Down an Unfamiliar Road

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXVI) 02/13/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

Contextual interpretation specialist Gary M. Burge says that interpreting John’s thought requires thinking of the Father’s testimony as separate from the Spirit, the water, and the blood. Indeed, John does not indicate how the Father gave His testimony (he merely refers to its fact). In John’s Gospel, we find a similar case, where Jesus includes the Father as supporting His case but does not explicitly say how in His roll call of witnesses.[1] Instead, John urges that since we accept human testimonies, we should receive divine testimony. God’s spiritual authority rests behind the water and blood testimony. God’s Spirit affirms truths about the Gospel of Jesus the Anointed One. It is impossible to avoid thinking about the schism in John’s church at this point. Human testimonies were struggling for acceptance.

John says that these testimonies come up against other points of view and God. God’s point of view, expressed in the historical life of Jesus and kept alive in the church’s witness through the Spirit, must now win the day. Indeed, God’s witness is exclusive to His Son. Thus, the test of whether or not we accept God’s testimony rests here: Do we embrace the truth about Jesus the Anointed One? Do we concur with the apostolic eyewitness? Put in another light (as John is prone to do), to reject the truth about Jesus, to reject the “water and the blood,” is to stand opposed to God and contradict His witness.^[2]

Emphasizing the Apostle John’s call to Christian fellowship, Bruce B. Barton (1954) states that when people become God’s children, they know that salvation is sure because they have the testimony in their hearts ‒ God’s witness.[3] They know that the Spirit who regenerated them gives them an inner witness to that reality.[4] God’s Spirit, alive in their spirit, witnesses that everything Jesus said and did was proper. That is the primary function of the Spirit – to testify and reveal Jesus to every believer.[5] They should realize that they are calling Him a liar by rejecting what God has so plainly said. This has two aspects: refusing to believe what God said about His Son and, consequently, refusing to accept the Anointed One who can save people from sin’s spiritual death penalty. The Apostle John blasted the false teachers who claimed to know God but did not believe God’s words concerning His Son. Their theory was logically impossible and amounted to calling God an outright liar.^[6]

A scholar who truly inspires Christian missionaries, Daniel L. Akin (1957), points to where the Apostle Paul stated, “The Spirit testifies together with our spirit that we are God’s children.”[7] Then he adds that the internal witness of God’s Spirit in the heart confirms to the child of God that they were right to believe that Jesus is God’s Son who alone gives the gift of eternal life.[8] This internal testimony is God’s presence in us. It beautifully balances and complements the external and historical witness of the baptism and crucifixion of Jesus, all witnessed by the Holy Spirit.

In the context of pastoral theology and practical application, this verse is of great value. John does not point us back to a prior experience. Instead, he leads us now to look at a present testimony and witness. So, who are you trusting today? Who are you believing in today? Where are your hope and confidence today? Is it the Anointed One? If so, rest assured that you have the Son and His gift of eternal life. Not knowing the exact moment, you were converted does not mean you are not saved. An experience can be helpful, but present-day testimony provides confirmation and assurance that God wants you to enjoy and that your soul longs to have – “I believe in Jesus, the only Anointed One.” You will find that confession to be a blessed avenue of assurance that will cause you to proclaim with passion and conviction, “Jesus is the Son of God.”^[9]

With a classical thinking approach to understanding the scriptures, Bruce G. Schuchard (1958) notes that the last of three references to “everyone / the one who believes” that the man Jesus is the Anointed One, God’s Son, marks another beginning. Here, John turns from the “witness of God to His Son” to accepting or rejecting that testimony. Cited previously with little explanation, God’s testimony to His Son now becomes the theme that unifies this concluding passage’s final subunit. The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in themselves. The person who does not believe God has acted as if He were a liar. It’s because they have rejected His testimony concerning His Son.^[10]

Great expositional teacher David Guzik (1961) feels that the Apostle John does not want us to believe with blind faith. Instead, our faith is founded on reliable testimony. And we have the most reliable witness possible, God. Thus, John exposes the great sin of unbelief. Most everyone who refuses to believe God (in the complete sense of the word believes) doesn’t intend to call God a liar. But they do it, nonetheless. What hope can there be for the one who persists in hearing what God says and then calling Him a liar?^[11]

In his unorthodox Unitarian way, Duncan Heaster (1967) states that the Lord Jesus didn’t witness to His word by giving out bits of paper or teaching a catechism; He was, in person, the constant exhibition of the word He proclaimed. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t write books, pass out literature, or speak words from a platform. Our Christian lifestyle is the essential witness to people, that witness which wells up from the Anointed One’s teachings and spiritual life within us. We can see how God’s Word became flesh in the prophet Hosea’s writings.[12] The command to go and marry her was not “the word of the Lord” to Israel, as was his marriage and example of true love to his wife. Hosea’s example in his marriage was the word of the Lord to Israel. He made the word flesh.[13] The Lord did this to perfection, yet like Hosea, we must do the same in principle. Not believing in God and not believing in His word of the Gospel are paralleled here in verse ten. David parallels trusting in God and His word.[14] ^[15]

Bright seminarian Karen H. Jobes (1968) observes that a Christian is, by the Apostle John’s definition, one who heard the witness of the Final Covenant, recognized it as God’s interpretation of the significance of the life and death of Jesus His Son, and internalized it as their belief. But the rejection of the Gospel of Jesus the Anointed One is not a morally neutral act. John would not look favorably on the pluralistic, culturally centered view of religious belief that is so popular today, that “one’s belief is what is true for you but has no claim on me.” Because the apostolic testimony about Jesus is God’s testimony, to hear it and not believe it entails making God a liar.

This is the second time John mentions making God a liar. The first time involves the denial of personal sin.[16] God says humans are sinners alienated from Him, living in spiritual darkness with death as their only future. But in His love, He sent his Son to atone for that sin, to reconcile people to Himself. God has given His testimony, and it stands for all time. When someone rejects God’s love offered in the Anointed One in favor of some other belief system (or nonbelief), they implicitly declare that they know better than God, thus “making” Him a liar.^[17]

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

EXPOSITION

So, anyone who wants to dispute the evidence must disprove what God said.  Jesus disagreed with the Pharisees after they heard Him say, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never exist in darkness. They will have the light that gives life.” But the Pharisees said to Jesus, “When you talk about yourself, you are the only one to say that these things are true. So, we cannot accept what you say.” Jesus answered, “Yes, I am saying these things about myself. But people can believe what I say because I know from where I came. And I know where I am going. But you don’t know where I came from or where I am going. You judge me the way people judge other people. I don’t judge anyone. But if I judge, my judgment is true because I am not alone when I judge. The Father who sent me is with me. Your law says you must accept what they say when two witnesses say the same thing. I am one of the witnesses who speaks about myself. And the Father who sent me is my other witness.”^[18]

So as far as John is concerned, when Jesus speaks, God is speaking.  So he now introduces his sixth test, the Test of Truth. If God could heal, cause the blind to see, the deaf to hear, the mute to talk, the lame to walk and raise the dead, and Jesus did all these things, then anyone begging for more proof is what David  called a “fool.”^[19] So the key phrase in what Jesus said to the Pharisees in His defense is that the Light is the One who gives spiritual and eternal Life.

