Wednesday’s Column: Third’s Words

I’ll be repeating the book of I John in present-day terminology. It’s not a true translation of the book, as I am not qualified to do so. It will be based on an exegetical study of the book and will lean heavily on the SBL and UBS Greek New Testaments, as well as comparisons with other translations (ESV, NASB, NIV, ERV, NLT). My goal is to reflect the text accurately, and to highlight the intent of the author using concepts and vocabulary in common use today. 

This is not an “essentially literal” translation, and should be read as something of a commentary. 

Friend or Foe

This is how you know you’re with him: he gave us his spirit.¹ Loved ones, don’t believe every spirit, but really put them to the test to see if they came from God. You’ll need to test them because a whole lot of fake teachers were sent² to the world. 

This is how you know if a spirit came from God: every spirit that comes from God will acknowledge that Jesus was sent to earth as a human. If a spirit refuses to acknowledge this, it isn’t God’s. In fact, it’s the spirit of Jesus’s enemies. You heard that the spirit of Jesus’s enemy was coming — it’s here now. 

Young ones, you are from God and have already beaten these spirits. How? Jesus is far more powerful than his enemies, and he’s with you. These enemies come from the world, so they talk like it — and the world listens to them. But we came from God. If you know God, you’ll listen to us. God’s enemies are the ones who don’t listen to us. This is how you can tell the difference between a legitimate spirit and a fake one.

¹ In this context, πνευματος is used to mean something like “ethos” or “system of teaching”. God sent a legitimate belief system, then Satan counterattacked by sending a ton of illegitimate information to make truth more difficult to find.  

²  This is further evidenced by εξεληλυθασιν in 4.1 and εληλυθοτα in 4.2. The former describes false teachers sent to earth. The latter describes the one true teacher sent to earth.