The First Epistle of
JOHN
1
Prologue
1 That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have witnessed with our eyes, that which we contemplated and our hands handled* with reference to the word of the Life† 2 —oh yes, the Life was manifested, and we have seen and testify and declare to you that eternal Life who was in the presence of the Father and was manifested to us— 3 that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, so that you also may have fellowship with us;‡ indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. 4 Yes, we write these things to you so that our§ joy may be fulfilled.
The conditions of fellowship
God is light
5 Now this is the message that we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and there is no darkness* at all in Him. 6 If we claim that we have fellowship with Him while walking in the darkness, we are lying and not living the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light just as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ† His Son cleanses us from all sin.‡
God forgives confessed sin
8 If we claim that we have no sin,§ we are deceiving ourselves and the Truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous so as to forgive us those sins and to cleanse* us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we claim that we have not sinned,† we call Him a liar and His Word is not in us.
* 1:1 John could hardly be more emphatic as to the certainty of what he is going to write—he is an eye-witness, an ear-witness, a hand-witness, a mind-witness… † 1:1 The text has the definite article with “life”, and from the next verse it seems clear that the reference is to the Son (compare John 1:4). ‡ 1:3 Note that the fellowship is to be based on historical fact, not someone's subculture. § 1:4 The manuscript evidence is badly divided between “our” and ‘your’, roughly 60:40%. The best line of evidence, in my view, is with the majority in favor of “our”; it is easy to see how many copyists could make the change (a change in only one letter). The more people we bring into the fellowship, the greater our joy. * 1:5 I suppose that “darkness” here refers to sin and Satan; presumably it follows that there is no light in Satan. Also, “walking in the darkness” (next verse) refers to living according to the world's values, a world controlled by Satan. † 1:7 Perhaps 5% of the Greek manuscripts omit “Christ” (as in NIV, NASB, LB, TEV, etc.). ‡ 1:7 Cleansing is not the same as forgiveness. If a mother forgives her boy for playing in the mud, he escapes punishment, but that does not wash the clothes. Forgiveness takes care of the consequences of our sin in heaven, but for the consequences down here we need cleansing (although some consequences cannot be undone). As we walk in the light we will be progressively cleansed. § 1:8 I take the reference here to be to the sin nature; of course someone without a sin nature would have no need of a Savior, nor of regeneration. Anyone who really thinks that he does not have one is most certainly self-deceived, if not satanically deceived. * 1:9 If He forgave without cleansing us, we would still be dirty. But He only forgives when we confess. (Do not forget Proverbs 29:1). † 1:10 The reference here is to individual acts of sin. To contradict God, who affirms that we do in fact commit sins, is to make Him out to be a liar—probably not a good idea.