one another, God in us abides [3S Pres Act Indic] and his love in us perfected [Nom FS Perf Pass Part] is [3S Pres Act Indic]. In this we know [1Pl Pres Act Indic] that in him we abide [1Pl Pres Act Indic] and he in us, that from his Spirit he has given [3S Perf Act Part] unto us [Dat]. 14And we have seen [1Pl Perf Act Indic] and bear witness [1Pl Pres Act Indic] that the Father has sent [3S Perf Act Indic] the Son to be Savior of the world. 15 Whoever confesses [3S 1 Aor Act Subj] that Jesus is [3S Pres Act Indic] the Son of God, God in him abides [3S Pres Act Indic], and he in God. 16And we have known [1Pl Perf Act Indic] and we have believed [1Pl Perf Act Indic] the love which God has [3S Pres Act Indic] in us [en hemin]. God love is [3S Pres Act Indic], and the abiding-one [Nom MS Pres Act Part] in the love in God abides [3S Pres Act Indic] and God in him abides [3S Pres Act Indic]. In this love has been perfected [3S Perf Pass Indic] with us, so that confidence we may have [1Pl Pres Act Subj] in the day of judgment, for just as he [ekeinos] is [3S Pres Act Indic] also we are [3S Pres Act Indic] in this world. 18Fear is not [3S Pres Act Indic] in love but perfect love out drives [3S Pres Act Indic] fear, for fear punishment involves [3S Pres Act Indic], but the fearing-one [Nom MS Pres Mid Part] has not been perfected [3S Perf Pass Indic] in love. 19We love [3S Pres Act Indic], for he first has loved [3S Perf Act Indic] us. 20If someone says [3S 2 Aor Act Subj], I love [1S Pres Act Indic] God and his brother he hates [3S Pres Act Subj], liar he is [3S Pres Act Indic]: for the not-loving-one [Nom MS Pres Act Part with me] his brother whom he has seen [3S Perf Act Indic], God whom he has not seen [3S Perf Act Indic] he cannot [3S Pres Mid Indic] love [Pres Act Inf]. 21And this command we have [1Pl Pres Act Indic] from him, that the loving-God-one [Nom MS Pres Act Part] also should love [3S Pres Act Subj] his brother.
17 13

4:7: As when John introduced the old/new commandment to love in 1 John 2:7-14, John opens this passage about the way that we ought to love by reminding us of the way in which we have been loved through addressing his readers as Beloved. This way of addressing his readers underscores his point in the whole verse: we love because love is from God, and therefore anyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. So, to all those who are indeed Beloved, who do know God and have been born of God, we are called to love one another in the same way that we have been loved. Lenski makes an interesting point about the article before love (he agape): The first fact is that this love is from God. Note the article. When our versions translate love is of God, this is not exact. Strictly speaking, this means that love in general is from God as its one fountain and source.Only the love, the one that John urges, the one of one Christian toward another, is from God.There is no need to worry about our loving also our neighbor who is not a Christian. God loves all men and yet loves his children in a special way by bestowing all manner of loving gifts on them. He loves them in a way in which he cannot love the wicked. This is also true with regard to us. John speaks of this narrower range of love because this love exhibits so clearly our fellowship with God, yea, our origin from him.1 By one another, John most likely refers exclusively to those inside the Christian fellowship. Although John does not think evangelism unimportant, he seems primarily concerned with the way that we treat those inside the church. Paul makes a similar statement in Galatians 6:10: So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith. Stott makes a magnificent homiletic observation: The refrain of this paragraph is the reflexive love one another. It occurs three timesas an exhortation (7, let us love one another), as a statement of duty (11, we oughtto love one another; cf. ii. 6, iii. 16), and as a hypothesis (12, if we love one another). What John is at pains to demonstrate is the ground of this imperative obligation. Why is reciprocal [page] love the plain duty of Christians?...It is because God is love in Himself (8, 16), has loved us in Christ (10, 11), and continues to love in and through us (12, 13), that we must love each other.2 4:8: Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is in some ways the simple corollary to what John had written in 4:7, but John takes this a step further: it is not only the case that God loves, but God himself is love. Therefore, if you do not love, then you cannot claim to know God. What does it mean, though, that God is love? This is a profound truth, but it pushes us to see love being defined by who God is, rather than defining God by some abstract idea of what love is. Gods nature is so incredibly loving because he is the one to define what love is. 4:9: As if to answer someones request, Please help me to understand what it means that God is love, John gives us not merely an example, but the defining example of Gods love: that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. Jesus coming was not a single action of love in a string of actions of love, but this was the action of love toward which everything God had done pointed. John describes this by writing that In this the love of God was made manifest among us The word manifest is an important word in this book, especially in 1 John 2:28-3:10, where John says that what we will be has not yet been made manifest, but when he is made manifest we shall be like him, because we
1

