1 John 4: Knowing God Through Love

Resources:

• 1 John 4 Reading Guide
• 1 John 4 Teaching Notes
• 1 John 4 Video

Overview:

• 1 John 4 includes two major ideas.
  • Believers ought to “test the spirits” to see whether they are from God (1 John 4:1–6).
  • God both loves us and “God is love” (1 John 4:7–21), leading believers to love one another.
• 1 John, chapter 4 focuses on several key points:
  • Test the Spirits (Verses 1-6): Believers are urged to discern between true and false spirits. The test of a true spirit is its acknowledgment that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. False prophets deny this fundamental truth.
  • God is Love (Verses 7-21): The central theme of this chapter is the declaration that “God is love.” John emphasizes that love originates from God, and those who love are born of God and know Him. Conversely, those who do not love do not know God.
  • Manifestation of God’s Love (Verses 9-10): God’s love is manifested in sending His only Son into the world to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. This selfless act is the epitome of divine love.
  • Call to Love One Another (Verses 11-12): Since God loved us so greatly, we are also called to love one another. This love is evidence of God living in us and His love being made complete in us.
  • Assurance through the Holy Spirit (Verses 13-16): Believers can know they live in God and He in them because He has given us His Spirit. Additionally, acknowledging that Jesus is the Son of God further assures us of God’s abiding presence.
  • Perfect Love Casts Out Fear (Verses 17-18): God’s perfect love drives out fear, particularly the fear of judgment. Believers can have confidence because fear is replaced by the assurance of God’s love.
  • The Necessity of Love (Verses 19-21): Loving God is inseparable from loving others. If someone claims to love God but hates their brother or sister, their love for God is questioned. True love for God is demonstrated through love for fellow believers.

Notes on the video:

• i John is a small book with many big ideas. The theme of this chapter is Perfect Love. Perfect Love dives out all fear – you have nothing to worry about.
• v1: Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God. For there are many false prophets in the world. 
  • Paul clearly loves those he was writing to.
  • Paul is warning us not to believe everything or person that claims speak for or be the Holy Spirit. These false teachers teach false doctrine and false church. We need to verify they are communicating God’s word. We need to test pur teachers to ensure they are correct.
  • Acts 17:11-12 says people were open-minded but examined messages given to them against the scriptures.
• v2: This is how we know if they have the Spirit of God: If a person claiming to be a prophet acknowledges that Jesus Christ came in a real body, that person has the Spirit of God. 
  • The Bible is a measuring rod to determine absolute truth when someone claims to be of God.
• v3: But if someone claims to be a prophet and does not acknowledge the truth about Jesus, that person is not from God. Such a person has the spirit of the Antichrist, which you heard is coming into the world and indeed is already here.
  • Anyone who doesn’t confess Jesus is not from God, regardless of what they claim.
  • People are coming (or are already here) that will claim to represent God but if their teachings aren’t Biblical then they are false teachers. Examples include Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, Seventh Day Adventists, and many, many more.
  • False teachers need to be exposed to prevent people from following them and being lured away from Christ. False teachers are anti-Christ. Anti-Christ in this sense is not satan, anti-Christ is anyone teaching or promoting a false gospel that distracts people from Jesus and the Bible.
  • Antichrist is identified or labeled in several different ways in Daniel, 2 Thessalonians, and Revelations. The Book of Jude is all about how to defend against these false doctrines.
• v4: But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world. 
  • This verse enables us to speak with authority about overcoming the distractions of this world. We can be confident about this because of what Christ did for us.
  • We shouldn’t fear offending others with our faith.
• v5: Those people belong to this world, so they speak from the world’s viewpoint, and the world listens to them. 
  • Anyone who knows God listens to someone teaching scripture. Anyone who is not does not want to listen to scripture.
• v6: But we belong to God, and those who know God listen to us. If they do not belong to God, they do not listen to us. That is how we know if someone has the Spirit of truth or the spirit of deception.
• v7: Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. 
• v8: But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
  • We can “take the gloves off” when speaking to others about scripture but we must not hate those who are false teachers – we should try to educate them so they realize they are teaching false doctrine. We love them and don’t want to see them punished over teaching false doctrine.
• v9: God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. 
  • We must try to see each other through God’s eyes – love others as He loves us.
• v10: This is real love — not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.
• v11: Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. 
• v12: No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us.
  • This is how we know we remain in Him if we behave in this manner.
• v13: And God has given us his Spirit as proof that we live in him and he in us. 
• v14: Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes and now testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 
  • Even though He died for the world not everyone believe in Him. This means all people are not children of God.
• v15: All who declare that Jesus is the Son of God have God living in them, and they live in God.
• v16: We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them. 
• v17: And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.
  • In the end we can have confidence in this and have no fear.
• v18: Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. 
  • Those who still fear have not yet reached perfection in His love.
  • Jesus is our hope – we have nothing to worry about with regard to punishment or judgement.
• v19: We love each other because he loved us first.
• v20: If someone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? 
  • This is one of my favorite verses in the entire Bible – I keep it pinned to my dashboard to help control “road rage”. 
• v21: And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.
  • Who is our brother that we need to love?
  • We need to love those who may give us a hard time. We are to love the way He loved us,
  • You can love someone by sharing the truth of Christ with them.
  • Penn Jillette of Penn & Teller (and a well-known atheist) famously said Christians should share their faith. Penn doesn’t respect people who don’t proselytize because if Christians truly believe people could be going to hell they should be trying as much as possible to prevent this from happening by sharing the gospel. 

Group Discussion:

• No time tonight – we ran too long and had to end the meeting at 7:30.