1 John 5 - William Robertson Nicoll's Sermon Bible vs Calvin John

1 John 5

1 John 5:1

1 John 5:3Love for God's Commands.

I. People talk of "going to heaven" as if admission to future happiness had nothing to do with the bent and tone of their minds and their inward being here on earth. But salvation is the consummation of that eternal life which begins for Christ's true servants in this world. This essence of eternal life is union with Him who is the Eternal, and is the Life. To possess it, in however imperfect a measure, is to be in moral fellowship with the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit. There is nothing arbitrary in the Divine awards. Alike for weal and for woe, there is a true continuity between a man's character as formed and settled in this world and the portion assigned to him in the next. Perdition is no vindictive infliction for bygone evil, but the inevitable, one might say the natural, result of obdurate persistency in evil, or, as it has been expressed, a free will self-fixed in obstinate refusal of God, and therefore necessarily left to itself; and salvation must similarly be the complete development of a moral and spiritual condition which may be described as the renewal of the soul by the joint operation of grace on the one hand and of responsiveness to the aid of grace on the other, which condition must at any rate have been inaugurated if the soul is to depart in what is called the state of grace. In short, we must be grateful for salvation if we would be saved.

II. And how is this to be done? By loving what God commands—that is, by putting our wills into a line with His will; by giving Him our hearts; by sympathising, if we may so speak, with His intentions towards us and for us. Thus to love what He commands is accepted by Him as in substance love for Himself.

W. Bright, The Morality of Doctrine, p. 154.

1 John 5:4Office and Province of Faith.

I. Faith is not primarily a light of the soul. Though its gaze ought ever to be fixed on the source of all light, it looks to that source rather in the first instance as being at the same time the source of all warmth and all life. It is the living principle by which the soul drinks in life from the heavenly fountain of life; and only as the recipient of the light from above does it become the light of every one in whom it shines. It is still given to Christ's disciples to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven. To those who believe in Him it is given, but to those who do not believe in Him it is not given. We are to seek and search, not with our eyes half closed, as though we were fearful lest we should see too much of truth, lest we should look beyond God into a region where God is not. In this respect also, seeing that we have such a High-priest, who Himself is passed into the heavens, we may approach boldly to the temple of wisdom, for He who has delivered our hearts and souls has also delivered our minds from the bondage of earth. Therefore let no man say to the waves of thought, "Thus far shall ye go, and no farther." Let faith propel them, and they shall roll onward, and ever onward, until they fall down at the foot of the eternal throne.

II. The true antithesis is not between faith and reason, but between faith and sight, or more generally between faith and sense. The objects of faith are not the things which lie beyond the reach of reason, but the things which lie beyond the reach of sight—the things which are unseen, the things which as yet are objects of hope, and which therefore must be remote from the senses. Nor is it the office of faith to deliver man from the bondage of reason, but from the bondage of the senses, by which his reason has been deposed and enthralled, and hereby to enable him to become reason's willing, dutiful, active servant. In fact, the truths which are the objects of faith are in the main the very same with those which are the objects of reason, only, while reason is content to look at them from afar, or, it may be, handles them and turns them about, or analyses and recompounds them, but after all leaves them lying in a powerless, notional abstraction, faith, on the other hand, lays hold of them and brings them home to the heart, endowing them with a living reality, and nurtures itself by feeding on. them, and leans on them as a staff to walk with—yea, fastens them on to the soul as wings wherewith it may fly. Thus faith surpasses reason in power and vitality; it also anticipates reason by centuries, sometimes by millenniums. It darts at once with the speed of sight to those truths which reason can only attain to slowly, step by step, often faltering, often slumbering, often wandering by the way. When faith dies away, the heart of a nation rots; and then, though its intellect may be acute and brilliant, it is the sharpness of a weapon of death and the brightness of a devouring fire.

J. C. Hare, The Victory of Faith, p. 63.

The Victory of Faith.

It is acknowledged by everybody that the world is a place of conflict; but it is not felt by everybody that there is an inestimable advantage in this: that the conditions of human life should be those of conflict. And yet, if we reflect, we shall not, I think, murmur that our lot should be cast in a world where there is every need for the putting forth of our energies, for surely it is by the stimulating influences of various oppositions that our powers will ripen and develop. Let us take such a survey of the conflict as will enable us to see that perhaps one of the reasons why there is so much complaint of failure lies in this fact: that men mistake the nature of the conflict, and as they mistake the nature of the conflict, so they mistake the nature of the weapons that should be employed.

I. They mistake, I think, the nature of the conflict. The world, they say, is a great arena of contest. It is true, and there are many foes. We may enumerate them. There is poverty, there is ignorance, there is obscurity, there is weakness; and as men take a survey of life, these are the enemies which they most dread. Of all they dread poverty as the worst. It seems to smite down man and to rob him of the powers of struggle, because it robs him of the power of hope. They dread obscurity, they dread ignorance, because if a man feels that he can only emerge into the full light, where he can be seen and can have a full, free scope for his energies, then perchance success will be his. The Apostle tells us in effect the foe is not care; the foe is not obscurity; it is not poverty. The thing which men mistake is the enemy that they have to assail, and they always will identify the real advantages of life with the things that they can see, which they can enjoy, whereas he tells us that the true enemy is not in the world, nor in the things that are in the world, but rather that it is in the world within the heart. The enemy, he says, is not poverty, but desire; the enemy is not obscurity, but lust; and therefore he brings out and shows where the true conflict is. Here, he says, are the enemies: "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life"; and now I know that men may win the victory in imagination, and be defeated at the testing time. Not he who has broken through the barriers of the shade of inferiority and has found his way to the highest places of the earth, but rather he who has taken the chains of these lower things, and has broken them in pieces, and has risen out of the darkness of sin into the true light of the knowledge of purity and of God; not he who imagines that his power is sustained by men being at his feet, but he rather who has been victorious over the subtle passions of his own heart—he has overcome the world.

II. Then there is another thought; that is, the weapon is mistaken also. If, indeed, poverty is the worst of evils, obscurity the worst of enemies, ignorance the worst of foes, then by all means let us take to our aid the weapons of human warfare. I know that the weapons of industry shall overcome poverty, and I know that industry and knowledge will vanquish obscurity and bid ignorance depart; but if these are not the foes, then must we try another weapon. The Apostle bids us to try the weapon of faith. This, he says, is the victory that overcomes the world. Take rather this weapon in hand, and the triumph shall be yours—even your faith. At the essential root of all human life the measure of human success lies often in the spirit of confidence and faith. Therefore in the world of religion and in the great world—for religion, after all, is only the art of living nobly and well—this will be the victory that shall overcome the world, even our faith.

Bishop Boyd-Carpenter, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 321.

Faith's Conquest.

That there is a contest carried on in creation between opposite principles was so apparent even to the heathen that many of them imagined the existence of two opposite deities, the one dealing out good and the other engaged in counteracting that good. We who have the Divine revelation know better than this. We know that a fierce conflict goes on between evil and good, but that only good can be referred to the Creator, evil originating exclusively with the creature. This earth, which God designed for the habitation of an innocent, and therefore happy, race, has been converted, through the apostacy of that race, into a battle plain, upon which Satan and his emissaries measure their strength with Jehovah and His hosts. The contest between Christ and Satan is a contest for the souls of men, and its battles are fought on the narrow stage of individual hearts more frequently than on the wide area of nations and provinces.

I. It is asserted here that the renewed man overcometh the world. We must take a modified interpretation of St. John's strong sayings. The renewed man "overcomes," and the renewed man "does not sin," in the sense of the object which he has in view, rather than of the end to which he has attained. The sayings are to be interpreted of what is habitual, not of what is occasional. His habits are those of victory and righteousness. When he fails to conquer or falls from obedience, the failure and fall are exceptions to ordinary success and general steadfastness. Hence we may say, the renewed man overcomes because, though sometimes defeated, to be the victor, and not the vanquished, is his habit.

II. And now as to the agency by which this result is effected. Faith overcometh the world. In general it is worse than useless to concede to the world. The world very justly takes it for cowardice and gives it contempt. And this faith decides that the march of a righteous cause is not to be advanced by throwing a mantle over the uniform of its soldiers. It decides that they who would hate you if you showed yourself an out-and-out Christian can only love you in proportion as you play the renegade and buffoon. Thus by faith in the whole record of Scripture, by faith in the fact that the friendship of the world is enmity with God, by faith in Christ as able to effect the spread of the Gospel without requiring me to disguise it in myself, by faith in the Holy Spirit as ready to support me against all obloquy which absolute decision may provoke, I overcome the world; I resist its advances; I decline its courtesy; I reject its alliance. When a man is not afraid of standing out to be pointed at; when he will make no terms but that the world shall come over to his ground, that he will perish rather than advance one inch towards the world, then we affirm that a great victory has been achieved, and so preeminent has faith been in the conflict that at once we may declare with St. John, "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith."

H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 2015.

Power of Faith among the Heathen and among the Jews.

I. God did not leave Himself without a witness on earth. He would not so forsake mankind as that there should not be a single eye of faith to look up to Him among all the nations, that there should not be a single altar, a single heart, from which prayer, and thanksgiving, and praise should mount to heaven. When the whole world was turning away from Him to enwrap itself in its own natural darkness, He called Abraham to be the father of them that believe, and promised that from him in the course of ages should spring One through faith in whom all the nations of the earth were to be blessed. Thus did God ordain that faith should overcome the world. When man had given himself up to the worship of the creature, of the earth and its fruits, of the flesh and its lusts, God said, I will light up the light of faith in the heart of Abraham.

II. The faith which was a living principle in the hearts of the Jews, and which manifested itself so often by heroic action and endurance—nay, which became so inwrought in them that seventeen centuries of dispersion and oppression have not been able to destroy it—was a faith in Jehovah as the God of their fathers and their own God, who in manifold wonderful ways had shown Himself to be the Protector of their fathers, and who had chosen them out from all the nations of the earth to be His peculiar people. The heathen never discerned that God was a God of holiness and justice; at least, their popular religion was often at direct variance with any recognition of this truth. To the Jews it had been declared and fully displayed, although they were perpetually blinding their hearts to it. Along with the historical groundwork of their faith, they had a law, by keeping which they were to show forth their faith; and every commandment in that law was, as it were, a fresh step towards overcoming the world. In reading the law, indeed, there was often a veil upon their hearts; often, too, they turned the law itself into a veil, the letter of which darkened and concealed its spirit. The Jews could trust in God, and could act nobly and boldly in that trust; for a high degree of such trust may exist apart from that earnest endeavour after righteousness which ought to go along with it. But few of them lived by faith: only the just can so live; and they alone who do live by faith can be just. Even those who were strongest in their faith or trust in God's upholding and protecting providence, and who by this faith were enabled in outward act to overcome the world to vanquish the most formidable outward enemies it could bring against them, even those who were full of this lively, animating trust, and who in this trust encountered and overthrew every obstacle—even they could yet at times fall woefully and appallingly. The revelation made to the Jews was incomplete, and so it was seldom adequate to produce anything like a faith which will overcome the world.