R.C.H. Lenski, The interpretation of the Epistles of St. Peter, St. John and St. Jude (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1966), 495. 2 John Stott, The Epistles of John, an introduction and commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 159-60.

shall see him as he is (3:2). Also, John tells us that the reason the Son of God was made manifest was to destroy the works of the devil (3:8). I will have to do more study on this, but it seems that the word for manifest is a word used always to speak of the way that God parades his Son in our midst. Kruse writes, Life involves knowing or having Jesus Christ himself, for life is all tied up in him. Hence the authors statement that Gods purpose in sending his one and only Son into the world was that we might live through him. However, the possibility that people might live through him by knowing or having Jesus Christ depended on much more than a revelation of Gods love in sending his Son into the world. A far greater demonstration of his love was needed, as the next verse (4:10) makes clear.3 Concerning the word monogenes, Kruse explains that, in other NT use of the word, The stress is not on the fact that the person was begotten of the father or mother concerned, but on the fact that the father or mother had only one child, and that child was the one who was so sadly affected.Thus, in John 1:14, 18 the emphasis is upon Jesus unique role as the bearer and revealer of the glory of God, and in John 3:16, 18 the emphasis falls upon the sacrifice made by the father in giving his only Son for the salvation of all who believe, and the seriousness of not believing in the one and only Son whom God gave. The use of monogenes in 1 John 4:9 fits into the same category as its use in John 3:16, for here in 4:9 the author also emphasizes the fact that the one whom God sent into the world was his one and only Son. Once again the emphasis is not that Jesus was begotten of God, but that God had only one Son, and this one and only Son he sent into the world so that we might live through him.4 4:10: In v. 10, John focuses in more narrowly as he tries to define love: In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Love is not, cannot be defined for the gratefulness we feel toward God for all he has given us; rather, we can only understand what love is when we see the way that Jesus Christ became the propitiation for our sins. Jesus was sinless, but he allowed himself to be sacrificed so that we might live through him (4:9). There could have been no ulterior motives apart from love for Jesus to end up on the cross. Concerning the word propitiation, Kruse writes, The word translated here as atoning sacrifice (hilasmos) is found in [page] only two places in the NT, both of them in this letter (here and 2:2, see A Note on Hilasmos, pp. 75-76). Hilasmos occurs six times in the LXX (Lev 25:9; Num 5:8; Ps 129:4 [=130:4 ET]; Ezek 44:27; Amos 8:14), and in every case except Amos 8:14 it relates to the removal of guilt because of sin, and in most places (Ps 129:4 and Amos 8:14 are the only exceptions) it relates to the removal of sin through sacrifice. There can be little doubt, then, that when the author uses the term hilasmos here he is emphasizing that God sent Jesus Christ to be the atoning sacrifice to remove the guilt we had incurred because of our sins so that we might have eternal life. This was the great expression of Gods love, and on this basis the author can say, God is love.5 4:11: John again addresses his readers as Beloved in order to urge them to love one another in the same way: Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. The imperative is absolutely bound up in the indicative: we are loved, therefore we ought to love one another. 4:12: John writes cryptically in v. 12: No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. As I read this, this could be mean four things:

Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 158. Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 159. 5 Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 160-61.