Also, in the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, we find an apparent reference to this provision, “Moses hung the snake in the desert. It is the same with the Son of man. Therefore, He must also be crucified. Then everyone who believes in Him can have eternal life.”^[20]  This led John to close that chapter by declaring, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. But those who do not obey the Son will never have that life.”^[21]

When Jesus was feeding the 5,000 listeners near the Sea of Galilee, He made this a point of reference to His mission when He said, “I came down from heaven to do what God wants, not what I want. I must not lose anyone God has given me. But I must raise them on the last day. This is what the one who sent me wants me to do. Everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him has eternal life. I will resurrect them in the final days is the belief my Father wants.”^[22] When the subject returned to the bread, Jesus told them, “I can assure you that anyone who believes has eternal life. I am the Bread that gives life.”^[23]

When Jesus’ teaching turned somewhat esoteric, and many who had been following Him for the bread turned and left, He asked His disciples if they also planned on leaving.  It was then that Peter stood up and said, “Lord, where would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. We believe in you. We know that you are the Anointed One from God.”^[24] Then after Jesus used His parable of the true shepherd and the sheep, and the Pharisees objected to His making that claim, Jesus made it clear, “I give my sheep eternal life. They will never die, and no one can take them out of my hand.”^[25]

Afterward, Jesus was informed that some Greeks who came to celebrate the Passover in Jerusalem, our Lord began to describe why everything that happened at that time was so vital to His plans.  He told all who listened, “The Father who sent me told me what to say and what to teach. And I know that whatever He says to do will bring eternal life. So, the things I say are exactly what the Father told me to say.”^[26]

Later on, in the Garden of Gethsemane, as the Master was agonizing in prayer that God’s will, not His will, be done, He told His heavenly Father just before His arrest, “You gave the Son power over all people so that He could give eternal life to all those you have given to Him. And this is eternal life: that people can have a personal relationship with You, the only true God, and have a personal relationship with the Savior, the Son of man, the one You sent.”^[27]

In verse eleven, we have the substance of the internal testimony mentioned in verse ten. It is this – we are conscious of the Divine gift of eternal life, and this we have in the Son of God. The distinction between eternity and time is what the human mind feels to be natural and necessary. But we might become confused when we try to think of eternity. The Apostle John’s idea of endlessness may be included in it, but it is not the main one. We admit that it is not time, that it is the very antithesis of time, yet we attempt 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.[28] It is that life in God that includes all blessedness and is not broken by physical death.[29] Its opposite is exclusion from God.

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[1] John 5:37

[2] Burge, Gary M., The Letters of John (The NIV Application Commentary), op. cit., pp. 204-205

[3] 1 John 5:9

[4] See Romans 8:16; Galatians 4:6

[5] See John 14:26; 15:26; 16:7-13

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

[7] Romans 8:16

[8] 1 John 5:11-12

[9] Akin, Dr. Daniel L., Exalting Jesus in 1,2,3 John (Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary), op. cit., loc. cit., Kindle Edition

[10] Schuchard, Bruce G., Concordia Commentary, 1-3 John, op. cit., pp. 540-541

[11] Guzik, David: Enduring Word, 1,2, & 3 John & Jude, op. cit., pp. 94-96

[12] Hosea 1:2

[13] John 1:14

[14] Psalm 56:3-4

[15] Heaster, Duncan. New European Christadelphian Commentary: op. cit., The Letters of John, pp. 73-74

[16] 1 John 1:10

[17] Jobes, Karen H., 1, 2, and 3 John (Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on The New Testament Series Book 18), op. cit., p. 224

[18] John 8:12-19

[19] Psalm 14:1

[20] John 3:14-15

[21] Ibid. 3:36

[22] Ibid. 6:38-40

[23] Ibid. 6:47

[24] Ibid. 6:68-69

[25] Ibid. 10:28

[26] Ibid. 12:49-50

[27] Ibid. 17:2-3

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

[29] 1 John 1:25

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXV) 02/10/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

As a spiritual mentor, Ronald A. Ward (1920-1986) feels that whoever commits themselves to trust in God’s Son as the true Anointed One will find that the objective (based on what we know things are) amd subjective (being told what things are) testimonies confirm what is in their hearts. They have the eivdence that is already inside and coming from the outside. This confirmation is especially valid of a person abiding in union with Go and God dwelling in them.[1]

With academic precision, Stephen S. Smalley (1931-2018) states that the Apostle John spoke earlier of the character of the divine witness to Jesus, the Son of God and Anointed One; now, he moves to a discussion of the results of that witness. First, John claims that keeping faith in God’s Son includes accepting the Father’s testimony and that witness is both the cause and effect of Christian faith. Namely, “the one who believes has that witness within himself.” Furthermore, we find in verse ten; several phrases are echoed from earlier verses and repeated for emphasis. For instance, for verse 10a, see verses 5b and 9a; for verse 10b, see 9b. Sometimes a phrase is used positively, “believe,” and negatively, “believe not.” It is all intended to focus on faith and trust in Jesus as God’s Son.^[2]

As a seasoned essayist on the Apostle John’s writings, John Painter (1935) notes that this is the third of four uses of the Greek verb pisteuō (“believe”) by the Apostle John in this epistle.[3] This construction is used thirty-six times in John and only ten times in the rest of the Final Covenant. While pisteuō often means to believe what is said and draws attention to the content of belief, it often portrays a personal commitment, though it need not be complete and firm.[4] We should not treat these distinctions as hard-and-fast rules, as the second and third parallels show in this tenth verse. There is also a question of not believing what was said. When the witness is to the Son, achieving the testimony means believing in the Son. The explanation is little more than a repetition of God’s word from verse nine that he (the one not believing God) “has made Him a liar.”[5]

Ministry & Missions Overseer Muncia Walls (1937) says that the witness is in the believer in the form of the Holy Spirit; as the Apostle Paul wrote, the Anointed One in you, the hope of glory.[6] Jesus had promised His disciples that although He would leave them, another Comforter would come to them, and that Comforter would be the Anointed One. Note His words, “1 will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.”[7] The Spirit which indwells the believer is the Spirit of Jesus the Anointed One – the Holy Spirit. We know we are children of God because the witness dwells within!

John’s argument against the Gnostics here is that you can’t claim to know God and at the same time ignore the Incarnation. You can’t have one without the other. And those who refuse to believe in the deity of Jesus the Anointed One deny God’s witness and make God out a liar. To reject Jesus, the Anointed One who was God manifest in the flesh is to deny what God has openly declared to be fact, and to do God is a liar. ^[8]

Expositor and systematic theologist Michael Eaton (1942-2017) hears the Apostle John saying that a Christian will be a person of assurance and conviction. That’s because the believer possesses the indwelling Spirit and thus has certainty that the testimony to the Gospel, they heard is the truth. The one who believes in the Son of God has the witness in themselves. This explains the difference between human testimony and the testimony of the Spirit. Human testimony is external. It consists of historical witnesses and evidence of one kind or another. Human testimony may be forgotten, becoming lost in antiquity. But the testimony of the Spirit is a testimony within. When a person becomes a Christian, the Spirit is given to dwell within them. From that point on, they “have the testimony in themselves.” It is something that he or she is conscious of.

What would be the value of a witness that we did not know about? It gives us joy. We find delight in our salvation springing up within us. It provides assurance and boldness. It gives us love for God because the witness of the Spirit makes us realize how much God loves us. It has the effect of stirring up our love for God. We can endure almost anything, and make any sacrifice, if the witness of the Spirit is strong and powerful in our lives. The witness of the Spirit makes God real to us. When the Spirit is witnessing that we are children of God, it is like being in heaven already.

