Down an Unfamiliar Road

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXXVI) 02/27/23

^5:12 Whoever has the Son has life, but whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

With a traveling evangelist’s heart, Absalom Backus Earle (1812-1895), an American Baptist pastor, evangelist, and author, in a book on Incidents Used In His Meetings, addresses the subject of a sacrificial death to save someone who could not protect themselves, tells us about an eye-catching sight in Brooklyn, New York’s Greenwood Cemetery. It is the monument of a noble fireman, with his cap and trumpet and a baby in his arms. The occasion was that several families were burned out of their apartments in one of those terrible fires in New York. Firefighters assumed that everyone had escaped from the burning building. But that’s when a frantic mother cried at the entrance: “My darling baby is still in the building!” She was about to rush into the flames to rescue her infant when this fireman cried: “You cannot get your child.” But she screamed, “I must save my child.”

The fireman’s heart was moved, and he said: “I will get your child.” So, at the risk of his life, he went up through the fire to the apartment, and sure enough, there was the tiny unharmed baby, unaware of its danger. The fireman took it in his arms to bring it to its mother. He had gone a short distance when he discovered that the floor to the stairs had fallen in. Then he knew there was no way to escape. A quick thought struck him, “I must save this child even if I die. So he went to the nearest window and tossed the child through the fire and smoke down to where the other firefighters were standing. Then he turned and tried to make it back to the stairs but went down among the falling timber and fire and lost his life.

Would anyone blame that child if they went at every opportunity to the cemetery and got down on their knees and kissed, again and again, the cold marble feet of that fireman while looking up at his face with tears in their eyes, saying: “He saved me, but he lost his life in doing it.” So who is there among us who would not go to the bleeding feet of our Savior and kiss them, and looking up in His face, say: “He lost His life in to save me.”

All for Jesus! All for Jesus!

All my beings ransomed pow’rs,

All my thoughts, and words, and doings,

All my days, and all my hours.[1] [2]

A staunch conservative who upheld the doctrine of eternal torment for sinners, Joseph Angus (1816-1902) urges us to genuinely believe that God gives eternal life, and that life is in His Son, and we become holy and happy; we are forgiven and sanctified. We are left without hope if we reject this truth or any part of it. Then, like the world, we wallow hopelessly in wickedness.[3]

After checking the text closely, Richard Tuck (1817-1868) agrees with the Apostle John that we must feel an abiding presence and influence in our hearts and minds. There are significant things engraved on our minds which come up occasionally, such as “Abide in Me, and I in you, so that you are my disciples.” So, it would be best to remain faithful to what you have learned. If you do, you will remain in fellowship with the Son and Father.[4] This mandate is not a passing breath but the functions of breathing; not a drop of blood that passes through the veins, but the pumping heart which circulates it. Jesus said, “I am in them, and you are in me. May they experience such perfect unity that the world will know that you sent me and that you love them as much as you love me.”[5]

After observing the Apostle John’s attention to detail, John Stock (1817-1884) notes that to possess the Lord is to have Him in our hearts by faith. It also requires putting our whole trust in Him; calling upon Him; honoring His holy name and His word; to mention His name only before the Father and mankind when we say our hope of eternal life. God gives us His Son, and we have Him as our only refuge when we come to Him as our Lord and Savior, Teacher and Guide, Example and Master. He is the husband of the Church, His bride, the Good Shepherd in whom they are complete by His Holy Spirit.

Some design their conduct after those who do not have God’s Son; neither will they come to Him as their Savior nor submit to Him as their Lord. Those who despise, doubt, and die are destroyed before the people’s eyes. The faithful are rich beyond expression, no matter how poor, and heirs of God’s kingdom; the unbelieving are lacking, although they are increased with goods, and surrounded by adherents and flatterers, whose end is a sorrowful death unless they turn to God. Heaven and hell border on each other in the revelation of God. Here is heaven in possession of the Anointed One; and torture in rejecting Him, which infidelity occasions. It is no small matter to reject the Anointed One as a Savior. It is a sin of the most fearful magnitude, and it persisted in rendering forgiveness impossible in this world or the world to come.[6]

After contemplating John’s train of thought, William Kelly (1822-1888) agrees that none can have spiritual life unless they accept God’s Son, who is the way, the truth, and the life. Not only will they have God, but a glorifier of God in the Son of man who was also the Son of God to whom God granted it and no other. The believer honors the Son by believing and receiving eternal life. The unbeliever dishonors Him and rejects the gift of life to his regret but must bow when he is raised for judgment.

Could life have been detached from the Son of God to be in us only and not in the Son to become corrupt and decay? But since it is in the Son, it abides holy and imperishable; and so, it is that we have it, and know that we have it on His word. Every good work, every right affection, all faithful service, and proper worship flow from eternal life in the power of the Spirit. Christians cannot please God, the Father of the Lord Jesus, without the action that brings eternal life. For now, that life has come in the person of God’s Son. Thus, the Father delights in our having this life, for it has joy in knowing, serving, and worshipping the Father and the Son, as led by the Holy Spirit. But let none forget what life would be without Jesus in our hearts.

“Those that do not have God’s Son as their Savior have no spiritual or eternal life.” If you who read these words are an unbeliever, beware. I pray for you. Why refuse everlasting life? Why reject the love of God in giving and sending His Son? Why leave Him who tasted death for you? Yet He never did you anything but good, and what have you ever shown to His name but neglect, dislike, and despite as far as you could? O believe what God tells you of His Son. If you believe in Him, you have Him. It is impossible to have the Son of God and not have eternal life. It is no less true than painfully real. Listen to John’s message to doubters: The Father loves Jesus the Anointed One because He is His Son, and God gave Him everything there is. And all who trust God’s Son to save them have eternal life; those who don’t believe and obey Him will never see heaven. God’s punishing wrath will remain on them throughout eternity.[7] [8]

A theologian familiar with the Apostle John’s writing style, William Burt Pope (1822-1903), is sure that John knows that not believing in God is not trusting His testimony. John also knows that not accepting the evidence is not having confidence in the witness. Also, not being confident of the internal assurance of the Spirit is not knowing forgiveness or the guarantee of sonship contained in possession of “the Life.” Finally, the believer’s spiritual life is nothing less than what God’s Son possesses. The Son of God is eternal life, the source of redeemed life; He is the believers’ Prince of life. The closing testimony of the Bible ‒ for there is nothing after these words ‒ is that they who have God’s Son have spiritual and eternal life: which is fellowship with God, in union with Jesus.[9]

Known as a distinguished classical Bible scholar at Trinity College, Cambridge, Gordon Calthrop (1823-1894) asks, “How do we attain eternal life?” Calthrop gives these answers:

(a) It is God’s gift. We cannot merit, acquire, or receive compensation for efforts or moral excellence on our part. We need to accept it, stretch out our hand, and thankfully take what the Lord God, of His infinite bounty and goodness, sees fit to offer.

(b) It is bound with the Person of the Lord Jesus the Anointed One. “This life,” says John, “is in God’s Son.” In the Lord Jesus the Anointed One, we have the reservoir containing “The Life.” “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.”[10] Again, “As the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son to have life in Himself.”[11]

(c) And again: we must come into contact, so to speak, with this living reservoir or fountainhead so that the stream that issues from it may flow into our being, and make us, too, partakers of its blessings. The idea is that of possession, of mutual living, so that each of us can say of the Anointed One, “He is mine.” And the Anointed One, on His part, will be willing to declare for each of us, “I am theirs.”

Calthrop then asks, “What are the manifestations of eternal life?” There is a correspondence between our physical and our spiritual life. We find three things in a living body: sensation, movement, and growth. Likewise, we find the following in our spiritual life:

(a) Consciousness. ‒ In a living soul, there is what, perhaps, we could not call sensation, but which we may call consciousness, or realization, of God who surrounds every soul, as the atmosphere surrounds us. We exist in God as an element. But it is perfectly possible for us to be utterly insensitive and not have any consciousness of Him. It will be so until we receive the new birth that the Spirit bestows. Then God flashes upon us as if He had just come into being. We behold, we know, and we delight in the moral teaching and grandeur of Him manifested to us in His Son, Jesus the Anointed One.

(b) Another manifestation of life is movement. And occupation for God, or man for God’s sake, is one of the characteristics of those who are born again of the Spirit and made new creations in Jesus the Anointed One. “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?”[12] is one of the first questions such persons always ask. Absolute stillness ‒ meaning abstinence from all spiritual occupation ‒ is evidence of spiritual death. You must move, employ yourself; you must use some, at least, of your talents in the Divine service if you are “alive unto God.”[13]

(c) Then there is growth; and this is of various kinds: (i) First, the growth that comes from exercise—the exercise of the graces which God has bestowed upon us. (ii) Next, the growth of intelligence in spiritual things. We have many schoolmasters here ‒the Scriptures, our conscience, and not least of all, the discipline of life. And through these the Holy Spirit is showing us daily more about ourselves, and more about the character and will and purposes of God. (iii) Then the growth of advancing assimilation. I mean this ‒ we become like those with whom we associate.

God takes advantage of this peculiarity of our human constitution to produce a resemblance to the Anointed One in us. He sets before us the Lord Jesus as the great object of our contemplation. Looking at the Anointed One, earnestly gazing upon Him, trying to understand Him, sympathizing with Him more and more, we catch something of His spirit; the features of His character are impressed upon us; we become to some extent like Him.[14]

After sufficient examination o f the Greek test, Brooke Foss Westcott (1825-1901) points out that the variations from exact parallelism in the two members of the verse are significant ‒ “Having the Son of God” stands for “has the Son,” and the position of “the life.” is changed. Notice the altering use of “having” and “has” in this verse.[15] In this way, “has life” is validated by “having the Son.” Like a spiritual farmer planting the seed of God’s Word, Henry A. Sawtelle (1832-1913) argues that if we convey eternal life to the world as a deposit in the Anointed One, then the double statement of this verse is the most obvious inference. If the Anointed One and “the life” are inseparable, we cannot have one without the other. The Revised Version[16] correctly translates the article before ‘life’ ‒ “Has not the life.”  And yet they have a natural life, proving John means another life. It is when touched by the Anointed One that we come spiritually alive. Our regeneration is in connection with the Anointed One.[17] Being spiritually alive is because of the Anointed One.[18] The Anointed One is our life;[19] we have life more abundantly as we have more of the Anointed One.[20] Those who reject the Anointed One, of necessity, cut themselves off from the true life.[21]

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[1] All For Jesus, by Mary Dagwood Yard James, 1889

[2] Earle, Absalom Backus: Incidents Used in His Meetings, Kissing His Feet, Publisher: J. H. Earle, Boston, 1888, pp. 94-95

[3] Angus, Joseph: The Bible Handbook, op. cit., p. 753

[4] 1 John 2:24

[5] Tuck, Richard: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary: (on an original plan), op. cit., pp. 338-339

[6] Stock, John: An Exposition of the First Epistle General of St. John, op. cit., pp. 435-440

[7] John 3:35-36

[8] Kelly, William: An Exposition of the Epistles of John the Apostle, op. cit., pp. 375-376

[9] Pope, William B., The International Illustrated Commentary on the N.T., Vol. IV, op. cit., p. 319

[10] John 1:4-9

[11] Ibid. 5:26

[12] Acts of the Apostles 9:6

[13] Romans 6:11

[14] Calthrop, Gordon: Church Pulpit Commentary, 1 John, op. cit., pp. 322-324

[15] Westcott, Brooke F., The Epistles of St. John: Greek Text with Notes, op. cit., p. 188

[16] The Revised Version is an 1881 revision of the 1611 King James Version (ERV)

[17] Ephesians 2:10

[18] Galatians 2:20; Philippians 1:21

[19] Colossians 3:4

[20] John 10:10

[21] Sawtelle, Henry A., Commentary on the Epistles of John, (Ed). Alvah Hovey, op. cit., p. 59

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXXV) 02/24/23

^5:12 Whoever has the Son has life, but whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

According to Robert Jamieson (1802-1880), Andrew Fausset (1821-1910), and David Brown’s (1803-1897) way of thinking, they find the Apostle John’s remarks here to reinforce it as a conclusion. They note that in verse twelve, there is no addition of “God” after “Son” in the first instance. John was undoubtedly aware that his readers knew the “Son” was God’s Son. Adding it to the second occurrence made unbelievers understand what a serious thing it is not to have Him. In the former clause, “has” implies denotes possession. The second reading indicates that “have” is not yet theirs. To have the Son is to say as the bride, “I am my Beloved’s, and my Beloved is mine.”[1]

Faith is the means whereby the regenerate have the Anointed One as cohabitant. Having eternal life by faith gives the believer life in its seed form and the promise of its bloom and blossom in the hereafter. Eternal life here is: (1) initial, and is an earnest of that which is to follow; in the intermediate state (2) partial, belonging but to a part of a man, though that is his nobler part, the soul separated from the body; at and after the resurrection (3) perfectional. This natural life consists of the union of the soul and the body (as that of the reprobate in eternal pain, which ought to be termed death eternal, not life) but also spiritual, the union of the soul to God, and supremely blessed forever (for life is another term for happiness).[2]

A German Protestant theologian and contributor to Johann P. Lange’s Commentary, Karl G. Braune (1810-1877), says that if we reflect on the holiness of God and His hatred of sin and iniquity and begin to fear, there can never be reconciliation between God and sinners, let us take courage; the work is difficult, but the Son of God has accomplished it; and no matter how great the distance between God and us is, yet through the Son we have access to Him. If we still fear for ourselves, all may be lost through our weakness and inability to do good again. Fear not; even here, help is at hand; the Spirit of God is our support; He is the pledge and earnest of our redemption.

These being the necessary means of salvation, it was essential to reveal to the world the doctrines concerning the Son and the Holy Spirit: and the belief in these doctrines is necessary for every Christian, as far as the proper use of the means depends on good faith and confidence of the principles. “Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.”[3] And again, “No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also.”[4] Since we can only come to the Father through the Son, to deny the Son is to cut off all communication between the Father and us. The same may be said of the blessed Spirit, through whom we are in the Anointed One. “And,” says the Apostle Paul, “if anyone does not have the Spirit of the Anointed One, they do not belong to the Anointed One.”[5] Our blessed Lord has told us that “This is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus the Anointed One, whom You sent.”[6] [7]

With his lifework well-illustrating his biblical and reformation ideal, pastor-theologian Robert Smith Candlish (1805-1872) notes that with a sense of sin upon the conscience and hatred in the heart, it is impossible to have anything like that free and independent spiritual life God intends for us to have as His gift. Therefore, to give us that life, He must first deliver us from sure death – from our guilty conscience and liability to judgment – and the consequent dread, discomfort, and dislike that life is wholly incompatible. However, if I have the Son, I have life, in the sense and to the effect of complete and final deliverance from eternal death to everlasting life.

