JOHX, EPISTLES OF
hate his brother Christian. Love lights the path, so that he can walk without stumbling.
The writer then turns to iinniediate circum- stances (vv. !-■'''). The sin which keeps them far from God has been removed ; the experience of the old and the strength of the young have secured victory (w.^^- ^'■^). This explains how he could write as he has written. Their knowledge and strength made it possible for him to use the words he has penned (vv.^^''- ^■^). But there is need of hard striving. Love of the world may soon destroy all that they have gained. The world is passing ; only that which is done according to God's will abides (vv.^^'^^).
(6) So he passes to the first statement of the christological thesis (vv.^®"^^). Faith in Jesus as the Christ is the test of fellowship with God. The passing of the transitory suggests the signs of the times. The last hour has struck. The saying ' Antichrist cometh ' is being fulfilled in the many false teachers who have appeared. The F"aith had gained a decisive victory, in the unmasking of the traitors, who had to go. The crisis had shown that all such false teachers, however they differed among themselves, were aliens, and no true mem- bers of the Body. This the readers knew, if they would use their knowledge. Their anointing had given to all of them knowledge to detect falsehood. Falsehood culminates in the denial that Jesus is the Messiah. This denial includes denial of the Father, in spite of Gnostic claims to superior knowledge. All true knowledge of the Father comes through the Son. It is gained in living and abiding union, the eternal life which He has pro- mised (vv.'^"-^). This much he must write about the deceivers. If his readers had used their know- ledge, he need not have written it (vv.^- ^). Let them abide, and confidence will be theirs when ' He ' appears (v.^^). Who can have this confidence ? Those who know that God is just, and who there- fore learn in the experience of Christian life that the doing of righteousness is the true test of the birth from God {v.^).
2-^-4®. — (a) We pass to the second statement of the ethical thesis (2^(-'-3-^) : the doing of righteous- ness, i.e. love of the brethren, shown in active ser- vice, is the sign by which we may know that we are ' loving God.' In 3^"^ thesis and warning are con- sidered in the light of the duty of self-purification, laid upon us by the gift of sonship and the hope of its consummation. Everyone who has this hope must of necessity purify himself here and now. Lawlessness does not consist only in disobeying the injunctions of a definite code. There is a higher Law Avhich is broken by every act of afxaprla, of failure to realize in life the ideal set before men in the human life of Jesus Christ. This is further explained in vv.'-^s, introduced by an earnest warn- ing against deceivers. The doer of righteousness alone has attained to Christ-like righteousness. The doer of sin still belongs to the Devil, who has been working for sin throughout human history. So, if we realize that for us rigliteousness finds its clearest expression in love of t lie brethren, we gain a clear contrast : God's children, always striving to realize the ideal of sinless love, and the children of the Devil, striving after, or drifting towards, their own ideal of sinful hate and selfish greed. Sinlessness, i.e. righteousness, is not the monopoly of a chosen race, or section of men. It is the natural outcome of the new life which every man majr have, if he will take it and use it, to follow Christ, not Cain, whose evil life found its natural expression in the final issue of hatred — murder with violence (v.'^). Verses 13-18 contain varia- tions on the same theme. The world's hatred sliould not surprise them ; it is the natural atti- tude of those who cannot stand the sight of good.
They really ought to know that love and death, mui-der and eternal life, have nothing in common. And Christ's example has shown what love is. At least tliey can show their love in helping their brethren. He who has not even got so far as that need not talk of God's love. With an exhortation to sincerity in loving service (v.^*) the meditation passes over once more to the tests of truth. How can we know that we are on the side of truth, and still the accusations of our consciences ? — By throw- ing ourselves on God's omniscience. AVlien a man feels conhdence towards God and finds that his prayers are answered — that he wishes for and does the things that God wills — his conscience ceases to accuse (w.^"-^). God's will is shown in His com- mand— which is more than a series of precepts : He bids men have faith in Christ and love like His. These lead to fellowship with Him. Men know that they have it by their possession of the Spirit which He has given (vv.-^- -^).
(b) Thus the interlacing of Faith and Love leads on to the second presentation of the christological thesis (4^"**), in such a way as to show its vital con- nexion with the ethical. The mention of _ the Spirit suggests the form of the new statement. All spiritual phenomena could not be regarded as the work of God's Spirit, The spirits must be tested by their attitude to the Christ. The reality of the Incarnation as a permanent union between God and man is the vital truth. The statement (42.3) ig followed by a short meditation (vv.*"^) on the attitude of the Church and the world to the two confessions and those who make them. The spirits of truth and error are clearly discerned by the kinds of people who listen to them.