It follows then that to resist the claims of the Lord Jesus; the Anointed One is in effect to call God a liar. Unbelief is a sin against God’s testimony. The one who does not believe God has made Him a liar because they have not considered God’s testimony concerning His Son. God asks us to accept the revelation He has already given. He has no plans to add anything further to convince us. He wants us to be convinced by His Word, coining to us in the testimony of the apostles.^[9]

Great Commission practitioner David Jackman (1945) says that we must be careful to preserve the Apostle John’s strong emphasis on believing, intensified by the negative correlative in the second part of verse ten. For it is not our subjective experience of the Anointed One that saves us, but our belief in Him confirmed and deepened by the inner witness of the Spirit. It echoes Apostle Paul’s teaching, “The Spirit testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children,”[10] and “Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out ‘Abba, Father.’”[11] A significant theme of biblical theology is that God wants His people to be assured of their relationship with Him as reconciled, forgiven sinners. The only alternative is to make God out to be a liar.

That is how the Bible draws the line between faith in Jesus and unbelief. This is not surprising when considering how strong the evidence for belief is presented. In human nature, there is a natural element of unwillingness to believe. We see it in the rejection of God’s witness and is still giving through His Spirit concerning His Son; there is ample evidence for faith. But mankind’s problem is not ignorance so much as rebellion; not that we cannot believe but we refuse to believe.^[12]

After analyzing the Apostle John’s teaching in verses six to ten, Earl S. Johnson Jr (1947-2020) is persuaded that the Apostle John wants to finalize his argument about the truth that is found in Jesus the Anointed One God’s Son. In these verses he uses words that come from the same Greek verb meaning to witness nine different times in only seven verses. This is the same root word from which we derive our English word martyr. Johnson is sure that the three witnesses mention by the Apostle John are to be interpreted as “water” – His baptism; “blood” – His crucifixion; and the “Spirit” who was present at His baptism and guided Him into the wilderness to overcome Satan’s temptation and anointed Him for His ministry. The final witness is His heavenly Father.[13] [14]

After studying the context surrounding this verse, John W. (Jack) Carter (1947) notes that another witness that the Apostle John brings to the stand is the Holy Spirit, who speaks to the heart of every believer. These words are more for the fellowship of believers than it is for the heretics. Every believer has a relationship with the Holy Spirit, who teaches the truth of Jesus’ nature through the deep recesses of their heart. True believers have accepted the Lordship of Jesus the Anointed One and the reality of His nature and purpose by faith. However, once that decision is made, as they grow in faith, they come to understand the truths of the Gospel as the Holy Spirit illuminates it as they become immersed in the Word of God.

Consequently, John calls upon every believer as a testimony to the true nature and purpose of Jesus the Anointed One, a population who all agree to a truth taught to them by one source: the Holy Spirit. Those who have not placed their faith and trust in God do not have this resource. They do not hear the voice of the Holy Spirit in their hearts. Consequently, it is easy for them to reject the Gospel and proclaim that what God says, what the Holy Spirit says, or what Jesus says is all a lie.^[15]

A man who loves sharing God’s Word, Robert W. Yarbrough (1948) notes that the first half of verse ten is a commendation of the faith made possible and constituted by God’s self-testimony. Believing “God” is shorthand for the fullness of God’s self-disclosure in Jesus the Anointed One, a significant theme of the whole epistle, namely, those who believe receive the testimony and enjoy its beneficial transformative working within. The second portion of verse ten joins the two halves of the sentence, highlighting the opposite effect of the contrasting assertions.

In John’s continuing pastoral orientation, we should note that his rhetoric is not a condemnation but essentially an appeal. Starkly parallel to the one who believes is the “unbelieving” one. While saving belief in the Son implies personal commitment, the negative counterpart reflects not believing in God. It probably means (not) to give Him credence.[16] This person not only fails to trust God personally; they do not even grant God the respect for a careful hearing. It is consistent with Jesus’s statement in John that those who belong to God hear his voice.[17] Those who listen to God and learn from Him are drawn to the Anointed One.[18] The person here in verse then has not listened or learned and does not respond to His call.[19] ^[20]

Skilled in Dead Sea Scroll interpretation and New Testament writings, Colin G. Kruse (1950) states that in verse ten, the Apostle John explains that the divine testimony is appropriated internally by those who believe in the Anointed One: Anyone who believes in the Son of God has this testimony in their heart. The witness referred to here is God’s testimony to His Son made known through the testimony of the eyewitnesses.

There are two ways of interpreting this statement. First, in the light of verse six, we might say that it refers to the inner witness of the Spirit. And it cannot be denied that the role of the Spirit in this letter and the Fourth Gospel is to testify to Jesus. But this verse does not actually say that believers have ‘the inner testimony of the Spirit in their hearts; it simply states that they have the testimony’ in themselves. So, the second and more likely interpretation is that the testimony believers have in themselves is the true testimony concerning Jesus the Anointed One, which they heard from the eyewitnesses and have accepted and internalized.^[21]

Believing that Christians can fall away from the faith, Ben Witherington III (1951) focuses on two ideas here in verse ten: the testimony of God to the Son and the divine and internal testimony that comes through the Spirit when one accepts on faith the external testimony. The one who believes in the Son of God has assurance from the internal testimony of the Spirit that this faith is not held in vain. Here the emphasis is on the individual – the one who believes. Thus, quite logically, the work of confirmation by the Spirit follows belief in the external testimony and the making of the good confession.^[22]

With her crafted spiritual insight, Judith Lieu (1951), the damaging alternative is not “the one who does not believe in the Son of God” but “who does not believe God.” Although, given the fluidity of construction of the verb “to believe,” it would be a mistake to overemphasize the simple dative verb used here.[23] The implication appears to be that to refuse to acknowledge and respond to God’s Son, whose status relies on God’s testimony, is nothing less than to refuse to trust God. It is to treat God as a liar – within the dualistic framework; this is to place God firmly alongside all that opposes God’s truth and light.[24]

This is not a misapprehension or an erroneous judgment; it is not a failure to believe a secondary article of faith nor an understandable mistaken difference of opinion. On the contrary, it is a fundamental denial – the perfect “has made” who God is and what God has done and does do. The sonorous tones of the final clause of verse ten reinforce the seriousness. The two perfect verbs, one negative (“has not believed”), the other positive (“has testified”), are set in a sustained opposition to those two fundamental acts of commitment, and they effectively exclude the one who does the former from the benefits of the latter. The verse climaxes by repeating the final words of verse nine; there is no attempt to argue or to persuade, no appeal to specific evidence or support: God’s testimony given concerning His Son, and there is no room for its reversal, for negotiation, or for debate. ^[25]

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

[2] Smalley, Stephen S., Word Biblical Commentary, Vol. 51, 1,2,3 John, op. cit., p. 285

[3] See 1 John 5:1, 5, 10. 13

[4] John 8:31-32

[5] Painter, John. Sacra Pagina: 1, 2, and 3 John: Volume 18, op. cit., loc. cit., Kindle Edition

[6] Colossians 1:27

[7] John 14:18

[8] Walls, Muncia: Epistles of John and Jude, op. cit., pp. 68-69

[9] Eaton, Michael: Focus on the Bible, 1,2,3 John, op. cit., pp. 186-187

[10] Romans 8:16

[11] Galatians 4:6

[12] Jackman, David: The Message of John’s Letters, op. cit., p. 153

[13] 1 John 5:9-11

[14] Johnson Jr, Earl S, Basic Bible Commentary, James, 1-2 Peter, 1-3 John, and Jude, op. cit., pp. 121-122

