Mature Love is Expressed through Love for One Another
4:19 We love because He first loved us. 4:20 If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his fellow believer, he is a liar. For the one who does not love his fellow believer whom he has seen, cannot love the God whom he has not seen. 4:21 And we have this commandment from ˹God through Jesus Christ˺: The one who loves God must also love his fellow believer.
5:1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the father also loves the child born from Him. 5:2 This is how we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and carry out His commandments.
5:3 For this is our love for God, that we keep His commandments. Moreover, His commandments are not burdensome, 5:4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world, and this is the overcoming power that has overcome the world – our faith.
Translation by the author from the SBL Greek New Testament.
Summary of Verses 4:19-5:4
In this unit, John explains that genuine love for God exists only when believers also love fellow believers. Love for others is grounded in love for God by keeping His commandments.
Love for God and love for others are intricately tied together so that it is impossible for them to exist apart from each other, and they confirm the genuineness of each other.
Love for God is demonstrated by doing what God says – keeping His commandments. The commandments of God are not burdensome for the person who truly loves God. Because of faith in Jesus Christ, this person has power to overcome the world.
Click here for a full outline of First John.
Verse 4:19
We love because He first loved us.
The believer is able to love because he or she has experienced and understood God’s love first. True love is not innate to humans. It originates with God. It was demonstrated by God sending His Son, Jesus Christ. It is now poured into the hearts of believers and should characterize their lives.
As Karen Jobes notes in her commentary: “All human love is distorted by our fallen nature, such that no one can truly love God or others as we ought. It is only when a person comes to Christ and begins to realize the extent and nature of God’s love that their ability to love rightly can be transformed by the work of the Spirit”. [JOBES p. 106]
From the earliest days of the New Testament, commentators, students of the Bible, and even scribes who copied the text have asked, “Who is the object of the verb ‘we love‘”? Does the verse mean: “We love God because He first love us,” or “We love one another because He first loved us.” Or is it generic: “We are able to love because He first loved us.”
Some scribes who copied the early manuscripts of First John apparently were concerned about this uncertainty and added the word “Him” or “God” to the text to make the meaning explicit, but resulting in several variants for this verse. This uncertainty comes across in various English translations:
NASB: We love, because he first loved us.
KJV: We love him, because he first loved us.
NLT: We love each other because he loved us first.
However, textual critics are certain that “Him” and “God” are later additions and not what John originally wrote.
Commentators are divided on whether the implied object is “God” or “one another”. Perhaps it is best to regard the object as both God and one another. Remember that for John, love for God and love for others are two sides of the same coin, as Jesus summarized the Law and the Prophets (Matthew 22:34-40).
For more information on the variant see: MARSHALL p. 225, footnote 26; YARBROUGH p. 366, footnote 4:19; KRUSE p. 182, footnote 226.
Verse 4:20
If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his fellow believer, he is a liar.
John returns to the topic of love for fellow believers.
A claim to love God is a lie if love for fellow believers is lacking.
For the one who does not love his fellow believer whom he has seen, cannot love the God whom he has not seen.
Real love for the invisible God is expressed in love for fellow believers that we see and interact with every day. So, love for others is evidence of love for God.
I. Howard Marshall has a good comment on this verse in his commentary: “A person may deceive other men by declaring that he loves God; but since God cannot be seen, there is no direct way of telling whether he truly loves God. Even if he goes through the outward motions of devotion to God, prayer, attendance at worship, and so on, it may be all empty show. But a person cannot so easily deceive others regarding his love for his fellow Christians; since they can be seen, the person’s relation with them is also visible.” [MARSHALL pp. 225-226]
It is amazing how much verbal devotion to God can co-exist with ungody attitudes, actions, and relationships with other people.
yet hates his fellow believer
In regard to hating a fellow believer, John may have several things in mind based on what he has said so far in his letter:
- Hate puts obstacles in the path of another believer that causes that other believer to fail or fall (2:9-10).
