Whoever denies the Son has not the Father either; he who confesses the Son has the Father also.
The verse stands in the middle of John's warning about antichrists, and it turns a doctrinal dispute into a personal test. Everything depends on where a person stands towards the Son — and John says the Father comes or goes with Him.
Christian words and Christian practice can fool us. Hamilton Smith names the one question that settles it:
Having the Spirit and the truth, we at once learn that the Person of Christ is the great test of every antichristian system. We may be deceived if we judge them by the Christian terms they may use and the practice they may pursue. The real test is this: where do they stand on the truth about the Person of Christ? Every false system denies the truth of His Person in some form. There are, however, two main forms of error and opposition to the truth. One of them, found mainly among the Jews, denies that Jesus is the Christ — the Messiah who is to come. The other rises among those who profess Christianity, and it denies the truth of the Father and the Son.
William Kelly turns to people who claim to honour God the Father while denying the Son:
The Unitarians claim to honour the Father, but they deny the Son. The result is that their claim to the Father, according to this verse, is worth nothing at all. The Father is not the test of the truth; the Son is. So if anyone acknowledges the Son, he has the Father also. They go together. But the Son is the only test, and the one Mediator.
The first half of the verse looks obvious until you see who it targets. Darby says why John had to write it:
It is also important to note this word in verse 23, "No one who denies the Son has the Father." Many who reject Christ pretend that they do not reject the Father.
Another writer shows what that pretence is really after:
Men will pretend to honour the Father while they try to dishonour the Son. But Scripture is plain: "No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also." Those who deny the eternal Sonship of Jesus are known for boasting of their worship of the Father. The enemy will attack any and every part of the truth, but his real object is the Person of the Son.
Edward Dennett takes up the claim to believe in God without Christ:
So God — God the Father — cannot be known apart from the Son. He cannot be known apart from the truth of what He is in His own essential dignity, or apart from the truth of His person, as Jesus Christ come in the flesh… To claim faith in God apart from Christ amounts to rejecting the true God. God has made Himself known only in Christ, and He can be known nowhere else.
Saying the words is not the same as knowing God. J. G. Bellett makes the point:
I may say, "Abba, Father," in the spirit of adoption. A poet may say, "We are also His offspring." But no one knows God as the Father unless the Son is acknowledged in the glory of the Godhead.
The second half of the verse is the promise. H. J. Vine lists what comes with the Son:
We are to leave alone those who do not confess the Son. They have not the Father. "Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also" (v. 23). He knows the Father. He has the Father. He has eternal life. And all this is because he "has the Son" (5:12). These vital possessions are abiding, enduring, and eternal.
James Boyd adds that no believer before Christ came had this:
To have the Son, then, is to have the Father. No believer in past times had this, for the Father had not come to light. The revelation of the Father waited for the Son to be shown. Both came to light together, and both are known together. To have the One is to have the Other.
Some older Bibles print the second half of the verse in italics, as if the translators doubted it. One writer explains why, and why the words belong:
An example is 1 John 2:23. In our New Testament the last half of the verse stands in italics, as if it were not in the Greek. But it is in many Greek copies (except the word 'but'), and it is genuine beyond doubt. It was probably left out because both halves of the verse end with the same Greek words, 'has the Father.'
- Test — the real measure of any teaching is not the Christian words it uses but where it stands on the Person of the Son.
- Pretence — many who reject Christ still claim the Father. John cuts that claim off. The enemy's real target is the Son.
- Access — there is no way to the Father around the Son. God has made Himself known only in Christ.
- Gift — whoever confesses the Son has the Father, knows Him, and has eternal life. The Father and the Son come together, never apart.
- Wording — older Bibles italicise the closing clause, but it is genuine. A copyist's eye slipped, because both halves end with the same words.
As for *you* let that which ye have heard from the beginning abide in you if what ye have heard from the beginning abides in you, *ye* also shall abide in the Son and in the Father.
John writes to people surrounded by teachers who deny the Son. His answer is not a new argument but an old one — hold on to what you already have, because what abides in you decides where you abide.
The phrase is easy to misread as a person. One commentator notes the exact wording and where it sends us back to:
"Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you." It is not "Him that is from the beginning," but "what (or, that which) you heard from the beginning." He goes back as far as the opening words of the first chapter. The difference between "Him that was from the beginning" and "that which" is very small. In fact both are true, each perfect in its own place. But an emphasis is lost in the Authorised Version. It should be brought out at the start of verse 24, as newer translations do: "As for you, let that which you heard from the beginning abide in you." What he presses is this: abiding in what they heard from the beginning.