J. C. Hare, The Victory of Faith, p. 151.

Power of Faith in Man's Natural Life.

If Christian faith has often been represented as a totally new quality, a gift of the Spirit, to which there is nothing analogous in the unregenerate man, this has arisen in great measure from the notion that faith is mere belief. For such faith being notoriously powerless, they who felt the inadequateness of such faith for the office assigned to it in the Christian scheme of salvation might naturally infer that the faith which is to be the living root of the Christian life must be something wholly and essentially different from any form of belief discoverable in the natural man. And so in truth it is. Whereas, if the business of faith be in all men equally to lift up the heart and the will, as well as the understanding, from things seen to things unseen, and to draw us away from the impulses of the present moment to the objects of hope held out by the future, to supply us with higher principles, and motives, and aims of action than those with which the senses pamper and drug us, then assuredly may the whole of man's life, so far as he is a being raised above the beasts of the field, be called a school and exercise and discipline of faith.

I. To take one of the simplest daily examples, when we lie down on our beds at night, we lie down in faith: we believe and trust that the dew of sleep will fall on our heavy eyes, and will bathe our weary limbs, and will refresh them and brace them anew. Again, when we rise in the morning and betake ourselves to our daily task, we rise and set to our task in faith: we believe and trust that the light will abide its wonted time in the sky, and that we may, each according to his station, go forth to our labour and to our work until the evening. And whatsoever that work may be, each step in it must rest on the ground of faith. Faith is absolutely indispensable to man even when he is dealing with outward things, in order to make them minister to his sustenance and outward well-being.

II. A child cannot learn his alphabet, cannot learn the name of anything, cannot learn the meaning of any word, except through faith. He must believe before he can know. That which is the law of our intellectual being at all stages of our progress in knowledge is most evidently so in the first stage. If the child did not believe his teachers, if he distrusted or doubted them, he could never learn anything. In like manner, the whole edifice of our knowledge must stand on the rock of faith, or it may be swallowed up at any moment, as has been seen in the history of philosophy, by the quicksands of scepticism. Faith, too, must be the cement whereby all its parts are bound together each to each, or a blast of wind will scatter them. Every fresh accession of knowledge requires fresh exercises of faith: faith in evidence; faith in the criterions and in the faculties by which that evidence is to be tried. Faith, too, is indispensable as the motive principle whereby alone we can be impelled to seek after knowledge. We must have seen in the visions of faith that our Rachel is beautiful and well-favoured; thus alone shall we be willing to serve seven years for her, which years will then seem but a few days for the love we bear to her.

J. C. Hare, The Victory of Faith, p. 103.

Faith a Practical Principle.

I. Nothing can be more fallacious than the notion that faith is not a practical principle. Were faith nothing more than the assent of the understanding, then, indeed, we should be forced to grant that it is not a practical principle. But this consequence of itself is enough to prove how totally inadequate that definition of faith must be. In truth, if we look thoughtfully through the history of the Church, or even of the world, we shall find that this, under one shape or other, has ever been the main principle and spring of all great and magnanimous action, even faith. The persons in whose character love has been the predominant feature have not seldom been disposed to rest in heavenly meditations and contemplations. Unless, too, it be corrected and nerved by faith, love shrinks from giving pain and giving offence. But the great, stirring motive spirits in the history of the world, the angels who have excelled in strength, and who have done God's commandments, hearkening unto the voice of His word, have been those who may be called the heroes of faith, those who by faith have dwelt in the immediate presence of God. By giving a substantial reality to that which is invisible, to that which is no object of the senses or of the natural understanding, and by animating the heart with an unshakable assurance of that for which it looks in hope, faith performs the task assigned to her of overcoming the world.

II. Bearing this in mind, we perceive how every act of faith, as the act of a man's whole personality, will be single, and that there is no confusion of thought, no mixing up of incongruous elements, in saying that it is not the act of the understanding alone, but of the understanding and still more emphatically and essentially of the will. If it were the act of the understanding alone, it would be the act of a fraction of a man's being. Only as the act of the will mainly and primarily is it the act of a man's whole being. The primary, germinal act must be that of the will, not of the understanding. There must be some motion of the will, however slight, which in the first instance directs the application of the understanding to an object before that object can be introduced through the understanding to act upon the will. Hereby we may be assisted in some degree to conceive how the influences of the Spirit should be of such momentous power in the work of our faith, in producing it from the very first and afterward in nourishing and maturing it. Were faith merely an act of the understanding, it would be without that region which is the peculiar sphere of the spirit. So far, however, as faith is a spiritual act, so far as it is the act of the will, which Christ came to redeem from the bondage of the flesh, we may feel assured that in every act of spiritual faith, in every act by which we evince a desire to become partakers in Christ's redeeming grace, to shake off the yoke of corruption, and to strive after the glorious liberty of the children of God—in every such act, we may feel assured, the Spirit of God will be working along with our spirits.

J. C. Hare, The Victory of Faith, p. 32.

References: 1 John 5:4.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. i., No. 14; J. Natt, Posthumous Sermons, p. 332; E. Blencowe, Plain Sermons to a Country Congregation, vol. ii., p. 351; H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, The Life of Duty, vol. i., p. 209; E. Cooper, Practical Sermons, vol. i., p. 243; T. T. Crawford, The Preaching of the Cross, p. 135; Fleming, Church of England Pulpit, vol. v., p. 29; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. iii., p. 221; A. P. Peabody, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xviii., p. 105; H. P. Liddon, Ibid., vol. xxi., p. 241; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. ii., p. 243; J. Keble, Sermons from Easter to Ascensiontide p. 201.

1 John 5:4Filial Faith overcomes the World.

I. The indefiniteness, the sort of unsatisfactory vagueness, that is sometimes felt to attach to the Scriptural idea of the world, is here somewhat obviated by the connection or train of thought in which it occurs. What is the world which faith overcomes? It is whatever system or way of life, whatever society or companionship of men, tends to make us feel God's commandments, or any of them, to be grievous. If this is a true account of the world as here presented to us, it must be very evident that it is a world to be overcome. We cannot deal with it, if we would avoid its deleterious and deadly influence, in any other way. The world cannot be shunned, neither can it be conciliated. The only effectual, the only possible, way is to overcome it. And the manner of overcoming it must be peculiar. It must be such as thoroughly to meet and obviate that tendency to minister to a rebellious frame of mind which constitutes the chief characteristic, and indeed the very essence, of what is here called the world.

II. Two explanations, accordingly, of this overcoming of the world are given, the one having reference to the original source, the other to the continued following out, of the victory. (1) "Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world." So the victory begins; that is its seed or germ. And as to its seed or germ it is complete, potentially complete, though not so in actual result fully and in detail. Being born or begotten of God implies the overcoming of the world. There is that in our being born or begotten of God which secures, and which alone can secure, our overcoming the world. And what can that be but the begetting in us of a frame of mind which cuts up by the roots the whole strength of the world's hold over us—the idea, namely, of God's commandments being grievous? (2) This implies faith, and faith in constant and lively exercise. Our overcoming the world is not an achievement completed at once, and once for all, in our being begotten of God. It is a lifelong business, a prolonged and continuous triumph in a prolonged and continuous strife. Our being born of God does, indeed, give us the victory; it puts us in the right position and endows us with the needful power for overcoming the world: but we have still before us the work of actually from day to day, all our life long in point of fact, overcoming the world; and it is by faith that we do so.

R. S. Candlish, Lectures on First John, vol. ii., p. 186.

Christian Faith.

Christian faith has this advantage over simple religious faith, in the more general sense of the word: that, having obtained clearer and fuller notions of God's perfections, it is rendered stronger and more triumphant over temptations.

I. Christian faith, or the faith that Jesus is the Son of God, gives us so much clearer and fuller notions of God that it makes us know both Him and ourselves and love Him far better than we could do without it. If the Christian turns to the temptations of the world, and casts the eye of faith towards that future and unseen recompense which is promised him, he bethinks him at what price it was purchased for him, and by what infinite love it was given; he feels, on the one hand, how worthless must be his own efforts to buy that which only the blood of the Son of God could buy, yet, on the other hand, with what zealous hope he may labour, sure that God is mightily working in him, giving him an earnest will and strengthening him to do steadily what he has willed sincerely. This, then, is a faith that overcometh the world, for it is a faith that looks to an eternal reward, and which is founded on such a display of God's love and holiness that the Christian may well say, "I know in whom I have believed."

II. The means of gaining this faith are principally three: reading the Scriptures, prayer, and a partaking of the Lord's Supper. You see what it is that is wanted—namely, to make notions wholly remote from your common life take their place in your minds as more powerful than the things of common life, to make the future and the unseen prevail over what you see and hear now around you. Faith will come by reading, as of old time it came by hearing; and when we have thus become familiar with Christ, have learned to love Him and to know that He not only was, but is now, a living object of our love, the prospect of being with Him for ever will not seem like a vague promise of we know not what, but a real, substantial pleasure, which we would not forfeit for all the world can

T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. ii., p. 8.

References: 1 John 5:4, 1 John 5:5.—C. Kingsley, Town and Country Sermons, p. 231; J. H. Thom, Laws of Life after the Mind of Christ, 2nd series, p. 45; W. Anderson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 138.

1 John 5:6Christ Coming by Water and Blood.

I. Let us settle the immediate sense of these words. There was living then at Ephesus a conspicuous and enterprising teacher, whom not a few were likely to regard as more profound and philosophical than St. John, who himself probably looked down with superb indulgence on the aged Galilean as pious enough in his simple way, but quite uncultured, without any speculative ability, with crude and unscriptural views of God and the universe, and wholly unfit to interpret Hebraic ideas to men who had breathed the air of Gnostic wisdom. "One confusion," he would say, "which John makes, must be most carefully avoided: you must draw a sharp distinction between Jesus and Christ. Jesus was simply a man, eminent for his wisdom and goodness, but not supernaturally born, on whom at his baptism a heavenly power called Christ descended, to use him as an instrument for revealing truth and working miracles, but to depart from him before he suffered and died." Now St. John, in the context before us, contradicts this absolutely. "The self-same Person who stooped to the waters of Jordan gave up His blood to be shed for us on Golgotha." This is He, the one, indivisible Christ, in whom to believe is to overcome the world.

II. In the "water and blood" St. John further saw a combination which seemed to present in a kind of symbolical unity the purifying and the atoning aspects of Christ's work.

III. When we hear that He came by water and blood, it is well-nigh impossible not to think of that great ordinance in which water is made the effectual sign—that is, the organ or instrument—of a new birth, and of that still greater rite which embodies for us in a concrete form the new and better covenant, and in which, as St. Augustine tersely expresses it, we "drink that which was paid for us." And thus the water and the blood, in this large and manifold application of the terms, bear witness, with the Holy Spirit, for Jesus as the Christ, for Jesus as God's own Son.