The new life we enter is more than undoing our scheduled demise or reversing the sentence and destruction that brings death. It is a new endowment; it is imparting new power, privilege, or capacity to us; it is the accession or addition of a unique ability of life, over and above any we ever possessed or ever could have gotten for ourselves, even though the blight of sin’s guilt and the curse would never come upon us for we have God’s Son. We have Him, not merely as presented to us in His relation to sinners, by being made sin for us and holy in His righteousness. We must indeed first have Him in that character and capacity.

But we also have Him as a Brother in His family relationship to the Father, as the Son to whom the Father has granted to have life in Himself.[8] I do not speak of His relationship to the Father before the universe was created and came into this world: it is not the life the Son had that the Father gave me. I speak of Him as such since His incarnation and will continue to be all through eternity. When I have Him, I have Him as He is and always will be. I have the Son, and in Him, I have the very life the Father has given Him.[9]

Called a great and rare spiritual thinker, Frederick Denison Maurice (1807-1873) lamented that in his day, some honored men wanted to get rid of all outward testimonies of God’s love – of the water and the blood – and dwell exclusively on what they call the Spirit’s internal testimony. However, he did not undervalue their doctrine as a counterweight to some Seminary professors’ abrasive, carnal, and earthly language. In fact, God allowed it as a protest against idolatry, yet, did not concede that they were wiser than the Apostle John or that they knew what the witness of the Spirit is. On the contrary, he found them continually rejecting God’s external witness by confusing what He said with what they were thinking internally.

By doing this, it became very exclusive. The victims of casual impressions, of nervous ecstasies or depression, by not being willing to receive God’s testimony to others and themselves. This is the blessing of the Water and the Blood. They speak of the gift of eternal life to everyone, not just those conscious of it, in that Son who died for all and lives for all. The words of the Apostle John contain the only possible limitation of this gift, and they are, in truth, not a limitation but an expansion of it, “Those who have the Son, have eternal life; those who do not have the Son have no future life.” We have no life in ourselves. The Spirit does not witness a miserable, partial, selfish, new life, which is given to us because we are Christians or believers or have certain rare emotions. Instead, He testifies to us of a Universal and Everlasting Life that dwells in the Son of God, which we may enjoy if we do not desire to be separated from the great family in heaven and earth named in Him.[10]

Without overlooking crucial points, Johann Eduard Huther (1807-1880) says that verse eleven is connected in thought with verse twelve. The whole idea on the internal side is brought out with the two verses taken together. In verse eleven, the witness or testimony is that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. The testimony that Jesus is the Son of God[11]  becomes, as it passes towards and to the internal sphere, the testimony that God has bestowed upon us, in and through Him, eternal life. Whether the clause and this life are in His Son must be considered independent and coordinated with the first clause. The witness is thereby referred to as part of the testimony. Huther, and most recent commentators who express an opinion on the subject,  take the former view.

There is,  however,  at least one strong reason in favor of the latter view. The testimony John reports in his Gospel, which, we may believe, was brought to his mind by the water, blood, and Spirit, was not simply that God gave us eternal life but also that this life is in His Son. This was the truth John learned from God’s witness, and we may believe that it was also the truth he intended to proclaim to his readers as a Divine testimony. This view of the sentence seems to naturally progress the thought in verses ten to twelve. Those who believe that Jesus is God’s Son and believe in Him have the external testimony transferred, as it were, to the inner sphere within themselves.^[12] Thus, this testimony now passes to the mind and becomes internal: that God gave us eternal life and that life is in His Son;^[13]Consequently, those who possess the Son as indwelling, accordingly, have eternal life as their possession in their soul.[14]

With an inquiring mind, Daniel Denison Whedon (1808-1885) points out that we now are to have the result through the rest of the chapter with this Divine testimony. It is summed up in the word life; life in the Anointed One and the Anointed One in us. In the background, death[15] and the wicked one,[16] and the world[17] cast a dark shadow of contrast to life. So, we have the great antithesis, the battle-array, in which faith is the sure conqueror,[18] and life, present and future, the promised eternal prize.[19]

In line with Apostle John’s conclusion, Henry Alford (1810-1871) finds the conclusion of the Apostle John’s whole argument from verse six to verse eleven. But he carries it further, identifying the matter as a case of the believer’s possession of the Son of God and eternal life. But first, notice the diction and arrangement in verse twelve.

With meticulous Greek text examination and confirmation, Johann Bengel remarks, “Verse twelve is two verses in one: The first half with emphasis has to be pronounced: in the other, life, the latter furnishes a simple and beautiful example of the laws of emphasis in arrangement: having a life, not having a life.” Next, “to keep those words which the Father has witnessed to the Son,” nor “having the Son,” as Hugo Grotius does “to have a guarantee for eternal life.” The Son possessed the Anointed One by faith and testified by the Spirit, the water, and the blood: and the possession of the life, not in its most glorious development, but all its reality and vitality.

Furthermore, it must be noted that the question of whether eternal salvation is confined to those who have the Son does not belong here but must be entertained on other grounds.[20] It shows that the Apostle John is contemplating a possible contingency instead of facts: and confining his remarks to those to whom the divine testimony has come. To them, according to if they receive or do not receive God’s witness. It is more than “having the witness;” it is “having the Son of God.” The “having” is a choice of which savior – Life to life or death to death.[21]

As a faithful and zealous scholar, William Graham (1810-1883) points out that transitioning from the eleventh to the twelfth verse is natural since spiritual life is in God’s Son. The way for us to make sure of the divine energy is to receive God’s Son, who contains and dispenses it. Hence the words of the apostle, “Those that have the Son have life.” Martin Luther says bluntly, in his German language, “Those that have the Anointed One have everything, and those who are without the Anointed One, have nothing!” We became God’s children by receiving Him, which means believing in His name. To have the Anointed One – to receive the Anointed One, come to the Anointed One, be in the Anointed One, Jesus, and have Him dwelling in us, are all descriptions of the living faith which appropriates His gifts and rejoices in His manifold fulness.[22] In every form and measure, life is connected with Jesus, the Son of God,[23] and therefore He is preached and proclaimed in the Gospel as the refuge and hope of a perishing world.

To be in Him is to be delivered from condemnation, to receive Him is salvation and eternal life, to imitate Him is our highest aim as Christians, and to be like Him is our highest conception of eternal blessedness. Those who do not have the God’s Son have no life, but, as John elsewhere asserts, the wrath of God casts a shadow over them. They are not in the way of life and peace, for these are to be found in Jesus alone, and whatever their vain hopes and delusions, they have not and cannot have a well-grounded prospect of meeting the issues of eternity with joy. They have no life because they refuse Him, who is the source and fountain of life, and so they will and must remain unquickened and unblessed, a wanderer and an exile through the ages of eternity. Their portion is death, and they will have their portion and dwelling place in the region of death forevermore.[24]

With the zeal of a text examiner, William Edward Jelf (1811-1875) believes that those who cling to and have faith in the Son of God, namely, those who receive the Anointed One as the Son of God have life which God gives in the Christian plan of salvation. But, on the other hand, those who do not by faith possess and hold to the Son of God as the mediator of the New Covenant, but who thinks that it was given by the hands of a mere man called the Anointed One have no share in the gift which the Christian arrangement represents as given to mankind by the hands of the Son of God. The great heresy of during John’s time was not a disbelief in the Gospel as the system of religion but a disbelief in the Divine nature of Jesus ‒ and unbelief that the Gospel was brought upon the earth by the Son of God ‒ and this is also the heresy of modern times.[25]

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[1] Song of Solomon 6:3

[2] Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, New Testament Volume, op. cit., p. 730

[3] 1 John 5:12

[4] Ibid. 2:23

[5] Romans 8:9

[6] John 17:3

[7] Braune, Karl G., A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures by John Peter Lange, Epistles General of John, p. 168

[8] John 5:26

[9] Candlish, Robert S., The First Epistle of John Expounded in a Series of Lectures, op. cit., Lecture XL, pp. 243-244

[10] Maurice, Frederick Denison: The Epistles of St. John: A Series of Lectures on Christian Ethics, op. cit., pp. 282-283

[11] See 1 John 5:5

[12] Ibid. 5:10

[13] Ibid. 5:11

[14] Huther, Johann Eduard: Critical and Exegetical Handbook to the General Epistles, Epistles of John, op. cit., pp. 815-816

[15] 1 John 5:16

[16] Ibid. 5:18

[17] Ibid. 5:19

[18] Ibid. 5:4

[19] Whedon, Daniel D., Commentary on the New Testament, op. cit., p. 279

[20] See 1 Peter 3:19 cf. 2:10

[21] Alford, Henry: The Greek Testament, op. cit., Vol. IV, pp. 507-508

[22] See John 3:36; 5:24

[23] Cf. John 1:4; 5:26; 1 John 5:20; Colossians 3:3

[24] Graham, William: The Spirit of Love; Or, A Practical and Exegetical Commentary on the First Epistle of John, op. cit., pp. 331-332

[25] William Edward Jelf, A Commentary on the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit.,p. 75

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXXIV) 02/23/23

^5:12 Whoever has the Son has life, but whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

In verse twelve, straightforward preacher Charles Simeon (1759-1836) says that nothing less than everlasting happiness or misery depends on this point. Those who desired eternal life; and sought it earnestly through the Anointed One received it from God as an unmerited gift and are looking to the Anointed One for an even “more abundant” life.[1] It is to preserve it in their soul. Thus, those who “live by faith in the Son of God” have spiritual and eternal life in their souls. They can claim everlasting life upon the promise of God’s Word. They can plead the promises of God[2] and be assured that they will not be disappointed.[3] Indeed, eternal life has already begun in their soul.[4]

Like others, they were once spiritually dead but now have “passed from spiritual death to eternal life.”[5] Living by faith in the Son of God demonstrates that they are alive and that the Anointed One lives in them.[6] They may not have a comfortable sense and assurance of their happy state, but they are spiritually alive and will be forever.

On the other hand, those who have not received and lived in union with Lord Jesus the Anointed One in their hearts have no life in their soul. They are still “spiritually dead in trespasses and sins.”[7] They are far from having any title to eternal life and remain under a sentence of everlasting condemnation and “awaiting God’s judgment.”[8]  Whatever they may have, they do not have eternal life. According to the general acceptance of the term, they may have learning, riches, honor, and even morality, but they are not spiritually alive. And if they die in their present state, they will die without God; yes, if they were the foremost king on earth, they would still pass away on the same level as the lowliest of their subjects; they would descend from their pinnacle of honor to the lowest pit of shame and misery.[9]

Considering everything the Apostle John has said so far, Adam Clarke (1774-1849) then points out that since eternal life is given through the Son of God, it follows that it cannot be enjoyed without Him. No one can have it without having the Anointed One; therefore, he that has the Son has life, and he that has not the Son has no life. Consequently, it is in vain to expect eternal glory if the Anointed One is not in our hearts. Therefore, the indwelling of the Anointed One gives both a title and its usefulness. This is God’s record. Let no one deceive themselves. An indwelling Anointed One – GLORY; no indwelling Anointed One – NO GLORY. God’s record will stand.[10]

With his captivating teaching style, Jewish convert Augustus Neander (1789-1850) notes that the testimony accrediting Jesus as God’s Son shows its importance to believers, which attestation that He is God’s Son implies and assures them. “This is what God has testified: He has given us eternal life, which is in His Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have God’s Son does not have life.”[11]

Through this witness, whereby Jesus is ascribed as the Son of God, He is made known as the One who alone can impart a true, eternal, divine life of bliss to mankind. God has established the fountain of eternal life by sending to us His Son. Hence this witness also includes the gift of eternal life. In God’s Son, eternal life is grounded; all life, apart from fellowship with Him, is certain death. So, it follows that those who have received the Son have experienced true life. In contrast, through unbelief, those who shut themselves off from the Anointed One and the fountain of Living Water have blocked themselves from the source of everlasting life.[12]

After spiritually analyzing John’s conclusions, Gottfried C. F. Lücke (1791-1855) sees verse twelve as connected with verse five and as a colophon[13] to all that precedes. The moral and ethical point in this verse is this: Is it possible that someone will not believe in Jesus the Anointed One and firmly trust Him since God accredited Him as His Son and since only by faith in Him is there eternal life? Without this faith, eternal life cannot be obtained.[14] [15]

Although chronically ill with lung disease, Francis William Pitt Greenwood (1797-1843), Unitarian minister of King’s Chapel in Boston, proposes that we receive God’s Son in these three modes: ‒ as a Teacher, as an Example, and as a Savior. In each of these, He is spiritual and eternal life to those who have Him. So, let’s look at them.

I. He is our Teacher because His instructions are truth, and truth brings life. In another sense, the Anointed One’s life is by His word. He teaches us how to live and for what ends. Honor, happiness, respect, love, usefulness, those things without which life is only animal, or worse, are most easily and entirely secured by adopting the principles and obeying the precepts of the Gospel. It is life, by eminence, to live temperately, soberly, justly, kindly, peacefully, doing good actions, exercising good affections, and gaining a good reputation.

II. He is our Example because the life-giving Word is embodied and made incarnate in the Teacher; it is instructive and possesses the merit and charm of historical interest. The Son not only points the way to the Father, but He precedes the disciple and guides him in it and through it. Whoever walks as the Anointed One lives in proportion to the exactness of their imitation of the vigor and health of His life. Thus, to know that we are sharing the energy and motivation of our Master is enough to give us an increase of vital warmth, to cause the pulse of our soul to beat firmer and regularly because it beats in a happy and honored union with the heart of Jesus. If His life was true and eternal, then that borrowed from His is the same. The seeds of corruption are not in it. The process of dissolution cannot commence in it. It is a sound, pure, and heavenly life, for it is the very life of the Son of God.

III. He is our Savior by faith, obedience, and imitation; He is Life. And why? Because the hope and assurance of eternal life are contained and perfected in such trust.^[16]

With systematic theological intellect, Charles Hodge (1797-1878) sees this necessity of a knowledge of the Gospel as expressly asserted in the Scriptures. Our Lord not only declares that no one can come to the Father, but by Him; that no one knows the Father, but the Son, and those to whom the Son reveals Himself; but He says expressly, “They that do not believe, are forever lost.”[17] But faith without knowledge is impossible. The Apostle John says, “They that have the Son have spiritual and eternal life; those without God’s Son lack any such life.”[18]

Hence, knowing the Anointed One is not only the condition of life, but it is life, and without that knowledge, the eternal life in question cannot exist. The Apostle Paul said, “I count all things but loss, for the excellency of knowing Jesus as my Lord.”[19] Therefore, Jesus, the Anointed One, is not only the giver but the object of life. Those exercises, which are the manifestations of spiritual life, begin with Him; therefore, there can be no such exercises; without the knowledge of God, there can be no religion.^[20]

Without using complicated language, Albert Barnes (1798-1870) notes that the Apostle John states a principle our Savior laid down is this essential testimony God ever issued on salvation: “Those who believe in the Lord Jesus already have the elements of eternal life in their soul and will obtain salvation.”[21] [22]

With impressive theological vision, Richard Rothe (1799-1867) points out that the Apostle John now confirms (drawn from his experience) what he has said concerning the witness of God. Being God’s witness, John says, those (and only those) that have the Son possess this eternal life. God has given us eternal life in a specific and exclusive manner in His Son.[23] Therefore, no one can have fellowship with the Anointed One without having this life.