1. John is speaking about our witness in the world, so that when the church becomes a group of believers who genuinely love one another, the world sees God in some sense. This would be an extraordinarily powerful foundation for evangelism. 2. John is talking about the sign by which we know that God abides in us. Since we cannot see God, the only sign we have are the actions resulting from our relationship with him. (This is Kruses point, p. 161-62.) 3. John is saying something along the lines of what he writes in v. 20: If anyone says, I love God, and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. The fact that we havent seen God in v. 12 is thus being contrasted with the fact that we have seen our brother in v. 20. 4. John is reminding us of the principle in 3:2: Beloved, we are Gods children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. Thus, John could be saying that, although we have not been perfected yet to be just like him (which will happen when we see him when he is made manifest), God abides in us, and his love is slowly perfected in us through our growth in love for one another. I think that all of these ideas have some merit, but I will have to think a little bit more before I come down on a particular side. Stott puts it simply: God who is love still loves, and today His love is seen in our love.6 This seems to accord to some degree with meaning (1), although probably beyond a merely evangelistic sense, since believers would also see God by the love of fellow believers for them. The more I look at this, the more I would agree with this kind of a modified (1). 4:13: This is the third in this phrase in the passage (v. 9, 10), and here John focuses on how we can know that we abide in him, and he in us. The means of this knowledge is through the fact that, he has given us of his Spirit. Although the English translation is vague, it is clear that he has not given us (as if the us were written in the accusative), but that he given unto us (dative case) from his Spirit. But what is the Spirit giving unto us of himself? Lenski insists that the participial phrase ek tou pneumatos denotes source: Just as God does not come into our hearts without the greatest gift for us (his Spirit), so, when the Holy Spirit is given to us, he does not enter our hearts without gifts for us. God gave the Spirit to us (3:24) and thereby has given from his Spirit to us, has given us a number of gifts, all of which come from the Spirit as the source. Among them is this fruit of the Spirit, which Paul names as the first in Gal. 5:22, love, the love for one another of which John is speaking, which is so great a mark of our connection with God that Paul sings its praise in strains that go even beyond those of John (I Cor. 13).7 Kruse, on the other hand, believes the best option to be that the Spirit teaches the truth about Gods sending Jesus as the Saviour of the world and knowing this provides believers with the basis of assurance: In 3:24b a similar statement is found (And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us), which leads immediately into a discussion of the way the Spirit of Truth can be distinguished from the spirit of error, namely, that the Spirit of truth acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh and the spirit of error does not. Within this letter the role of the Spirit is always related to the truth about Jesus Christ (see A Note on the Role of the Spirit,
6

John Stott, The Epistles of John, an introduction and commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 163. R.C.H. Lenski, The interpretation of the Epistles of St. Peter, St. John and St. Jude (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1966), 507.

pp. 151-55). If we take note of the role of the Spirit in the rest of the letter, we have to conclude that it is neither the very presence of the Spirit nor the activity of the Spirit producing love for fellow believers that the author has in mind here, but rather the Spirit as witness to the truth about Jesus proclaimed by the eyewitnesses (cf. 2:18-27; 3:24b-4:6; 5:6-8 and commentary ad loc.). This being the case, we would have to say that although 4:13 is transitional it is more closely connected with what follows than with what precedes. What the author is implying in 4:13, then, is that because the Spirit teaches believers about the love of God expressed in the sending of the Son to be the Saviour of the world (4:14), and because they believe that teaching, they may be assured that they dwell in God and God in them. 8 I think that Kruse has the better argument, especially in live of all of the ways that theology is tied to love in this letter. In other words, Lenski might be right, but only by extensionthe point of this passage is that right doctrine precedes right action (love). 4:14: Interestingly, we see in v. 14 the other two members of the Trinity, after having seen the Holy Spirit in 4:13: And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. This is, in fact, the classic soteriological (the Son is here called sotera) roles of the Father and the Son: the Father sends, and the Son is sent to be the Savior of the world. Kruse points out that This is a very significant expression of the orthodox belief about Jesus because it does not focus upon Jesus having come in the flesh, that is, the reality of his incarnation, that we find in other places in the letter, but upon Jesus having been sent to be the Saviour of the world.9 Also, Kruse makes a distinction between the phrase Saviour of the world in John 4:42 (where the Samaritans are embracing Jesus as their own savior, even though he was a Jewthat is, where of the world is the emphasis), by writing: However, the concerns of 1 John are different from those of the Fourth Gospel. The background of 1 John was strife within the Christian community. The question of whether Jesus is the Saviour of the world was not the issue. What was in question was whether Jesus needed to be recognised as Saviour at all. In particular, it was whether belief in Jesus death as an atoning sacrifice for sin was necessary. Those who had seceded from the authors community denied that they had sinned (cf. 1:6-2:2 and commentary ad loc.) and argued that Jesus atoning death was unnecessary and did not take place (cf. 5:6-8 and commentary ad loc.). Those who, with the author, acknowledged their sins, confessed the importance of Jesus atoning sacrifice which provided cleansing from their sins. They confessed that the Father sent his Son to be the Saviour of the world.10 I wrestle with pinning too much on the elusive historical background, so I would take Kruses argument to a point. He is helpful to note the way in which the issue at stake here is Savior, while the issue in John 4 is of the world. And, it cannot be argued that there were these disputes going on in Johns day. 4:15: So then, Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. This is perfectly consistently with what John had written earlier, Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father (1 John 2:22-23). If we read this without looking at the context of the passage, however, we miss the reason John is saying this. Previously, when he dealt with those who have heretical confessions (1 John 2:18-27; 1 John 4:1-6), the issue was truth vs. error. That is partly what John is driving at here, but more than that, John wants us
8

Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 163. Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 164. 10 Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 164.

to understand that confessing Jesus Christ is the only way for God to abide in you, which is the only way to cultivate love in our lives: No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us (1 John 4:12). I am wondering if this is the clearest statement in the book thus far that love is a theological issue. The next closest statement I can find is in 3:23: And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us. Even this statement, though, seems more to speak to the fiducia (trust) aspect of faith rather than the notitia (content/information) aspect of faith. (The other aspect, assensus, is implied in both statements.) The inescapable message of this verse is that we must believe some true content about who Jesus is if we are going to have God abide in us. Love isnt something Christians happen to value, or something that we can work up inside ourselves; love is something that is created by God in our lives, and which is connected to our theology of who Jesus is. 4:16: And we have come to know and we have come to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. Here, John warns us away from excesses of theological speculation, reminding us that we come to know Gods love experientially. We cannot know Gods love apart from notitia, but we will never know Gods love if notitia is all that we experience. The reason for this is that God is not an abstract philosophical beingHe is Love Himself, and Love acts. Love does things for those captured in His embrace. Therefore, whoever abides in Love (genuine Love not the garbage that passes for Love on television) is actually abiding in God himself, and such a person will find that God has also been abiding in him or her. Stott puts this in a different way: The apostle does not mean that the way to come to dwell in God and He in us is to confess Christs Sonship (15) and to abide in love (16), but the reverse. It is the divine indwelling which alone makes possible both belief and love. They are its fruit, and therefore its evidence: he who dwells in love is (i.e. is thereby seen to be) dwelling in God (NEB).11 We dont check off lists of to-dos before God abides in us; Gods abiding in us gives the ability to do all that he has commandedfaith, love, obedience, etc. 4:17: The fourth in this statement: By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. Suddenly the issue of confidence arises for the first time since 2:28: And now, little children, abide in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence before him and not shrink from him in shame at his coming. And the way we have confidence is for love to be perfected with us (and, by the way, the phrase is meth hemon, so this is indeed about love perfected with us, not in us). The by this almost certainly refers to 4:16, in which case John is stating that the perfection of our love depends on love of God as it abides in us. The confidence we have, John writes, is particularly important for the day of judgment, which was also at stake in the confidence John mentioned in 2:28. From both verses, the message seems clear that, unless Gods love is perfected (brought to its ultimate goal) in us, we will shrink from him in shame at his comingthat is, on the day of judgment. At the same time, this should not concern us, because John is explaining that those who abide in God (and in whom God abides) will have confidence on that day.

11

John Stott, The Epistles of John, an introduction and commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 168.

In this vein, Lenski is wise to counsel us not to pin our confidence before Christ onto our own ability to love: This is not our love (whether for God, for our brethren, or for both), and the verb does not mean that our love has been perfected (is made perfect, our versions), and the thought is not that only when our love gets to this stage, do we have boldness for the judgment day. Let us say that we should then be in a sad state, for we should never know whether our love is perfect enough. We must daily confess that our love falls short of the ideal (1:9). Our boldness for the judgment day rests on Gods love, on v. 9, 10.12 This is trueour love is not the basis of Gods judgment for us. As we saw in 1 John 2:28-3:10, our confidence in Christ is based on what is absolutely, beyond a shadow of a doubt true right now: Beloved, we are Gods children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared (1 John 3:2). No one can challenge our status as Gods children, because it is true in fact. Nevertheless, what we will be has not yet appearedmore is coming on the basis of what is already true. And, in this way, we read further that we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. We are justified (Pauls sense) on the basis of Gods love; however, our salvation is justified (Jamess sense) when the love in us is brought to completion on the final day. Our confidence is not that we have been perfected, but that the process has infallibly begun in our justification, and that it will be infallibly brought to completion by the one who began such a good work in us on the day of Christ Jesus through our sanctification and glorification. The phrase because as he is so also are we in this world is a bit tricky. Is John saying that we love as he loves because he himself abides in us? I am going to need some commentary help on this one. Kruse explains: Bearing in mind that the present tense of the Greek verb on its own does not designate action in the present, but action presented as ongoing by the writer, whether in the past or the present, we are justified in translating this text so as to read: we are in the world in the same way as he was. Fourth, we need to ask how the statement we are in the world in the same way as he was would function as a basis for believers having confidence on the day of judgement [sic]. One way forward is to recognize that 4:17b falls within a section (4:7-21) whose overall theme is love for one another as the mark of those who live in God. Knowing this, we could say that believers who love one another in this world, in the same way as Christ loved his disciples (John 13:1, 34; 15:9, 12), when he was in the world, show that they live in God, and therefore they need have no fear as they face the day of judgement.13 4:18: Returning to the theme of confidence without using the word, John writes this: There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. This seems to be nearly a restatement of 4:17, but the corollary: with perfected love, you can have confidence, and thus you will not have fear of punishment on the day of judgment. We will be judged on the basis of our love; however, we cannot love apart from our faith in Jesus Christ (4:15). Salvation is by faith alone, but saving faith is never alone. And this is important, as Lenski notes:
R.C.H. Lenski, The interpretation of the Epistles of St. Peter, St. John and St. Jude (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1966), 511. 13 Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 168.
12