W. Bright, Morality in Doctrine, p. 28.

Reference: 1 John 5:6.—Preacher's Monthly, vol. ix., p. 205.

1 John 5:6Has Christ Risen?

I. Let us ask ourselves what is the evidence with which we are supplied on the subject of the Resurrection, what is there to be said on the subject to a person who believes—I will not say in the supernatural inspiration, but in the general trustworthiness, of the writings of the first Christians. In order to know that our Lord did really rise from the dead we have to satisfy ourselves that three distinct questions may be answered. Of these the first is this: Did Jesus Christ really die upon the cross? For if He merely fainted or swooned away, then there was no resurrection from death; then He merely recovered consciousness after an interval. The Evangelists, each one of them, say expressly that He did die; and the wonder is not that He died when He did after the three hours' agony on the cross, but that, with all His suffering at the hands of the soldiers and of the populace before His crucifixion—with all these sufferings He should have lived so long. But suppose that what looked like death on the cross was merely a fainting fit, would He have survived the wounds in His side inflicted by the soldier's lance, through which the blood yet remaining in His heart escaped? We are expressly told that the soldiers did not break His limbs, and that He was already dead; and before Pilate would allow His body to be taken down from the cross he ascertained from the centurion in command that He was already dead.

II. The second question is this: Did the disciples take our Lord's dead body out of the sepulchre? They would not have wished to do it. Why should they? What could have been their motive? They either believed in His approaching resurrection, or they did not. If they did believe in it, they would have shrunk from disturbing His grave as an act not less unnecessary than profane; if they did not believe in it, and instead of abandoning themselves to unreflecting grief, allowed themselves to think steadily, what must have been their estimate of their dead Master? They must now have thought of Him as of one who had deceived them, or who was Himself deceived. If He were not a clever impostor who had failed, He was a sincere but feeble character, who had Himself been the victim of a religious delusion. On either supposition, why should they arouse the anger of the Jews, and incur the danger of swift and heavy punishment? And once more, had they desired and dared to remove our Lord's body from its grave, such a feat was obviously beyond their power. The tomb was guarded by soldiers; every precaution had been taken by the Jews to make it secure. The great stone at the entrance could not have been rolled away without much disturbance, even if the body could have been removed without attracting attention. The character of the guards themselves was at stake. Had they countenanced or permitted any such crime, their almost inevitable detection would have been followed by severe punishment. In after-years, you will remember, St. Peter was released from prison by an angel; and the sentinels were punished by death.

III. A third question is the following: What is the positive testimony that goes to show that Jesus Christ did rise from the dead? There is, first of all, the witness of all the Apostles. Next, there is the testimony of a large number of persons besides the Apostles. Five hundred persons could not be simultaneously deceived. Their testimony would be considered decisive as to any ordinary occurrence when men wished only to ascertain the simple truth. And the force of this flood of testimony is not really weakened by objections which do not, you will observe, directly challenge it, but which turn on accessory or subordinate points. For instance, it is said that the evangelical accounts of the Resurrection itself and of our Lord's subsequent appearance are difficult to reconcile with each other. At first sight they are, but only at first sight. In order to reconcile them, two things are necessary: first, patience; and secondly, determination to exclude everything from the narrative which does not lie in the text of the Gospels. Two-thirds of the supposed difficulties are created by the riotous imagination of the negative commentators. Scripture takes no precautions against hostile judges; Scripture speaks as might a perfectly truthful child in a court of justice, conscious only of its integrity and leaving the task, whether of criticism or of apology for what it says, entirely to others. It proceeds on the strong conviction that in the end, in this as in other matters, Wisdom is justified of her true children.

H. P. Liddon, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xv., p. 257.

1 John 5:6-8The Spirit, the Water, and the Blood.

I. Consider the testimony of the water. I believe that the reference here is exclusively to baptism—the baptism of Jesus Himself, and probably also the baptism which He instituted, and which remains as a permanent ordinance in connection with His name. This is the testimony of the water. Jesus, the Christ, came not by water only; but He did come by water. He was baptised by John in the Jordan. The importance attached by the Evangelists to the baptism of Jesus is surely not without significance. It stands on the very threshold of Christ's public ministry. It was His initiation into that ministry. It was His own open consecration of Himself to His own great work in relation to the new era; and the signs which accompanied His baptism were, so to speak, the manifest anointing by the Father of His Son. Thus Jesus, the Christ, "came by water." His public ministry was inaugurated by a baptism, which brought with it a Divine testimony to His being the Anointed.

II. Consider the testimony of the blood. His was a baptism, not only of consecration, but of suffering. The blood-shedding of Jesus was really a testimony to His Divine Sonship; it was the price He was willing to pay for the world's redemption; it was the completion of His revelation of the Father. Not until He hung upon the cross could He say, "It is finished."

III. Consider the testimony of the Spirit. Even during His life on earth, the Spirit which manifestly shone through the character, and conduct, and works of Jesus Christ, bore witness to Him as the Anointed of the Father. But, again, this Spirit with which Jesus was anointed was a Spirit which He was also to impart. "The Spirit beareth witness" in the Church "because the Spirit is truth."

T. C. Finlayson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xviii., p. 195.

1 John 5:6-11The Witness of Christ.

"Witness!" The word in its emphatic recurrence is typical of the situation out of which the Epistle springs. The special perils and anxieties with which the Church is now beset are changed from those with which we are familiar in the earlier epistles of St. Paul. And it may be worth our while to remind ourselves of the contrast. There the effort had been to get the message itself of Christ out in its distinct and native force; to disentangle it from the encompassing matter that obscured or distorted it; to set it free from the misdirections to which it was liable, whether from Jewish or Gentile pressure. But now the body of believers has possessed its faith for some years; some have grown up from childhood within its familiar environment. There they stand, in compact possession of their position. But over against them they find set, in resolute hostility, a world, intellectual and moral, that will not yield—a world fierce, hard, and strong. And the task given them to do begins to look tough and grim. It will be a long business. They are but as a spot of light in the darkness that shows few signs of breaking. This "world" is, indeed, to be convinced, convicted, converted, but not, it seems, at a stroke, not in some rapid onset of victory. A long, slow, plodding fight is evidently ahead, the end of which no eye can yet recognise. And the faith that is to face this work must look well to itself. It must have recognised how far it means to go, on what it can rely; it must be complete, and prepared, and explicit. Christians must not be afraid to look into their faith. Its early simplicity is inadequate for their task. They must unearth its roots; they must probe it and note, and sort, and distinguish. They must verify their belief. And this verification they must win out of the fact itself to which belief commits them. The fact is a living fact, and can make its own answers. By contact with it, by penetration into it, the fact will bear witness to itself.

I. How can this be? How can a fact be said to bear its own evidence with it? Well, broadly speaking, all facts, of whatever kind, to which we give internal credit do so—at least, to some degree. For the credit we give them is derived, not from the mere evidence for their having occurred, but from their harmonious correspondence with the world into which they arrive. They fit it; they belong to it; they fall in with it; they take an appropriate place amid the general body of facts. It is this luminous self-evidential character which St. John would claim for the Christian fact. Its witness to itself is to be found in its complete correspondence with the spiritual situation into which it enters. The burden of responsibility for the nature of the proof is thus thrown back upon ourselves. It operates as a judgment, detecting where we stand and laying bare the secrets of the heart. The Christian must, if he would be sure of himself in the awful war with the world, brood and pore over the Divine fact presented to him, the fact in which he had believed, until the fact itself should grow ever more luminous with the intensity and the reality of the light that it threw on the tremendous issues which lie about man's destiny here and hereafter. Ever as he so pondered the illumination would increase; and in this increase of illuminative power would lie that evidence of the fact, that intelligent and convincing assurance, which his anxiety desired.

II. And there was another form of this witness which adhered in the fact—the witness, namely, which it gave to God the Father. Not only did the Christian fact harmonise with the human situation which it claimed to explain, but it carried with it a sudden sense of correspondence with the God in whom men had believed. St. John's confidence in giving his witness of that which he had "seen, and heard, and handled" crowns itself in the consciousness that, through the power of this experience, he found himself brought out of a dark jungle of death into the clear light of day; he saw the face of God once more, undimmed and spotless. This was what fortified and corroborated his adherence to the fact. The light had been manifested, and with this result: that the message which he had now to declare unto his hearers was just this: "that God was indeed light," and only light, nothing but light; and that in Him was no darkness at all.

III. There is a third form of this witness to the reality of the fact. It is that which is expressed in the enigmatical reference to the three that bear witness on earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood. Water and blood—these are real and concrete witnesses to Him who came in the flesh. Here on earth, among us, they are still wielded, filled, possessed by the Spirit, applied by the Spirit to the perpetual proof of the purification and redemption which were once for all made manifest in Jesus Christ. Here they still are. And through this combined concord of inward with outward, of living essence with objective factors, of witnessing Spirit with the testifying water and blood, the proof is decisively given both of the presence and power of the working will of God, and of the validity of the originating fact in which that will took form and came among us. "There are three that bear witness on earth, the Spirit, the water, and the blood: these three agree in one."

H. Scott Holland, Pleas and Claims for Christ, p. 67.

References: 1 John 5:8.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xx., No. 1187; J. Keble, Sermons from Easter to Ascensiontide, p. 160; Ibid., Sermons for Lent and Passiontide, p. 172. 1 John 5:9, 1 John 5:10.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxi., No. 1213.

1 John 5:10The Inward Witness.

I. The nature of the witness must be first ascertained. The illustration suggests that the witness must be something clear and definite, and capable of being ascertained beyond doubt. (1) There is the conscious experience of a new force acting upon the soul, a new life circulating in every faculty. (2) This new inward force is connected invariably with a certain belief, which gathers round one unchanging form: the form of Christ upon His cross. (3) The whole man is changed, and changed in the direction of holiness. The purifying water has touched the conscience and the heart, and made them clean and Christlike—the holy reflection of a pure and holy Saviour.

II. We must glance at what it is that the witness proves. We have the witness in ourselves, but to what? (1) First, it is to the reality and solemn greatness of the world unseen—the soul, sin, the Saviour, God, heaven, and hell. The quickened soul actually sees and touches these things with an intensity so truly equal to that of bodily sight as to leave the relative importance of the two words their proper and natural value. (2) Then it is a witness to the truth of Christianity. For the man has tried it, and proved it to be what it professes to be. (3) It is a witness to the Divine authority and power of the word of God. For such a man opens his Bible, and finds there the living image of himself. (4) It is a witness to our personal acceptance before God. It is the witness of the Spirit with our spirit that we are indeed God's children. For whence comes this inward life, this Divine force, which works upon the soul, whence this vivid sight of the cross and the new and higher life filling the soul once dead in trespasses and sins? Whence come they but from God? They are His voice, and that the voice, not of an avenging Judge, but of a gracious and reconciled Father.