[15] Carter, Dr. John W. (Jack). 1,2,3, John & Jude: (The Disciple’s Bible Commentary Book 48), op. cit., pp. 125-126

[16] Cf. John 4:21; 8:31

[17] Ibid. 8:47

[18] Ibid. 6:45

[19] Matthew 11:28

[20] Yarbrough, Robert W. 1-3 John (Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament), op. cit., p. 288

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

[22] 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

[23] The Dative case shows the relationship of an indirect object to a verb

[24] 1 John 1:10; 2:21-22

[25] Lieu, Judith: A New Testament Library, I, II, & III John, op. cit., pp. 218-219

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXIV) 02/09/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

Every prayer, happiness, every joyful obedience to the will of God, the hour of peace, and new experience and conviction of forgiven sin testify to the living power of the Anointed One within us, in His Holy Spirit. The more earnestly a person clings to their Savior in faith. The more natural and visible eternal life becomes to them, the more genuine their sanctification is, and the more all earth’s fading pleasures lose their charm. With the blessed hope of eternal life before them, they lose all delight in those childish, foolish fancies that are the best the world offers. This personal experience is accomplished in believers through those witnesses of God. So John speaks of them in the verses we have been considering. Those who have received this power will be able to declare with the prophet: “You are stronger than I am, and you overpowered me.”[1] ^[2]

As the author of a distinguished history of the Oxford Movement[3] written from an unsympathetic viewpoint, English bishop of Manchester Edmund Arbuthnott Knox (1847-1937) emphasizes that the foundation stone laid by God is Jesus the Anointed One. Our faith rests on Him, and the text warns us how to build on this foundation. Jesus the Anointed One is not a dead but a living Rock whose witness is within us. Therefore, we rest upon a live person, not on a thread of facts or a string of events. As a matter of fact and history, we believe that our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One, lived upon the earth, died, rose again from the dead, and ascended into heaven. But a person might consider all this the same way we think that Pontius Pilate or King Herod once lived and died.

Yet, a person might complain, “It is all true, I have no doubt, every word of it, but it is no use to me. It does not help me to know that the four Gospels are all true when tempted to do wrong. What is the use of events that happened long ago to stem the flood of my sins? You might as well try to keep back the Atlantic Ocean with a few decayed beams of wrecked vessels as to dismiss my sins with Bible stories. The power of sin is within me. To resist it, I must have a more potent force within me.

The words of our text meet this need. God the Father, God the Son dwelling in us through God the Holy Spirit, is a sufficient witness. God in us – this is the power, the only force strong enough to stem the flood, to stay the corruption within. This is just what the world cannot understand. The prophecies of our Lord’s coming were fulfilled when He revealed Himself to His disciples, but not the world. The person who does not love Jesus the Anointed One hears the same Gospel and reads the same Bible as the true believer but sees no value in it. They bring their body, eyes, ears, quick intellect, and reasoning powers to church, but not their heart. They do not know what it is to love the Anointed One.

Perhaps we might understand more clearly the witness within if we go back to the saints of old, and think of their faith. Enoch walked with God before a line of the Bible was written; Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob all knew, loved, and feared God before Moses wrote the first chapter of Genesis. The Apostle Paul believed in Jesus the Anointed One before Matthew penned his Gospel. For more than two hundred years, Christians in different places probably knew only parts of the Final Covenant. But why go so far back? How many devout and humble Christians, full of love for Jesus the Anointed One, sat in church and lifted prayer and praise from the very depths of their hearts, though they could not read a page of their Bibles and only knew portions here and there?

What was the reason? They had the witness in themselves, Jesus the Anointed One dwelling in them by His Holy Spirit. This is the only foundation. No other foundation can anyone build than that already laid, which is Jesus the Anointed One. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. God can dwell in us by His Spirit as He pleases. But He sent us His confirmation through His written Word, the testimony of apostles and prophets.^[4]

As a prolific writer on the New Testament Epistles, George G. Findlay (1849-1919) urges us to get behind the Apostle John’s words in this passage, asking from them two things: First, what was the specific object of the world-conquering faith, as John held it and witnessed its early triumphs? Second, what were its characteristic marks and the methods of its working? The answer to our first inquiry lies close at hand, “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Anointed One is born of God. Furthermore, whatever is born of God, overcomes the world.” Again, “Who is it that overcomes the world, but those who believe that Jesus is the Son of God?” In verses nine and ten, we read: “This is the witness of God, namely, that He has borne witness about His Son.… Those who do not believe God make Him out to be a liar, in that they have not believed in the testimony God gave concerning His Son.”

In 1 John 4:14-15, we read, “We have seen that the Father sent his Son to be the world’s Savior, and this is what we tell people now. Anyone who says, ‘I believe that Jesus is the Son of God,’ is a person who lives in God, and God lives in that person.” The assertion of the Divine Sonship of Jesus was the Apostle John’s battle cry. It is not a stereotypical conventional article of a long-accepted creed; instead, as the utterance of a passionate conviction, the condensed record of a profound and vivid life experience shared by John with numerous companions. They practiced fruitful salvation that was real to the consciousness of the earliest believers: that “Jesus is the Son of God,” and “the blood of Jesus, God’s Son, cleanses from sin.” These facts were the life of John’s fellowship with those around him. In these two certainties lay the kernel and essence of the faith contained in the Church’s testimony.^[5]

With his stately speaking style, William Macdonald Sinclair (1850-1917) points out that believers who have a three-fold testimony of God no longer see Him as an external object of thought to be contemplated and grasped: it has become part of their nature. The three separate messages produced the appropriate result, and they can no more doubt the testimonies than they can doubt themselves. The water has assured them that they are no longer under the Law but under grace and taught them the necessity of the new birth for living right.[6] The blood has shown them that they cannot face God unless their sins are forgiven, enabling them to feel they have received a pardon. Also, they are being cleansed daily. They also have in themselves the assurance of eternal life[7] And the Spirit, which has had a part in both these, is daily making them grow in grace.[8]

Then the Apostle John presents the negative contrast, as usual, to strengthen the affirmative. He regards the evidence as so certain that those to whom this message is delivered yet reject it seem as if they are boldly asserting that what God had said was false. The skeptical reply that the news did not come from God is not John’s purpose to consider; his object is to warn his friends of the light in which they ought to regard the opponents of the truth. There should be no complacent condoning; from the point of view of the Christians themselves, such unbelievers were throwing the truth back in God’s face.^[9]

Beyond any doubt, remarks Alonzo R. Cocke (1858-1901), the one who receives the outward testimony of the Spirit has something conferred even more intimate: they have “the witness in themselves.” The Spirit testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. The testimony becomes a part of our inner life, and now abides with us, a living factor in their spiritual consciousness. How sweet to have such assurance as a live element in our souls. But the one who rejects God’s testimony concerning Jesus incurs terrible guilt. They practically declare those divine facts which testify of God’s Son of God to be false and, in effect, make God a liar. Unbelief stamps God’s testimony as false and rules the all-truthful One, who cannot lie, out of court. It is a fearful position to occupy, throwing God’s words into His face and calling Him a liar.^[10]

Esteemed ministry veteran James B. Morgan (1859-1942) implies that nothing could be more satisfactory than the external evidence in favor of the Anointed One, which competent and credible witnesses have proven the facts of His history. Jesus founded His Gospel doctrines on these truths. Our Lord established public ordinances to illustrate and confirm these truths. Water Baptism and the Lord’s Supper seem to be referred to in the context as “water and blood.” But, above all, the Spirit gave witness through the miracles that His apostles performed and the gifts and graces He conferred upon His followers. The evidence thus becomes such as leaves everyone without excuse.