Our versions and some commentators refer Johns words to our love for God: our love for him throws out fear of him, but it does so only when our love is perfect or has developed to a high degree. This is Catholic doctrine according to which no one can be certain whether his love is perfect enough. In these verses John is speaking of what Gods love does.14 What at the bottom of our judgment is not our own ability or inability to loveat the bottom of our judgment is Gods love for us. Kruse writes: What the author means by perfect love here is Gods love for them which dispels their fear. But Gods love for believers cannot be separated from their love for God.When believers love God because he first loved them (4:19), then their fear of God is driven out. Love for God and fear of God cannot coexist (cf. Rom. 8:15).15 Lenski, following up on his argument from v. 7 that John is not talking about love in general, but the specific love that flows from God, makes a good point: Fear is the opposite of boldness; where the one is, the other is not. Johns statement is not axiomatic and general as some regard it, as also our versions regard it. These overlook the fact that en te agape has the article of previous reference: in connection with the love, i.e., with this love of God for us of which John is speaking. There is no place for fear on our part in connection with this love of God for us. This love has removed all our sins (1:9; 2:1,2; 4:10); what is there left to make us afraid?16 4:19: One of the more famous verses of the book: We love because he first loved us. Yet, this verse is merely a summary of all that John has been saying in this passage. We do indeed love because he first loved us, the reason being that God is Love, and only by abiding in God (which happens because God sets his love upon us) is love created and perfected in us. 4:20: This verse signifies the application of all of this theology of love: If anyone says, I love God, and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. Interestingly, we might make an important correlation between this verse and 4:10: In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. It is not love merely to love God; rather it is love when God loves usand specifically, when God loves us enough to give up his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Lovereal Love, the kind of Love demonstrated and modeled by Love Himselfrequires sacrifice for the good of others. The issue of seeing the object of your love is interesting. We might point out that, unless your love for your brothers is perfected in this life, you will never see Christ as he is upon his return (1 John 3:2). Also, John seems to be getting at a similar point in 3:17: But if anyone has the worlds goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does Gods love abide in him? Seeing a need is often tied to love-producing pity (e.g., Exod. 2:25, 3:7), and so the idea is that if you see your brother in need and do not help, in what sense do you say that you have love in your life? Stott draws together the teaching of this verse with concepts from the rest of the epistle: If what a man contradicts what he says, he is a liar. To claim to know God and have fellowship with God while we walk in the darkness of disobedience is to live (i. 6, ii. 4). To claim to possess the Father while denying the deity of the Son is to lie (ii. 22, 23). To claim to love God while hating the brethren is to lie also. These
R.C.H. Lenski, The interpretation of the Epistles of St. Peter, St. John and St. Jude (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1966), 514. 15 Colin Kruse, The letters of John, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 168. 16 R.C.H. Lenski, The interpretation of the Epistles of St. Peter, St. John and St. Jude (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1966), 513.
14

are the three black lies of the Epistle, moral, doctrinal and social. However loudly we may affirm ourselves to be Christian, our habitual sin, denial of Christ and selfish hatred expose us as the liars we are. Only holiness, faith and love can prove the truth of our claim to know, possess and love God.17 Stott also quotes an extremely incisive point by Calvin: It is a false boast when anyone says that he loves God but neglects His image which is before his eyes (Calvin).18 4:21: As in many of the sections in this letter, John ends on a transitional statement that links what he has just been saying with what he is about to say. In 4:21, John ties loving ones brother to the commandment, which will be the focal point of 5:1-5: And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother. John had also described love as a commandment in 2:7-11 and in 3:19-24.

17 18

John Stott, The Epistles of John, an introduction and commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 170. John Stott, The Epistles of John, an introduction and commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 171.