So the message and the Person are not rivals. What they first heard was itself the revelation of the Son:
If the truth that we have received from the beginning abides in us, we abide in the Son and in the Father; for this truth is the revelation of the Son, and is revealed by the Son, who is the truth. It is living truth, if it abides in us; so, by having it, we have the Son, and in the Son, the Father also. We abide in it, and by that we have eternal life (compare John 17:3).
If the first message was the Person of Christ, then Christian truth has no later editions. That is the reason the verse can command us simply to stay:
"From the beginning" is Christ in flesh, the beginning of God's ways in grace… Man develops, progresses, changes. What was from the beginning in what God does is perfect. This is a root principle of Christianity. It makes the Person of Christ the foundation of everything. His work displays God's moral nature to others, but His Person is that in which He is. We hold to Him. This cannot change. The essence of Christianity is, therefore, that there is no development in it.
The Antichrist denies the Father and the Son. The refuge of the youngest believers is what they heard at the start, and holding it keeps them in true communion:
The Antichrist will deny the Father and the Son, and that Jesus is the Christ. Now these are terrible falsehoods, and the faithful in the last days will be kept from believing them. Meanwhile, evil ripens and the spirit of falsehood spreads further. The sure refuge of the babes is that what they had heard from the beginning should abide in them. Then they would abide, in true communion, in the Son and in the Father. No one will deceive them with talk of the "universal fatherhood" of God, or anything like it. They will not settle for anything less than the true confession of the Son: "whoever denies the Son does not have the Father."
The verse names the Son first, then the Father. That order is deliberate:
In 1 John 2:24, it is abiding "in the Son and in the Father." The whole treatment of this matter here is meant to teach us how truly the Son is one with the Father. We cannot be in the Son without being in the Father, and we can only be in the Father by being in the Son. For that reason the Son comes first in 1 John 2:24.
What John gave the babes has a long reach beyond their crisis:
The "babes" had the anointing of the Holy One, and they knew the truth. But now the apostle adds an exhortation… This is the third source or means of their safety, and in it lies a principle of lasting importance. Once corruption has come in and produced confusion on every hand, there is no other remedy than to go back to the beginning. The apostle Paul urges Timothy in the same way. In the difficult days he faced, Timothy was to continue in the things he had learned and been assured of, knowing who taught him (2 Timothy 3:14-17).
- Heard. The command fixes on what you heard at the beginning. That first message is itself the revelation of the Son.
- Held. Christianity has no development. What God gave at the start is perfect, so holding on is safety, not backwardness.
- Housed. The truth kept in you is living truth. Hold it, and you have the Son — and in the Son, the Father.
- Home. You cannot be in the Son without being in the Father, and you reach the Father only through the Son. So John names the Son first.
- Return. When confusion spreads, the remedy is not a new answer but the old one: go back to the beginning.
And this is the promise which *he* has promised us, life eternal.
John has just warned his readers about deceivers, and told them to hold on to what they heard from the beginning. Here he names what God has promised them: eternal life. But how can a life that believers already have still be called a promise?
One writer ties this promise to the verse before it, and to how Jesus Himself described eternal life.
This continuing in the Son and in the Father is eternal life. The Lord Jesus spoke of eternal life as, "that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent" (John 17:3). Verse 25 of our chapter carries this a step further. He who abides in the Son and in the Father is abiding in the life which is eternal. The Eternal Life had been shown and seen, but that was the privilege of the apostles only. Now we may have that life and be in it; and this is for all of us, for these things were written to the babes in the family of God.
One writer asks where the truth is found, and whether anything can be added to it.
Where then is the truth, and what is it? It is Christ; and it is Christ as He was shown here. How can there be any development of Him, or of God's written word which reveals Him? Nothing can be added to make the truth more perfect than it is... The truth cannot be separated from Christ, and from Christ as God has revealed Him in His word.
John writes to the youngest believers. Another writer shows what the enemy was aiming at.
God's safeguard for the babes of His family is that they hold fast the truth they have heard. What had come out in Jesus was to have a lasting place in the heart. They were to treasure it there, and it was to form them in the truth about the Father and the Son. This was the real substance of Christianity, that in which eternal life consisted... The enemy sought to rob the babes of the enjoyment of eternal life by taking from them the truth of the Person of the Son. If they lost the truth about the Son, they lost the truth about the Father. They would also lose the joys that these great truths bring to the soul.