The argument of the apostle, founded on its nature and fulness, is irresistible. “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son.” However, this external evidence is satisfactory as it is. He “that knew what was in man”[11] saw that many of His people would be ill-qualified to examine the credibility of such evidence. He has therefore furnished them with another. Whenever they receive the Gospel, He has caused it to spring up in their minds. So, our text speaks, “He that believes on the Son of God has the witness in himself.”^[12]

In reviewing what the Apostle John says in this verse, Archibald T. Robertson (1863-1934) sees the Apostle John distinguishing between “not believing” God’s witness and “surrender to and reliance on” His testimony concerning His Son. See the same distinction less clearly drawn in John’s Gospel.[13] See a similar occasion of “believing” after “witnessing” in John’s Gospel.[14] Furthermore, those who believe God’s testimony have the witness within themselves. By using perfect active indicative tense, it implies a permanent state.^[15]

With characteristic fundamental thinking, Alan England Brooke (1863-1939) proclaims that those who trust the guidance of God’s Son have in their experience the testimony which God gave on His behalf, which became part of themselves. Those who do not accept the witness as accurate dismiss the truth and make God a liar. There is no room here for ignorance or misconception. To reject the witness is to deny the truthfulness of God. He spoke and acted with absolute clearness. His testimony is an open record, not hidden in a dark corner. The witness must, therefore, either be accepted or rejected. It cannot be ignored or explained away. The rejection and its effects are inevitable. With the choice made, its consequences became manifest.

The nearest parallel to this expression is John 2:23. It involved believing in Jesus as Anointed One, which His name implied, and the readiness to follow Him as Anointed One (until they discovered how different His conception of the Messianic office was from theirs). It seems to denote devotion to a person possessed of those qualities that the witness borne to him, or at least to the idea expressed in that witness. Note that the phrases of verse nine are repeated for emphasis, each point examined. The witness has spoken; it cannot be ignored or set aside because it comes from God, in a case where His word alone can be final, as it concerns His Son. In John’s view, there can be no excuse for refusing to accept evidence that is so clear and satisfactory.^[16]

With an eye for detail, David Smith (1866-1932) sees the Apostle John’s statement here in verse ten as a subtle and profound analysis of the exercise of the soul. It brings blessed assurance in three stages:

   (1) “Believe God,” accept His testimony concerning His Son, not simply His Baptism[17] but the historical manifestation of God in the Anointed One, the Incarnation. God speaks not by words but by acts, and to set aside His supreme act and all the forces it has put in operation is to “make Him a liar” by treating His historical testimony as unworthy of credit.

   (2) “Believe in the Son of God” makes the believing soul surrender, which is the reasonable and inevitable consequence of contemplating the Incarnation and recognizing its wonder.[18]   

(3) “The Internal Testimony.” The love of Jesus satisfies the deepest need of our nature. When He is welcomed, the soul rises and greets Him as “all its salvation and desire.” The testimony is no longer external in history but an inward experience and, therefore, definite. These three stages are, according to the metaphor in the Apostle John’s Revelation, is (a) hearing the Savior’s voice, (b) opening the door, and (c) communion.[19]^[20]

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[1] Jeremiah 20:7 New Living Translation (NLT)

[2] Dryander, Ernst von: A Commentary on the First Epistle of St. John in the Form of Addresses, op. cit., p. 206

[3] The Oxford Movement consisted of high church members of the Church of England which began in the 1830s and eventually developed into Anglo-Catholicism. 

[4] Knox, Edmund A., The Church Pulpit Commentary, op. cit., Vol., pp. 319-321

[5] Findlay, George G: Fellowship in the Life Eternal: An Exposition of the Epistles of St. John, op. cit., p. 362

[6] John 3:5; Titus 3:5

[7] John 1:7; 1 John 2:2; John 6:53

[8] Galatians 5:22; Ephesians 5:9

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

[10] Cocke, Alonzo R: Studies in the Epistles of John; or, The Manifested Life, op. cit., pp. 128-130

[11] John 2:25

[12] Morgan, James B., An Exposition of the First Epistle of John, op. cit., Lecture XLV, p. 447

[13] John 6:30ff

[14] Ibid. 2:23

[15] Robertson, Archibald T., Word Pictures in the New Testament, op. cit., p. 1969

[16] Brooke, Alan E., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Johannine Epistles, op. cit., pp. 138-140

[17] Matthew 3:17

[18] Romans 12:1

[19] Revelation 3:20

[20] Smith, David: Expositor’s Greek Testament, 1 John, op. cit., p. 196

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXIII) 02/08/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

In his negative discussion of the subject, notes Sawtelle, John brings out the impressive fact that the unbeliever not only fails as the inward witness of the truth but positively impeaches God’s integrity. The word “because” (KJV & NIV) introduces a further statement in verse ten, confirming the awful truth about unbelief – boasting rationally in an irrational way! By being the least conscious of a fault or sin, you are the more sinful! You put God with liars and His Gospel with fables.^[1]

With Spirit-led certainty, William Baxter Godbey (1833-1920) says that we constantly receive human testimony in all the interests of life, jurisprudence, and litigation, with fewer and less reliable witnesses than these three who fortify the significant problem of salvation, revelatory and experimental.[2] Intellectual faith, exercised by worldly people, has no power to save. Saving faith is not academic but spiritual, inspired by the Holy Spirit and bringing the human spirit in touch with God. Since the Holy Spirit constantly witnesses, His work and faith are the infallible human condition of regeneration and sanctification. Therefore every believer receiving according to their faith is attested by the Holy Spirit. Consequently, the Christian religion is the most luminous and intelligent reality in the universe.^[3]

Called the “Prince of Preachers,” Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892) states that practical trust in the living God, easy as it seems to be, is a virtue never practiced by an unregenerate heart. The glorious atonement made by the incarnate Son of God is worthy of everyone’s trust. One would imagine that every sinner would have instantly washed in this cleansing fountain and without hesitation believed in the divine Redeemer: but it is not going to happen. Sinners will not come to the Anointed One that they may have spiritual life. They would rather trust in anything than belief in Jesus’ sacrifice. Until the Holy Spirit works a miracle, they will not confess that God’s great sacrifice removes all guilt. Hence, this simple, common-place matter of faith, yet becomes the distinguishing mark of the chosen of the Lord. No other token is so infallible. Feelings and actions may all serve as evidence, but the master evidence of interest in God’s promise of salvation is faith in Him like Abraham.[4] There were many other good points in the patriarch’s character, but this was the decisive one – he believed God; indeed, this was the root of all else that was commendable in him.^[5]

Noting the Apostle John’s doctrinal implications, John James Lias (1834-1923) feels that verse ten is an expansion of verse five. Those who believe in the Son overcome the world by having faith in God’s witness. They are convinced that He in whom they believe is no other than the Only Begotten of the Father, capable of inspiring them with every “good and perfect gift” which comes from that “Father of all light.”[6] The present tense “believing” signifies either the habitual, permanent attitude of the soul or the only condition by which the believer accepts the testimony.

