Lectionary Calendar
Saturday, April 27th, 2024
the Fourth Week after Easter
the Fourth Week after Easter
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Bible Commentaries
Concordant Commentary of the New Testament Concordant NT Commentary
Copyright Statement
Concordant Commentary of the New Testament reproduced by permission of Concordant Publishing Concern, Almont, Michigan, USA. All other rights reserved.
Concordant Commentary of the New Testament reproduced by permission of Concordant Publishing Concern, Almont, Michigan, USA. All other rights reserved.
Bibliographical Information
"Commentary on 1 John 4". Concordant Commentary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/eng/aek/1-john-4.html. 1968.
"Commentary on 1 John 4". Concordant Commentary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/
Whole Bible (48)New Testament (19)Individual Books (9)
Verses 1-2
8 The title ..Adversary" has far more aptness than is at first apparent. Satan is known to us only through his word He never appears otherwise than as the evil creature indicated by his titles. From his very beginning his work has been to oppose and destroy. In Eden's garden he is seen as the Adversary of God. He imputed a false motive to the commandment not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He aimed directly at the character of God and brought in the estrangement. On the other hand, he is also the Adversary of the saints ( 1Pe_5:8 ). As such, he accused Job falsely ( Job_2:5 ). Sin was introduced and is being perpetuated by his slanders. Wrong thoughts and mistaken notions concerning God are at the root of all lawlessness, and lawlessness is sin. God is misunderstood, misjudged and hated because of the Adversary's lies. Hence the Son of God has come to annul his acts by making God known. The work of the Adversary is really one of the essential factors for a true knowledge of God. Sin is a necessary prelude to salvation, and estrangement precedes reconciliation, and it is only through these that God's heart could be bared and His affections shared by mankind. But the office of sin and estrangement is not effected until they are annulled and replaced by righteousness and peace. The purpose for which the Son of God was manifested was to undo what the Adversary had done. We do not see this purpose accomplished yet. It will have a partial fulfillment in the next eon, when the Adversary will be bound. Its complete culmination will not be seen until the consummation when death, the Adversary's crowning success, is abolished, and he himself, together with all creation, will be reconciled to God ( Col_1:20 ). Thus it is that the Son of God will completely annul the acts of the Adversary.
10 Two spiritual paternities are indicated by conduct, righteousness and love on the one side and unrighteousness and hate on the other. The latter tendency reaches its goal in murder (12) and the former in self-sacrifice (16).
18 This is a warning against a danger of the so-called "social gospel". It makes mere philanthropic talk and social theory a substitute for personal deeds of compassion. True beneficence is the product of a regenerate and instructed heart, and not of ostentatious and superfluous organization that seeks to raise the masses while it neglects the heart needs of the individual.
23 This precept seems almost an anticlimax, for believing is usually put down as entirely outside the category of practical virtues. Yet believing is the most practical exercise in the world. All action is dependent on belief; all effort is qualified by it. Eve believed the serpent and opened the sluice gates of sin. Christ believed God and secured salvation. The fall resulted from lack of faith in God and every phase of the return to Him is founded on faith. Take the practical precepts of the preceding paragraphs. One who heartily believes God has the most powerful incentive possible to please Him by relieving the distress of his needy brother, for his faith would find an impelling motive in the love which belief has engendered. True faith is not idle: it acts. But the important point is the fact that the quality of its acts meets the approval of God. Furthermore, as is implied in the second part of the precept, true faith is the most fertile field of love. It is only as the love of God is realized that it is possible to display it to others. It is intensely practical to recognize this, for every effort to cultivate love apart from faith will be fruitless. If, then, more and greater love is needed, it is to be found in the fuller appreciation of
God's love, not in the contemplation of our own.
1 The only true standard for testing spirits is the written revelation of God and its testimony to the living revelation, which became flesh and remains flesh. In this passage the reference is to His coming in the past. In John's second epistle he warns against the deceivers who are not avowing Jesus Christ coming in flesh-that is, in the future. In both cases those who make Him a spirit are associated with the spirit of antichrist ( 2Jn_1:7 ).
Verses 3-21
3 The spirit of antichrist is the spirit of the world. It does not want the Christ of the Scriptures, but prefers some substitute more suited to its taste. This spirit has come to pervade, not only the world, but the nominal church, which has become largely a religious world. In it rites and ceremonies are substituted for the salvation of Christ, the energy of the flesh takes the place of the power of the Spirit, and the wisdom of men displaces the wisdom of God. The world is to be saved by social service and sanitation and reconciled by reform. Everywhere are signs that the majority of the churches have lost faith in God's Christ and are attempting to find some better means of carrying on God's work than through the power of His Son.
8 We are never told that God is justice, or God is power, or God is wisdom. These are His attributes, not His essence. The distinction is of vital import, in the conflicting maze of reasoning concerning God's ways and words. Justice and power and wisdom are relative, but love is absolute. He is never so just as when He justifies the unjust, for that is in line with love. He is never so strong as when His weakness overpowers human strength, for that links it to love. He is never so wise as when His foolishness confounds the wisdom of men, for that glorifies love. All His attributes appear and withdraw at the beck of love. All serve it, and never go counter to its commands. We cannot reason that God will do thus and so because He is just, or strong or wise. Love may not give leave. But we can safely lay our heads on the bosom of His love and there learn the great lesson that He IS love, and has both the power and wisdom to carry out the dictates of His affection. What clearer proof can be given that all that He has done and is doing is leading up to that grand ultimate when He will be All in all, and love will rest in being loved?
9-10 In accordance with the era for which John writes he does not mention grace. The design of the incarnation is the manifestation of God's love, which proves to be no idle display but a transforming energy.
17 The day of judgment there spoken of is not the so-called "general judgment", of which the Scriptures know nothing, but one of the many judgments which it makes known. It is difficult to imagine this judgment in some far-off future day. It is spoken of as a time when love will give boldness and cast out fear. As the believer of this present economy cannot by any means come into condemnation, and shall not enter any judgment, we shall do well to leave this experience with the Circumcision, to whom John wrote. They will enter the day of judgment which precedes the day of the Lord. They will pass through the terrible tribulations portrayed in the Unveiling. Heaven above will conspire with the earth beneath to pour out God's hoarded indignation upon the earth. The earth will reel, the stars will fall, the elements will be charged with death. In such a time there will be much meaning to the passage we are considering. Nothing but perfect love, that is, love in the maturity of its powers, will be able to stand unshakable in that day.
19 The inculcation of love to God is of little avail, unless first of all His love has been expounded and finds a place in our hearts. It should be the aim of the evangelist and teacher to elaborate God's love in the gift of His Son, in the salvation which He has provided, in the mercy or grace which attends it, and in the future bliss which it will provide, and the nearness to Himself which it involves. The power of such a presentation will produce a responsive love n all who believe, such as could by no means be provoked by exhortations or commands.
1 The new birth is confined to the Circumcision, nevertheless, as we also are members of God's family, it should be natural for us to love all who know Him as their Father. This should break through all barriers of church or creed, race or nationality, for spiritual kinship is stronger than any physical tie. Children of God are one by a permanent and indissoluble tie, and the renewed life is put under the stimulus and inspiration of the greatest of all relationships.