The deceivers made promises of their own. One writer sets them against God's promise, and names the error they were pushing.
The babes need and receive the most watchful warning against innovators who overturn the truth by promises as false as God's promise is true... The recent deceivers tried to persuade themselves and others about eternal life. They said we do not have it now in the Son, and can only receive it at the resurrection. But this is to forget and abandon what we heard from the beginning; it was a lie, and no lie is of the truth.
Two things stand behind the word "promised": the character of God who gave it, and the coming of His Son.
"God cannot lie." Every promise of His shall be fulfilled, not a word of His shall fail. And He has promised eternal life, and He did it before the ages of time. The promise was made before time began, but it had to be brought into time and shown there. When the ages of time have passed away and ended, full blessedness will remain in glory and love for ever. But the fulfilment of the promise depended on one thing: the Son coming out of eternity into time.
Scripture speaks of eternal life as something believers have today, and also as something still ahead. One writer shows where each emphasis comes from.
This eternal life is in God's Son, and true believers have it in Him now, and shall have it in Him and with Him for all eternity (1 John 5:11). Through John the Spirit of God presents eternal life as something the saints in Christ have even now. Through Paul the Holy Spirit presents it as tied to our glorified condition with Christ in a coming day. So it is a "blessed hope", the "hope of eternal life" (Titus 1:2; Titus 2:13; Titus 3:7).
- Promised — a God who cannot lie promised eternal life before time began. Its fulfilment waited on the Son stepping out of eternity into time.
- Given — the life once seen only by the apostles now belongs to every child of God, down to the youngest.
- Held — the way to hold the promise is to abide: continuing in the Son and in the Father is itself the eternal life.
- Guarded — the truth heard from the beginning keeps the promise safe. Nothing can be added to Christ as God revealed Him, and deceivers make promises as false as God's promise is true.
- Completed — John shows the life as ours today. Paul shows it as our hope. It is one life, held now and enjoyed in full in glory.
These things have I written to you concerning those who lead you astray
John gives the youngest believers in his family a warning. He has been writing about people who are trying to pull them off course. Who were these deceivers? And why did John think the least mature Christians needed to hear about them?
Much of the New Testament exists because error broke in first. One writer sets this verse inside that larger pattern.
The greater part of the New Testament — the letters — owes its origin to the damage Satan did in the Church. God allowed the damage only so that the folly of these things would be shown up, and so that the full glory of the truth would come out. "I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you." What he writes about here is what certain pretenders held. They made the highest claims for themselves, and they would lead these believers astray.
John aims this warning at the "babes" — the newest believers. One writer draws a pointed lesson from that choice about how we treat new converts.
Notice that it is the babes John warns about this danger and trap. That matters greatly. In our day people too often think it needless — or even unwise — to warn young converts about common errors. John, on the other hand, speaks plainly, and prepares them for the dangers that lie all around their path. Even a worldly proverb says, "To be forewarned is to be forearmed." Many a shipwreck would have been spared us if those who lead in the Church of God had copied John's example.
So how did they work? One writer describes their method: a promise of something more than these young believers already had.
Seducers raise doubts even more than other unbelievers do, to spread their own errors and lead astray the simple who enjoy the truth of God. One of the great aims of this letter is to arm even the youngest believers against their evil and dangerous tricks. One way these seducers worked was to make the immature doubt whether they had the full truth. The antichrists claimed there was far more to know than anyone had known before. This new light of theirs was the great prize, they said. And if you did not have it, that raised the question whether you were a real Christian at all.
Calling such people liars sounds harsh. One writer answers that objection, and links plain speech to where our hearts really are.
It was an evil at work from the very beginning. And what mercy there is even in this! The evil did exist, and it had to come to light at some point. So God allowed it to break out then, and put His own revealed verdict on it. We would never have dared to say such strong things about people we had known as friends, or as so-called brothers. Call them liars! How shocking and unloving, people would say. But the moment anyone sets himself against the full revelation of the Son of God — or rather, denies it — the Holy Spirit makes no allowance for it. I believe we ought not to either. If the heart is unprepared for this, you will find something else goes along with it. Where self-love, touchiness and stubbornness rule unchecked in what touches ourselves, there is little care for the Lord Jesus.
John does not leave the warning alone. One writer points to the safeguard that follows, and to a common misuse of it.