The apostles were the first to pass through this experience. In attaching themselves to the Anointed One, they experienced a transformation in their innermost life that made them conscious of their previous state of existence and their present state of being spiritually alive, which was authentic and imperishable. This fact repeats itself when we contact the Anointed One; this would compel us to acknowledge that there is such a fountain of eternal life in the Anointed One as can be only in God. Only the end of the world’s history will give a perfectly unambiguous objective decision on the controversy between the Anointed One and the unbelieving world. Whenever a person is in union with the Anointed One, they will be born again to eternal life.

Another thing about the passage is that “Faith is not a mere witness on the man’s part to the Object of his faith; it is a witness which the man receives from that Object.” In its first beginnings faith is, no doubt, mainly the acceptance of testimony from without. Still, the element of trust involved in this acceptance includes the beginning of an inner experience. Such trust arises from the attraction the object of our faith has exercised upon us. It rests on the consciousness of a vital connection between us and that object.

Therefore, our inner predisposition increases according to the measure with which we accept the Divine witness. Thus there is formed in us a certainty of faith which rises unassailably above all skepticism.”[24]

Even unbelievers readily acknowledge the assertion that those who do not have God’s Son don’t have eternal life. Therefore, they cannot deny that they do not have everlasting life and that their moral condition does not satisfy God’s requirements. Indeed, they do not deny this, but they reject that this is because they do not have God’s Son in their hearts; and to convince them of this is impossible by human power alone.

Nevertheless, all Christians must endeavor to do so as far as they can, especially by manifesting in their manner of living that they are continually entering into the fuller possession of such a life. For if faith in the Anointed One characteristically distinguishes them from the world. The more we are surprised that people do not comprehend that the reason for their dissatisfied condition is found in the fact that they do not attach themselves to God’s Son. That’s why we must all the more feel stirred up to let this valid eternal life manifest utilizing our whole being. This manifestation convinces the world more than our criticizing it for its unbelief.[25]

Ranked highly by other theologians on the doctrine of the atonement, John McLeod Campbell (1800-1872), Scottish minister and Reformed theologian, mentions that some have spoken of the difficulty in joining “themselves and glory in one thought.” The greater difficulty is to unite ourselves and eternal life in one thought now, although God has already connected us to the truth of things in the Anointed One. But, as I have said, we are alike slow of heart to receive Anointed One’s revelation of ourselves and to receive His revelation of God ‒ to believe that God has given to us eternal life in His Son and that God is love.[26]

Consistent with the Apostle John’s advice, Heinrich A. W. Meyer (1800-1873) finds that verse twelve immediately states the implication from the preceding thought.  If the Life is initially in the Son, then those who have the Son with them also have the Son.[27] Changing and weakening the sense, Hugo Grotius (1583-1645)[28] puts the Son: Verba ill aquae Pater Filio mandavit; (“words of water the Father gave to the Son), even “have the Life” he erroneously explains by jus certum ad vitam aeternam (“certain right to eternal life).” While the Apostle John in the first clause simply says “the Son,” in the second he adds “of God.” On this, Bengel[29] remarks habet versus duo cola; in priore non-additur Dei, nam Fideles norunt Filium; in altero additur, ut demum sciant Fideles, quanti sit, non habere (“it has two strains; In the former, there is no addition of God, for the faithful, know the Son; in the other, that the faithful may at length know how important it is not to have).”[30]

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[1] See John 10:10

[2] Ibid. 6:40

[3] Isaiah 45:17

[4] John 6:47

[5] Ibid. 5:24

[6] Galatians 2:21

[7] Ephesians 2:1

[8] John 3:18, 36

[9] Simeon, Charles, Horæ Homileticæ, Vol. XX, op., cit., Discourse 2468, pp.541-542

[10] Clarke, Adam: Wesleyan Heritage Commentary, op. cit., Hebrews-Revelation, pp. 397-398

[11] 1 John 5:11-12

[12] Neander, Augustus: The First Epistle of John, Practically Explained, op. cit., pp. 295-296

[13] Colophon (1) a publisher’s emblem or imprint, especially one on the title page or spine of a book. (2) a statement at the end of a book, typically with a printer’s emblem, giving information about its authorship and printing.

[14] Acts of the Apostle 4:11

[15] Lücke, Friedrich C. F: A Commentary on the Epistles of St. John, trans. Thorleif Gudmundson Repp, The Biblical Cabinet (Edinburgh: Thomas Clark, 1837, Vol. 15, pp. 274-275.

[16] Greenwood, F. W. P: The Biblical Illustrator, Vol. 22, First Epistle of John, op. cit., pp. 443-444

[17] Mark 16:16; John 3:18

[18] 1 John 5:12

[19] Philippians 3:8

[20] Hodge, Charles. Systematic Theology, Vol. 2, op. cit., The Call of Salvation Through the Word, pp.  647-648

[21] John 3:36; Mark 16:16

[22] Barnes, Albert: New Testament Notes, op. cit., 1 John 5, pp. 4885-4886

[23] 1 John 2:23

[24] Findlay, George G., Fellowship in the Life Eternal; An Exposition of the Epistles of St. John, op. cit., 391-392

[25] Rothe, Richard: Exposition of the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit., The Expository Times, May 1895, pp. 375-376

[26] Campbell, John McLeod: The Nature of the Atonement, MacMillan and Co., Ch. VII, 1856, p. 99

[27] Cf. 1 John 2:23

[28] Grotius, Hugo (1583–1645) [Hugo, Huigh or Hugeianus de Groot] was a towering figure in philosophy, political theory, law, and associated fields during the seventeenth century and for hundreds of years afterward.

[29] Johann Albrecht Bengel, (born June 24, 1687), Winnenden, near Stuttgart, Württemberg [Germany] – died November 2, 1752, Stuttgart), German Lutheran theologian and biblical scholar who was the founder of Swabian Pietism and a pioneer in the critical exegesis of the New Testament.

[30] Critical Exegetical Handbook New Testament by John Edward Huther, Meyer, Heinrich A. W., Commentary on the New Testament, Epistles of James and John, op. cit., p. 471

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXXIII) 02/22/23

^5:12 Whoever has the Son has life, but whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

With all the Apostle John’s words in mind, John Wesley (1703-1791) says that the fact that holiness and happiness are united and sometimes fashioned in the inspired writings as “the kingdom of God,” or “the kingdom of heaven.” It is termed “the kingdom of God” because it is the immediate fruit of God’s reigning in the soul. He uses His mighty power to set up His throne in our hearts; they are instantly filled with “righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.” It is also called “the kingdom of heaven” because heaven is open to receive and reward their soul with eternal life.

Whoever they are that experience this, can declare before angels and mankind, “Everlasting life is won, Glory on earth has begun!” According to the constant tenor of Scripture bears record that God “Has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. They who have the Son” (reigning in their heart) “have life, even life everlasting.”[1] For “this is life eternal, to know the only true God, and Jesus the Anointed One whom You sent.”[2] And those to whom this is given may confidently address God as their heavenly Father. ^[3]

With scholarly meditation, James Macknight (1721-1800) notes that as the word “have” (KJV) is used in verse twelve in the sense of acknowledging,[4] the scope of the passage directs us to take it in that sense here. For notwithstanding “have” in the last clause of this verse is used in its ordinary signification, it is not uncommon in Scripture to find the same word used in different senses in the same passage.^[5]

More concerned with the Church than its sacraments, William Jones of Nyland (1726-1800) points out that in the text, the Apostle John expresses several vital thoughts: First, our unique relationship to the Lord Jesus the Anointed One by saying. “He that has the Son.” What are we to understand by these words? What is involved in them? (1) In His existence as Savior, not only in His historical reality but in His present existence. (2) In His perfection. It will profit nothing to believe in Jesus as an ordinary Man, having our human nature’s imperfections, weaknesses, and sinful tendencies. Faith in such a being would not result in any accession of strength. Instead, we must consider our faith in Him as “holy, sinless, and righteous.” Thus, we are motivated to trust in His Divinity as Jesus God’s Son, by believing in Him. (3) In His unfailing interest in us.

Faith in His existence and perfection and Divinity will not benefit us unless we believe He cares for us and desires to bless and save us. Now, we need what I have called a realizing faith in Him. Such faith requires a far greater and more profound thing than intellectual assent. As Canon Liddon says, “When the soul in very truth responds to the message of God, the complete responsive act of faith is threefold ‒ simultaneous acceptance from the intelligence, from the heart, and the will.”[6]

More concerned with the Church than its sacraments, William Jones of Nyland (1726-1800) points out that those who hold this relationship are possessors of the highest life. “Those that have the Son have life.” In verse twelve, what are we to understand by “the life” in the Greek text? (1) It is not mere physical life. The most wicked have this. Fallen angels have existed for thousands of years.[7] Therefore, to argue for the infinite or finite of existence from the Apostle John’s teaching concerning “the life” is a gross perversion of his teaching. (2) Not mere intellectual life. Such people as Voltaire, Byron, et al. possessed this to a high degree, but who would affirm that they had “the Son” and “the life”? (3) Not mere emotional life. Many with sympathy are abundant and active, who sincerely pity the wretched, who have often been moved to tears as they contemplated the woes of the Man of sorrows, who yet have neither “the Son” nor “the life.”

The life which John writes about is “the new life of God in humanity.” This new life may be viewed as a new governing affection. By faith in the Anointed One, a person is regenerated, and their ruling love is changed. Their deepest and strongest fondness is no longer earthly, selfish, or sinful but heavenly, humble, and holy; they love God supremely. They are brought into a vital and blessed relationship with God. Divine love is life. “The mind of the Spirit is life.”[8] He who has the Son has this life. He has it now, not in its most glorious development, but really and increasingly.[9] Under this supreme love for God, all the faculties of the spiritual nature advance toward perfection in blessed harmony with His holy will.^[10]

We see here one of many illustrations of the divine perfections of the Word of God, says Cameron. Jesus came by water and blood, but He went by blood and water to God. The order in which God gave the command for the Tabernacle directed that the ark of the covenant should be made first before the brass altar. Jesus was in the bosom of the Father before His death on the cross. So also, the arrangement of the vessels of the Tabernacle shows the same order as symbols of truth. Coming out from the Most Holy Place, the priest must pass by the basin of water before reaching the blood of the altar, but in returning, the blood came first and afterward the water.

The reality of what we learn in these types was fulfilled when Jesus came from God and returned to God. In the power of Life, as set forth by the water, He came from God, the Holy One, bearing our sins in His body to the altar of the cross. Here sins were cleansed by His blood, and then He returned to God in the victory of the same spotless life He brought with Him. The living One came from God to die but returned to God, alive forevermore. “For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through His life!”[11] ^[12]

For example, a man with a heartfelt friendship with hymn writerJohn Newton,[13] Thomas Scott (1747-1821) finds that the Scriptures are indeed a message from God to us concerning the person and salvation of the Anointed One. “This is the record that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Therefore, those that have the Son have life, and those that do not have the Son of God have no life.”[14] This is the center of revelation, in which all the lines meet from every part of its circumference. The everlasting mercy of God in purposing salvation for sinners; His infinite wisdom, forming the grand design of glorifying His justice and holiness, even in pardoning and blessing those who deserve punishment; His unfathomable love, in giving His only-begotten Son to be the Savior of the world; the great mystery of godliness, God “manifest in the flesh,” Emmanuel purchasing the church with His blood; the love of the Anointed One in His obedience to dying for us on the cross; His glorious resurrection, ascension, and mediatorial exaltation; all constitute the central and most essential part of God’s message to the world. “This,” He says, by a voice from heaven, “is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: hear what He has to say.”[15] ^[16]

We must endeavor to explain this language and show its appropriateness and energy. The Apostle Paul says, “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through,” or “Jesus our Lord the Anointed One.”[17] Then John says, “This is the record, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son: he that has the Son has life, and he that does not have the Son of God does not have not life.”[18] The salvation of the Anointed One is completed, as far as His mediatory work is concerned: but who are they that will eventually be  “saved from eternal punishment through Him?”[19] To this question, the Scripture answers with the most decided precision; “those that receive Him,”[20] “they that believe in Him,”[21] and “they that are found in Him.”[22]  Union with the Anointed One is necessary to commune with Him: He saves all those, and those only, related to Him. True faith forms this union and relation and makes the sinner a partaker of the Anointed One and His salvation.^[23]

In another place, the atoning sacrifices of the Mosaic law, which typified the redemption of the Anointed One, were offered upon Mount Zion. Then King David inquired, “Who may worship in your sanctuary, Lord? Who may enter your presence on your holy hill?[24] It draws a character that entirely accords with a true believer in the Final Covenant. Thus we see which of the professors of true religion will stand accepted on the day of judgment, but this has nothing to do with open neglect or opposition to revealed truth or refusal of the Gospel salvation plan. On the contrary, in perfect harmony with these Scriptures, our Lord describes His true disciples, “whoever does my heavenly Father’s will, the same is my brother, my sister, and my mother.” “Blessed are they that hear the Word of God and keep it.”[25] ^[26]

As a potential young theologian, Joseph Benson (1749-1821), at the age of fifteen, preached in cottage prayer meetings, notes that this is a message testified to by the six witnesses ‒ three in heaven and three on earth. It tells us “That God sincerely and freely offered to humanity and conferred on true believers in particular; eternal life.”Namely, giving them title to it in their justification and adoption,[27] the fitness for it, in their new creation or sanctification,[28] and a foretaste or token of it by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in their hearts,[29] allowing them to enjoy communion with the Father and the Son;[30] and through that, as it were, “to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus,”[31]and have their “conversation in heaven.”[32] And this life is in His Son whose doctrine has revealed it;[33] whose merits have procured it; whose Spirit has imparted the beginning of it; and whose example will conduct us to the complete possession of it. In other words, by whom it was purchased, and in whom it is treasured; so that they have all the springs, and the fulness of it, in themselves, to communicate to His body, the Church, first in grace and then in glory.