The statement “Those that do not believe makes God a liar,” causes some confusion. Some Greek manuscripts have “God,” some “Son,” some “Son of God,” and so on. But there can be little doubt that “God” is the accurate reading. “Son” undoubtedly comes from a similar passage in John’s Gospel,[7] where belief in the Son is taught, and the desire to make this part of the antithesis correspond more precisely to the one in John’s epistle. The whole point of this part of the passage is belief in God. Those who believe in the Son of God has God’s testimony within. Not to believe this testimony is to disbelieve God, and to disbelieve God is to make Him a liar because it is a fact that God bore witness, and not to believe that witness is neither more nor less than deliberately accuse God of lying.^[8]

The Apostle John goes on to ask, what is the secret of that power of faith that enables us to overcome the world? It is this – faith is the appropriation by the individual of the witness God has given. Faith is the acceptance of His testimony, the principle which causes us to act on it. Believe in God’s testimony, and subsequently, the testimony is within. And it will not be long before it manifests its presence by the working of the Divine power that changes the heart.

Then John points out the daring nature of unbelief. God has borne witness concerning His Son. The witness is clear enough to those who will receive it. What it is we have already seen. What is involved in rejecting it, we are now told. It is to accuse God of untruth, to insult Him by denying His testimony. It is not merely blindness, misfortune, or excusable ignorance; it is a downright sin. Nevertheless, God’s witness concerning His Son manifests itself to those who do not willfully shut their eyes. We must, therefore, not shrink from warning people of the danger of refusing to believe God’s word, as well as of the infinite blessing of hearing God’s voice and acknowledging His revelation of His Son.^[9]

Famous evangelist and publisher Dwight L. Moody (1837-1899) decided to say a word about unbelief at this point in his commentary. Some people told him that it is a hard thing when he says that unbelief is the greatest sin – greater than blasphemy, drunkenness, and the like. You can’t offer anyone a greater insult than to accuse them of telling a willful lie. So many people have had their reputations destroyed because they called someone else a liar. The sin of unbelief is putting a lie in God’s mouth and calling Him a liar.^[10]

Distinguished for his outstanding scholarship, especially in connection with the New Testament canon, Theodore Zahn (1838-1933) states that this witness by God is not the Word of Life which the Apostles proclaimed, but the person on which their preaching centers, namely, Jesus.[11] In the preceding clauses, this person who always existed, all the manifestations of whose life and whose physical qualities were sensibly perceived by the Apostles with ears, eyes, and hands, is described impersonally and paraphrased. All that was audible, visible, and tangible that the disciples could perceive in their interaction with Jesus is summed up in “the Word of Life”[12] and, as the change in the construction shows, referred back to its center. But the personal Logos is not called the Word of Life because He gives life, but because He is spiritual and eternal Life.[13] He is described as the one who is the personification of Life.[14] ^[15]

A tried and tested biblical scholar who believes in the up-building of the Christian life, Robert Cameron (1839-1904) calls verse ten a startling sentence that should cause all of us to pause before doubting a single utterance from God’s mouth. The Apostle John says, “Those who do not believe God has made Him a liar.” It should take everyone’s breath! In the original, the force of the words implies a refusal to believe. When one refuses God’s testimony concerning His Son and therefore refuses to cast themselves entirely upon Him, they reject God and impeach His character for accuracy. They not only refuse to believe what God says, but this refusal makes God false, a deceiver, a liar. Will God tolerate being made a liar by a sinner whose heart is deceitful? What sort of a place would heaven be to a person who makes God a liar in their heart?

But the Apostle John, who does not want his readers to be intimidated, doesn’t leave it there. He counters with what John the Baptizer had to say about Jesus, “He tells what He has seen and heard, but people don’t accept what he says. Whoever accepts what He says has given proof that God speaks the truth.”[16] Therefore, let us receive the witness of God and set our seal of approval on his unquestioned truthfulness so that we do not become guilty of the awful sin of making God a liar. Remember the words of the Father, the works of the Anointed One, the Scriptures, John the Baptist, and the disciples, all bear their testimony that Jesus is God’s Son.

Furthermore, God has appointed the Spirit, the water, and the blood to testify. 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, His ministry by water, and His exit by blood, are still valid. To reject these witnesses is to make God a liar. Refusing to believe His Son ends any possibility of spiritual and eternal life.[17] ^[18]

With his Spirit-directed calculating mind, Alfred Plummer (1841-1926) notes that for the first time in this Epistle, we have the complete phrase “to believe on,” which the Apostle John uses forty times in his Gospel. Elsewhere in Final Covenant, it occurs only about ten times. It expresses the most assertive confidence and trust; faith moves towards and clings to its object. Whereas “to believe a person” means nothing more than to believe what they say.[19] Thus, “to believe on or in a person” means to have total trust in their character. They [KJV “he has”] have an abiding presence in them.[20] Have does not mean merely “they accept it.”[21] Likewise “in them”’ in this context cannot mean anything but “in themselves.”^[22]

From a Pentecostal perspective, Samuel Ashton Keen (1842-1895) points out that the faith which saves the soul is believing what God says, and believing it because He says it. Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. When God told him He was going to give him a son, Abraham, without any outward proof and against hope, chose to believe God simply because He’s the one who said it, so, according to Abraham’s faith it was granted him. God’s word is His testimony concerning the divine purpose to save the soul that believes in Jesus. If we receive the witness of others (which we do), the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which He testified of His Son. So, if you say: “I know what is to be believed; that the infallible word of God is the sole ground of faith,” can you agree that you trust the word of the Lord?

Not long since, says Keen, a gentleman, a comparative stranger to me but who had reasonable trust in my integrity, said to me: I owe a fellow Christian in your town seventy-five dollars. I want to pay it but cannot leave my home to do so. Will you take the money to him? I said: I will. He handed me the amount. When I took it, I saw an expression of relief come to his face, and he felt an evident satisfaction that showed he thought his debt was now paid. Moreover, he trusted me to cancel the IOU note held by this other gentleman. He believed I would do it.

I could tell the burden was off his mind; he felt that my integrity for faithfulness in meeting his claims was vindicated. His conscious commitment to me of this business brought him the rest, which the witness of faith always insures. He stopped worrying about it hours before I could make the payment because I took the responsibility of paying off his shoulders, which I could not have done if he had not confided in my word of promise to him. So, when the soul commits the concern of its salvation to Him who can save unto the uttermost, it begins to take up the triumphant shout that the witness of faith always inspires.^[23]

With regal etiquette, Ernest von Dryander (1843-1922) states that the Anointed One is not merely a great reformer, whose words are echoed by thousands of followers, but the Head of renovated humanity, greater – infinitely greater – than the first Adam. He is the Vine Who nourishes the branches with His never-failing strength.[24] He is the grain of corn that lives in a more beauteous form after death.[25] He is for us not only a significant religious prophet, but He is the Head who guides us, the members of His Body, the Church; with His Word and Sacraments He nourishes and strengthens us, and gives us renewed life; He is among His faithful ones wherever they are gathered together in His name;[26] He lifts them upon the wings of faith; gives strength to the weary, rest to the heavy-laden, power of sanctification to the weak and tempted, courage to the fearful – to all He gives the vigor of life from above. He brings peace, joy, and happiness – all that makes existence holy and rich – into our transient life here.

This is the witness of God, which He testified of His Son through the Spirit, namely of Him, “Who came by water and blood.” There can be no testimony more powerful, and no other is needed. Anyone who stands in the sun’s rays needs no proof that the sun is shining; they have more than proof: they have experienced it. Those who have the spiritual life of the Anointed One need no further evidence of salvation given to them; they live in a world of life as long as they live by faith in the Anointed One. It is the Spirit of God Himself Who daily witnesses to this.