E. Garbett, Experiences of the Inner Life, p. 61.

References: 1 John 5:10.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxi., No. 1250; vol. xx., No. 1207; vol. xxiv., No. 1428; Preacher's Monthly, vol. v., p. 214.

1 John 5:12The Lord and Giver of Life.

I. If religion had nothing to do with this life, it would be enough to become religious when we are on the point of departing from life, when we are on the borders of another world; but it is never thus that the Bible speaks of religion. Rather it tells us that religion has the promise of this life as well as of that which is to come; that it is not a mere death-bed ornament, but something that beautifies, elevates, and makes noble this present life. Without it a man cannot live the highest life of which he is capable. There may be existence without religion, but not the sort of life which his Creator intended man to live. This being so, we are not surprised that the text speaks of religion as something which we should have in our present life. It does not say that he that hath the Son shall have life, but "He that hath the Son hath life." As the oak is contained in the acorn, so eternal life has its seed and first beginnings in the life we are living now.

II. Having the Son seems to mean, in the first instance, having the revelation which God gave by His Son. God taught us through Jesus Christ that sin is a very terrible thing, so terrible that it cost the death of the Son of God. But He did not stop here: He proved to us at the same time His great love to us sinners. Let a man once realise that the revelation made by Jesus Christ is true for him personally, and a new life will be communicated to his soul from the Lord and Giver of life. He has the Son now; and therefore he realises the fact that he has a share of the life, spiritual, regenerate, eternal, which Christ promised to His faithful disciples.

III. A true Christian is one who lives a double life: the ordinary life which all men live and an inner, secret life which is hid with Christ in God. This life is the scene, so to speak, of his greatest joys and sorrows, and Christ is the Sharer of both. He is the Head, and each true believer one of His members. He is the Vine, and we are His branches; and we are strong, healthy, and fruitful only by deriving sap and nourishment from the Vine.

E. J. Hardy, Faint yet Pursuing, p. 231.

1 John 5:12Christ the Life of the Soul.

It is a very difficult thing to define accurately what we mean by life. Perhaps we shall not be very far wrong if we say that in its highest sense life is that state of which any being is, or feels that it is, capable. So that when anything has reached its true condition, that is its life.

I. The life of every one lies in that Divine particle which man originally received. That particle is lost—quite lost. Christ is the only Son of God. Therefore in Christ the Divine particle has descended. It is only in Christ, it can only be by connection with Christ, that any son of Adam can regain the Divine particle of life wherewith he was originally endowed, and which is essentially man's life. Therefore "he that hath the Son hath life."

II. We all have felt the difference between the cold effect of a picture we look at and the glow of the touch of its living original. We are too accustomed to deal with the holy truths of our religion as pictures. We look at them, but they do not speak to us; we admire them, but we are not influenced by them; we dream about them, but it is not action. The sentiment is strong, but there is little principle. There is much poetry, but it is not life. All this is "not to have Christ." Possession of Christ appears to me to be made up of three things. (1) The Christian has Christ's work. Believe it, as a matter of actual historical fact, that Christ did bear the cross for you, and the life for man He has received back from the Father He now holds in heaven for you; and that assent of your heart to that great truth immediately makes that great truth your own. (2) The Christian has Christ Himself. We want a presence, an all-pervading, happy, constant presence, with us. We want a love which we can grasp, which we are conscious shall never decrease. We want the glory of an eternity thrown over us. All this we have if we have Christ (3) But a man's life does not lie only in these things. There is a deep, secret, mystic being which every one holds—a life within life. It is the life of the Holy Ghost. There must be the real feeding upon Christ in the soul of a man if he would maintain what is, after all, his truest life. If a man would live, he must lay up Christ always in the recesses of his innermost, secret affections.

J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 2nd series, p. 228.

References: 1 John 5:12.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xiii., No. 755. 1 John 5:13.—Ibid., vol. xxx., No. 1791. 1 John 5:13-15.—Ibid., vol. x., No. 596.

1 John 5:14Right Petitions Heard by God.

The power by which we overcome the world is the Divine life which we have in the Lord Jesus Christ; but in order to our obtaining that life two conditions must be fulfilled: first, God must give it; and secondly, we must take it.

I. God must give it, for although there may be many things that we could earn or produce for ourselves, obviously there is one thing which we could neither earn nor create, into which, it is plain, we must be born—that is, our life. Now this is true of all life, whether the life that we possess by nature, or the life that we possess by grace. Nevertheless, respecting the Divine life that is in Christ Jesus a further affirmation must needs be made. It must not only be given us by God, but it must be taken through our faith. And this arises from the very nature of spiritual things, for when God is said to have made us free and responsible creatures He is said in effect to have ordained that our obedience should be of a certain quality, that it should not be that of the world, unconscious and constrained, not that of the beasts, unconscious and instinctive, but that of the holy angels, the voluntary obedience of a free and virtuous choice.

II. What is meant by asking according to God's will? We must make both the matter and the spirit of our prayers correspond to His will. We must ask first in the right spirit, and then for the right thing. (1) We must ask in the right spirit. We must, as the Apostle says, lift up holy hands. In the hands of supplication which we raise to heaven there must be found no sinful and inordinate desires. (2) We must ask the right thing. You will find what is according to God's will, what you not only may expect, but must expect, to receive, in the pages of God's holy word. Lord Clive, we are told, once when he was in India was taken into a vaulted chamber which was filled from end to end with all kinds of treasure: there were heaps of gold, heaps of silver, heaps of precious trinkets, heaps of jewels; and he was told by the native ruler of Bengal to take as much as he pleased. And recalling that incident of his life, it is said that he exclaimed, "I am amazed at my own moderation!" Now the Bible is God's treasure-house, filled from end to end with precious jewels; and we are bidden to take as many of the rarest and richest as we please, without money and without price.

J. Moorhouse, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 624.

References: 1 John 5:14.—T. V. Tymms, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxxiii., p. 181. 1 John 5:14, 1 John 5:15.—Homilist, 2nd series, vol. ii., p. 37; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 162.

1 John 5:14-17The Sin unto Death.

St. John appears to speak of some one sin as standing apart from all others, as a sin unto death—a sin so fatal, so entirely beyond the possibility of pardon, that Christians should even refrain from making petitions to God on behalf of one who had committed this sin. A little consideration, however, may lead us to conclude that such was not precisely the meaning which was in St. John's mind when he wrote. The Apostle is speaking of the power of a Christian's prayers. He shows it to be an immediate consequence of our faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God that we should offer up our prayers in full confidence that those prayers will be heard, and that they will be answered, provided only that the petition is in accordance with God's holy will. He then goes on to show that a Christian may obtain forgiveness for his brother by intercession, provided that the sin for which he prays has not been a deadly sin, a sin unto death. St. John is evidently anxious that his doctrine of intercession should not be abused, and therefore he limits his doctrine by saying that there is a kind of sin for which he cannot venture to encourage Christians to pray with the hope that the sin will be pardoned. St. John is not laying down a rule as to what sins can be pardoned and what not, but as to what sins form a fair and proper subject for Christian intercession. Let us learn from the subject that sin is certainly a more deadly thing than many men suppose, and that there is danger lest those whom Christ has redeemed should fall away from grace and never rise again. Therefore let him who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.

Harvey Goodwin, Parish Sermons, vol. iii., p. 383.

References: 1 John 5:16.—H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 132. 1 John 5:16, 1 John 5:17.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. vi., p. 183. 1 John 5:17.—Ibid., vol. vii., p. 60; Clergyman's Magazine, vol. ii., p. 264. 1 John 5:18.—Expositor, 1st series, vol. vii., p. 210.

1 John 5:18Infirmity of Faith: its Cause and Remedy.

I. If all the Christian people about us had a clear vision of God's face, if they distinctly heard God's voice, if they lived and moved and had their being under the constant control of the invisible terrors and glories of the spiritual universe, you and I would not receive the existence of that universe on their authority indeed, but our whole spiritual nature would be raised and elevated by the atmosphere that we should be breathing, and our vision of that universe would become clearer too, and we too should catch the mighty tones that moved through it, and we should be stirred and agitated by all its splendours and by all its terrors. We cannot help having a weak faith in these days, or if we can, it is so hard to help it that that man must be of an heroic temper, must have the inspiration of the Holy Ghost in an altogether exceptional degree, who escapes from the general spirit of his times. The great objects for which Christ came into this world were twofold: not to bring us one by one to God merely, but to bring us all to God together, and to restore us to each other as brethren as well as to restore us to God as our Father. And if we desire to master and to escape from this infirmity of faith, this dimness of spiritual vision, that spiritual isolation of which we have been miserably guilty must cease; and if we return to union with each other, we shall then have more direct union with God.

II. Another reason may be alleged besides this spiritual isolation for the infirmity of our faith and the dimness of our vision. When the uncertainty comes we think about it; we dwell upon it; we are troubled by it; we try to answer it, instead of turning our eyes at once unto that high region in which the great spiritual realities dwell; and especially, I think, our thought is not sufficiently engaged about Him who calls Himself the Truth. Let us look up to Him who abides with the Church for evermore; and the spirit of wisdom and revelation being granted to us through Jesus Christ our Lord, then the life of Christ in this world and His life in the invisible world in which He reigns now will become vividly real to us, will be bright with a supernatural splendour, and influence us with a supernatural power.

III. As to those who are in the earlier movements of religious thought, who have just begun to serve God, and to whom these great truths are all unreal, they must be for a time content, I suppose, to remain as they are; they must be born again before they can see the kingdom of heaven; and when they are born again, the vision does not at once become bright, and clear, and distinct. Immediate and vivid consciousness of the new universe into which they have entered must not be expected. They must for a time be contented to have faith in an invisible Christ. And why should we not for a time believe in Him whom we have not seen? The testimony comes to us from innumerable souls that they trusted for a time in an invisible Christ, and that after a while His glory was revealed to them. They waited for a while, looking for His appearance; and by-and-by He appeared, and they came to live and move and have their being in Him.

R. W. Dale, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 399.

1 John 5:21Idols.

I. Let us glance at three forms of idolatry against which we must ever be on our guard. (1) There is the worship of other gods, or false gods: the worship of Moloch, and Baalim, and Ashtaroth, gods of gold and jewels, of lust and blood. (2) There is the worship of the true God under false and idolatrous symbols. The golden calf was meant as a visible symbol of God's unseen presence. It was a cherubic emblem, like those woven on the curtains of the temple on Sion, or those which stretched their wings over the mercy-seat. And yet calf-worship was idolatry; it was a violation of the second commandment. (3) The third form of idolatry is the worship of the true God under the guise of false notions, false conditions.