Benson continues by saying that although the Apostle John has spoken mainly of the three in heaven and of the three on earth, who bear witness continually, he deferred mentioning, till now, what it is they are witnessing. Therefore, introducing it last, and after so much preparation, might make a stronger impression on the minds of his readers. They possess saving knowledge communicated by the Spirit of wisdom and revelation by having Him.[34]

Having a living faith in Him, working by love,[35] leads to a genuine interest in Him, as a wife has in her husband;[36] and vital union with Him, such as a branch has with the tree in which it grows;[37] or such as a member of the human body has with the head.[38] A consequence of that interest and union with Him brings conformity to having the same mind as the Anointed One and living as He lived.[39] The Anointed One becomes wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption to them.[40] A believer having the Son has spiritual life here and is entitled to eternal life hereafter. But those who do not have the Son have no interest in the benefits that union with Him through the Spirit, says Benson, that conformity, more or less, to His image. The Anointed One has not enlightened them as to His wisdom, justified as His righteousness, renewed as His sanctification. Therefore, whatever they may profess, whatever orthodoxy of sentiment, regularity of conduct, or form of godliness, are alienated from the life of God[41] and have neither spiritual life now nor eternal life hereafter. In other words, they have part of Him.[42]

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[1] 1 John 5:11, 12

[2] John 17:3

[3] Wesley, John, The Works of: First Series of Sermons, Sermon 7, p. 142

[4] 1 John 2:23

[5] Macknight, James: Apostolic Epistles with Commentary, Vol. VI, p. 115

[6] Jones, William, The Pulpit Commentary Vol. 22, The First Epistle of John, p. 162-163

[7] 2 Peter 2:4; Jude 1:6

[8] Romans 8:6

[9] Galatians 2:20

[10] Jones, William: The Pulpit Commentary, op. cit., Vol. 22, p. 163

[11] Romans 5:10

[12] Cameron, Robert: The First Epistle of John, or, God Revealed in Life, Light, and Love, op. cit., Logos

[13] Newton, John: Composer of “Amazing Grace”

[14] 1 John 5:11-12

[15] Matthew 3:17; 17:5

[16] Scott, Thomas: Sermons, Sermon I, The Truth and Importance of Scripture Revelation, pp. 340-341

[17] Romans 6:23

[18] 1 John 5:11-12

[19] Romans 5:9

[20] John 1:12

[21] Ibid. 12:44

[22] Philippians 3:9

[23] Scott, Thomas: Sermons, Sermon VI, On Regeneration, p. 384

[24] Psalm 15:1

[25] Matthew 12:49-50; Luke 11:28

[26] Scott, Thomas: Sermons, Sermon IX, Final Retribution of Believers and Unbelievers, p. 413

[27] Titus 3:7; Romans 8:17

[28] Colossians 1:12; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Ephesians 4:22, 24

[29] Ephesians 1:14

[30] 1 John 1:3

[31] Ephesians 2:6

[32] Philippians 3:20

[33] 1 John 5:11

[34] Ephesians 1:17; Matthew 11:27

[35] Galatians 2:20; 5:6

[36] Romans 7:4

[37] John 15:4

[38] 1 Corinthians 12:27; Romans 12:5

[39] Philippians 2:5

[40] 1 Corinthians 1:30

[41] Ephesians 4:18

[42] Benson, Joseph: Commentary of the Old and New Testaments, op. cit, p. 347

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXXII) 02/21/23

^5:12 Whoever has the Son has life, but whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

The writer of Hebrews stated that if we are faithful to the end, trusting God just as we did when we first became Christians, we will share in all that belongs to the Anointed One.^[1] And in his second Epistle, the Apostle John warned that if you stray from the Anointed One’s teaching, you will leave God behind. However, if you are loyal to the Anointed One’s Gospel, you will have God within you. Then you will have both the Father and the Son.^[2]

John the Baptizer stated that all who trust Him – God’s Son – to save them would have eternal life; those who don’t believe and obey Him will never see heaven, but the coming wrath of God remains upon them.^[3] And no doubt John remembered hearing his Lord tell them that He was leaving and going back to the Father, but He wanted them as they traveled through the world to preach the Good News to everyone. So those who believe and are baptized will be saved. But those who refuse will go to their graves unforgiven and condemned.^[4]

So, for John, the question became: who do you believe? The sinner who calls God a liar, or, the Holy Spirit who says God is not a man that He can lie.  If God called Jesus His Son, that’s all the proof anyone needs. But it’s more than just believing; it is the result of believing.  Years ago, a TV quiz show hosted by comedian Groucho Marx was called “You Bet Your Life.”  Of course, there was no life-or-death factor; it was simply a play on words. However, it is the same case of betting your life by believing or not believing that Jesus is God’s Son and the only way to salvation and eternal life, it does become a matter of gambling life or death for your soul.

Therefore, the substance of the internal testimony is this – we are conscious of the Divine gift of eternal life, and this we have in God’s Son. John does not use “everlasting life,” although the idea of endlessness may be included in it, but it is not the main one. The distinction between eternity and time is what the human mind feels is authentic and necessary. But we are apt to lose ourselves when we attempt to think of eternity. We admit that it is not time, that it is the very antithesis of time, yet we try to measure it while we declare it immeasurable. We make it simply a very long time. In John’s writings, the main idea of “eternal life” has no direct reference to time. Eternal life is possessed already by believers; it is not a thing of the future.[5] Life in God includes all blessedness that remains unbroken by physical death.[6] Its opposite is permanent exclusion from God and His presence.

One of my highly admired mentors was the late Dr. Charles W. Conn, President of Lee University in Tennessee. At a Pentecostal Servicemen’s Retreat in Berchtesgaden, Germany, he shared the following illustration of eternity. He told us to imagine a bird out in the universe building a new planet for another world. Every day it would fly to the earth, pick up one grain of sand, rock, dirt, or water and deposit it on the new planet. Then, when that bird completely removed all trace of the earth, not one second of eternity would have passed.

While in the military, I once discussed salvation, heaven, and hell with a fellow soldier. He told me very straight forward that he did not believe in heaven or hell. So I put this proposition to him: If there is no heaven or hell, then by living life according to God’s Word and avoiding sinful pleasures, which often can bring more pain and suffering than they do pleasure, I would have nothing to lose. But if there is a heaven and a burning hell and you reject the message of salvation, then, in the end, you will lose everything.  Either way, I can’t lose.  Why risk being wrong? He looked at me and said, “I guess you’re right.” But he decided to take his chances. I can only hope that the Holy Spirit reminded him of our conversation later somewhere down the road, and he reached out to God for salvation.

We can see that verses eleven and twelve are the climax to the Apostle John’s initial part of his letter, namely, that the Son of God is the “Word of Life.” Therefore, possession of God’s Son is the ownership of eternal life and vice versa. We cannot separate eternal life from the person of the Anointed One. False teachers tried to split John’s congregation in two.[7] The truth of eternal life is not at issue here, but only those who know God’s Son possess it. False teachers do not enjoy eternal life.[8] 

The result of God’s witness about Jesus the Anointed One is that God gives the believer eternal life through Him. The phrase “eternal life” is emphatic. The testimony is that God gave eternal life when He gave His Son. Eternal life is the final testimony to God’s Son. Eternal life is more than a quantity of life that lasts forever; it is a quality of life, the highest spiritual life, irrespective of time.[9] This life is the very life of God. Therefore, keep this in mind, eternal life is more qualitative than quantitative.

Eternal life is qualitative life because God is free from corruption. He is pure holiness. God is peace, so the eternal life He passes to us has balance. Eternal life contains unconditional love so that we can have unrestricted love. God embodies eternal life in the person of the Son of God. The person who embraces Jesus the Anointed One as their Savior begins a new kind of life. They will experience that life forever.[10] 

Therefore, the Son of God is the means to eternal life. We can find eternal life nowhere else than in God’s beloved Son. There is no compromise here. God’s Son IS life.[11]  Eternal life testifies to the Son’s life with the Father, a qualitative and eternal life. The possession of eternal life is a testimony to God’s Son. Eternal life rests in Jesus the Anointed One.[12]  

Note the sequences in John’s argument. The Father possesses eternal life and gave it to the humanity of the Anointed One.[13]  So Jesus can say, “I live because of the Father.”[14] So then, Jesus offers believers that same eternal life.[15] It proves that Jesus is God’s Son.[16] The principle is that eternal life comes exclusively through Jesus the Anointed One. It applies to believers in that the life of God’s Son brings us into God’s presence as His present possession and in the eternal state of heaven. Thus, Jesus is the only way into God’s life and fellowship.[17]

COMMENTARY AND HOMILETICS

This verse has comments, interpretations, and insights of the Early Church Fathers, Medieval Thinkers, Reformation Theologians, Revivalist Teachers, Reformed Scholars, and Modern Commentators.

With a studious monk’s spiritual insight, Bede the Venerable (672-735) states that the Apostle John does not simply say that there is life in the Son; he says that God’s Son is life itself. The Son, in turn, glorified His Father by saying: “The Father has life in Himself, and He has granted that same life-giving power to His Son.”[18] He shows how this life is common to both Father and Son when he says: “And this is the way to have eternal life – to know You, the only true God, and Jesus the Anointed One, the One you sent to earth.”[19] [20]

As a firm spiritual disciplinarian, John Owen (1616-1683) states that the reason the Apostle John proposed in his Gospel the promise of Justification as the object of our faith to eternal life. Therefore, it is considered an ordinance of God to that end. Hence, God’s love, grace, and wisdom in sending His Son comprised the same objective. Therefore, not only is it an act of God in providing the Anointed One for our justification, but all His actions towards the person of the Anointed One were to deliver Justification to us. So, “God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin.”[21] “He did not spare even His Son but gave Him up for us all,”[22] and “the Lord laid on Him the sins of us all.”[23] So He was “Raised to life for our justification.”[24] And our faith is in God, who “raised Him from the dead,”[25] “and in His exaltation.”[26] It is all verified by “the record God has given of His Son.”[27] ^[28]

When people first learn, by their acquaintance with the Anointed One, to place all their hopes of salvation in a personal union with Him, from whom they received a pardon through grace, righteousness, and redemption, what more could any person as for than what we read in verse twelve: “Those who have the Son have spiritual life, and those who do not have the Son have no life?” And what can having the Son signify but having an interest in Him, being made one with Him? But the phrase “having the Son” disproves that dull and moral interpretation, especially when we remember “being in the Anointed One, is abiding in Him,” which must signify a very close union between the Anointed One and us.^[29]

With a spiritually contemplative mind, Matthew Henry (1662-1714) feels that nothing can be more absurd than the conduct of those who doubt the truth of Christianity. In the ordinary affairs of life, they do not hesitate to proceed on human testimony and would consider anyone out of their senses who declined to do so. The honest Christian has seen their guilt, misery, and need for a Savior to provide for such spiritual wants and circumstances. But, on the other hand, they found and felt the power of the Word and doctrine of the Anointed One, humbling, healing, quickening, and comforting their soul. As a result, they have a new disposition and new delights and are not the person they formerly were.

Yet they still have a conflict with themselves, sin, the flesh, the world, and wicked powers. But they find strength from faith in the Anointed One to overcome the world and travel towards a better life. Every Gospel believer has such assurance as a witness in themselves. It removes doubt except in hours of darkness or conflict, but none can persuade them out of their belief in the truths of the Gospel. Here is what makes the unbeliever’s sin so awful, the sin of unbelief. He gives God the lie; because he believes not the record God provided for His Son. While rejecting this record, it is in vain for an individual to plead that they believe God’s testimony in other things. Those who refuse to trust and honor the Anointed One as God’s Son, who object to His teaching as Prophet, rely on His atonement and intercession as High Priest, or obey Him as King, are dead in sin, under condemnation. No outward morality, learning, forms, notions, or confidences avail them.^[30]

As an unapologetic Gospel preacher, Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) indicates that in verse twelve, the Apostle John shows respect for the words of the Anointed One in his Gospel, “Anyone who believes in God’s Son has eternal life. Anyone who doesn’t obey the Son will never experience eternal life.”[31] Where the Scripture speaks of souls coming to the Anointed One, it also speaks of joining with Him as the reason to enjoy His benefits. “Yet you refuse to come to me to receive this life.”[32] There is a vast difference between finding it suitable that the Anointed One’s redemption and virtues should be theirs who believe. Nor have any interest in the ransom price being a fitting reward of faith. They find no relevant testimony of God’s respect for the agreeability and excellency of such grace. Likewise, they see no advantage in the Anointed One’s sacrifice just because they and the Anointed One are united. Therefore, in the eyes of the heavenly Judge, they may be looked upon and taken as one who does not care about eternal life with God.^[33]

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[1] Hebrews 3:14

[2] 2 John 1:9

[3] John 3:36

[4] Mark 16:15-16

[5] John 3:36; 5:24; 6:47, 54; 17:3

[6] Ibid. 11:25

[7] 1 John 2:25-26

[8] Ibid. 1:1-2

[9] John 17:2-3; 3:15-16; 5:24-26; 6:40, 47, 68; 10:10, 28; 11:25-26

[10] Ibid. 11:25-26

[11] 1 John 1:2; John 11:25; 14:6

[12] John 1:4

[13] Ibid. 5:26

[14] Ibid. 6:27

[15] Ibid. 3:36; 5:24; 20:31

[16] Ibid. 1:4; 5:26-27; 6:57; Acts of the Apostles 3:14-15

[17] Ibid. 14:6

[18] Ibid. 5:26

[19] Ibid. 17:3

[20] Bede the Venerable: Ancient Christian Commentary, Bray, G. (Ed.), op. cit., Vol. XI, p. 225

[21] Romans 3:25

[22] Ibid. 8:32

[23] Isaiah 53:6

[24] Romans 4:25

[25] Ibid. 10:9

[26] Acts of the Apostles 5:31

[27] 1 John 5:10-12

[28] Owen, John: The Doctrine of Justification, op. cit., pp. 145-146

[29] Owen, John: A Vindication of Some Passages in a Discourse Concerning Communion with God, op. cit., p. 45.

[30] Henry, Matthew: Concise Commentary on the Bible, op. cit., pp. 2059-2060

[31] John 1:12

[32] Ibid. 5:40

[33] Edwards, Jonathan, The Works of: Soul’s Eternal Salvation, Discourse 1, p. 329

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXXI) 02/20/23

^5:11 This is what God told us: He has given us eternal life in His Son.

Ministry & Missions Overseer Muncia Walls (1937) notes that the Apostle John again declares that the only means of salvation is through Jesus the Anointed One. To deny Him and who He is, is to reject the privilege of salvation. Eternal life can only be obtained through the Lord Jesus, the Anointed One. Salvation is experienced only through Baptism in His Name and being filled with His Spirit. He IS salvation. Outside of Him, there is no hope for eternal life. ^[1]

Expositor and systematic theologist Michael Eaton (1942-2017) says that God’s witness activates spiritual life within our hearts. And this is the testimony: “God gave us eternal life,” and “this life is in His Son.” Thus, it speaks of the two sides of the witness of the Spirit. The Spirit also assures us that we have eternal life. Still, such a witness is built upon the foundation of such everlasting life in the historically manifested Son of God. The essence of the Christian Gospel is life. What happens when a person receives Jesus the Anointed One by faith? According to the apostles’ preaching, they come spiritually alive.

