Jesus Came as a Human Being

¹Dear friends, don’t believe every spirit. Instead, test the spirits to see if they are from God. Many false prophets have gone out into the world.

²Here’s how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that agrees that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.

³But every spirit that doesn’t agree with this isn’t from God. Instead, it’s the spirit of the great enemy of Christ. You’ve heard that this spirit is coming, and even now it’s already in the world.

⁴But you, dear children, are from God, and you have defeated these enemies. That’s because the one who’s in you is greater than the one who’s in the world.

⁵False prophets are from world, and so they speak from the world’s point of view, and the world listens to them.

⁶But we are from God, and whoever knows God listen to us. But whoever isn’t from God doesn’t listen to us. That’s how we can tell the difference between the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falseness.

We Love Because God Loved Us

⁷Dear friends, let us love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves is a child of God and knows God.

⁸Anyone who doesn’t love doesn’t know God, because God is love.

⁹This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his only Son into the world so that we could receive life through him.

¹⁰This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to give his life to purify us from our sins.

¹¹Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we should also love one another.

¹²No one has ever seen God, but if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is made complete in us.

¹³Here’s how we know that we live in him and he lives in us: He has given us his Holy Spirit.

¹⁴The Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. We have seen this and are witnesses to it.

¹⁵If anyone agrees that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they live in God.

¹⁶And so we know and depend on the love that God has for us.

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God lives in them.

¹⁷This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus.

¹⁸There is no fear in love. Instead, perfect love drives away fear, because fear has to do with being punished. The one who fears has not been perfected in love.

¹⁹We love because he loved us first.

²⁰If anyone claims to love God but they hate a brother or sister, they’re a liar. If they don’t love their brother or sister, even though they’ve seen them, they can’t claim to love God, when they haven’t seen him.

²¹Here’s the command God has given us: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.