Here we have the reason the apostle speaks to the babes this way. We must not shut our eyes to the seduction all around us. But their safeguard comes right after: the anointing they have received. Let us not misunderstand that, because I have heard it said, "Oh, I can get on without teaching." I do not think you will. If someone despises teaching, you may be sure that person never grows or gets on. The Lord has given helps and teachers. But the point is this: the young soul has an anointing of the Holy Spirit, and there is no need for the teaching of new things.
Why can the anointing be trusted when a teacher may not be?
They did not rely on teachers to tell them what was true and what was false. That was the work of the anointing of the Spirit. Teachers may be true or false, but the anointing is always true; nothing false comes from this divine teacher.
- Cause. Error came in, and God allowed it so its folly would be shown up and the truth would shine out. Much of the New Testament exists because of it.
- Target. John aims the warning at the youngest believers. He prepares them for danger instead of hiding it from them.
- Tactic. The deceivers promised new light beyond the truth held from the beginning. They worked by making young believers doubt they had the whole truth.
- Plain speech. Where people deny the Son of God, Scripture makes no allowance. A heart full of self finds that plainness offensive; a heart set on Christ does not.
- Safeguard. The anointing inside the believer tells truth from lie. Teachers may be true or false; the anointing is always true.
and *yourselves*, the unction which ye have received from him abides in you, and ye have not need that any one should teach you; but as the same unction teaches you as to all things, and is true and is not a lie, and even as it has taught you, ye shall abide in him.
Teachers were pulling these believers away from Christ, and John answers by pointing to something they already hold. So what is this anointing, and does the verse really mean a Christian needs no human teacher?
John comforts the least mature part of the family, not the most advanced. One writer weighs what that means for every believer further along:
How striking that he comforts not the whole family, but the least mature part of it! He assures them that they possess the great, distinctive privilege Christ went on high to send down, to be in them and with them. They wait for His coming, with all the power of the world and the schemes of Satan set against them. The babes, he declares, have an anointing from the Holy One, and by His power living in them we can say they know all things. If that is so with them, how much less can anyone deny it to the young men and the fathers in the household of faith?
The anointing is the Holy Spirit Himself, given to them and staying. One writer sets it beside the other thing that abides — the word they heard:
He had said that the word they heard was to abide in them — the one written standard of the truth. Now he repeats the other blessed truth. The holy anointing, the Spirit given to them, abides. His anointing abides in you, "little children": this He faithfully continues. And the anointing of the Spirit is for understanding and enjoying, in power, the truth of God in Christ.
The anointing gives capacity, not a ready-made store of facts:
John teaches the "babes" that since the Holy Spirit has anointed them, they are themselves at the source of all knowledge. He does not mean that they in fact know all things. He means that, in having the anointing, they have within themselves the possibility of knowing, and so of telling truth from error.
Some have used this clause to dismiss human teachers altogether. One writer answers that directly:
I hardly need to say this does not refer to Christian teaching. Some have abused this text to deny the need of God-given teachers. That is not the thought at all. But we have received an anointing from God — we need no human teaching, only divine. Suppose someone comes to you claiming he has found some wonderful truth in Theosophy, Spiritism, or Christian Science. Do not be tempted to look into it. The anointing you have already received teaches you. There is nothing beyond that.
The word itself points back to oil, and to the difference between a channel and a source:
Oil is clearly a picture of the Holy Spirit. It was called the anointing oil, and the Spirit given to believers is called "the anointing." Man, as man, cannot teach his fellow man the things of God. Man, as a vessel of the Holy Spirit, may serve as a gracious channel, but the source of the teaching is always and ever the Holy Spirit.
Teachers can be right or wrong. This teacher carries no such risk:
Teachers have their work to do. They bring the word of God before the saints, and it carries its own authority and conviction to the soul. But it is the Spirit of God who makes divine truth good to us. Teachers may be true or false; the anointing is always true. Nothing false comes from this divine teacher.
And this safeguard belongs to the youngest believer, not the seasoned one:
Notice, too, it is the babe who has this anointing. It is not a matter of attainment, or even of experience. It is a divine instinct that lets us detect error and refuse it. We recognise it as not truth, because it does not give us the Christ of God; therefore we reject it.
The verse ends not in knowledge but in staying with Christ, and the order matters:
This order is very beautiful. First the anointing. Then this anointing teaching them all things. And last, abiding in Him. What could lead us astray, if the anointing of the Holy Spirit worked mightily in our souls, if we kept receiving His teachings, and if we were abiding in Christ! We should then be in the living enjoyment of the source of all knowledge, power, and blessing.
- Anointing — The anointing is the Holy Spirit, given and staying, so that we understand and enjoy the truth of God in Christ.