Such a person is made alive with spiritual life from God’s Son. It is a life full of sensitivity to God and His Spirit. It is energy, liveliness, and a desire to do things for God. It understands with clarity. When others are unsure and confused about Godly things, the Gospel is self-evident and plain for Christians. They are no longer dead to the workings of God; they are alive to them. “Eternal life” is the clear mind concerning God, appetite for God in their desires, and capacity to obey God within our willpower. And it goes on and on; it grows and develops. Eternal life is a growing life, an ever-increasing life. ^[2]

After studying the context surrounding this verse, John W. (Jack) Carter (1947) points out that in verses ten and now eleven, the Apostle John uses another legal term: “a record:” a written testimony.  The idea is that something that is written down cannot be changed. Today this is called a “disposition.” Written testimonies cannot be altered. It is a piece of solid, substantial evidence presented to the court. The final proof of salvation that John brings to the stand is the gift of eternal life found only in Jesus, the Anointed One. All religious expression and effort focus on reconciling the gap between God and mankind. John points to the gift of eternal life through Jesus the Anointed One as the only acceptable means to fill that gap. With this, John rests his case with a final summation.^[3]

A man who loves sharing God’s Word, Robert W. Yarbrough (1948) draws our attention to the first word in verse eleven, “and,” with an implication in verse ten. Objectively, God’s testimony is that He has made a saving disclosure regarding His Son.[4] But in verse eleven, John specifies what this witness amounts to: “God gave us eternal life.” “Eternal life” is placed in an emphatic position in its clause. That “God gave” it is a reminder “that we are destitute of it” without the Anointed One and “merits cannot acquire it.” Some suggest that “gave” describes the uniqueness of an event in the Anointed One’s past. This concept makes the unbelief of verse ten all the more meaningful because not only has God proclaimed the truth and attested richly to it, but His gracious act also has the gift of eternal life to its recipients as its goal. Some, however, would rather make God a liar than bow to receive God’s blessing.^[5]

Skilled in Dead Sea Scroll interpretation and New Testament writings, Colin G. Kruse (1950) sees the Apostle John now amplifying the nature of God’s witness. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Up to this point, John has emphasized God’s witness concerning the person (who came in the flesh) and work (coming by water and blood) of the historical Jesus. But here, John accentuates God’s testimony concerning the benefit made available to believers through His Son. Here is God’s testimony concerning the eternal life He gives people “in His Son.” In 1 John, eternal life is not an unending extension of life as we know it; instead, it is “having” Jesus the Anointed One. Eternal life is identified with Jesus the Anointed One. He is eternal life,[6] that was with the Father from the beginning.[7] ^[8]

Believing that Christians can fall away from the faith, Ben Witherington III (1951) tells us that here in verse eleven, we are told that God has given everlasting life to believers and that this life is in His Son. Here the act of giving is in the past tense, referring to the historical events of Jesus’ life, or at least the fact of His life. Faith is the condition of receiving God’s life, but once acquired, that life also confirms faith. John states that whoever has the Son has everlasting life, and the converse is also true. This life is available only through the Son. Without the Son, one is spiritually dead, even if one is intellectually alive and lively. Perhaps John has the heretics in view here. Notice that this is called “the witness/testimony,” by which John means the divine evidence or witness to the truth about Jesus. That believers have everlasting life in His name validates the high Christological claims about Him. It is the internal testimony to the fact about Jesus.^[9]

With her crafted spiritual insight, Judith Lieu (1951) says that characteristically, the Apostle John switches from the language of objective reality to that of the subjective appropriation that embodies that reality. The “this is” (the testimony)[10] and commentary anticipate what follows. The “that” clause that follows is not the content of the testimony, namely, (what someone asserts) but constitutes the testimony itself. It also repeats the unfulfilled definition of verse nine (“For this is the testimony of God”): God’s gift of life is God’s testimony giving. On this occasion, “the testimony” is not explicitly defined as “God’s,” perhaps because that is by now self-evident or probably because the preceding verses have excluded any suggestion that this appropriation in “us” exhausts the sum total of God’s testimony. ^[11]

Emphasizing the Apostle John’s call to Christian fellowship, Bruce B. Barton (1954) notes that this is the testimony that the false teachers refused to believe, but the Christians held on to it as the truth; that God has given us eternal life, and this life is found only in His Son. Divine, eternal life resides in the Anointed One, who makes it available to all who believe in Him. That Jesus is indeed God’s Son was established by God’s testimony.^[12] Therefore, believers have eternal life in relationship to and in union with Jesus the Anointed One, who is Himself “life,”^[13] and they have eternal life because of Him.^{[14] [15]}

With a classical thinking approach to understanding the scriptures, Bruce G. Schuchard (1958) proposes that as a complement to the paired clauses that frame (5:10a, 10b, and 5:12a, 12b) are instances of an equal clause beginning with an attention-grabbing “this is.” And this is the testimony that God has given us the life of the coming age. A statement much like the one with which the body of the Epistle begins to mark its framed end. “This” again (as in 5:3a, 4b, 6a, 9b) looks forward to the clause’s “God’s Son” and concluding references to “testimony” (5:10a, 10c). Then there is “The life of the age to come.” A prominent inaugural theme of both the prologue (see 1:1) and the beginning of the Epistle’s second half (see 3:15) helps with its references in the Epistle’s conclusion. In Jesus, the age that is to come, its kingdom, comes. Therefore, in Jesus, the life of the age to come is “received and enjoyed here and now” by all who trust in Him. ^[16]

In his unorthodox Unitarian way, Duncan Heaster (1967) understands that this God given testimony concerns His gift of eternal life through His Son. Therefore, our witness is a life lived here, like the life we will live eternally in Heaven’s Kingdom. That life given to us by the Holy Spirit is “the life” of the Lord Jesus. We now live that life in union with the mind of the exalted Jesus. Therefore, the Gospel of the future Kingdom was explained in parables about how life should be lived now; the “eternal life,” as John puts it, the Kingdom Life. But this life is a gift of the Lord’s Spirit, living and thinking as He does; the energy is “in His Son.” It is so true to practical experience; it is not the exposition of doctrinal truths that makes a powerful witness. Instead of the Kingdom Life, the Eternal Life, the life which was and is in the Anointed One, lived in human life before the eyes of our fellow believers.^[17]

Bright seminarian Karen H. Jobes (1968) tells us that God’s testimony is firm, rooted in His character, revealed in His Son, and witnessed by the Spirit, the water, and the blood. John now brings his argument back to address the assurance he wants his readers to have. God testifies, and He cannot lie,[18] that He offers to all[19] what He gave “us” (meaning John and the Apostles) who believed His testimony about His Son, namely, the gift of eternal life found in no one other than God’s Son, Jesus the Anointed One. So closely does John’s argument link God’s testimony about Jesus to the witness of the Spirit, the water, and the blood that any claim that excludes the Spirit, the water, or the blood is not God’s testimony but merely human ideas devoid of the power to save and assure.[20]

A skilled sermonizer, David Legge (1969) tells us that the Greek noun martyria and verb martyreō for “testify” or “bear witness” are used no fewer than ten times in verses six to eleven. John depicts it for us in an illustration, a courtroom drama. Now, as you may be aware, if you’re familiar with the Final Covenant, the Apostle Paul uses courtroom imagery in the book of Romans.[21] Of course, specifically in some of those portions of Scripture, he presents God as our Judge, God, who is holy and righteous, weighing our sins against His law. Not only is God the Judge in Paul’s courtroom scene, but we are the accused; we are the condemned before the courtroom bar of God. Then in Paul’s scene, we also find that there’s a third party, the Anointed One, who is our Advocate.

He is the One who stands before God’s throne and pleads our case and proves that we are not guilty of breaking God’s law since evidence proves that our lawless living has been forgiven. In verse ten, John says: “All who believe in the Son of God know in their hearts that this testimony is true. Those who don’t believe this call God a liar because they don’t believe what God testified concerning His Son.” This is indisputable evidence involving the Anointed One to show and prove to all without reasonable doubt that He is who He says He is. It is undeniable evidence, and to reject it is not unreasonable; it is unbelief! As John Stott said: “Unbelief is not a misfortune to be pitied; it is a sin to be deplored.”[22] The evidence is staggering, and to reject it, John says, you’re trying to make God a liar! But the evidence is stacked in the Anointed One’s complete favor.

That is the weight of their testimony after the three witnesses have given it. Then thirdly and finally, John presents the verdict on their testimony in the courtroom. “And this is the record: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.” In other words, John tells it like it is. John says: “Here is the evidence, take it or leave it, here are the facts: God testified concerning His Son whom He gave so we could have eternal life, and this life is found only in His Son. It’s on record; this is the testimony; it’s indisputable.” Who could misunderstand language like that?

A Christian’s faith is in the Anointed One, from start to finish. Therefore, those with the Son have eternal life – and those who do not have the Anointed One of the Bible and human history have no eternal life. People need to hear this: you can use evangelical language, you can belong to a denomination that classes itself as evangelical, you can say, “I belong to the church, I’m Baptist, I’m Presbyterian, I’m Brethren, I’m Episcopalian, I’m Pentecostal or something other.” But listen to God’s Word: it’s got nothing to do with all that! He that has the Son has everlasting life!^[23]

^5:12 Whoever has the Son has life, but whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

EXPOSITION

This same truth inspired the Apostle Paul to tell us we must keep all this in mind: God made us part of the Anointed One, Jesus. And the Anointed One has become for us wisdom from God. He is why we are right with God and pure enough to be in His presence. The Anointed One is He who set us free from following our sinful tendencies.^[24] In another letter, Paul stated he had been crucified with the Anointed One: and his old self no longer lives, but the Anointed One lives in him. And the life he now has within his body is a result of his trusting in the Son of God, who loved him and gave Himself for him.^[25]

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[1] Walls, Muncia: Epistles of John and Jude, op. cit., p. 89

[2] Eaton, Michael: Focus on the Bible, 1,2,3 John, op. cit., p. 188

[3] Carter, Dr. John W. (Jack). 1,2,3, John & Jude: (The Disciple’s Bible Commentary Book 48), op. cit., p. 126

[4] 1 John 5:9-10

[5] Yarbrough, Robert W., 1-3 John (Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament), op. cit., pp. 289-290

[6] 1 John 5:20

[7] Ibid. 1:2

[8] Kruse, Colin G., The Letters of John (The Pillar New Testament Commentary), op. cit., loc. cit., Kindle Edition

[9] Witherington, Ben III, Letters and Homilies for Hellenized Christians: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary on Titus, 1-2 Timothy and 1-3 John, op. cit., loc. cit., Kindle Edition

[10] Cf. 1 John 1:5

[11] Lieu, Judith: A New Testament Library, I, II, & III John, op. cit., p. 219

[12] 1 John 5:7-9

[13] John 1:4; 14:6

[14] 2 Timothy 1:10

[15] Barton, Bruce B., 1,2, & 3 John (Life Application Bible Commentary), op. cit., p. 112

[16] Schuchard, Bruce G., Concordia Commentary, 1-3 John, op. cit., pp. 542-543

[17] Heaster, Duncan. New European Christadelphian Commentary: op. cit., The Letters of John, p. 76

[18] Numbers 23:19

[19] See 1 John 2:2

[20] Jobes, Karen H., 1, 2, and 3 John (Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on The New Testament Series Book 18), op. cit., p. 225

[21] Romans 3:9-28

[22] Stott, John: The Epistles of John, TNT, Eerdmans, 1964, p. 182.

[23] Legge, David: Preach the Word, 1 John, Sermon 15

[24] 1 Corinthians 1:30

[25] Galatians 2:20

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXX) 02/17/23

^5:11 This is what God told us: He has given us eternal life in His Son.

Noting the Apostle John’s doctrinal implications, John James Lias (1834-1923) feels we are permitted to grasp the truth in its fulness of God’s Word. “The Life was manifested” that it might become ours. Eternal, unchangeable life is within our reach. And this life can only be obtained in and through the Son of God, as John repeatedly tells us,[1] that we might have life. The “He gave” here refers no doubt to the first coming of the Anointed One into the world as the one-act which gave eternal life to the world. The aorist tense asks us to contemplate that this gift reached us in the Person of the Son. We should not fail to observe how the Apostle Paul comes to the same conclusion after a long argument, in almost the exact words. “The gift of God is eternal life in Jesus the Anointed One our Lord.”[2] ^[3]

A tried and tested biblical scholar who believes in the up-building of the Christian life, Robert Cameron (1839-1904) notes that the Apostle John adds to what has been said so far, “God has given to us eternal life and this life is in His Son,” and we obtain this life believing in His name. About forty times in John’s Gospel, spiritual and eternal life is said to be received by having faith in the Anointed One, but only once here in this Epistle. It is assumed that the persons to whom John writes have already believed. Then he adds in verse twelve, “Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” If God has given us spiritual life in the Anointed One, then we also have what God has put in Him – eternal life. If we do not accept the Anointed One, we do not have spiritual life. So, Christianity is perpetual faith in a person and not the acceptance of a creed.