II. Every one of us is an idolater who has not God in all his thoughts, and who has cast away the laws of God from the governance of his life. I know not that it is a much worse idolatry to deny God altogether, and openly to deify the brute impulses of our own nature, than it is in words to confess God, yet not to do, nor to intend to do, never seriously to try to do, what He commands or to abandon what He forbids. If you do not worship the public idol of the market-place, have you no personal idol of the cave?

III. But St. John will not leave us to what is abstract: he will point us to One whom he has seen and heard, and his hands have handled, even the Word of life; to One who is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person. "This," he says, "is the true God and eternal life." If you rely on religious teachers, they may offer you a dead Christ for the living Christ; an agonised Christ for the ascended Christ; an ecclesiastical Christ for the spiritual Christ; a Christ of the elect few for the Christ of the sinful many; a petty, formalising, sectarian Christ for the royal Lord of the great, free heart of manhood; a Christ of the fold for the Christ of the one great flock; a Christ of Gerizim or Jerusalem, of Rome or of Geneva, of Oxford or of Clapham, for the Christ of the universal world. So long as we worship idols, so long as we take pleasure in unrighteousness, so long as we love the darkness rather than the light—so long we cannot see God, neither know Him. And because to know Him is life and eternal life, and because there is no other life, since all other life is but a living death, therefore St. John wrote as the last word of his epistle, as the last word of the whole revelation of the New Testament, "Little children, keep yourselves from idols."

F. W. Farrar, Sermons and Addresses in America, p. 164.

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1. Whosoever believeth He confirms by another reason, that faith and brotherly love are united; for since God regenerates us by faith he must necessarily be loved by us as a Father; and this love embraces all his children. Then faith cannot be separated from love.

The first truth is, that all born of God, believe that Jesus is the Christ; where, again, you see that Christ alone is set forth as the object of faith, as in him it finds righteousness, life, and every blessing that can be desired, and God in all that he is. (89) Hence the only true way of believing is when we direct our minds to him. Besides, to believe that he is the Christ, is to hope from him all those things which have been promised as to the Messiah.

Nor is the title, Christ, given him here without reason, for it designates the office to which he was appointed by the Father. As, under the Law, the full restoration of all things, righteousness and happiness, were promised through the Messiah; so at this day the whole of this is more clearly set forth in the gospel. Then Jesus cannot be received as Christ, except salvation be sought from him, since for this end he was sent by the Father, and is daily offered to us.

Hence the Apostle declares that all they who really believe have been born of God; for faith is far above the reach of the human mind, so that we must be drawn to Christ by our heavenly Father; for not any of us can ascend to him by his own strength. And this is what the Apostle teaches us in his Gospel, when he says, that those who believe in the name of the only-begotten, were not born of blood nor of the flesh. (Joh 1:13.) And Paul says, that we are endued, not with the spirit of this world, but with the Spirit that is from God, that we may know the things given us by him. (1Co 2:12.) For eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor the mind conceived, the reward laid up for those who love God; but the Spirit alone penetrates into this mystery. And further, as Christ is given to us for sanctification, and brings with it the Spirit of regeneration, in short, as he unites us to his own body, it is also another reason why no one can have faith, except he is born of God.

Loveth him also that is begotten of him Augustine and some others of the ancients have applied this to Christ, but not correctly. For though the Apostle uses the singular number, yet he includes all the faithful; and the context plainly shows that his purpose was no other than to trace up brotherly love to faith as its fountain. It is, indeed, an argument drawn from the common course of nature; but what is seen among men is transferred to God. (90)

But we must observe, that the Apostle does not so speak of the faithful only, and pass by those who are without, as though the former are alone to be loved, and no care and no account to be had for the latter; but he teaches us as it were by this first exercise to love all without exception, when he bids us to make a beginning with the godly. (91)



(89) Literally, “and the whole God — totum Deum .” — Ed.

(90) The literal rendering of the verse is as follows, —

“Every one who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been begotten by God; and every one who loves the begetter loves also the begotten by him.” — Ed.

(91) The subject no doubt is love to the brethren throughout; and this passage shews this most clearly. Love to all is evidently a duty, but it is not taught here. — Ed.



2. By this we know He briefly shows in these words what true love is, even that which is towards God. He has hitherto taught us that there is never a true love to God, except when our brethren are also loved; for this is ever its effect. But he now teaches us that men are rightly and duly loved, when God holds the primacy. And it is a necessary definition; for it often happens, that we love men apart from God, as unholy and carnal friendships regard only private advantages or some other vanishing objects. As, then, he had referred first to the effect, so he now refers to the cause; for his purpose is to shew that mutual love ought to be in such a way cultivated that God may be honored.

To the love of God he joins the keeping of the law, and justly so; for when we love God as our Father and Lord, reverence must necessarily be connected with love. Besides, God cannot be separated from himself. As, then, he is the fountain of all righteousness and equity, he who loves him must necessarily have his heart prepared to render obedience to righteousness. The love of God, then, is not idle or inactive. (92)

But from this passage we also learn what is the keeping of the law. For if, when constrained only by fear, we obey God by keeping his commandments, we are very far off from true obedience. Then, the first thing is, that our hearts should be devoted to God in willing reverence, and then, that our life should be formed according to the rule of the law. This is what Moses meant when, in giving a summary of the law, he said,

“O Israel, what does the Lord thy God require of thee, but to love him and to obey him?” (Deu 10:12.)



(92) The love of God,” here clearly means love to God: it is the love of which God is the object. — Ed.



3. His commandments are not grievous This has been added, lest difficulties, as it is usually the case, should damp or lessen our zeal. For they who with a cheerful mind and great ardor have pursued a godly and holy life, afterwards grow weary, finding their strength inadequate. Therefore John, in order to rouse our efforts, says that God’s commandments are not grievous.

But it may, on the other hand, be objected and said that we have found it far otherwise by experience, and that Scripture testifies that the yoke of the law is insupportable. (Act 15:2.) The reason also is evident, for as the denial of self is, as it were, a prelude to the keeping of the law, can we say that it is easy for a man to deny himself? nay, since the law is spiritual, as Paul, in Rom 7:14, teaches us, and we are nothing but flesh, there must be a great discord between us and the law of God. To this I answer, that this difficulty does not arise from the nature of the law, but from our corrupt flesh; and this is what Paul expressly declares; for after having said that it was impossible for the Law to confer righteousness on us, he immediately throws the blame on our flesh.

This explanation fully reconciles what is said by Paul and by David, which apparently seems wholly contradictory. Paul makes the law the master of death, declares that it effects nothing but to bring on us the wrath of God, that it was given to increase sin, that it lives in order to kill us. David, on the other hand, says that it is sweeter than honey, and more desirable than gold; and among other recommendations he mentions the following — that it cheers hearts, converts to the Lord, and quickens. But Paul compares the law with the corrupt nature of man; hence arises the conflict: but David shews how they think and feel whom God by his Spirit has renewed; hence the sweetness and delight of which the flesh knows nothing. And John has not omitted this difference; for he confines to God’s children these words, God’s commandments are not grievous, lest any one should take them literally; and he intimates that, it comes through the power of the Spirit, that it is not grievous nor wearisome to us to obey God.

The question, however, seems not as yet to be fully answered; for the faithful, though ruled by the Spirit, of God, yet, carry on a hard contest with their own flesh; and how muchsoever they may toil, they yet hardly perform the half of their duty; nay, they almost fail under their burden, as though they stood, as they say, between the sanctuary and the steep. We see how Paul groaned as one held captive, and exclaimed that he was wretched, because he could not fully serve God. My reply to this is, that the law is said to be easy, as far as we are endued with heavenly power, and overcome the lusts of the flesh. For however the flesh may resist, yet the faithful find that there is no real enjoyment except in following God.

It must further be observed, that John does not speak of the law only, which contains nothing but commands, but connects with it the paternal indulgence of God, by which the rigor of the law is mitigated. As, then, we know that we are graciously forgiven by the Lord, when our works do not come up to the law, this renders us far more prompt to obey, according to what we find in Psa 130:4,

“With thee is propitiation, that thou mayest be feared.”

Hence, then, is the facility of keeping the law, because the faithful, being sustained by pardon, do not despond when they come short of what they ought to be. The Apostle, in the meantime, reminds us that we must fight, in order that we may serve the Lord; for the whole world hinders us to go where the Lord calls us. Then, he only keeps the law who courageously resists the world.



4. This is the victory As he had said that all who are born of God overcome the world, he also sets forth the way of overcoming it. For it might be still asked, whence comes this victory? He then makes the victory over the world to depend on faith. (93)

This passage is remarkable, for though Satan continually repeats his dreadful and horrible onsets, yet the Spirit of God, declaring that we are beyond the reach of danger, removes fear, and animates us to fight with courage. And the past time is more emphatical than the present or the future; for he says, that has overcome, in order that we might feel certain, as though the enemy had been already put to flight. It is, indeed, true, that our warfare continues through life, that our conflicts are daily, nay, that new and various battles are every moment on every side stirred up against us by the enemy; but as God does not arm us only for one day, and as faith is not that of one day, but is the perpetual work of the Holy Spirit, we are already partakers of victory, as though we had already conquered.

This confidence does not, however, introduce indifference, but renders us always anxiously intent on fighting. For the Lord thus bids his people to be certain, while yet he would not have them to be secure; but on the contrary, he declares that they have already overcome, in order that they may fight more courageously and more strenuously.

The term world has here a wide meaning, for it includes whatever is adverse to the Spirit of God: thus, the corruption of our nature is a part of the world; all lusts, all the crafts of Satan, in short, whatever leads us away from God. Having such a force to contend with, we have an immense war to carry on, and we should have been already conquered before coming to the contest, and we should be conquered a hundred times daily, had not God promised to us the victory. But God encourages us to fight by promising us the victory. But as this promise secures to us perpetually the invincible power of God, so, on the other hand, it annihilates all the strength of men. For the Apostle does not teach us here that God only brings some help to us, so that being aided by him, we may be sufficiently able to resist; but he makes victory to depend on faith alone; and faith receives from another that by which it overcomes. They then take away from God what is his own, who sing triumph to their own power.



(93) The words literally are, —

“For every thing begotten by God overcomes the world,” etc. The neuter gender is used for the masculine, “every thing” for “every one,” as in the first verse; or according to כל in Hebrew, it is used in a plural sense, for πάντες as in Joh 17:2, “that all (πᾶν) which thou hast given him, he should give them (αὐτοῖς) eternal life.”

Macknight and others have said that the neuter gender is used in order to comprehend all sorts of persons, males and females, young and old, Jews and Gentiles, bond or free. Why, then, was not the neuter gender used in the first verse? It is clearly a peculiarity of style, and nothing else, and ought not to be retained in a translation.

“Victory” stands for that which brings victory, the effect for the cause; or it may designate the person, as νίκη means sometimes the goddess of victory. — “And this the conqueress who conquers the world, even our faith.” — Ed



5. Who is he that overcometh the world This is a reason for the previous sentence; that is, we conquer by faith, because we derive strength from Christ; as Paul also says,

“I can do all things through him that strengtheneth me,”

(Phi 4:13.)