- Given to babes — John presses it on the least mature believers first; if they have it, no one further along lacks it.
- Teaches — It supplies capacity to know and to tell truth from error, not a finished store of knowledge.
- Not against teachers — Teachers stay God's gift and God's channel. What the verse rules out is human teaching as the source.
- Abide — The order is anointing, then teaching, then abiding in Him — and a soul kept in that order is not led astray.
And now, children, abide in him, that if he be manifested we may have boldness, and not be put to shame from before him at his coming.
The chapter has warned about people who left the faith. John answers that danger with one short instruction — abide — and points to the day Christ appears.
The chapter has just sorted believers into fathers, young men and babes. Here that sorting stops. John's word now takes in every believer, whatever their growth.
With verse 28, the Apostle speaks again to the whole family of God. He speaks to all His children, whatever their spiritual growth or state. He had just told the babes that the Anointing was theirs, and that they could therefore "abide in Him." Now he urges the whole family to "abide in Him." What is good for the babes is good for all. This abiding is the way of all spiritual fruitfulness and growth. When we drift from Him, and our affections and interests settle on the things of the world, then we are feeble and unfruitful.
Abiding is practical. It touches the will, our weakness, and God's word.
To abide in Him, then, means more than the practical surrender of our wills and distrust of ourselves. It also means clinging to Him in love, leaning on Him in our weakness, and fellowship with Him in His thoughts, as His word makes them known.
The drift John warns about had already begun.
Remember that this departure was then going on. It began with Judas — or if not with Judas, then with the many disciples who turned back and walked with Him no more. They left from the time He showed that His coming in the flesh and His death are the food faith cannot do without... Confess Him if you believe; confess Him if your hearts rest on Him for life eternal. And not merely confess Him, but, whatever the pressure, abide in Him.
Some translations read "if He be manifested" instead of "when." That is not doubt about whether He will come.
The word "if" does not refer to the time "when." It refers to the reality of the event, whenever the time comes for Christ to appear. There is no doubt about the future fact. It is not a question left hanging whether it is to be. But if He appears — and He surely must — He would have the saints abide in Him, and not be turned aside. Then we may have boldness and not be ashamed before Him at His coming.
John does not say you may have confidence. He puts himself inside the sentence, and commentators take that in two ways. One reading hears a teacher's concern for the people he taught.
If they did not abide in Him, the apostle had lost all his work. It would have been to that extent his shame. You get the same thing in the second epistle (v. 8): "Watch yourselves, so that we may not lose what we have worked for, but may win a full reward."... The apostle here is pressing them to abide in Christ, so that he may not be ashamed of his work.
Others read the "we" as John including himself among all believers. On that reading, the shame falls on someone who only claimed to have life, never on a true child of God.
If the life is not there, then of course there is no abiding. Someone who has only assumed that he has life will be exposed when the Lord appears, and "put to shame from before Him at His coming." This cannot refer to a true believer. The believer "abides in Him," and he will not be treated as an unbeliever at the Lord's coming.
If salvation is certain, does a believer's conduct still matter?
As in 1 Corinthians 3:15, so in 1 John 2:28, it is only a question of the Lord's dealings about their labours, and not about their righteousness. Some fear that pure grace and the certainty of salvation would let people follow their own will. But suppose a father said to his son, "You are my son; you will always be my son." Would he add, "So you can do whatever you like"? No. He would say, "You ought to behave as my son."
- Everyone. The address widens from fathers, young men and babes to every child of God. What John said to the youngest believer, he says to all.
- Abide. It means a surrendered will, distrust of self, dependence in weakness, and fellowship with Christ through His word.
- Against drift. People were already leaving. John's call is to confess Him and stay with Him whatever the pressure.
- Certain. The "if" in some translations raises no doubt at all. Christ will appear; the word points to the reality of that day, not to its date.
- Shared outcome. John says "we," not "you." Commentators differ: the shame may fall on the worker whose labour was lost, or expose a life that was never real. For believers, it touches their labours and reward, not their righteousness.
If ye know that he is righteous, know that every one who practises righteousness is begotten of him.
The closing verse of 1 John 2 sets a plain test: righteousness lived out shows where a person's life came from. Two questions follow: who is the "He" who is righteous, and what righteousness John means.
One writer calls the verse a test, and says plainly what it is not for:
Verse 29 mentions the test of righteousness. It is an acid test. But its purpose is not to question whether their salvation is real, or to make them doubt. The test is there so that they can reject a false profession.