The Father, the words and the works of the Anointed One, the Scriptures, John the Baptizer, and the disciples all bear their testimony that Jesus is the Son of God, notes Cameron. But God has appointed the Spirit, the water, and the blood to bear witness as well. They bear official witness to the Anointed One and point out how He is related to us in accomplishing our redemption. The Spirit, the water, and the blood are three complete testimonies. What was performed by the Anointed One, in His entrance upon His ministry by water and His exit by blood, are still visible. To reject these witnesses is to make God a liar and discard His Son. Here ends the doctrinal part of the First Epistle of John.^[4]

As a secular and sacred Law enforcer, Sir Robert Anderson (1841-1918) denotes that faith in its simplest character is not trust, nor even faith in a person, but the belief of a record. “Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Anointed One, is born of God.”[5] “Who is he that overcomes the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God?”[6] So, reading this fifth chapter, we find that God’s testimony is in question between sinners and themselves. “There are three who bear witness, the Spirit, the water, and the blood, and the three agree in one. If we receive the witness of others, the witness of God is greater. They that believe in the Son of God have the witness in themselves.[7] In the whole chapter, beginning with verse six, the terms “water” and “blood” are to be interpreted by the typology of Scripture. The Anointed One came as the fulfillment not merely of “the water of purification”[8] but of “the blood of atonement.”[9] And so also if we turn to the Gospel of John. It was written that we might believe “that Jesus is the Anointed One, the Son of God; and that, believing, we might have life through His name.”[10] ^[11]

Manifestly and distinctly, Erich Haupt (1841-1910) calculates that any explanation of the water and the blood must consider the twofold relation they assume here. First, they are witnesses or a source of testimony. Therefore, the water and the blood must represent some divine act, some heavenly institution, in virtue of which God appears on behalf of the Anointed One. Secondly, we observe that the Anointed One is said to have “come.” The Apostle John uses the word “come” concerning the Anointed One as a solemn voice that refers to Jesus’ coming as the Anointed One, not to His being born, but His manifestation as Savior of the world. The proposition before us needs to signify that Jesus attained His Messianic position through water and blood. Therefore, these two are not only the pledge of His divine Sonship but the powers through which He was established as the world’s Savior. Accordingly, the water and the blood must be pointed to as constitutive factors in the life of the Redeemer.^[12]

With his Spirit-directed calculating mind, Alfred Plummer (1841-1926) says what the Apostle John says in verse eleven is the external witness of God when the believer internally appropriates it, namely, the Divine gift of eternal life. Plummer explains that “He has given” eternal life is better translated as “He gave.” but perhaps this is a case in which the English perfect may represent the Greek aorist. But at any rate, “gave” must not be weakened into “offered,” still less into “promised.” The believer already possesses eternal life. This life is in God’s Son. Therefore, eternal life has its seat and source in the Son, the “Prince” or “Author” of life.[13] ^[14]

With regal etiquette, Ernest von Dryander (1843-1922) asks, “Who guides the arrow of the word of God so that it penetrates the conscience of man?” It is the Holy Spirit. “Who arouses death-stricken souls to yearn for peace and salvation?” It is the Holy Spirit. “Who makes the Anointed One’s presence in the preaching of His Word?” It is the Spirit of truth. So there are three testify on earth – the Spirit, the water, and the blood. Only in the power of the Spirit do the other witnesses become living and convincing. But “these three agree in one” on one shared object: declaring Jesus the Anointed One as God’s Son and Redeemer of the world.

In addition, it is decreed according to Jewish Law that two or three witnesses must substantiate every truth.[15] Since this holds true in the case of earthly tribunals and even more in the case of the heavenly, should anyone attempt to make God a liar by not believing the testimony He gave of His Son? What hinders them from joining the ranks of true believers? Why stand aloof? Why not revere the Person of Jesus the Anointed One and yet refuse to believe He is the Redeemer? Because they art lacking in one thing; even though there should be numberless witnesses, the living God provided many signs and wonders, why would they remain unconvinced? Why would they refuse to experience the unique and peculiar power these witnesses exercise in giving their testimony? Why wait until forced to confess with Jeremiah, “O Lord, you misled me, and I allowed myself to be misled. You are stronger than I am, and you overpowered me. Now I am mocked every day; everyone laughs at me.”[16] ^[17]

With his stately speaking style,  William M. Sinclair (1850-1917) says that the Christian creed is reduced here to a small scope: the gift of eternal life and the dependence of that life upon His Son. Eternal life does not mean the mere continuance of life after death, whether for good or evil. Instead, it is the expression used throughout the Apostle John’s writings for life in God without reference to time, which can have no end. As such, it implies heaven and every possible variety of blessedness and consists of believing in God the Father and His Son. Its opposite is not annihilation but the second death: existence in exclusion from God.[18] ^[19]

For R. A. Torrey (1856-1928), the expression “living,” as applied to the Word of God, noticeably means something more than partaking of the kind of life with which we are acquainted from observation. God speaks of Himself as the “Living God.” The Lord Jesus is the “Prince of Life.”[20] He announced Himself to John in the vision of Patmos as “He that lives.” Eternal life is in Him.[21] It is clear, then, that when we read, “The Word of God is living,” we are to understand that it lives with a spiritual, inexhaustible, and inextinguishable, divine life. If the Word of God is indeed living in this sense, then we have a fact of tremendous significance.^[22]

A man who appreciates Jesus’ embodiment of the divine transforming emotion on how we live in this world, Robert Law (1860-1919), asserts that spiritual and eternal Life, God, the Father revealed in the Anointed One, is the sole and absolute source. He is the true God and Eternal Life.[23] Eternal Life is His gift² to men; potentially, when He “sent His Son into the world that we might live through Him;”[24] actually, when we believe in His name.[25] The Anointed One is the sole mediator of spiritual Life. If “the witness is that God gave us Eternal spiritual and eternal Life,” it is because “this spiritual and eternal Life is in His Son.” By the Incarnation of the Only-Begotten Son, the Eternal Life in its Divine fulness became incorporated with humanity and remain a fountain of regenerative power to “as many as receive Him.”[26]

Also, says Law, here John’s doctrine of the Logos (“Word”) enables him to carry thought on this subject in the Final Covenant a step further than the Pauline view of the Anointed One as the Second Adam and the “Man from heaven.”[27] In what sense the Life of God is in the Anointed One and mediated through Him is unfolded in the opening verses of the Epistle, where it is said that the subject of the entire Apostolic announcement is “the Word of Life.” This announcement is possible because “the Life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare unto you the Life, the Eternal Life, which was in relation to the Father and was manifested unto us.”[28] ^[29]

With characteristic fundamental thinking, Alan England Brooke (1863-1939) says that the witness is finally defined with some of the essential characteristics already described. So far, the Apostle John only taught his readers that it is a Divine witness borne by the Father to His Son and that those who believe in the Son have it as a possession as part of themselves. Now John states what it consists of. God bore witness to His Son when He gave life to mankind – that higher spiritual life they can realize and make their own by uniting themselves to Jesus, the Anointed One, God’s Son.[30]

God’s testimony consisted of the fact that He gave life to mankind by sending His Son that they might have life in Him.[31] The sending of the Son on a mission is characterized by the Water of the Baptism and shed Blood on the Cross, the object of which was to implant a new life in believing men and women. It was the witness borne by God to the nature and character of Jesus of Nazareth. The gift was something best described as “spiritual life.” The tense emphasizes the fact, apart from its consequences. The reference is to the historical fact of the mission of Him who came by Water and by Blood. The gift of life is a witness only where it has been accepted, which is part of the “testimony,” not an additional statement about life. The witness is the gift of a life which is in God’s Son.^[32]

As a spiritual mentor, Ronald A. Ward (1920-1986) mentions that the Apostle John now analyses the content of the divine testimony. God gave us eternal life. When? It is natural to say, “when we were born again.” But Paul told Timothy that God’s grace was given to us through the Anointed One, Jesus before time began. So, there is no eternal life apart from the Anointed One – and it comes from God.[33] [34] In a spirited confrontational way, Peter S. Ruckman (1921-2016) states that from verse eleven on down, through verse fifteen, is the plainest section found anywhere in John’s first epistle. The Apostle Paul shares this theology ‒ salvation is based on believing something.[35] We need not do something or get something to “abide,” not keeping anybody’s commandments, doing, going, loving the brethren, or anything else, as we have found in the first four chapters. How can anyone not believe that Jesus of Nazareth was God’s Son when God said so?[36] Jesus said He was God’s Son.[37] The disciples said so:[38] Matthew,[39] Mark,[40] Luke,[41] John,[42] Peter,[43] and Thomas.[44] Also, Paul,[45] Martha, [46] the demons,[47] and the Holy Spirit.[48][49] How many more witnesses does anyone need?

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[1] John 6:33, 51; 10:10

[2] Romans 6:23

[3] Lias, John James: The First Epistle of St. John with Exposition, op. cit., pp.391-392

[4] Cameron, Robert: The First Epistle of John, or, God Revealed in Light, Life, and Love, op. cit., p. 238

[5] 1 John 5:1

[6] Ibid. 5:5

[7] Ibid. 5:10

[8] Numbers 19

[9] Leviticus 16

[10] John 20:31

[11] Anderson, Sir. Robert: The Gospel and its Ministry, op. cit., p. 30

[12] Haupt, Erich: The First Epistle of St. John: Clark’s Foreign Theological Library, Vol. LXIV, op. cit., pp. 298-299, 318-319

[13] Acts of the Apostles 3:15; See John 1:4; 5:26

[14] Plummer, Alfred: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, N. T., Vol. IV, p. 163

[15] Deuteronomy 19:15

[16] Jeremiah 20:7 – New Living Translation

[17] Dryander, Ernst von: A Commentary on the First Epistle of St. John in the Form of Addresses, op. cit., XV, The Invulnerability of Faith, p. 202

[18] Cf.  1 John 2:25; John 17:3; 2 Timothy 1:10

[19] Sinclair, William M., New Testament Commentary for English Readers, Charles J. Ellicott (Ed.), op. cit., Vol. 3, p. 492

[20] Acts of the Apostles 3:15

[21] 1 John 5:11

[22] Torrey, R. A., The Fundamentals – A Testament of Truth, Vol. 2, pp. 126-127

[23] 1 John 5:20

[24] Ibid. 4:9

[25] Ibid. 5:13

[26] John 1:12

[27] 1 Corinthians 15:22, 45-49

[28] 1 John 1:2

[29] Law, Robert: The Tests of Life: A Study of the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit., p. 190-191

[30] Cf. John 3:19

[31] Cf. Ibid. 10:10

[32] Brooke, Alan E., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Johannine Epistles, op. cit., pp. 140-141

[33] See John 17:3

[34] Ward, Ronald A., The Epistles on John and Jude, op. cit., pp. 56-57

[35] Acts of the Apostles 15:11

[36] Matthew 3:17

[37] John 1:14; 5:17; Hebrews 1:8

[38] Matthew 14:33

[39] Matthew 8:29

[40] Mark 3:11

[41] Luke 1:32; 4:41

[42] John 19:7

[43] Matthew 16:16

[44] John 20:28

[45] Matthew 14:33

[46] John 11:27

[47] Luke 4:40-41

[48] Luke 3:22; John 1:32    

[49] Ruckman, Dr. Peter S., General Epistles Vol. 2 (1-2-3 John, Jude Commentary), op. cit., loc. cit. Kindle Edition

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXIX) 02/16/23

^5:11 This is what God told us: He has given us eternal life in His Son.

In his Baptist Magazine by a Clergyman in England, Welsh preacher David Thomas (1813-1894) states that Eternal life is a gift for these reasons:

I. THE SUBJECT OF THE “RECORD” – What is it? It is not endless existence. The “record” does not refer to something new. The Bible assumes mankind’s immortality. “Eternal life” consists in the soul’s well-being – its intrinsic, internal blessedness: “the kingdom of God is within you.”[1] This life is “eternal.” Its resource is the Eternal One, His principles of righteousness embedded in the heart and “springing up into everlasting life.”[2]

II. THE DOCTRINE OF THE “RECORD” (1) is a gift ‒ not something for which people need to do good deeds, but something to be received. (2) It is a gift already given. The believer has its foretaste. (3) It is a gift already given “in His Son.” God’s “grace and truth” come through Jesus the Anointed One, not in systems or churches. (4) It is for the “record.” It is a testimony that people may hear as being said by God’s authority for those who accept it to have everlasting life.^[3]

After checking the text closely, Richard H. Tuck (1817-1868) states that the Apostle John’s words in verse eleven are a statement or declaration we must believe. The Christian creed is limited in scope – the gift of eternal life and the dependence of that life upon God’s Son. Therefore, eternal life is not merely continuing life, but the new life by spiritual birth is limitless. Eternal life is that which we now understand as spiritual life. That is, in its nature, continuous. This everlasting life is not subject to the “second death.”[4] It depends on our relationship to Jesus the Anointed One. To have the Anointed One by faith is to breathe the first breath of eternal life. That life is in the Anointed One for impartation to us, and the receptivity in us is our faith.^[5]

After observing the Apostle John’s attention to detail, John Stock (1817-1884) agrees that God’s testimony surpasses all others. It is higher than heaven, is above the earth, and firmer than the rocks that girt the ocean. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my word will not.[6] It is as unquestionable as it is infinitely gracious. An unexceptionable witness accompanies it, and happy are they who credit God and do not treat His record as false, as did the unhappy Jews as a nation, who so pushed salvation so far from them.

The whole Gospel is compacted in the words of this record, and the gift of eternal life, which we lost in the fall of Adam, which we never could regain, or merit. Now it is ours in God’s dear Son; all who believe in Him come to the Father by Him. Death, the wages of sin,[7] is all our just punishment; and the law of faith excludes boasting. We are so accustomed to sin that it is like one breathing tainted air. We don’t notice it until some wicked deed is committed.

Sin, however, is damnable, whether we perceive it or not. The law of God, which extends to the thoughts and desires of the heart, makes it known and also its sinfulness, and proclaims each transgressor cursed and brings in all the world guilty or subject to punishment⁴; and so we confess justly that we for our evil deeds do worthily deserve to be punished¹. God in love brought us redemption from so fearful a curse by a way for us to escape through His co-equal and beloved Son. He commended His love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, the Anointed One died for us:[8] in whom we have redemption through His blood,[9] the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace; wherein He hath abounded towards us, in all wisdom and prudence; saving and calling us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus, before the world began.^[10]

God in love brought us redemption from so fearful a curse and so deserved and awful death and made a way of escape for us by and through His co-equal and beloved Son. He commended His love towards us that, while we were yet sinners, the Anointed One died for us.[11] In Him, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace,[12] wherein He has abounded towards us, in all wisdom and forethought.[13] ^[14]

Known as a distinguished classical Bible scholar at Trinity College, Cambridge, Gordon Calthrop (1823-1894) notes that when we hear the words “eternal life,” we turn instinctively to the opening of the great High Priestly prayer recorded in the Apostle John’s Gospel.[15] So it gives rise to three questions.

I. How do we attain this “eternal life?” (a) It is a gift of God. We cannot merit it; we cannot acquire it as compensation or the result of any amount of laborious effort or moral excellence. We have to accept it, stretch out our hand, and thankfully take what the Lord God, of His infinite bounty and goodness, sees fit to offer. (b) It is bound up with the Person of the Lord Jesus the Anointed One. In the Lord Jesus the Anointed One, we have the reservoir which contains life. “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.”[16] “As the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son to have life in Himself.”[17] (c) And again: we must come into contact, so to speak, with this living reservoir or fountainhead so that the stream that issues from it may flow into our being and make us partakers of its blessings. “He that has the Son has life.”[18]

II. What can we understand by “Has the Son”? The idea is that of possession, of mutual control, so that each of us shall be able to say of the Anointed One, “He is mine,” and the Anointed One, on His part, will be willing to speak of each of us, “I am His.” But how is this possession brought about? On our part, by the perfect surrender of ourselves to the Lord. As long as there is any holding back of anything from the Anointed One, He is of no benefit to us. He will not—indeed, He cannot—enter our inner being until we open the door and allow Him to come in, and even then, He will join on no other terms than that of absolute surrender.

III. What are the manifestations of “eternal life”? We find three crucial things in a living body – sensation, movement, and growth.

