Words in italic type have been added for clarity. They are not found in the original Hebrew or Aramaic.

I John 5

What should I learn from this chapter?

• The story hidden from the ages
• Faith overcomes the world
• Definition of an Idol

Obedience by Faith

I John 5:¹ Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ (Messiah) is born of God, and everyone who loves Him (the Father) who begot (the Son) also loves him (the believer) who is begotten of Him (God).

I John 5:² By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments.

I John 5:³ For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.

I John 5:⁴ For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world— our (or your) faith.

I John 5:⁵ Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

• The “world” is the pleasures of this life without regard to the next life.
• Those who can overcome the world are born of God.

The Certainty of God’s Witness

I John 5:⁶ This is He who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not only by water, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth.

I John 5:⁷ For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word (the Son), and the Holy Spirit; and these three are One.

• Verse 7 says the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are “One”.
  Deuteronomy 6:4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one! (One in character, purpose, agreement.)

I John 5:⁸ And there are three that bear witness on earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree as one.

• Verse 8 says the Spirit, Water, and Blood “Agree as One”.

• A Trinity of Words: The Spirit, The Water, The Blood

• A “witness” is a pillar. Egyptian pillars were called “witnesses” because of the pictographs inscribed on them. They tell a story to be repeated throughout the ages.
  God has a story, a bigger story than any inscribed on any pillar. He wants to declare it throughout the ages. His witnesses are His Word, His saints, His Signs and Wonders, His Angels, and even the Rocks will shout out should His creation not know His story. Alleluiah! Hear and Believe:
  
• We, God’s creation, have a God who is not like us. If He were – He would be our worst nightmare: An All-Powerful God that doesn’t have our best interests at heart.
  Have you ever felt like that? Know and believe this…your enemy is not God, your enemy is His enemy. Your enemy is your accuser who will do anything to cripple you.
  
  Unlike Satan, God will do anything to heal you. And that is how it all began…not in the Garden of Eden, but behind the veil in the Holy of Holies of the heavens when God made the decision to save his creation even before He created them.
  
  God had a terrifying plan, ugly, horrible, and dark. He put His plan in a chest (a secret place) and slid it into the darkness (unrevealed). Only He knows the outcome, an outcome so wonderful nothing will ever compare to it. No story-line can compete with it.
  
  Envision God’s Plan that can only be described metaphorically, God, as the solitary Powerhouse of Light (Energy and Heat), the One and only God, turned His energy inward – producing an embryonic division of Himself as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, sharing identical spiritual DNA, each with a separate role, a cell division, but united in motive, purpose, and holiness.
  
• Behind heaven’s veil (a secret), the Son, with a song in His heart, made a vow.
  
  • Jonah 2:9 But I will sacrifice to You, With the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord.”
    
• The Son morphed into a Lamb as Lightning struck, splaying it into two pieces. The Father and the Spirit walked between the pieces sealing the covenant of death, signed in blood by the Son.
  
  • Revelation 13:8 All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
    
• God then created the Heavens and the Earth from His own Light through the power of His Right Arm: the Son of the King, the Prince.
  
  • John 1:3 All things were made through Him (Jesus), and without Him (Jesus) nothing was made that was made.
  • Hebrews 12:2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
  • John 17:21 that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me.
  • John 1:1-3 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. ALL things were made through Him, and without Him NOTHING WAS MADE that was made.

• Nobody knows what God does from beginning to end. But by the Word of God we can tell the amazing story of the birth and baptism (the Water), the cross (the Blood), and the resurrection (the Spirit), and we wait in faith to see the end.

• Ecclesiastes 3:11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.

• [NOTE: vs 7 and 8: Only 4 or 5 very late manuscripts contain these words in Greek.]

I John 5:⁹ If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which He has testified of His Son.

I John 5:¹⁰ He who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony that God has given of His Son.

• John 6:28-29 Then they said to Him, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?” Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.”

I John 5:¹¹ And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.

I John 5:¹² He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.

• Either/Or, Black or White, there are no shades of grey. The life He offers is Eternal Life, and it begins NOW.

I John 5:¹³ These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.

• I Corinthians 15:1-4 Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: (Note: THE Gospel =) that Christ (1) died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and (2) that He was buried, and that (3) He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,

Confidence and Compassion in Prayer

I John 5:¹⁴ Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.

I John 5:¹⁵ And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

I John 5:¹⁶ If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin which does not lead to death, he will ask, and He will give him life for those who commit sin not leading to death. There is sin leading to death. I do not say that he should pray about that.

I John 5:¹⁷ All unrighteousness is sin, and there is sin not leading to death.

• Is the writer speaking of physical death, spiritual death, or both?
  • Physical: Which people mentioned in scripture do we know that God took their physical life and why?

Knowing the True—Rejecting the False

I John 5:¹⁸ We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps (guards) himself (him), and the wicked one (Satan) does not touch him.

I John 5:¹⁹ We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.

• The whole world lies under the influence of Satan. He is called “the god of this age/world”.

I John 5:²⁰ And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.

I John 5:²¹ Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.

• Idol = Anything that takes priority over God.
  
  • Matthew 10:37 He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.
  • Luke 16:13 “No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon (riches).”
  • Joshua 24:15 … choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, … But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”