John does not name the person he calls righteous, and readers have long divided over the answer. One commentator says the letter itself leaves the answer open:
"If you know that He is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of Him." This righteous practice proves the source of the new life that walks this way. We may ask, who is "He"? Almost every Christian here would say "Christ," and he is quite right. But quite a few answer that "God" is the one called "righteous" here, because being born of Him in the same sentence points to God... But readers have overlooked a very striking feature of this letter: you cannot say for certain whether it means God or Christ. The ground of this is very precious, because Christ is God.
John does not argue from birth forward to behaviour. He argues from behaviour back to birth:
Verse 29 and chapter 3:1-9 present righteousness... John reasons like this: the fruits of life are there, so the life itself must be there too.
God sets the standard for this righteousness, not human opinion. One life on earth displayed it perfectly:
Righteousness is a divine trait, and everyone who practises righteousness is born of God. This is not righteousness of human standard, but what is of God. Law tested man for righteousness, and the verdict on all was, "None is righteous, no, not one." But God has a family on earth. Each one is born of Him and bears His character. We could never show the fruits of righteousness unless we were born of God. Jesus on earth showed righteousness in its perfection, with nothing mixed in. He is Jesus Christ the Righteous.
The word "righteousness" is easy to misread here. One writer explains what it means, and what it does not:
The child will be like Him of whom he is born. Having the same nature, it will bear the same fruits. But we must take great care to grasp what righteousness means. As the apostle Paul teaches, God makes every believer His righteousness in Christ (2 Cor. 5:21)... This gives him a perfect standing before God. John in this scripture does not speak of our standing. He speaks of our life down here — the display of the eternal life we have in Christ. So the righteousness he speaks of is practical.
Righteousness and obedience overlap, yet one writer draws a fine line between them:
Righteousness is always obedient. But in itself it expresses more than submission to God's authority. It also expresses consistency with the relationship we stand in.
Up to this point John has asked where a person walks — in light or in darkness. From here the question shifts:
The light that came into the world in the Person of the Son of God brought into being a people who bear the moral character of God. From this point (chapter 2:29) to the end of the letter it is not so much a question of where a man is, but of what he is. It is not, "Is he in the light?" or, "Is he in the darkness?" but "What is he?" Is he a child of God or a child of the devil? ... The great mark of one born of God, the thing that shows he is born of God, is that he practises righteousness. He is not only in the light, he is the fruit of the light, and he walks according to the light.
- Source. No one produces this righteousness out of himself. Where it shows, the life behind it came from God.
- Nature. To be born of Him is to bear His character. A child is like the one who gave it life.
- Fruit. John reasons from the fruit back to the life — the fruit is showing, so the life must be there.
- Test. The verse is not there to unsettle believers. It exposes a false claim, not the safety of God's children.
- Question. From this verse on, the issue is no longer where a person walks but what he is — a child of God, or not.
See what love the Father has given to us, that we should be called [the] children of God. For this reason the world knows us not, because it knew him not.
The verse opens with a call to stop and look. John points to a love that has given believers the name and place of children of God. Then he adds the cost: the world that never knew Christ does not know them either.
John does not simply say the Father loves us. He asks what kind of love this is. One writer sets it beside the best that human giving can manage:
It is not only this love that is stressed here, but "what kind of love." Human charity may call itself love because it gives generously, and maybe lifts someone out of misery and poverty into comfort and plenty. In one sense you may call that love, but it falls far short of the Father's love. This is a kind of love that does more than rescue enemies from a state of sin and total ruin, and clothe, feed and enrich them. It is satisfied with nothing less than bringing them into His own house for ever as His own children. True, pure love delights in having those it loves near.
The words "children" and "sons" are not the same, and the difference is family closeness:
"See what kind of love the Father has given to us." It is not only the measure of it but the kind of it that is so wonderful. It shows itself in this, that the Father has given us this boundless love "that we should be called children of God." "Children" is the right term, not "sons." John normally uses the word "son" only about Christ… To be a child of the family is more intimate than the position of an adopted son. We are sons by adoption, but we are children by the closest family tie to the Father, though both come through the Son.
The name is not flattery. It is a fact today, even though nothing on the outside shows it:
First of all, John speaks here of the present: "See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God." His love has already taken effect on us. Already today we are called, and are, children of God. But the world still knows nothing about it. It sees nothing special in us. This is because it has no relationship with Christ and sees nothing special in Him. The family of God is a mystery to them.