(a) There is a sensation we may call consciousness, or realization, of God in every living soul. God surrounds every soul as the atmosphere surrounds us. God surrounds us on every side. We exist in God as an element through creation. But it is perfectly possible for us to be utterly insensitive and not have any consciousness of Him. Our conscience is numb until we have received the new birth that the Spirit bestows. Then God flashes upon us actually as if He just came into being. We behold, we know, and delight in Him’s moral teaching and grandeur manifested in His Son, Jesus the Anointed One.

(b) Another manifestation of life is movement. And occupation for God, or mankind for God’s sake, is one of the characteristics of those born again of the Spirit and made new creations in Jesus the Anointed One. “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?’[19] is one of the first questions such persons always ask. Absolute silence is evidence of spiritual death. You must move, employ yourself; you must use some, at least, of your talents in the Divine service if you are “alive unto God.”

(c) Then there is growth, which is of various kinds: (i) Exercise of the graces of God bestowed upon us. (ii) Growth of intelligence in spiritual things. (iii) Maturity through advancing assimilation. Looking at the Anointed One, earnestly gazing upon Him, trying to understand Him, sympathizing with Him more and more, we catch something of His spirit; the features of His character are impressed upon us; we become, to some extent, like Him.^[20]

With precise spiritual discernment, William Alexander (1824-1911) takes verses ten and eleven as one verse: “Whoever believes in the Son of God has the truth that God told us. But people who do not believe God make God a liar because they do not believe what God told us about his Son. This is what God told us: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.” In Alexander’s mind, the Son of God is “the living theology of Christians.” So, it makes sense then that as Christians, we “live” our theology, not just talk about it. All of Jesus’ teachings are null and void unless they are put into action daily. That’s what the Apostle John is trying to get across to his readers. If you say you love God, show it by loving each other. It’s the best witness you could have that you are a child of God. The inner witness is of no value unless it has the outer witness to agree and implements it. Any enthusiastic praise and worship is good, but not without the same excited love for our spiritual brothers and sisters in God’s family.^[21]

With holiness doctrine expertise, Daniel Steele (1824-1914) sees the phrase “That He [God] gave” as a historical fact in the mission of His Son, “He gave to us” who evangelically appropriate the Anointed One, “eternal life.” He who experimentally knows the truth of the Gospel has life eternal, which is present and future, or rather “eternal life” exists, above all time. Eternal life is a respected term in the Final Covenant, occurring forty-four times. It is found only once in the First Covenant.[22] God manifested it to us, says the Apostle John, through His Son.[23]  So, “this life is in His Son.” Its source and seat, its Prince or Author.[24] ^[25]

After sufficient examination of the Greek text, Brooke F. Westcott (1825-1901) feels that God partially unfolded His witness by giving us eternal life. The Mission of His Son was the gift of life,[26] of life in His Son.[27] The reference is to the historical facts by which God communicated this life to humanity. That which before the Anointed One’s first coming was great hope, by His coming was realized and given. It simply defines the character of life and does not identify it with the only true life. True life is not separate from God but in God. Believers are united with the Anointed One and God.[28] ^[29]

Like a spiritual farmer planting the seed of God’s Word, Henry A. Sawtelle (1832-1913) says that this verse’s contents signify God’s testimony through the water, blood, and Spirit. The water, pointing to the water of life, the blood representing the vital principle, and the Spirit, the very element of life itself. They all testify and continue to say that God gave to us who believe in the right to receive eternal life. This eternal life is not directly the state of future blessedness, described as already given because it is a promise. Still, the spiritual life in the soul commenced on earth is destined to survive the body’s demise. Therefore, true believers enter eternal life while in this world.

Observe that this life is something “given” by God’s grace. We do not earn or deserve it; we only receive it. And this life is (abidingly) in His Son. We must regard this statement as a part of the purpose of the testimony and coordinate with the latter part of the preceding sentence. The water, the blood, and the Spirit declared not only the gift of life but also that He who came that way had it absolutely and entirely in Himself. The Anointed One is the eternal vessel of the living water. It is all in Him. It is not in angels or churches but in God’s Son. Only in and through Him is life communicated to a lost world.[30] ^[31] Called the “Prince of Preachers,” Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892) agrees with Sawtelle. Yes, it is all a gift. We are sent to preach this: “God so loved the world that He gave His only Son born of a woman, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”[32] That is why the Apostle John says here in verse eleven, “This recorded, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.” On God’s part, it is all giving; it is all receiving on our part. The promise is already offered, freely made, and fulfilled. God does not begin with giving and then charge a price. No commission is payable upon receipt of His grace. He does not ask or receive a penny; His love is altogether a gift. You may accept His promise as a gift: He will not degrade Himself by listening to other terms.^[33]

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[1] Luke 17:21

[2] John 4:14

[3] Thomas, David: Homilist Magazine, 1862

[4] See Revelation 2:10-11; 20:6, 14; 21:8; in the Jewish Targums it is used in Deuteronomy 33:6; Psalm 49:11

[5] Tuck, Richard H., The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary, op. cit., p. 329

[6] Matthew 24:35

[7] Romans 6:23

[8] Ibid. 5:8

[9] Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14

[10] Stock, John: An Exposition of the First Epistle General of St. John, op. cit., p. 430

[11] Ibid. 5:8

[12] Philippians 4:19

[13] Ephesians 1:7-8

[14] Stock, John: An Exposition of the First Epistle General of St. John, op. cit., p. 430-431

[15] John 17:1-26

[16] Ibid. 1:4

[17] Ibid. 5:26

[18] 1 John 5:12

[19] Acts of the Apostles 9:6 (KJV)

[20] Calthrop, Gordon: The Church Pulpit Commentary, op. cit., Vol. 12, pp. 322-324

[21] Alexander, William: The Holy Bible with an Explanatory and Critical Commentary, op. cit., Vol IV, p. 343

[22] Daniel 12:2

[23] 1 John 1:2

[24] See 1 John 1:4; Acts of the Apostles 3:15

[25] Steele, Daniel: Half-Hours with St. John’s Epistles, op. cit., p. 139

[26] John 10:10, 29

[27] Ibid. 20:31

[28] Cf. Romans 6:23; 2 Timothy 1:1

[29] Westcott, Brooke F., The Epistles of St. John: Greek Text with Notes, op. cit., pp. 187-188

[30] 1 John 4:9; John 10:10

[31] Sawtelle, Henry A., Commentary on the Epistles of John, op. cit., pp. 58-59

[32] John 3:16

[33] Spurgeon, Charles H., According to Promise, The Promise a Free Gift, pp. 30-31

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXVIII) 02/15/23

^5:11 This is what God told us: He has given us eternal life, which is in His Son.

With scholarly meditation, James Macknight (1721-1800) supposes that the Apostle John had in mind his Master’s words which he recorded in his Gospel.[1] Though John spoke particularly of the three in heaven and the three on earth who bear witness continually, he deferred mentioning it till now. So, what is it they are witnessing? Perhaps John felt that by introducing it last, and after so much preparation, it might make a stronger impression on the mind of his readers. In this, as in other passages of scripture, the expressing action, for example, “God has given,” is used instead of the future, God will give us eternal life, to show the certainty of obtaining that great blessing through His Son.^[2]

After skillfully scrutinizing the Apostle John’s theme, John Brown of Haddington (1722-1787) describes the sum of God’s witness concerning His Son – that, in infinite love, made a full and free offer of grace and glory to us sinners in the everlasting Gospel; and, according to His eternal and infinite love, has graciously and tenderly conferred upon us who believe in him a full right and title, and beginnings, earnests, and foretastes of eternal life. It is secured, inhabited, communicated, and enjoyed in a state of union and communion with the Anointed One.^[3]

More concerned with the church than the sacraments, William Jones of Nayland (1726-1800), a British clergyman and author, treats verses six to eleven as one statement. Jones sees the fourfold witness to the Divine Sonship of Jesus in it. John states that by faith, Christians overcome the world. We have the most convincing testimony that confidence in Jesus as the Son of God is well-founded. That testimony is manifold. His homily is extensive, so I’ve included the main points here. (See Footnote #1960 to locate the full text.) Jones says we have —

I. THE TESTIMONY OF HIS BAPTISM. We regard his coming “by water” as referring to His baptism by John the Baptizer. That baptism was: (1) The inauguration of His great mission. When Jesus went to John for baptism, He finally left His private life and was just about to enter His public ministry, and His baptism was a fitting introduction to that ministry.

II. THE TESTIMONY OF HIS CRUCIFIXION. The reference is to the blood He shed on the cross for the redemption of humanity. But how did His death witness the truth that He was God’s Son? By the extraordinary phenomena associated with His death.[4] He voluntarily submitted Himself to death for the salvation of the lost world.[5] He freely surrendered Himself to the most painful and shameful death, not for Himself or his friends, but for sinners and rebels against Him and His Father so that they might have eternal life. Such self-sacrifice was more than human, more than angelic – but Divinely orchestrated to fulfill God’s Word.

“This was compassion like a God,

That when the Saviour knew

The price of pardon was His blood.

His pity ne’er withdrew.”[6]

III. THE TESTIMONY OF HIS SPIRIT. At our Lord’s baptism, the Spirit witnessed that He was God’s Son.[7] Our Lord said, “The Spirit of truth, which proceeds from the Father shall bear witness of me.”[8] Again He said, “The Spirit of truth … He will bring me glory by telling you whatever He receives from me.”[9] He bore witness to the Messiahship of Jesus by coming down, according to His promise, and making the Gospel of the Anointed One, which they preached, saving power to thousands of souls.[10]

IV. THE TESTIMONY OF HIS BELIEVING PEOPLE. All genuine believers in Jesus the Anointed One have their conscience as a witness that God gave them eternal life, and this life is in His Son. They are conscious that the life of love – love to God and mankind – is theirs. “We know that we have passed out of spiritual death into everlasting life because we love our fellow believers.”[11] And we know that this life was activated within us through the exercise of faith in the Anointed One. To us individually, this is the most convincing of all witnesses. “One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see.”[12]

V. THE TESTIMONY OF ALL THE BEFORE-MENTIONED COMBINED. All the preceding witnesses are united and concurrent in their evidence. “The three agree in one.”[13] We may say that the four agree as one. Their testimony is unanimous. There is no contradiction, no discrepancy in their evidence. They declare, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel.”[14] “You are the Anointed One, the Son of the Living God.”[15] ^[16]

At age fifteen, a potential young theologian who preached while holding cottage prayer meetings, Joseph Benson (1749-1821), sees the Apostle John identifying the water and blood as emblems of the offices Jesus sustained and of the salvation He obtained for His people. The water is a symbol of the purity of His doctrine, instructing people in the highest morals, and of His righteous and holy example; and, what is of still greater importance, of the purifying grace of which he is the fountain, sanctifying and cleansing such as believe in him, from all filthiness of flesh and spirit: while the blood which issued from him was an emblem both of the sufferings which awaited his followers, who were to seal the truth with their blood, and of his sufferings, whereby he hath made atonement for the sins of the world and procured for his followers a free and full justification. ”^[17]

Considering everything the Apostle John has said, Adam Clarke (1774-1849) states that the great truth to which the Spirit, the water, and the blood bear testimony is now part of the record. God has given us eternal life – a right to endless appropriate glory. And this life is in His Son; it comes by and through Him; He is its author and purchaser; it is only in and through Him. No other plan of salvation can be produced; God provided no other, and a person’s invention is vain indeed.^[18]

Ranked highly by other theologians on the doctrine of the atonement, John McLeod Campbell (1800-1872), Scottish minister and Reformed theologian, writes that someone spoke of the difficulty in joining, in anticipation, “themselves and glory in one thought.” The greater difficulty is to unite ourselves and eternal life. God has already connected us in the Anointed One in an authentic way. But, we are alike slow of heart to receive the Anointed One’s revelation of ourselves and His revelation of God – to believe that God has given us eternal life in His Son and believe that God is love.^[19]

Without using complicated language, Albert Barnes (1798-1870) describes verse eleven as a summation of the testimony God gave respecting His Son. Through Him, God gave eternal life o those who believe in Him. And this life is in His Son. Therefore, I would suggest to Dr. Barnes an amendment: “And His Son in us is eternal life.” It is treasured up in Him and obtained only through Him.^[20]

With impressive theological vision, Richard Rothe (1799-1867) points out how highly the Apostle John values that which we call Christianity. According to him, it is the possession of an eternal life bestowed by God and by no means merely a kind of moral illumination. It is not a mere doctrine or hope; it is not a simple sum of new ethical motives and impulses but a complete, perfect life. It is a life, too, that is eternal and consequently independent of the conditions of our present physical existence. Furthermore, it is not directly affected by the decay of our biological natural organism. On the contrary, it has its real foundation because it is spiritual life.

It is not something we created in ourselves, says Rothe, God bestowed it on us. It is also wholly dependent on Jesus, the Son of God, as its source, dependent on the person of the Savior, not merely on an individual. It can only be received and possessed with the Son Himself; Christianity is an actual living union with the Anointed One. There is no such thing as Christianity detached from the Anointed One. We can do Christianity no worse than to lower it from this height to make it more compatible with people’s intelligence and bring it under the same categories as other religions. If that happens, it must suffer the fate of all. It must decay once it has served its purpose and raised people’s minds above its standpoint.

On the contrary, states Rothe, a Christian must be born again into the eternal life of Christianity. It does not utilize an idealism of the human spirit but faith in the historical individual, the Anointed One. Here it is, where a lofty idealism is inseparably united with an equally definite realism. ^[21]

Consistent with the Apostle John’s advice, Heinrich A. W. Meyer (1800-1882) shares how God’s witness shows itself internally to the believer. Those, who, by believing, have the experiential witness of God, it is no longer just a feeling but a divine power, which God has given them. Hence the Apostle John says in verse eleven: “And this is in the record,”^[22] with “to us who have believed” to be mentally added.

According to Robert Jamieson (1802-1880), Andrew Fausset (1821-1910), and David Brown’s (1803-1897) way of thinking, we should read the Apostle John’s words, “Here is what God told us.” So, what did God tell John? The apostle leaves no doubt. God said He gave us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Thus,  to have eternal life, you must have God’s Son.[23] It means that as the second Adam, God’s Son, God secured this life for us. We would have lost it like the first Adam if it depended on us.[24]

In line with Apostle John’s conclusion, Henry Alford (1810-1871) makes the point that the testimony here in verses eleven is this, that, namely, that “God gave,” not “has given.” It is essential to notice that it is not the gift’s endurance but the gift itself is highlighted. We can see the present assurance of our possessing this gift when we combine verses eleven and twelve: “This is what God has testified: He has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have God’s Son does not have life.”^[25]

As a faithful and zealous scholar, William Graham (1810-1883) asks, what is the sum and substance of all the testimonies of God as revealed in the Gospel of the Savior? Hear what the Apostle John says, “This is the record, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.” From this record, we learn much about the nature of the Gospel. The Giver is God. He is the source and fountain from which all the gifts of providence and grace flow. The Creator and the creature come directly into contact in divine grace. He gave His Son, He shares His Spirit, and from Him, eternal life flows. On no other terms could we receive, and on none other could He dispense His blessings. If God offered salvation for our benefit, it must be free; otherwise, it is not a gift.