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[1] Sawtelle, Henry A., Commentary on the Epistles of John, op. cit., p. 58

[2] See Romans 10:10

[3] Godbey, William Baxter: Commentary on the New Testament, Vol. II, op. cit., pp. 396-397

[4] Genesis 15:6; cf. Romans 4:3

[5] Spurgeon, Charles H., According to Promise, Whose Are the Promises? pp. 28-29

[6] James 1:17

[7] John 3:18

[8] Lias, John James: The First Epistle of St. John with Exposition, op. cit., pp. 388-391

[9] Ibid. The First Epistle of St. John with Homiletical Treatment, op. cit., pp. 386-388

[10] Moody, Dwight L, The Homework of, Ch. 4, pp. 47-48

[11] 1 John 5:9, 10; John 1:7, 15, 5:31-46; 10:41; 12:41; 15:26; Romans 1:3; 15:21; Acts of the Apostles 8:12

[12] Ibid. 1:1

[13] Ibid. 1:4

[14] Cf. John 11;25; 14:6

[15] Zahn, Theodor: Introduction to the New Testament, op. cit., p. 329

[16] John 3:32-33

[17] 1 John 5:12

[18] Cameron, Robert: The First Epistle of John, or, God Revealed in Light, Life, and Love, op. cit. p. 236

[19] See 1 John 4:1

[20] See John 5:38; Hebrews 10:34

[21] Cf. Romans 8:16; Galatians 4:6

[22] Plummer Alfred: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, N. T., Vol. IV., p. 162-163

[23] Keen, Ashton: Faith Papers, Paper Third, The Way of Faith: How to Believe, pp. 13, 20

[24] John 15:4-5

[25] Ibid. 12:24

[26] Matthew 18:20

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXII) 02/07/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

On the other hand, those who reject God’s external and internal evidence insist that God is a liar. We must observe that John is not speaking of an absolute infidel who rejects Christianity altogether as a myth, but one who, accepting Christianity as a Divine revelation, refuses to receive the Anointed One as God’s Son. Now, as the miraculous facts of our Savior’s life, which they must accept if they receive anything, bear witness to the Divine nature of the Anointed One, they, by disbelieving that doctrine, make out that God, Who sent these signs and wonders, did so to deceive humanity, thereby labeling as truth that which is not valid. The witness God gave to the Divine nature of His Son is evident on the face of the Gospel, and, if it is not believed, it implies that God has given false testimony.^[1]

After checking the text closely, Richard H. Tuck (1817-1868) states that this witness in oneself is in two ways – having the permanently abiding Spirit and in a personal experience. Thus, failure to trust a person is really to declare them untrustworthy and, therefore, a liar.^[2]

After observing the Apostle John’s attention to detail, John Stock (1817-1884) responds to what the Apostle John says here: God’s Word has not returned to Him void[3] but prospered among those who received it. The human heart generates it – which the Lord opens – as in Lydia’s case.[4] Then a person’s pride is brought low; they take the subservient position and confessors of their sin and the blessed Savior. Finally, the atonement is received, and he rejoices in God⁴: peace and love, thanksgiving and the voice of Good News, something strange in the lonely heart – once like a dark and fruitless wilderness.[5]

God is adored, and believers are blessed⁵. Satan, the enchanter, darkener, usurper, liar, and murderer, is cast out; and they are awed by their escape and the grace of God in the Anointed One, Jesus. Our blessed Lord promised the Holy Spirit to them that came to Him, which should be in them as a well of water springing up unto eternal life.[6] The ever-blessed Spirit then becomes the inmate of the human soul and one with it in an inexplicable way. Those who joined to the Lord are of one spirit.[7] The Spirit of God who leads[8] dwells in each believer,[9] and bears witness with their spirit that they are God’s child;[10] and an heir of God, and a joint-heir with the Anointed One.^[11]

John reiterates that the Anointed One and His Church are united, and His Holy Spirit actuates every member of His body into eternity. The Holy Spirit is not inactive in the human heart: hence the new creatureship, the delight in devotion, the understanding of the things of the Spirit – which are foolishness to the natural man – the power over indwelling sin and outward temptation, and the perseverance in well-doing. Hence, unspeakable comforts and God’s consolations are not small to them that reverence Him and walk in the comforting presence of the Holy Spirit. In all this, the internal witness to the existence and deity of the Anointed One is operating. It springs out of a vital faith in Him ‒ by which the simplest is made more potent than the shrewd opponent of our most holy faith, and has an internal perception that the Lord exists, is everywhere present, is gracious and mighty to save. So they can say with the youth, “I was once blind, but now I can see,”[12] and needs no one to convince them of the existence of the Son (Sun) of Righteousness – whose rays gladden their heart and forever heals their soul⁵.^[13]

With an inquiring spiritual mind, Johannes H. A. Ebrard (1819-1893) points out that this testimony, as given in the past, does not altogether end the matter. Those who believe in God’s Son have God’s testimony, externally in the evangelical narrative or something belonging to the past and internally as an active and influential power. The like and selfsame testimony once uttered by God, “This is My beloved Son,” approves itself as established in believers. At the same time, it mightily demonstrates its power within us, as we see in verse eleven. On the other hand, those who do not believe the historical and sure testimony God offered to His Son are not excused but remain guilty. Those who reject God’s witness are treating Him like a liar.[14] Those who do not distinguish the Perfect tense in verse nine from the Present tense in verses seven and eight are not in a position to interpret the Apostle John’s thoughts in verse ten.^[15]

After contemplating John’s train of thought, William Kelly (1822-1888) declares that whatever the state of Christendom is, God’s Word remains forever faithful and applicable to the Christian, “He that believes … has the witness in himself.” Were the believer in a land where he could enjoy no fellowship with saints, where he had no opportunity to hear a Christian teacher, where he knew of not a single brother in the Lord, the Son of God on whom he believes remains just the same; and he has the witness in himself as assuredly as if surrounded with every Christian privilege possible on earth. He is not dependent on anyone under the sun; he has the Son.

How profoundly wise and gracious is this witness on God’s part! For in such a case, how many might cry out? What audacious presumption! But “he that believes has the witness in himself,” says God. The audacity is in the infidelity which rejects it: “He that does not believe God has called Him a liar because he has not believed God’s witness concerning His Son.” What could be worse than that? It is bad enough to lie about oneself, like a full-blown Brahmin[16] saying that he had not sinned, though it gives the lie to the word. It is worse, not negatively only but positively, to make God a liar, which everyone who rejects God’s witness to His Son, the Anointed One.^[17]

Familiar with John’s writing style, William B. Pope (1822-1903) advises that the testimony in verse ten has become subjective: the “three agree in one” within the believer’s consciousness. In other words, the believer has – for we must anticipate – eternal life within them. It came from the Spirit received by the Anointed One for us at His baptism, the release from the condemnation of death through His blood, and the Holy Spirit effecting and assuring both. Faith is followed by full assurance, but the security is here the possession of life itself.

But the person who attempts to make God a liar is not only without the internal testimony but also rejects the external testimony given to everyone who hears the Gospel record. Therefore, they are without excuse. Once before, John spoke of making God a liar. However, the one who denies that they have sinned is a liar and contradicts God’s testimony. Similarly, those who do not believe God’s witness concerning His Son reject the utmost possible evidence that God could give them, knowing mankind’s necessity. They have evidence before them, spoken or written evidence. Further, he deliberately rejects the testimony, knowing it to be Divine.