Why are believers called this only now? One writer points to what had to happen first:
There is no doubt that believers in the Old Testament were really children of God, but they were not called this, because the Father's love could not be fully shown or known until the Lord Jesus had come and atoned for sin at the cross.
The verse begins with the Father. But the one the world failed to know is Christ:
"The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know Him." Who? The "Him" here means Christ. The world did not know Him, and it does not know us for the same reason. We have the same life and character that He had. The world cannot recognise and own what is of Christ in us, because it did not recognise it in Christ.
Believers now stand where Christ stands. One writer follows that through, and adds a warning:
No one was ever as near to God as He was; but now we are brought into that very same nearness… So what is His becomes ours. But the world does not know us. Why? For the most precious reason — because it did not know Him. Whatever was His portion is our portion. If the world threw Him out, should I wonder if it throws us out too? If the world called Him every bad name, we must expect no better. Only let us take care that we do not deserve it.
Being unknown does not mean being invisible. God has given His children something to show the world:
If the world did not know the righteous Father presented in the righteous Son, it cannot know His righteous children. And it is to this place of children of God that the Father in His infinite love has called us. What a place of favour is ours while Christ is rejected from the earth — that we should be called to show the world the moral features of God!
- Love — it starts with the Father's giving, not with our worth. This love brings rescued enemies into His own house as His own children.
- Name — that love hands us a name: children of God. Writers stress this is closer than adopted sonship. A child shares the family's life, not just its title.
- Now — this name waited for the cross, and it is true today, even though outsiders see nothing special in us.
- Unknown — the world is blind to us because it was blind to Christ. His portion becomes ours, so rejection is no surprise.
- Display — while the earth refuses Christ, His children stay here to show the Father's moral features. That is the honour of the name, and its daily test.
Beloved, now are we children of God, and what we shall be has not yet been manifested; we know that if it is manifested we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.
John writes to people who already belong to God's family. Then he tells them that the best part has not appeared yet. The verse holds two things at once: a relationship settled today, and a change that waits for the day Christ appears.
John states a present fact, not a hope. One writer explains why John says "children" and not "sons":
John never speaks of "sons of God" in his message. In Paul's writings the Holy Spirit speaks of believers as "sons and heirs." But John unfolds the truth that believers are in the family of God by new birth. So he uses the word "children" to mark the shared nature of those born of God. As children of God we share in the divine nature... The Spirit of God gives the strongest assurance through the pen of John: "we are God's children now." There can be no doubt about it. It is our present and known position. We believed on Him, so we are born again and have eternal life.
The words "has not yet appeared" could sound as if the future were vague. But what is missing is public display, not information.
He adds something not yet manifested. It is not yet manifested what we shall be. What does he mean? That we shall be like Christ even in our bodies. He does not say or mean that it is not revealed to us, for it is set out in Scripture fully and simply. We would be wrong to think there is the smallest doubt about the result... his faith depends not on things that are seen, but on His assurance about things as yet unseen.
One writer pictures the difference between what the world will see and what His own will see:
When He is manifested in His glory, we shall not only be with Him but like Him, for we are going to see Him as He is. The world will see Him in that day, dressed in His majesty and His might. They will see Him in His official glories. We shall see Him in His more intimate personal glories. The crowd sees the kings of this world in official dress on state occasions. Their own families see them in private, as they are.
Why does John give sight as the reason for likeness? One line of comment takes the sight itself as the transforming power:
So great is the gracious power of the Second man to make us like Himself, that for us to see Him is to be like Him. When we saw Him here on earth by faith, we were made spiritually like Him. When we see Him bodily one day, we shall be like Him even in our bodies.
Commentators differ here. Another writer reads it the other way round: likeness is what makes the sight possible:
The thought here is not that the sight of Him will transform us then. There is a precious transforming power even now in looking into His face (2 Corinthians 3:18). But we are promised that we shall behold His face in righteousness. It follows that we must be like Him. Only after being made like Him will it be possible to take in the beauty and glory of His Person, "as He is."
"As He is" means what He is now, not what He will be. That glory is more than flesh could bear:
His glory is not yet manifested, but we shall be like Him, for "we shall see him as he is." That means not as He will be, but as He is now in heavenly glory at the right hand of God. The flesh could not see this and survive. Daniel fell as one dead, and John too, when it appeared. But we shall be like Him, and therefore able to see Him as He is.