He only then can conquer Satan and the world, and not succumb to his own flesh, who, diffident as to himself, recumbs on Christ’s power alone. For byfaith he means a real apprehension of Christ, or an effectual laying hold on him, by which we apply his power to ourselves.



6. This is he that came That our faith may rest safely on Christ, he says the real substance of the shadows of the law appears in him. For I doubt not but that he alludes by the words water and blood to the ancient rites of the law. The comparison, moreover, is intended for this end, not only that we may know that the Law of Moses was abolished by the coming of Christ, but that we may seek in him the fulfillment of those things which the ceremonies formerly typified. And though they were of various kinds, yet under these two the Apostle denotes the whole perfection of holiness and righteousness, for by water was all filth washed away, so that men might come before God pure and clean, and by blood was expiation made, and a pledge given of a full reconciliation with God; but the law only adumbrated by external symbols what was to be really and fully performed by the Messiah.

John then fitly proves that Jesus is the Christ of the Lord formerly promised, because he brought with him that by which he sanctifies us wholly.

And, indeed, as to the blood by which Christ reconciled God, there is no doubt, but how he came by water may be questioned. But that the reference is to baptism is not probable. I certainly think that John sets forth here the fruit and effect of what he recorded in the Gospel history; for what he says there, that water and blood flowed from the side of Christ, is no doubt to be deemed a miracle. I know that such a thing does happen naturally to the dead; but it happened through God’s purpose, that Christ’s side became the fountain of blood and water, in order that the faithful may know that cleansing (of which the ancient baptisms were types) is found in him, and that they might know that what all the sprinklings of blood formerly presignified was fulfilled. On this subject we dwelt more at large on the ninth and tenth chapters of the Epistle to the Hebrews.

And it is the Spirit that beareth witness He shews in this clause how the faithful know and feel the power of Christ, even because the Spirit renders them certain; and that their faith might not vacillate, he adds, that a full and real firmness or stability is produced by the testimony of the Spirit. And he calls the Spirit truth, because his authority is indubitable, and ought to be abundantly sufficient for us.



7. There are three than bear record in heaven The whole of this verse has been by some omitted. Jerome thinks that this has happened through design rather than through mistake, and that indeed only on the part of the Latins. But as even the Greek copies do not agree, I dare not assert any thing on the subject. Since, however, the passage flows better when this clause is added, and as I see that it is found in the best and most approved copies, I am inclined to receive it as the true reading. (94) And the meaning would be, that God, in order to confirm most abundantly our faith in Christ, testifies in three ways that we ought to acquiesce in him. For as our faith acknowledges three persons in the one divine essence, so it is called in so really ways to Christ that it may rest on him.

When he says, These three are one, he refers not to essence, but on the contrary to consent; as though he had said that the Father and his eternal Word and Spirit harmoniously testify the same thing respecting Christ. Hence some copies have εἰς ἓν, “for one.” But though you read ἓν εἰσιν, as in other copies, yet there is no doubt but that the Father, the Word and the Spirit are said to be one, in the same sense in which afterwards the blood and the water and the Spirit are said to agree in one.

But as the Spirit, who is one witness, is mentioned twice, it seems to be an unnecessary repetition. To this I reply, that since he testifies of Christ in various ways, a twofold testimony is fitly ascribed to him. For the Father, together with his eternal Wisdom and Spirit, declares Jesus to be the Christ as it were authoritatively, then, in this ease, the sole majesty of the deity is to be considered by us. But as the Spirit, dwelling in our hearts, is an earnest, a pledge, and a seal, to confirm that decree, so he thus again speaks on earth by his grace.

But inasmuch as all do not receive this reading, I will therefore so expound what follows, as though the Apostle referred to the witnesses only on the earth.



(94) Calvin probably refers to printed copies in his day, and not to Greek MSS. As far as the authority of MSS. and versions and quotations goes, the passage is spurious, for it is not found in any of the Greek MSS prior to the 16. h century, nor in any of the early versions, except the Latin, nor in some of the copies of that version; nor is it quoted by any of the early Greek fathers, nor by early Latin fathers, except a very few, and even their quotations have been disputed. These are facts which no refined conjectures can upset; and it is to be regretted that learned men, such as the late Bishop Burgess, should have labored and toiled in an attempt so hopeless as to establish the genuineness of this verse, or rather of a part of this verse, and of the beginning of the following. The whole passage is as follows, the spurious part being put within crotchets, —

7. “For there are three who bear witness [in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one:

8. And there are three who bear witness in earth,] the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree in one.”

As to the construction of the passage, as far as grammar and sense are concerned, it may do with or without the interpolation equally the same. What has been said to the contrary on this point, seems to be nothing of a decisive character, in no way sufficient to shew that the words are not spurious. Indeed, the passage reads better without the interpolated words; and as to the sense, that is, the sense in which they are commonly taken by the advocates of their genuineness, it has no connection whatever with the general drift of the passage. — Ed.



8. There are three He applies what had been said of water and blood to it’s own purpose, in order that they who reject Christ might have no excuse; for by testimonies abundantly strong and clear, he proves that it is he who had been formerly promised, inasmuch as water and blood, being the pledges and the effects of salvation, really testify that he had been sent by God. He adds a third witness, the Holy Spirit, who yet holds the first place, for without him the wafer and blood would have flowed without any benefit; for it is he who seals on our hearts the testimony of the water and blood; it is he who by his power makes the fruit of Christ’s death to come to us; yea, he makes the blood shed for our redemption to penetrate into our hearts, or, to say all in one word, he makes Christ with all his blessings to become ours. So Paul, in Rom 1:4, after having said that Christ by his resurrection manifested himself to be the Son of God, immediately adds, “Through the sanctification of the Spirit.” For whatever signs of divine glory may shine forth in Christ, they would yet be obscure to us and escape our vision, were not the Holy Spirit to open for us the eyes of faith.

Readers may now understand why John adduced the Spirit as a witness together with the water and the blood, even because it is the peculiar office of the Spirit, to cleanse our consciences by the blood of Christ, to cause the cleansing effected by it to be efficacious. On this subject some remarks are made at the beginning of the Second Epistle of Peter, (95) where he uses nearly the same mode of speaking, that is, that the Holy Spirit cleanses our hearts by the sprinkling of the blood of Christ. (96)

But from these words we may learn, that faith does not lay hold on a bare or an empty Christ, but that his power is at the same time vivifying. For to what purpose has Christ been sent on the earth, except to reconcile God by the sacrifice of his death? except the office of washing had been allotted to him by the Father?

It may however be objected, that the distinction here mentioned is superfluous, because Christ cleansed us by expiating our sins; then the Apostle mentions the same thing twice. I indeed allow that cleansing is included in expiation; therefore I made no difference between the water and the blood, as though they were distinct; but if any one of us considers his own infirmity, he will readily acknowledge that it is not in vain or without reason that blood is distinguished from the water. Besides, the Apostle, as it has been stated, alludes to the rites of the law; and God, on account of human infirmity, had formerly appointed, not only sacrifices, but also washings. And the Apostle meant distinctly to show that the reality of both has been exhibited in Christ, and on this account he had said before, “Not by water only,” for he means, that not only some part of our salvation is found in Christ, but the whole of it, so that nothing is to be sought elsewhere.



(95) Although the commentary in 2Peter1:9 seems to be close to whatCalvin is talking of here, it may be that perhaps the First Epistle of Peter might be the one he had in mind. - fj.

(96) If we exclude the words deemed interpolated, we may read the passage thus:

“This is he who came with water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not with water only, but with water and blood: the Spirit also beareth witness, for (or seeing that) the Spirit is truth (or, is true); because there are three who bear witness, the Spirit, the water, and the blood, and these three agree in one.

We see hence a reason why the Spirit is said to be true, even because he is not alone, for the water and the blood concur with him. Thus a testimony is formed consistently with the requirement of the law. We hence also see the import of what is stated when the testimony of men is mentioned, as though he had said, The testimony of three men is received as valid, how much more valid is the testimony of God, which has three witnesses in its behalf? It is called God’s testimony, because the witnesses have been ordered and appointed by him.

When it is said that he came with water and blood, the meaning is, that he came, having water and blood; the proposition διὰ has sometimes this meaning, and it is changed in the second clause into ἐν. We meet with similar instances in 2Co 3:11, and in 2Co 4:11. See Rom 2:27

According to this construction, the explanation of Calvin is alone the right one, that the water means cleansing, and the blood expiation, the terms being borrowed from the rites of the law; and a reference is also made to the law when the witness of men is mentioned. — Ed.



9. If we receive the witness, or testimony, of men He proves, reasoning from the less to the greater, how ungrateful men are when they reject Christ, who has been approved, as he has related, by God; for if in worldly affairs we stand to the words of men, who may lie and deceive, how unreasonable it is that God should have less credit given to him, when sitting as it were on his own throne, where he is the supreme judge. Then our own corruption alone prevents us to receive Christ,, since he gives us full proof for believing in his power. Besides, he calls not only that the testimony of God which the Spirit imprints on our hearts, but also that which we derive from the water and the blood. For that power of cleansing and expiating was not earthly, but heavenly. Hence the blood of Christ is not to be estimated according to the common manner of men; but we must rather look to the design of God, who ordained it for blotting out sins, and also to that divine efficacy which flows from it.



9. For this is the witness, or testimony, of God The particle ὅτι does not mean here the cause, but is to be taken as explanatory; for the Apostle, after having reminded us that God deserves to be believed much more than men, now adds, that we can have no faith in God, except by believing in Christ, because God sets him alone before us and makes us to stand in him. He hence infers that we believe safely and with tranquil minds in Christ, because God by his authority warrants our faith. He does not say that God speaks outwardly, but that every one of the godly feels within that God is the author of his faith. It hence appears how different from faith is a fading opinion dependent on something else.

10.He that believeth not As the faithful possess this benefit, that they know themselves to be beyond the danger of erring, because they have God as their foundation; so he makes the ungodly to be guilty of extreme blasphemy, because they charge God with falsehood. Doubtless nothing is more valued by God than his own truth, therefore no wrong more atrocious can be done to him, than to rob him of this honor. Then in order to induce us to believe, he takes an argument from the opposite side; for if to make God a liar be a horrible and execrable impiety, because then what especially belongs to him is taken away, who would not dread to withhold faith from the gospel, in which God would have himself to be counted singularly true and faithful? This ought to be carefully observed.

Some wonder why God commends faith so much, why unbelief is so severely condemned. But the glory of God is implicated in this; for since he designed to shew a special instance of his truth in the gospel, all they who reject Christ there offered to them, leave nothing to him. Therefore, though we may grant that a man in other parts of his life is like an angel, yet his sanctity is diabolical as long as he rejects Christ. Thus we see some under the Papacy vastly pleased with the mere mask of sanctity, while they still most obstinately resist the gospel. Let us then understand, that it is the beginning of true religion, obediently to embrace this doctrine, which he has so strongly confirmed by his testimony.