- Hate spreads false teaching that leads a person away from God, the source of life, and so has “murderous” results (3:15; 2:21-27; 4:1).
- Hate ignores the physical, emotional, and material needs of fellow believers that one has the resources to meet (3:16-18).
Verses 4:21
And we have this commandment from ˹God through Jesus Christ˺: The one who loves God must also love his fellow believer.
Love is the moral glue that binds fellowship with God and believers. Love for God and love for others cannot be separated.
The one who loves God must also love his fellow believer.
This statement echoes Jesus’ words in a number of places in the Gospels regarding love for God and others. See John 13.34; John 15.12; John 15.17; Mark 12:30-31.
Greek Note: ˹God through Jesus Christ˺
As noted previously in my posts, the appearance of small brackets (˹˺) indicates that a pronoun in the original Greek text has been replaced by a specific proper noun in my translation to clarify the meaning. In this verse, a phrase, rather than a single noun, replaces the Greek pronoun αὐτοῦ / autou which means “him”. My translation is:
4:21 And we have this commandment from ˹God through Jesus Christ˺: The one who loves God must also love his fellow believer.
Without the substitution, the translation would read:
4:21 And we have this commandment from him: The one who loves God must also love his fellow believer.
All modern English translations translate this as “him”, which is a proper word-for-word translation.
However, commentators have long discussed whether “him” refers to God or to Jesus Christ. In fact, in a significant number of manuscripts, scribes changed the reading to say from “God”, probably to clarify the meaning for the reader. This is another example of the vague use of pronouns by John that scholars call the Johannian Trinitarian Ambiguity. Click here for more information.
Some commentators believe that “him” refers to God because:
- God is the focus of the paragraph (verses 4:19-21) and Jesus is not mentioned in the context.
- John attributes the love command to God in verse 3:23.
Other commentators believe that “him” refers to Jesus Christ because:
- The statement closely resembles Jesus’ words in a number of places in the Gospels regarding love for God and others. See John 13.34; John 15.12; John 15.17; Mark 12:30-31.
Here are my takeaways from this:
- The command was expressed in detail by Jesus Christ but its final source was God. God gave the command through His Son. This is the reasoning for my translation of “him” as “God through Jesus Christ“.
- Ultimately, whether one understands “him” to refer to God or Jesus Christ makes no difference in the meaning and application of the verse.
- Both God and Jesus Christ are personal references. Robert Yarbrough emphasizes the significance of this in his commentary: “John’s counsel is grounded in a relationship with the Father or the Son, not the command of an impersonal moralism”. [YARBROUGH p. 265]
Go back to verses 4:13-18
Go forward to verses 5:1-4
Your Personal Study
Read First John 4:19-5:4 below and answer the questions focused on verses 5:1-4.
4:19 We love because He first loved us. 4:20 If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his fellow believer, he is a liar. For the one who does not love his fellow believer whom he has seen, cannot love the God whom he has not seen. 21 And we have this commandment from ˹God through Jesus Christ˺: The one who loves God must also love his fellow believer.
5:1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the father also loves the child born from Him. 5:2 This is how we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and carry out His commandments.
5:3 For this is our love for God, that we keep His commandments. Moreover, His commandments are not burdensome, 5:4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world, and this is the overcoming power that has overcome the world – our faith.
1. According to verse 5:1, how is a person born of God?
2. If God is the father of believers, what is the familial relationship between believers?
3. What is the connection between carrying out God’s commandments and loving the children of God (i.e., fellow believers)?
4. What is the definition of burdensome? Why do you think that keeping God’s commandments is not burdensome for the person born of God?
5. Compare the statements about the person “born of God” in verses 5:1 and 5:4. What is the object of the faith that is mentioned at the end of verse 5:4?
First John Translation.
First John Translation with Outline and Notes.
Bibliography of source information used for this series of posts.
Title Slide Image Credit: First John in Codex Alexandrinus, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Unless otherwise noted, English translations of Bible verses are by the author from the Greek text and are not quotations from any copyrighted Bible version or translation.
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