1 John
A short letter so you can know, not guess, where you stand with God.
Who wrote it: Anonymous; the same voice and vocabulary as John's Gospel, traditionally John the apostle, possibly the community around him. Around 90 to 100 AD.
What it is
Something had broken. A group had left the church ('they went out from us, but they were not of us'), and it seems they were teaching that Jesus had not really come in the flesh, that sin did not matter for the truly spiritual, and that they knew God in a way ordinary believers did not. The people left behind were shaken and unsure of themselves. 1 John was written so that they could be sure.
It does not argue in a straight line. It circles three tests, over and over: do you believe Jesus came in the flesh, do you keep his commands, do you love your brothers and sisters? Those are the marks. If you have them, you know. Alongside the tests run the letter's great one-liners. God is light. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive. See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God. God is love. Perfect love casts out fear. We love because he first loved us. Anyone who says they love God and hates their brother is a liar.
What is distinctive is the tone. The writer calls the readers 'little children' and is fierce about the false teachers and tender with everyone else. It has the highest view of who Jesus is in the New Testament outside John's Gospel, and the plainest test of whether you know him: whether you love people. Near the end it says why it was written, 'that you may know that you have eternal life'. Not hope, not feel. Know.
Verses worth keeping
- 1 John 1:9WEB
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us the sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Gen Zsame meaning, your wordsIf we own up to our sins, he is faithful and just: he'll forgive us our sins and clean us up from everything that's wrong in us.
'Faithful and just', not 'in a good mood'. Forgiving you is God keeping his word.
- 1 John 3:1WEB
See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God! For this cause the world doesn’t know us, because it didn’t know him.
Gen Zsame meaning, your wordsLook at the kind of love the Father has given us: we get to be called God's children! That's why the world doesn't get us. It didn't get him either.
Being misunderstood is treated here as evidence of family resemblance.
- 1 John 4:7WEB
Beloved, let’s love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
Gen Zsame meaning, your wordsFriends, let's love each other, because love comes from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
The test of knowing God in this letter is not what you feel. It is whether you love people.
- 1 John 4:18WEB
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.
Gen Zsame meaning, your wordsThere's no fear in love. Real love pushes fear out, because fear is about punishment. Anyone who's still afraid hasn't been made complete in love yet.
It does not shame you for being afraid. It says what love does to fear, over time.
Read 1 John
The full text, every chapter, from the World English Bible, a modern public-domain translation. Pick a chapter below. The highlighted verses are the place to start if you have never read it.
1 John 4
1Beloved, don’t believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit who confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, 3and 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. 4You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world. 5They are of the world. Therefore they speak of the world, and the world hears them. 6We 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.
7Beloved, let’s love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8He who doesn’t love doesn’t know God, for God is love. 9By this God’s love was revealed in us, that God has sent his only born Son into the world that we might live through him. 10In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11Beloved, if God loved us in this way, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God remains in us, and his love has been perfected in us.
13By this we know that we remain in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as the Savior of the world. 15Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. 16We 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. 17In 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. 18There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has punishment. He who fears is not made perfect in love. 19We love him, because he first loved us. 20If 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? 21This commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should also love his brother.
Questions about 1 John
Does 1 John say Christians don't sin?
1:8 says anyone claiming to have no sin is deceiving themselves, and 2:1 says 'if anyone sins, we have an advocate'. But 3:6 and 3:9 say whoever is born of God does not sin. The tension is real. Most readers take 3:9 as describing a settled direction (the Greek is a continuous tense, 'does not keep on sinning') rather than a claim of perfection. Some holiness traditions read it more strongly. Everyone agrees the letter provides for failure, because it says so in chapter 1.
What is 'the sin that leads to death'?
5:16-17 distinguishes sin that leads to death from sin that does not, and says not to pray about the first. The letter does not define it. In context it may mean the settled rejection of Christ by those who left the church. Christians have connected it to blasphemy against the Spirit, to apostasy, or to specific mortal sins. It is not a verse to use on yourself when you are afraid; a person worried about it is almost certainly not in it.
Who were the people who 'went out from us'?
The letter does not name them. From what it opposes, they appear to have denied that Jesus came in the flesh (an early form of what was later called Docetism), claimed special knowledge, and downplayed sin and love. The writer calls them antichrists, plural, meaning anyone against Christ, not a single end-times figure.