Hence the attitude which God assumes in the Gospel dispensation is that of a sin-pardoning Father seated on a throne of grace and freely dispensing His blessings to the nations. Eternal life is the splendid gift that the God of heaven reaches down to every person from His throne on high, inviting, commanding, and entreating us all to receive it from His hand. It is a gift worthy of God, for it contains pardon and peace here and now and the complete and blissful enjoyment of the divine glory hereafter. As opposed to the punishment and consequent death upon sin, it is the eternal gift of life, as opposed to the transient, perishable enjoyments of this temporary world. The full blissful vision of the indescribable Yahweh, into which the ransomed will enter at the return of the Lord;[26]  nor does our language contain any term more expressive of the enjoyments of the heavenly sanctuary.^[27]

With the zeal of a scriptural text examiner, William E. Jelf (811-1875) states that God’s witness is the subjective confirmation of the reality of the objective evidence of the Anointed One being God’s Son. The Father’s testimony consists of this: according to the plan of salvation, He has given us everlasting life; and this gift is in harmony with the higher instincts and desires of the soul. Therefore, the soul acknowledges its truth, just as it recognizes and acknowledges, proprio motu,[28] the existence of God. Thus, according to the Christian economy, eternal life depends on the Son of God having sacrificed Himself for us.^[29]

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[1] John 17:2

[2] Macknight, James: Apostolic Epistles with Commentary, Vol. VI, pp. 114-115

[3] Brown of Haddington, John: Self-Interpreting Bible, N. T., Vol. IV, p. 506

[4] See Matthew 27:45, 50-54; Luke 23:47-48

[5] John 10:17-18; Galarians 1:4; 1 Timothy 2:6; Titus 2:14; 1 Peter 3:18

[6] Christ’s Dying Love, written by Isaac Watts, 1770, Stanza 2

[7] Matthew 3:16-17

[8] John 15:26

[9] Ibid. 16:14

[10] Acts of the Apostles 2; 4:31

[11] Ibid. 3:14

[12] John 9:25

[13] Acts of the Apostles 5:8

[14] John 1:49

[15] Matthew 16:16

[16] Jones, William: The Pulpit Commentary, op. cit., Vol. 22, pp. 161-162

[17] Benson, Joseph: Selections from Commentary on the Old and New Testaments, op. cit., p. 347

[18] Clarke, Adam: Wesleyan Heritage Commentary, op. cit., Hebrews-Revelation, p. 397

[19] Campbell, John McLeod, The Nature of the Atonement Ch. VII, p. 168

[20] Barnes, Albert: New Testament Notes, op. cit., 1 John 5, p. 4885

[21] Rothe, Richard: Exposition of the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit., The Expository Times, May 1895, p. 375

[22] Meyer, Heinrich A. W., Critical and Exegetical Handbook on the General Epistles, op. cit., pp. 613-614

[23] Cf. John 1:4; 11:25; 14:6; Colossians 2:9; 2 Timothy 1:10

[24] Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, New Testament Volume, op. cit., p.720

[25] Alford, Henry: The Greek Testament, op. cit., Vol. IV., p. 507

[26] Matthew 25:46

[27] Graham, William: The Spirit of Love, op. cit., p. 329

[28] Proprio motu is a Latin term meaning: “on one’s own initiative”

[29] Jelf, William E., Commentary on the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit., p. 75

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXVII) 02/14/23

^5:11 This is what God told us: He has given us eternal life, which is in His Son.

We can also conclude that verses eleven and twelve are the climax to the Apostle John’s First Epistle. The Son of God is the “Word of Life.” Therefore, possession of the Son of God is the possession of eternal life and vice versa. John now gives the content of God’s testimony in this verse. We cannot separate eternal life from the person of the Anointed One.  False teachers tried to split the two.[1]  It is not the truth of eternal life at issue here; only those who know God’s Son possess it. Therefore, false teachers do not enjoy eternal life.

The result of God’s witness about Jesus the Anointed One is that God gives the believer in Jesus eternal life.  The words “eternal life” are for emphasis. The testimony is that God gave eternal life when He gave His Son. Eternal life is the final testimony to God’s Son. Eternal life is more than a quantity of life that lasts forever; it is a quality of life, the highest spiritual life irrespective of time.[2] This life is the very life of God Himself. It establishes that eternal life is as much a qualitative as quantitative life.

How do we apply this? Eternal life is qualitative life because God is free from corruption. He is pure holiness.  God is peace, so the eternal life He passes to us has symmetry.  Eternal life contains unconditional love, so we have the capacity for unconditional love.  God embodies eternal life in the person of the Son of God.  The person who embraces Jesus the Anointed One as their Savior begins a new kind of life. They will experience that life forever.[3]

Therefore, the Son is the means to eternal life. We can find eternal life nowhere else than in God’s beloved Son. There is no compromise here. This is because God’s Son is life.[4]  Eternal life testifies to the Son’s life with the Father, a qualitative and eternal life. The possession of eternal life is a testimony to God’s Son. This witness is because eternal life fundamentally rests in the life of Jesus the Anointed One. Note the sequence of John’s argument. The Father possesses eternal life and gave it to the Anointed One as a human.[5] So Jesus can say, “I live because of the Father.”[6]  Jesus gives believers eternal life.[7]  It provides evidence that Jesus is the Son of God.[8] Hence, eternal life comes exclusively through Jesus the Anointed One. The life of God’s Son brings us into God’s presence in the eternal state and is a present possession. Jesus is the only way into God’s life and divine presence.[9]

COMMENTARY AND HOMILETICS

This verse has comments, interpretations, and insights of the Early Church Fathers, Medieval Thinkers, Reformation Theologians, Revivalist Teachers, Reformed Scholars, and Modern Commentators.

With a studious monk’s spiritual insight, Bede the Venerable (672-735) points out that the Apostle John says that God has given us eternal life, and remember that he was saying this when he was still in the flesh and subject to physical death. But God gave us eternal life precisely the same way he gave us the power to become his children. So right now, we live on earth in the hope of his promise, which we shall receive in its fullness after we die and go to be with Him.”^[10] This evidence gave John the boldness to declare to everyone who read this letter:

In “The Shepherd of Hermas,” a book written in the late part of the second century (circa 275 AD), concerning the building of the Church, we find this testimony: “I saw six men come, tall, and distinguished, and similar in appearance, and they summoned a multitude of men. And they who came were also tall men, handsome, and powerful; the six men commanded them to build a tower³⁴⁹ for a man called the Rock. And the virgins who kept the tower ran forward and kissed Him and began to walk near Him around the tower. And that man examined the building carefully, feeling every stone separately, and holding a rod in His hand, He struck every stone in the building three times. But the other stones, which had not yet been cut for the tower, and received the seal, were put back onto the pile because they are still uneven.” What a comparison for pastors to the Rock of our Salvation and Shepherd of our souls, Jesus the Anointed One.

The Shepherd then says, “I am a messenger of repentance to those innocent as children^[11] because your part is good and honorable before God. Moreover, I say to you all, who have received the seal of the Son of God,^[12] be clothed with easiness, not focused on any offenses, nor continue sinning. He will rejoice over you and be joyful when he finds you are spiritually sound, so none of you will perish. But if He finds any one of these sheep strayed away, woe to the shepherds! – Pastors.  And if the shepherds themselves have strayed, what answer will they give Him for their flocks?^[13] Will they perhaps say that their flocks harassed them? They will not be believed, for such a thing is too incredible for a flock to say about a shepherd. Instead, the shepherd will receive punishment based on his lying. And I am a shepherd, and I am under a most stringent necessity of rendering an account of you.”^[14]

As a firm spiritual disciplinarian, John Owen (1616-1683) The Gospel is the revelation or declaration of that way of justification and salvation for sinners by Jesus Christ, which God, in infinite wisdom, love, and grace, has prepared. And upon a supposition of the reception thereof, it is accompanied by precepts of obedience and promises of rewards. “Therein is the righteousness of God,” that which he requires, accepts, and approves unto salvation — “revealed from faith unto faith,” Romans.[15] This is God’s record, “That He has given unto us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.”[16] “The words of this life,”[17] “All the counsel of God.”[18]

Wherefore, in the dispensation or preaching of the Gospel, the way of salvation is offered to sinners as the significant effect of divine intervention and grace. Unbelief is the rejection, neglect, non-admission, or disapprobation of it, on the terms whereon, and for the ends, it was proposed. So in John, the Baptizer’s preparatory preaching, the Pharisees’ unbelief is called the “rejecting of the counsel of God against themselves” to their ruin.[19] “They would have none of my counsel” is an expression of the same purpose;[20] so is the “neglecting this great salvation,”[21] Not giving it that admission that excellence requires. A disallowing of the Anointed One, the Stone “the builders disapproved of,”[22] as not meet for that place and work whereunto it was designed,[23] this is unbelief; to disapprove of the Anointed One, and His way of salvation as not answering divine wisdom, nor suited for its scheduled end. So is it described by the refusing or not receiving Him; all go to one purpose.^[24]

Regarding the Anointed One’s priestly office and its ministry, in and by human nature, He offered Himself a sacrifice for us,[25] and the Spirit prepared to give Him a body for this purpose.[26] But it was not the work of any human, by one offering, and that of Himself, to compensate for the sins of the whole church, and forever to perfect them that are sanctified, which He did.[27] Jesus was to purchase His church “with His blood.”[28] Suppose we have no consideration for the offices of the Anointed One. In that case, we can not receive any benefit through them nor perform any act of duty concerning them unless faith in His divine person is the foundation.^[29]

In his fiery manner, John Flavel (1627-1691) states that this new life with which the regenerate come alive is also an everlasting life.[30] This principle of life is the seed of God, and that remains in the soul forever.[31] It is no transient, vanishing thing but a fixed, permanent principle that abides in the soul forever. A person may lose their gifts, but grace abides; the soul may and must be separated from the body, but grace cannot be separated from the soul: when all forsake us, this will not leave us. Therefore, this principle implanted by the Spirit is vastly different, both from the extraordinary gifts of prophecy wherein the Spirit was sometimes said to come upon men under the First Covenant[32] and from the common vanishing effects He sometimes produces in the Final Covenant.[33] It is one thing for the Spirit to visit an individual in the way of present influence and assistance and another thing to dwell in them as His temple.^[34]

As a non-conformist to the Church of England orthodoxy, John Bunyan (1628-1688), English writer and Puritan preacher, shared these poetic words of inspiration:

“How the brave sun doth peep up from beneath,

Shows us his golden face, doth on us breath;

Yea, he doth compass us around with glories,

Whilst he ascends to his highest stories,

Where his banner over us displays

And gives us light to see our works and ways.

Nor are we now, as at the peep of light.

To question is it day or is it night;

The night is gone, the shadows fled away,

And now we are most certain that ’tis day.

And that it is when Jesus shows His face,

And doth assure us of His love and grace.”^[35]

From his strategic viewpoint as a biblical expositor and educational pioneer, William Burkitt (1650-1703) says it is as though the Apostle John said, “The sum of God’s testimony recorded in the Gospel concerning His Son Jesus the Anointed One is that God for His sake made pardon and salvation a gift to the world.”  He did so to assure them of grace here and eternal life hereafter, upon the condition of their believing acceptance, that is, of faith and obedience; accordingly, they have the Anointed One. They accept the merit of His blood and submit to the authority of His law. Thus they have eternal life, that is, have an undoubted right and assurance of it being theirs. Yes, they have it already, and its first fruits. But they that, either by unbelief or disobedience, refuse the Anointed One, shall never see life, but God’s wrath on them. Hence we learn 1) Eternal life is a gift from God. 2) This gift is available for us in His Son. 3) Our having or not having union with and interest in the Son depends on whether we have eternal life.^[36]

With all the Apostle John’s themes in mind, John Wesley (1703-1791) asks, “What is the witness of the Spirit?” The Greek word martyria may be rendered either the witness or, less ambiguously, the testimony or the record. The Spirit of God gives the testimony now under consideration to and with our spirit: He is the person testifying. He testifies to us is “we are the children of God.” The immediate result of this testimony is “the fruit of the Spirit,” namely, “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness.” And without these, the testimony itself cannot continue. It is inevitably destroyed, not only by the commission of any outward sign or the omission of known duty but by giving way to any inward sin; in a word, by whatever grieves the Holy Spirit of God.^[37]

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[1] See 1 John 2:25-26

[2] John 17:2-3; 3:15-16; 5:24-26; 6:40,47, 68; 10:10, 28; 11:25-26

[3] Ibid. 1:25-26

[4] 1 John 1:2; John 11:25; 14:6

[5] John 5:26

[6] Ibid. 5:27

[7] Ibid. 3:36; 5:24; 20:31

[8] Ibid. 1:4; 5:26-27; 6:57; Acts of the Apostles 3:14-15

[9] Ibid. 14:6

[10] Bede the Venerable, Ancient Christian Commentary, Bray, G. (Ed.), James, op. cit., Vol. XI, p. 225

[11] Matthew 18:3; 19:14

[12] 1 John 5:11

[13] Jeremiah 13:20; Zechariah 11:15-17

[14] Shepherd of Hermas, The great mysteries in the building of the Militant and Triumphant Church. Vision iii, 1-2, Similitude 9, Ch. XVI, pp. 49; Ch. XXI, p. 54

[15] Romans 1:17

[16] John 5:11; 3:14-17

[17] Acts of the Apostles 5:20

[18] Ibid. 20:27

[19] Luke 7:30

[20] Proverbs 1:30

[21] Hebrews 2:3

[22] 1 Peter 2:7

[23] Acts of the Apostles 4:11

[24] Owen, John: The Doctrine of Justification, op. cit., pp. 150-151

[25] Hebrews 8:3

[26] Ibid. 10:5

[27] Ibid. 10:4

[28] Acts of the Apostles 20:28

[29] Owen, John: Christologia, op. cit., pp. 132-133

[30] 1 John 5:11

[31] Ibid. 3:9

[32] 1 Samuel 10:6, 10

[33] Hebrews 2:4; John 5:35

[34] Flavel, John: The Method of Grace: How the Spirit Works, Ch. 5, op. cit., pp. 92-93

[35] Bunyan, John: On the Rising of the Sun, written in 1628 and published in 1688

[36] Burkitt, William: Expository Notes, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 737

[37] Wesley, John, The Works of: First Series of Sermons, vol. 5, Sermon, 11, p. 188