11That God hath given us eternal life Having now set forth the benefit, he invites us to believe. It is, indeed, a reverence due to God, immediately to receive, as beyond controversy, whatever he declares to us. But since he freely offers life to us, our ingratitude will be intolerable, except with prompt faith we receive a doctrine so sweet and so lovely. And, doubtless, the words of the Apostle are intended to shew, that we ought, not only reverently to obey the gospel, lest we should affront God; but, that we ought to love it, because it brings to us eternal life. We hence also learn what is especially to be sought in the gospel, even the free gift of salvation; for that God there exhorts us to repentance and fear, ought not to be separated from the grace of Christ.

But the Apostle, that he might keep us together in Christ, again repeats that life is found in him; as though he had said, that no other way of obtaining life has been appointed for us by God the Father. And the Apostle, indeed, briefly includes here three things: that we are all given up to death until God in his gratuitous favor restores us to life; for he plainly declares that life is a gift from God: and hence also it follows that we are destitute of it, and that it cannot be acquired by merits; secondly, he teaches us that this life is conferred on us by the gospel, because there the goodness and the paternal love of God is made known to us; lastly, he says that we cannot otherwise become partakers of this life than by believing in Christ.



12He that hath not the Son This is a confirmation of the last sentence. It ought, indeed, to have been sufficient, that God made life to be in none but in Christ, that it might be sought in him; but lest any one should turn away to another, he excludes all from the hope of life who seek it not in Christ. We know what it is to have Christ, for he is possessed by faith. He then shews that all who are separated from the body of Christ are without life.

But this seems inconsistent with reason; for history shews that there have been great men, endued with heroic virtues, who yet were wholly unacquainted with Christ; and it seems unreasonable that men of so great eminence had no honor. To this I answer, that we are greatly mistaken if we think that whatever is eminent in our eyes is approved by God; for, as it is said in Luke,

“What is highly esteemed by men is an abomination with God.” (Luk 16:15)

For as the filthiness of the heart is hid from us, we are satisfied with the external appearance; but God sees that under this is concealed the foulest filth. It is, therefore, no wonder if specious virtues, flowing from an impure heart, and tending to no right end, have an ill odor to him. Besides, whence comes purity, whence a genuine regard for religion, except from the Spirit of Christ? There is, then, nothing worthy of praise except in Christ.

There is, further, another reason which removes every doubt; for the righteousness of men is in the remission of sins. If you take away this, the sure curse of God and eternal death awaits all. Christ alone is he who reconciles the Father to us, as he has once for all pacified him by the sacrifice of the cross. It hence follows, that God is propitious to none but in Christ, nor is there righteousness but in him.

Were any one to object and say, that Cornelius, as mentioned by Luke, (Act 10:2,) was accepted of God before he was called to the faith of the gospel: to this I answer shortly, that God sometimes so deals with us, that the seed of faith appears immediately on the first day. Cornelius had no clear and distinct knowledge of Christ; but as he had some perception of God’s mercy, he must at the same time understand something of a Mediator. But as God acts in ways hidden and wonderful, let us disregard those speculations which profit nothing, and hold only to that plain way of salvation, which he has made known to us.



13These things have I written unto you As there ought to be a daily progress in faith, so he says that he wrote to those who had already believed, so that they might believe more firmly and with greater certainty, and thus enjoy a fuller confidence as to eternal life. Then the use of doctrine is, not only to initiate the ignorant in the knowledge of Christ, but also to confirm those more and more who have been already taught. It therefore becomes us assiduously to attend to the duty of learning, that our faith may increase through the whole course of our life. For there are still in us many remnants of unbelief, and so weak is our faith that what we believe is not yet really believed except there be a fuller confirmation.

But we ought to observe the way in which faith is confirmed, even by having the office and power of Christ explained to us. For the Apostle says that he wrote these things, that is, that eternal life is to be sought nowhere else but in Christ, in order that they who were believers already might believe, that is, make progress in believing. It is therefore the duty of a godly teacher, in order to confirm disciples in the faith, to extol as much as possible the grace of Christ, so that being satisfied with that, we may seek nothing else.

As the Papists obscure this truth in various ways, and extenuate it, they shew sufficiently by this one thing that they care for nothing less than for the right doctrine of faith; yea, on this account, their schools ought to be more shunned than all the Scyllas and Charybdises in the world; for hardly any one can enter them without a sure shipwreck to his faith.

The Apostle teaches further in this passage, that Christ is the peculiar object of faith, and that to the faith which we have in his name is annexed the hope of salvation. For in this case the end of believing is, that we become the children and the heirs of God.



14And this is the confidence He commends the faith which he mentioned by its fruit, or he shews that in which our confidence especially is, that is, that the godly dare confidently to call on God; as also Paul speaks in Eph 3:12, that we have by faith access to God with confidence; and also in Rom 8:15, that the Spirit gives us a mouth to cry Abba, Father. And doubtless, were we driven away from an access to God, nothing could make us more miserable; but, on the other hand, provided this asylum be opened to us, we should be happy even in extreme evils; nay, this one thing renders our troubles blessed, because we surely know that God will be our deliverer, and relying on his paternal love towards us, we flee to him.

Let us, then, bear in mind this declaration of the Apostle, that calling on God is the chief trial of our faith, and that God is not rightly nor in faith called upon except we be fully persuaded that our prayers will not be in vain. For the Apostle denies that those who, being doubtful, hesitate, are endued with faith.

It hence appears that the doctrine of faith is buried and nearly extinct under the Papacy, for all certainty is taken away. They indeed mutter many prayers, and prattle much about praying to God; but they pray with doubtful and fluctuating hearts, and bid us to pray; and yet they even condemn this confidence which the Apostle requires as necessary.

According to his will By this expression he meant by the way to remind us what is the right way or rule of praying, even when men subject their own wishes to God. For though God has promised to do whatsoever his people may ask, yet he does not allow them an unbridled liberty to ask whatever may come to their minds; but he has at the same time prescribed to them a law according to which they are to pray. And doubtless nothing is better for us than this restriction; for if it was allowed to every one of us to ask what he pleased, and if God were to indulge us in our wishes, it would be to provide very badly for us. For what may be expedient we know not; nay, we boil over with corrupt and hurtful desires. But God supplies a twofold remedy, lest we should pray otherwise than according to what his own will has prescribed; for he teaches us by his word what he would have us to ask, and he has also set over us his Spirit as our guide and ruler, to restrain our feelings, so as not to suffer them to wander beyond due bounds. For what or how to pray, we know not, says Paul, but the Spirit helpeth our infirmity, and excites in us unutterable groans. (Rom 8:26.) We ought also to ask the mouth of the Lord to direct and guide our prayers; for God in his promises has fixed for us, as it has been said, the right way of praying.



15And if we know This is not a superfluous repetition, as it seems to be; for what the Apostle declared in general respecting the success of prayer, he now affirms in a special manner that the godly pray or ask for nothing from God but what they obtain. But when he says that all the petitions of the faithful are heard, he speaks of right and humble petitions, and such as are consistent with the rule of obedience. For the faithful do not give loose reins to their desires, nor indulge in anything that may please them, but always regard in their prayers what God commands.

This, then, is an application of the general doctrine to the special and private benefit of every one, lest the faithful should doubt that God is propitious to prayers of each individual, so that with quiet minds they may wait until the Lord should perform what they pray for, and that being thus relieved from all trouble and anxiety, they may cast on God the burden of their cares. This ease and security ought not, however, to abate in them their earnestness in prayer, for he who is certain of a happy event ought not to abstain from praying to God. For the certainty of faith by no means generates indifference or sloth. The Apostle meant; that every one should be tranquil in these necessities when he has deposited his sighs in the bosom of God.



16If any man The Apostle extends still further the benefits of that faith which he has mentioned, so that our prayers may also avail for our brethren. It is a great thing, that as soon as we are oppressed, God kindly invites us to himself, and is ready to give us help; but that he hears us asking for others, is no small confirmation to our faith in order that we may be fully assured that we shall never meet with a repulse in our own case.

The Apostle in the meantime exhorts us to be mutually solicitous for the salvation of one another; and he would also have us to regard the falls of the brethren as stimulants to prayer. And surely it is an iron hardness to be touched with no pity, when we see souls redeemed by Christ’s blood going to ruin. But he shews that there is at hand a remedy, by which brethren can aid brethren. He who will pray for the perishing, will, he says, restore life to him; though the words, “he shall give,” may be applied to God, as though it was said, God will grant to your prayers the life of a brother. But the sense will still be the same, that the prayers of the faithful so far avail as to rescue a brother from death. If we understand man to be intended, that he will give life to a brother, it is a hyperbolical expression; it however contains nothing inconsistent; for what is given to us by the gratuitous goodness of God, yea, what is granted to others for our sake, we are said to give to others. So great a benefit ought to stimulate us not a little to ask for our brethren the forgiveness of sins. And when the Apostle recommends sympathy to us, he at the same time reminds us how much we ought to avoid the cruelty of condemning our brethren, or an extreme rigor in despairing of their salvation.

A sin which is not unto death That we may not cast away all hope of the salvation of those who sin, he shews that God does not so grievously punish their falls as to repudiate them. It hence follows that we ought to deem them brethren, since God retains them in the number of his children. For he denies that sins are to death, not only those by which the saints daily offend, but even when it happens that God’s wrath is grievously provoked by them. For as long as room for pardon is left, death does not wholly retain its dominion.

The Apostle, however, does not here distinguish between venial and mortal sin, as it was afterwards commonly done. For altogether foolish is that distinction which prevails under the Papacy. The Sorbons acknowledge that there is hardly a mortal sin, except there be the grossest baseness, such as may be, as it were, tangible. Thus in venial sins they think that there may be the greatest filth, if hidden in the soul. In short, they suppose that all the fruits of original sin, provided they appear not outwardly, are washed away by the slight sprinkling of holy water! And what wonder is it, since they regard not as blasphemous sins, doubts respecting God’s grace, or any lusts or evil desires, except they are consented to? If the soul of man be assailed by unbelief, if impatience tempts him to rage against God, whatever monstrous lusts may allure him, all these are to the Papists lighter than to be deemed sins, at least after baptism. It is then no wonder, that they make venial offenses of the greatest crimes; for they weigh them in their own balance and not in the balance of God.

But among the faithful this ought to be an indubitable truth, that whatever is contrary to God’s law is sin, and in its nature mortal; for where there is a transgression of the law, there is sin and death.

What, then, is the meaning of the Apostle? He denies that sins are mortal, which, though worthy of death, are yet not thus punished by God. He therefore does not estimate sins in themselves, but forms a judgment of them according to the paternal kindness of God, which pardons the guilt, where yet the fault is. In short, God does not give over to death those whom he has restored to life, though it depends not on them that they are not alienated from life.