One writer ties the change to Christ's coming, and marks it off from dying:
When are we to be like Christ in the glory? When He comes. It is not when a person dies and the spirit goes to be with Christ. Then he is like Christ when Christ was in the grave. And I do not want to be like Christ when Christ was in the grave... I want to be like Him in the glory. When will that be? When He comes, He will change our lowly bodies and fashion them like His glorious body.
- Now — the relationship is settled and known today. Believers are children of God by new birth, not candidates waiting for a verdict.
- Not yet — what is missing is public display, not information. Scripture states the outcome, so there is no doubt about it.
- When — the change comes at His appearing, not at death. At His coming He will fashion our lowly bodies like His glorious body.
- Sight — "as He is" means as He is now at God's right hand. Flesh could not see that glory and survive. Commentators differ: does the sight make us like Him, or does likeness make the sight possible?
- Likeness — the world will see Him in official majesty. His own will see Him in personal glory, and will be like Him even in their bodies.
And every one that has this hope in him purifies himself, even as *he* is pure.
John has just said that when Christ appears we shall be like Him. Verse 3 shows what that certainty does to the person who holds it. But who is the "him" the hope rests on? And how can anyone purify himself when Christ alone is pure?
The little phrase "in him" is easy to misread as something inside the believer. One writer takes it the other way — the hope has a Person as its foundation.
"And everyone who thus hopes in him" means founded on Him. The "him" does not speak of the man but of Christ. Where the hope is based on Christ, he purifies himself even as Christ is pure. If I am about to be so perfectly like Him then, I will take pains not to be inconsistent with Him now. And he says this to guard us against allowing sin, making excuses for self-will, or treating the moral glory of the Lord Jesus lightly in any way. That glory is now entrusted to the believer, to guard and to show in a practical way.
The verse does not say the believer is pure as Christ is pure. The verb chosen tells us something about his actual state.
It is said of the believer, "he purifies himself": this shows that he is not pure, as Christ is. He needed not to purify Himself. So it is not said that he is pure as Christ is pure. If that were so, there would be no sin in us. Rather, he purifies himself according to the purity of Christ as He is in heaven, because he has the same life as the life of Christ Himself.
"As he is pure" fixes the measure. Setting it that high means the purifying has no stopping point on this side of glory.
A steady, ongoing work of PURIFICATION goes on in everyone who holds this hope in Christ. Can you measure the holiness of Christ? Can you tell me the standard of purity that marks our Lord? Why, absolute purity in every detail. By His very nature He is the holy, spotless, undefiled One. Yes, that is the standard. If that is the standard, you can be sure there will be room for purification every hour of our lives in this world. We shall never be able to say, "Now I am fully up to the standard; I am as pure as He is pure." That day comes only when we are clothed in a body of glory, shine out in His likeness, and see Him as He is.
The words "purifies himself" can sound like a call to work at becoming a better version of yourself.
The present effects of such hope in Him must be great and powerful! And indeed they are. The practical results are healthy and far reaching. But that does not mean we should set about trying to be purer than we are. Such self-centred efforts are useless. This sweet purifying goes on as the hope shines in — the hope which God's children have in the Son.
The purifying is never the price of seeing Him. It follows from a hope that is already sure.
We do not purify ourselves to see Him and be like Him. We purify ourselves because we have the sure and certain hope of seeing Him and being like Him, by the sacrifice of Himself and through His own most precious blood. We purify ourselves, not by blood, but by the water of the Word.
Some treat Christ's return as the reason to leave present wrongs alone. The verse cuts across that.
Scripture never uses the coming of Christ to weaken present responsibility to the Lord in holiness. We often hear people say today, "Oh, you cannot expect a perfect church; when Christ comes, He will set all to rights." Such words, such thoughts, never came from the Spirit of God. Do you believe that Christ may come at any time? Can you hold that hope before you and still go on with what you know to be wrong? Do you believe that Christ, when He comes, will not only correct what is wrong, but approve your allowance of it? Easy-going unbelief shrinks from the cross and from every present duty, saying that Christ will set everything right when He comes. But that is to abuse the truth, not to believe it.
- In Him. The hope rests on Christ, not on a feeling inside the believer. Everything else in the verse follows from that.
- Like Him. Because I will be perfectly like Him then, I refuse to be inconsistent with Him now.
- Not yet pure. The word is "purifies," not "is pure"; John describes a work still in progress, not a finished condition.
- As He is pure. Christ's absolute purity is the measure, so there is room for purifying every hour until we see Him.
- Because of Him. We do not purify ourselves to earn the sight of Him. We purify because that sight is certain — and by the water of the Word, not by self-centred effort.