In this lesson we come to the last theme which John discusses. In this last chapter the apostle is discussing the 5th of 5 themes that he has taken up in this epistle:
· Maintaining fellowship
· Maintaining truth
· Maintaining righteousness
· Maintaining love
· Maintaining assurance, or confidence.
The relationship between these 5 themes is very important. It is instructive to note that the first of these themes links with the last; fellowship with Christ ends in assurance or confidence. Confidence is the kind of life that all men today are looking for. This is the image of humanity that is idealistically present in every human heart—we each want to be this kind of person, and this is exactly what Christianity is designed to produce!

The glory of our Christian faith is that it is designed to produce life, to fit us for living, and thus to be the kind of person that God intended man to be when He made him in the beginning—confident, able, adequate. The secret of that confidence is fellowship—the sharing of the life of Jesus Christ. This confident life will be manifest in a 3-fold way: as truth, as righteousness, and as love.

John says in verse 1 that truth and love; one produces the other. All who believe that Jesus is the Christ has been begotten of God, and every one who loves the father loves the child. Thus, he ties together these two great themes, belief in the truth, and love, and one is the result of the other.

In I John 4:21 John has just been talking about loving our brother. This leads to a logical question: “What does it mean to love my brother?...Who is my brother?” The answer is here in Verse 1: “Every one who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been begotten of God.” There is your brother. Such a one is part of the family. Thus, if we love the Father, we will love the other children of the Father any-where we meet them. This is inevitable. If we really share the life of the family of God, we will love the other members of the family.

“Does this mean that Christians are to love only other Christians and no one else?” No, but it’s where we begin. Love always begins within a family circle. We first love the members of our own family before we find it possible to love those outside. If love begins there, it will reach out finally to encompass the world as well. The love of a Christian is never limited merely to other "brothers," those who share the life of the Lord Jesus, but it must at least begin there.

Verses 2 and 3 link together love and righteousness. Someone asks, “How can I know that I truly love my brother?”  The answer is in Verse 2: “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.” When our actions toward our brother arise, not out of our personal feelings toward him, but out of our love for God and our desire to obey His Word, then we can be confident that it is really love.

Sometimes love must do the unpleasant thing. If it is an unpleasant thing that is being done because it is prompted by love to God and obedience to His commandments, well then, it is love, even though it makes someone angry, or upsets them temporarily. Do not be disturbed by that reaction. Love sometimes must be cruel to be kind.

The wonderful thing is that when we do that, we discover the truth of Verse 3. “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome [or grievous].” They are not difficult, though they seem to be at first. Yet, if we do it, if we will really love another to the point of helping him face unpleasant truth, we will discover that the results are not burdensome but delightful. If done in the right way we find it easy and delightful, producing riches of friendship and blessing.

Verses 4 and 5 then give us the results that will naturally follow:  “…for everyone born of God over-comes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that over-comes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”  When we seek to show love to others, to obey the Word, and to proclaim these doctrinal truths of the Scriptures, there is some-times a tendency for us to feel that our success as Christians is a result of our faithful efforts. But when we feel like that we are wrong. John declares that through these activities to overcome the world, it never is a result of our efforts. Effort is involved, but the results do not come from that. Victory is a sign that we have the Lord Himself within us. Our efforts are but a sign of the presence of the life of God, the Lord Jesus himself. Without that, everything else would be futile. It is not we who overcome the world, but it is He in us. All that we contribute is simply the fact that we believe in His life at work in us. Thus, our faith in Him overcomes the world.

Those who use the King James Version will note that there is a verse apparently omitted from the NIV text, Verse 7. This verse is omitted because it has no manuscript support earlier than the 15th century AD. The KJV translators did not have access to the number of manuscripts that are available today and therefore did not recognize this. But it is universally agreed today among Bible scholars that the statement concerning three witnesses in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit, is not a genuine part of the Scriptures and so is omitted from most contemporary texts.

John declares that there are 3 witnesses; 2 of them are external and historical, and 1 is internal and personal.  But all 3 are intricately related together, forming a marvelous fabric of testimony that is powerful in the extreme. The writer of Proverbs says a 3-fold cord is not quickly broken, and here are 3 mighty testimonies to the fundamental facts upon which Christian faith rests.

There are those symbolized by the water and the blood. You will note that these mark events which lay at the beginning and end of our Lord’s public ministry on earth—the water of baptism at the be-ginning, the blood of the cross at the end. Christ, himself, is the centering ground of Christian faith. This is always true. It is Jesus Christ himself who is the supreme fact upon which Christian faith rests. But two unique qualities mark his life, symbolized here by the water and the blood.

But beyond these two historical evidences, John says, there lies yet a 3rd–the mysterious, subjective, yet powerfully compelling evidence of the witness of the Spirit within. When the story of the sinless life and the cross is told, the Spirit of God works in the hearts of many to make it extremely personal. Such listeners suddenly see themselves as involved in the incidents, as caught up in the mighty sweep of these events and becoming part and parcel of them. The whole meaning of it becomes personalized for them so it is no longer, “Christ died for the world,” but “Christ died for me.” That is the witness of the Holy Spirit.

9We accept man's testimony, but God's testimony is greater because it is the testimony of God, which he has given about his Son. 10Anyone who believes in the Son of God has this testimony in his heart. Anyone who does not believe God has made Him out to be a liar, because he has not believed the testimony God has given about His Son.
Is not God more dependable than man? That’s John’s argument. If we will take the word of a strang-er and act on it, can we not believe the Word of God, especially when He has caused the testimony to be written down by the eyewitnesses of these events? In addition, when faith is exercised on the basis of that objective testimony, there is given a confirmation of the Spirit within which makes it wholly believable. Can you not exercise faith on that basis?  John says, “If you refuse to do that, then you are treating God as though He were a liar.” You insult God if you do not believe the record He has given.