4.1-21

We can read a fuller description of the "final Antichrist" that is coming in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, 8-9, but the "spirit of the antichrist" is already in the world (v3); and "even now, many antichrists have come" (1 Jn 2.18). Knowing this and having Paul's convicting testimony that many will prefer to believe what people say as long as it makes them (us) comfortable with who they (we) already are, RIGHT NOW is the time to be sure of the source of your "truth." "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths." 2 Timothy 4:3–4. Satan began immediately after creation with a 3-fold plan to deceive the world: 1) Doubt (Gen 3:1), 2) Denial (Gen 3:4), and 3) Distortion (Gen 3:5). He is still using this original plan today. Because Satan knows we are more apt to blindly trust those who appear to come from God, who do you presume he and his demons will disguise themselves as? "And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light." (2 Cor. 11:14). Abiding in God's Word enables us to accomplish what John is admonishing in the opening verses of chapter 4 - "but test the spirits to see whether they are from God" (v1). To counter Satan's plan, Christians must guard the truth by "knowing it." Firmly holding to the truth of God's Word as a conviction, we will be able to recognize the difference between the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Failing to do so results in not only being confused and unable to discern for yourself but also an inability to accurately convey the truth to others.

CHAPTER 4

Test the Spirits

1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,
3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.
4 You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.
5 They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world hears them.
6 We are from God. The one who knows God hears us; the one who is not from God does not hear us. From this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

God Is Love

7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
9 By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.
10 In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
12 No one has beheld God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.
13 By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.
14 We have beheld and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.
15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
16 And we have come to know and have believed the love which God has in us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
17 By this, love has been perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, because as He is, so also are we in this world.
18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love.
19 We love, because He first loved us.
20 If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.
21 And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.