There is a sin unto death I have already said that the sin to which there is no hope of pardon left, is thus called. But it may be asked, what this is; for it must be very atrocious, when God thus so severely punishes it. It may be gathered from the context, that it is not, as they say, a partial fall, or a transgression of a single commandment, but apostasy, by which men wholly alienate themselves from God. For the Apostle afterwards adds, that the children of God do not sin, that is, that they do not forsake God, and wholly surrender themselves to Satan, to be his slaves. Such a defection, it is no wonder that it is mortal; for God never thus deprives his own people of the grace of the Spirit; but they ever retain some spark of true religion. They must then be reprobate and given up to destruction, who thus fall away so as to have no fear of God.

Were any one to ask, whether the door of salvation is closed against their repentance; the answer is obvious, that as they are given up to a reprobate mind, and are destitute of the Holy Spirit, they cannot do anything else, than with obstinate minds, become worse and worse, and add sins to sins. Moreover, as the sin and blasphemy against the Spirit ever brings with it a defection of this kind, there is no doubt but that it is here pointed out.

But it may be asked again, by what evidences can we know that a man’s fall is fatal; for except the knowledge of this was certain, in vain would the Apostle have made this exception, that they were not to pray for a sin of this kind. It is then right to determine sometimes, whether the fallen is without hope, or whether there is still a place for a remedy. This, indeed, is what I allow, and what is evident beyond dispute from this passage; but as this very seldom happens, and as God sets before us the infinite riches of his grace, and bids us to be merciful according to his own example, we ought not rashly to conclude that any one has brought on himself the judgment of eternal death; on the contrary, love should dispose us to hope well. But if the impiety of some appear to us not otherwise than hopeless, as though the Lord pointed it out by the finger, we ought not to contend with the just judgment of God, or seek to be more merciful than he is.



17All unrighteousness This passage may be explained variously. If you take it adversatively, the sense would not be unsuitable, “Though all unrighteousness is sin, yet every sin is not unto death.” And equally suitable is another meaning, “As sin is every unrighteousness, hence it follows that every sin is not unto death.” Some take all unrighteousness for complete unrighteousness, as though the Apostle had said, that the sin of which he spoke was the summit of unrighteousness. I, however, am more disposed to embrace the first or the second explanation; and as the result is nearly the same, I leave it to the judgment of readers to determine which of the two is the more appropriate.



18We know that whosoever is born of God If you suppose that God’s children are wholly pure and free from all sin, as the fanatics contend, then the Apostle is inconsistent with himself; for he would thus take away the duty of mutual prayer among brethren. Then he says that those sin not who do not wholly fall away from the grace of God; and hence he inferred that prayer ought to be made for all the children of God, because they sin not unto death. A proof is added, that every one, born of God, keeps himself, that is, keeps himself in the fear of God; nor does he suffer himself to be so led away, as to lose all sense of religion, and to surrender himself wholly to the devil and the flesh.

For when he says, that he is not touched by that wicked one, reference is made to a deadly wound; for the children of God do not remain untouched by the assaults of Satan, but they ward off his strokes by the shield of faith, so that they do not penetrate into the heart. Hence spiritual life is never extinguished in them. This is not to sin. Though the faithful indeed fall through the infirmity of the flesh, yet they groan under the burden of sin, loathe themselves, and cease not to fear God.

Keepeth himself. What properly belongs to God he transfers to us; for were any one of us the keeper of his own salvation, it would be a miserable protection. Therefore Christ asks the Father to keep us, intimating that it is not done by our own strength. The advocates of freewill lay hold on this expression, that they may thence prove, that we are preserved from sin, partly by God’s grace, and partly by our own power. But they do not perceive that the faithful have not from themselves the power of preservation of which the Apostle speaks. Nor does he, indeed, speak of their power, as though they could keep themselves by their own strength; but he only shews that they ought to resist Satan, so that they may never be fatally wounded by his darts. And we know that we fight with no other weapons but those of God. Hence the faithful keep themselves from sin, as far as they are kept by God. (Joh 17:11.)



19We are of God He deduces an exhortation from his previous doctrine; for what he had declared in common as to the children of God, he now applies to those he was writing to; and this he did, to stimulate them to beware of sin, and to encourage them to repel the onsets of Satan.

Let readers observe, that it is only true faith, that applies to us, so to speak, the grace of God; for the Apostle acknowledges none as faithful, but those who have the dignity of being God’s children. Nor does he indeed put probable conjecture, as the Sophists speak, for confidence; for he says that we know. The meaning is, that as we have been born of God, we ought to strive to prove by our separation from the world, and by the sanctity of our life, that we have not been in vain called to so great all honor.

Now, this is an admonition very necessary for all the godly; for wherever they turn their eyes, Satan has his allurements prepared, by which he seeks to draw them away from God. It would then be difficult for them to hold on in their course, were they not so to value their calling as to disregard all the hindrances of the world. Then, in order to be well prepared for the contest, these two things must be borne in mind, that the world is wicked, and that our calling is from God.

Under the term world, the Apostle no doubt includes the whole human race. By saying that it lieth in the wicked one, he represents it as being under the dominion of Satan. There is then no reason why we should hesitate to shun the world, which condemns God and delivers up itself into the bondage of Satan: nor is there a reason why we should fear its enmity, because it is alienated from God. In short, since corruption pervades all nature, the faithful ought to study self-denial; and since nothing is seen in the world but wickedness and corruption, they must necessarily disregard flesh and blood that they may follow God. At the same time the other thing ought to be added, that God is he who has called them, that under this protection they may oppose all the machinations of the world and Satan.



20And we know that the Son of God is come As the children of God are assailed on every side, he, as we have said, encourages and exhorts them to persevere in resisting their enemies, and for this reason, because they fight under the banner of God, and certainly know that they are ruled by his Spirit; but he now reminds them where this knowledge is especially to be found.

He then says that God has been so made known to us, that now there is no reason for doubting. The Apostle does not without reason dwell on this point; for except our faith is really founded on God, we shall never stand firm in the contest. For this purpose the Apostle shews that we have obtained through Christ a sure knowledge of the true God, so that we may not fluctuate in uncertainty.

By true God he does not mean one who tells the truth, but him who is really God; and he so calls him to distinguishing him from all idols. Thus true is in opposition to what is fictitious; for it is ἀληθινὸς, and not ἀληθής A similar passage is in John

“This is eternal life, to know thee,

the only true God,

and him whom thou hast sent,

Jesus Christ.”

(Joh 17:3)

And he justly ascribes to Christ this office of illuminating our minds as to the knowledge of God. For, as he is the only true image of the invisible God, as he is the only interpreter of the Father, as he is the only guide of life, yea, as he is the life and light of the world and the truth, as soon as we depart from him, we necessarily become vain in our own devices.

And Christ is said to have given us an understanding, not only because he shews us in the gospel what sort of being is the true God, and also illuminates us by his Spirit; but because in Christ himself we have God manifested in the flesh, as Paul says, since in him dwells all the fullness of the Deity, and are hid all the treasures of knowledge and wisdom. (Col 2:9.) Thus it is that the face of God in a manner appears to us in Christ; not that there was no knowledge, or a doubtful knowledge of God, before the coming of Christ,, but that now he manifests himself more fully and more clearly. And this is what Paul says in 2Co 4:6, that

God, who formerly commanded light to shine out of darkness at the creation of the world, hath now shone in our hearts through the brightness of the knowledge of his glory in the face of Christ.

And it must be observed, that this gift is peculiar to the elect. Christ, indeed, kindles for all indiscriminately the torch of his gospel; but all have not the eyes of their minds opened to see it, but on the contrary Satan spreads the veil of blindness over many. Then the Apostle means the light which Christ kindles within in the hearts of his people, and which when once kindled, is never extinguished, though in some it may for a time be smothered.

We are in him that is true By these words he reminds us how efficacious is that knowledge which he mentions, even because by it we are united to Christ; and become one with God; for it has a living root, fixed in the heart, by which it comes that God lives in us and we in him. As he says, without a copulative, that: we are in him that is true, in his Son, he seems to express the manner of our union with God, as though he had said, that we are in God through Christ. (97)

This is the true God Though the Arians have attempted to elude this passage, and some agree with them at this day, yet we have here a remarkable testimony to the divinity of Christ. The Arians apply this passage to the Father, as though the Apostle should again repeat that he is the true God. But nothing could be more frigid than such a repetition. It has already twice testified that the true God is he who has been made known to us in Christ, why should he again add, This is the true God ? It applies, indeed, most suitably to Christ; for after having taught us that Christ is the guide by whose hand we are led to God, he now, by way of amplifying, affirms that Christ is that God, lest we should think that we are to seek further; and he confirms this view by what is added, and eternal life. It is doubtless the same that is spoken of, as being the true God and eternal life. I pass by this, that the relative οὗτος usually refers to the last person. I say, then, that Christ is properly called eternal life; and that this mode of speaking perpetually occurs in John, no one can deny.

The meaning is, that when we have Christ, we enjoy the true and eternal God, for nowhere else is he to be sought; and, secondly, that we become thus partakers of eternal life, because it is offered to us in Christ though hid in the Father. The origin of life is, indeed, the Father; but the fountain from which we are to draw it, is Christ.



(97) It is rendered by some, “through his Son Jesus Christ.” Our version, “even in his Son Jesus Christ,” seems not to be right, as it makes “him that is true,” to be the Son, while the reference is to God, as in the previous clause. The true meaning would be thus conveyed, “And we are in the true God, being in his Son Jesus Christ;” for to be in Christ, is to be in God. Three MSS., the Vulgate, and several of the Fathers, read thus, “and we are in his true Son Jesus Christ”. — Ed.



21Keep yourselves from idols Though this be a separate sentence, yet it is as it were an appendix to the preceding doctrine. For the vivifying light of the Gospel ought to scatter and dissipate, not only darkness, but also all mists, from the minds of the godly. The Apostle not only condemns idolatry, but commands us to beware of all images and idols; by which he intimates, that the worship of God cannot continue uncorrupted and pure whenever men begin to be in love with idols or images. For so innate in us is superstition, that the least occasion will infect us with its contagion. Dry wood will not so easily burn when coals are put under it, as idolatry will lay hold on and engross the minds of men, when an occasion is given to them. And who does not see that images are the sparks? What sparks do I say? nay, rather torches, which are sufficient to set the whole world on fire.

The Apostle at the same time does not only speak of statues, but also of altars, and includes all the instruments of superstitions. Moreover, the Papists are ridiculous, who pervert this passage and apply it to the statues of Jupiter and Mercury and the like, as though the Apostle did not teach generally, that there is a corruption of religion whenever a corporeal form is ascribed to God, or whenever statues and pictures form a part of his worship. Let us then remember that we ought carefully to continue in the spiritual worship of God, so as to banish far from us everything that may turn us aside to gross and carnal superstitions.

end of the first epistle of John