And hereby we know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.
John has been writing about eternal life. Now he asks a plain question. How can anyone tell whether that life is really theirs? His first answer is obedience.
The letter now changes direction. John moves from what this life is to how it shows itself. He does it to steady his readers, not to unsettle them.
But now he takes up another subject — the practical tests before men that we have got this life. In the main we may say that love for fellow believers, and righteousness or obedience, are the great tests... Now we come to the same life shown in its fruits down here; and they were questioning whether they had this life or not. So he gives them these marks of that life, to keep them conscious and certain that they had it — marks that some who made a high profession did not have.
John begins with the mark that gives a person nothing to boast about.
What is the leading trait? What are the special marks of divine life in man? It is not power, nor love, nor even righteousness. What is it then? Obedience. This, it is clear, gives no importance to man. It calls for the creature's rightful subjection, and it also upholds the majesty of God... Do not call this legal: where is anything of the sort in John? And let me add this. Where there is love, nothing is sweeter than doing the will of the one who is loved. That is even more true when we know that He whose will we do is completely good and wise in all He lays on us.
John's "we know" points to knowledge that keeps going, and the test starts at once:
"And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments" — the knowing is a continuous result. Keeping His commandments is not the only way the spirit of obedience shows itself; but as a rule it is the earliest. It begins without delay. It suits the youngest believer.
The word "commandments" can send a reader straight back to the law. Commentators here point the other way: life comes first, and obedience follows.
Yet they do not mean the Ten Commandments of the Law. That is never what John means by commandments here. It is all connected with Christ, bound up with Himself. In short, the law proved what man is; the gospel reveals what God in Christ is. So under law, God tested man to see whether he would give up his own will and meet God's demands to get life... So it is clear that the commandments here guide the new life already given, instead of being a moral standard to keep in order to gain life.
So where does a believer find them?
If one asks, Where am I to find them? we reply, Not on a list, but in whatever the Lord spoke and taught. This will oblige us to follow closely in His steps, but it is precisely what God expects from His children.
John speaks of God and of Christ about the same thing, so "Him" in this verse can point to either.
In this letter God and Christ are so completely joined in the apostle's thought that he speaks first of the one and then of the other about the same thing. God is revealed to us in Christ. It may seem confusing, but it brings out the glory of the Person of Christ... So it is here with God's commandments: they are Christ's commandments, and yet they are God's too.
Many readers turn this verse into a reason to doubt their salvation. Commentators here read John's purpose differently.
The apostle takes the essential principles of the divine life — of the divine nature as shown in Christ — and uses them to test those who claimed a share in it. He does this not to make the believer doubt, but to reject what was false. He speaks of his own position, and of the position of those he was writing to, with the most perfect assurance.
The test does expose one thing — an empty claim:
If there is no real spirit of obedience, there is no true knowledge of God. Real knowledge of God brings both the desire and the power to obey His commandments. Where that obedience is present, it proves we know Him. How necessary a guard against self-deception!
- Life first. The commandments do not produce the life; they direct a life already given. Under law, obedience was the road to life; here, life is the road to obedience.
- Obedience first. The opening mark of that life is not power, and not even love. It is obedience, because obedience gives man no importance and upholds the majesty of God.
- Christ's word, not a list. You find His commandments in whatever the Lord spoke and taught, so keeping them means walking in His steps.
- His, and God's. John speaks of God and Christ in one breath. The commandments are Christ's and God's at once, and that brings out the glory of Christ.
- Assurance kept, pretence exposed. John wrote this test to steady real believers and expose empty claims — a guard against self-deception, not a reason to doubt.
He that says, I know him, and does not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him;
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
but whoever keeps his word, in him verily the love of God is perfected. Hereby we know that we are in him.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
He that says he abides in him ought, even as *he* walked, himself also [so] to walk.
John is dealing here with the highest claim a person can make — that he lives in Christ. The proof John asks for is not a feeling or a form of words, but a way of walking.
John tests more than one claim in these verses.
Three times in this passage we find the words, "Whoever says." In verse 4, "Whoever says, I know Him." In verse 6, "Whoever says he abides in Him." In verse 9, "Whoever says he is in the light." Each time John gives a proof of what real Christianity is.
John handles this claim differently from the one just before it.
"Whoever says he abides in Him." Here is a further thing which might be only a boast, and an empty boast. John meets it in a way quite different from how he dealt with the careless despiser of God's authority. He called that man a liar, with the truth not in him, and marked him as having nothing of God at all. But when someone claims to abide in Him, how quiet and yet how conclusive the inference is! Do you say that you abide in Him? Then you ought to walk as He walked... Not the law but Christ is the standard.
The word "abide" points to more than being in Him. It is living in the awareness of what is already true.
Being in Him, we are to "abide in Him." As we understand it, that means abiding in the consciousness and power of being in Him. It is easy for any of us to say, "I abide in Him." But if we say it, we must produce what proves the claim to be real.
Another writer spells out what abiding involves in practice.
To abide in Him means more than giving up our own will in practice and distrusting ourselves. It also means clinging to Him in love, leaning on Him in our weakness, and communion with Him in His thoughts, as He has made them known in His word.
The verse sets no ceiling, and one writer warns against lowering it.
How often people say: "I know we are to be holy, but you cannot expect us to be perfectly holy."... We are not only to be like Paul. We are left here to be like Christ Himself. Look at this verse and you will see there is no limit short of that. The measure for our walk is what Christ was here. God abhors different measures. He does not measure His blessed Son's walk by one standard and His people's walk by another.
Yet notice exactly what the verse asks for.
It does not say we ought to be what He was. It says we ought "to walk in the same way in which He walked." We could not be what Jesus was. But He has left us an example, and we follow in His steps.
If His life is in us, it will show in what we do.
Suppose we are in His life, and also in the power and enjoyment of it. Then that life must express itself in our ways and activities, just as it did in Him. The grace and power of our walk, compared with His, will be poor and feeble; yet it will be walk of the same order. The difference will not be in kind but only in degree.
The pattern is not abstract. The gospels show it.
In the gospels we look at the footsteps of our beloved Lord. There we see a pathway of unbroken communion with the Father. We see the tenderest compassion to the sick and needy. We see victory over Satan's power, and complete separation from every evil principle of the world. The light and love of God lit up that pathway from beginning to end.
This standard is not a way of earning God's favour. It follows from a place already given.
Being a Christian, I am responsible to walk as one. Not that I may become one, bless the Lord! but because I am one... But through His precious blood we stand in the place of perfect favour — perfect peace, joy, and acceptance. So we ought to walk in keeping with the position grace has set us in.
- Claim — "Whoever says" appears three times in this passage. Saying you abide in Him is easy, so John asks for proof.
- Abide — to abide is to live in the consciousness and power of being in Him. It means a surrendered will, distrust of self, dependence, and communion with His thoughts in His word.
- Standard — Christ, not the law, is the measure. God does not keep one measure for His Son and a lower one for us.
- Walk — the verse does not ask you to be what He was, but to walk as He walked; the difference will be in degree, never in kind.
- Ground — we walk this way not to gain the place of favour but because grace has already set us in it.