Nothing is more vital, scarcely anything more substantial, concerning the moral wilfulness of unbelief in all the Scriptures. John says that those who refuse to accept the testimony to the divinity and incarnation of God’s Son forfeit eternal life by blinding their minds in calling Him a liar. What they deny is not this or that miraculous demonstration but the whole strain of proof brought by the Christian revelation that both light and life have come into the world as the heritage of everyone who does not willfully reject both.^[18]

With holiness doctrine expertise, Daniel Steele (1824-1914) draws our attention to the phrase “Witness in him” (KJV) here in verse ten. Some Greek scholars prefer “in himself” (Young’s Literal Translation YLT). The external witness accepted as valid becomes internal certitude when the will bows in accordance with the truth believed. Absolute and irreversible self-surrender to Him who is the Truth brings a direct consciousness of His Divine nature and work. The witness of the Spirit, the water, and the blood leads successively to an inner conviction and realization of pardon, newness of life, and sanctified cleansing. Thus, the Apostle John’s doctrine of assurance agrees with the Apostle Paul’s views on the subject.[19]

This blessed effect does not follow a mere speculative assent to a fact, but builds on trust and sole reliance in the person of the Anointed One. This statement supplements the conditions of the new birth partly stated in the first verse of this chapter. Speculative or historical faith is not decisive of salvation, but it is the first step toward a saving trust. “He that does not believe God” is a direct antithesis to “believing in the Son.” It implies the Godhead or supreme Divinity of Jesus the Anointed One. It also means that a person cannot be a true believer in God while refusing to rely on His Son for salvation.

But John has some harsh words for those who deny the Divinity of Jesus. It applies “Has made Him a liar” applies to two classes: First, to those who say that they have no sins[20] which need a Divine Savior; and, secondly, to those who deny that such a Savior is the Son of God, our Lord Jesus. The Gnostics belong to these classes whose teachings impeach God’s testimony that “all have sinned” and that there is salvation in no other name than that of Jesus the Anointed One. The two errors are twins. To lie is a dreadful sin, but to be a liar is much worse. The first, is an immoral act; the second, is an evil character. Hence the atrocity of failing to believe God’s word, to say nothing about an avowed distrust and disobedience. “Has not believed.” The perfect tense indicates a permanent state in the past continuing to the present hour.^[21]

After sufficient examination of the Greek text, Brooke F. Westcott (1825-1901) states that the witness is not of external testimony only, but internal also. Absolute self-surrender to the Son of God brings the believer a direct consciousness of His Divine Nature and work. He that believes on the Son of God has the witness in himself. That which for others is external is for the believer internal. The witness of Spirit and water and blood becomes an inner conviction of life and cleansing and redemption. The title of divine dignity (the Son of God) points to the assurance of this effect. Moreover, it is to be noted that here the condition laid down is belief in the Person of the Anointed One.

The direct antithesis to “believing in the Son” is “not believing God.” This follows that “believing in the Son” comes from “believing God,” welcoming His testimony. The phrase “not believing” (as distinguished from “has believed”[22] made God a liar. The word “liar” marks the general character and the falsity of the accused.[23] The form of expression suggests the idea of an inward conflict. A voice has been heard, and it has been deliberately rejected. When the crisis of choice came, they refused the message, thus making God a liar.

Furthermore, not believing God’s testimony resulted in a decision that influenced their feelings for Him.[24] The negative expresses the direct fact – “has not believed on the witness,” not simply “believed the witness,” makes the phrase unique. Belief in the truth of the witness is carried on to personal faith in the witness’ object, that is, the Incarnate Son Himself. It might have seemed more straightforward to say, “the witness of God,” but St John repeats at length what he has shown that the witness involved was a witness concerning His Son.^[25]

Like a spiritual farmer planting the seed of God’s Word, Henry A. Sawtelle (1832-1913) paraphrases the opening of verse ten by saying, “He that believes on (literally, into; is the faith reaching into and lodging in a personal object, the Son of God) has the witness in himself.” The testimony of God concerning His Son that He is God’s legitimate Son and the Giver of life. By believing in the Anointed One, this divine testimony becomes a part of oneself, a self-evidencing experience. The believer has a joyful, firm conviction, from which nothing can move them, that the Anointed One is a living reality, the very Fountain of Life. Those who believe have the testimony inside them; others refuse the testimony outside them.

Bible scholars regard verse ten as parallel with Romans 8:16. The two passages are alike in that they speak of an inward witness of the Spirit through experience. But they differ in this, that in the one case, the Spirit testifies and assures our kinship with God,[26] while the other guarantees the Anointed One’s Sonship.[27] Both passages are, at their root, related to Psalm 25:14. It is the experimental knowledge of spiritual facts possessed by the regenerate. Those who do not believe God (His word or testimony) make the great Creator a liar. Those who do not receive God’s testimony by the water, blood, and Spirit treat God as a liar.

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[1] Jelf, William E., Commentary on the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit., pp. 74-75

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

[3] Isaian 55:11

[4] Acts of the Apostles 16:14

[5] Romans 5:11

[6] Isa 5:11

[7] 1 Corinthians 6:17

[8] Romans 8:14

[9] Ibid. 8:9

[10] Ibid. 8:16

[11] Stock, John: An Exposition of the First Epistle General of St. John, op. cit., pp. 426-427

[12] John 9:25

[13] Stock, John: An Exposition of the First Epistle General of St. John, op. cit., p. 427

[14] Cf. 1 John 1:10

[15] Ebrard, Johannes H. A., Biblical Commentary on the Epistles of St. John, op. cit., p. 333

[16] The traditional occupation of Brahmins is that of priesthood at Hindu temples or at socio-religious ceremonies, and rite of passage rituals such as solemnizing a wedding with hymns and prayers.

[17] Kelly, William: An Exposition of the Epistles of John the Apostle, op. cit., p. 374

[18] Pope, William B., The International Illustrated Commentary on the N.T., Vol. IV, op. cit., p. 39

[19] See Romans 8:16; Galatians 4:6

[20] 1 John 1:10

[21] Steele, Daniel: Half-Hours with St. John’s Epistles, op. cit., pp. 137-139

[22] See John 5:24; 6:29ff.; 8:30ff; cf. 1 John 3:23; 5:1, 5, 10

[23] Cf. John 8:44; 1 John 2:4, 22; 4:20

[24] Cf. John 3:18; 6:69 (1 John.4:16); 11:27; 16:27; 20:29; 2 Timothy 1:12; Titus 3:8

[25] Westcott, Brooke F., The Epistles of St. John: Greek Text with Notes, op. cit., pp. 186-187

[26] Romans 8:16

[27] 1 John 5:10

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LXI) 02/06/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

After spiritually analyzing John’s conclusions, Gottfried C. F. Lücke (1791-1855) says that we have the first antithesis in verse ten: “Whoever does not believe God’s testimony concerning His Son, make Him a liar.” The perfect tense “believed not”  is here to be taken not entirely in a present sense since it denotes the isolated act of not believing or not having believed in times past. According to John, one who does not believe rejects God’s testimony when heard and remains an unbeliever.^[1]

With systematic theological intellect, Charles Hodge (1797-1878) explains that saving faith does not rest on the testimony of the Church nor the outward evidence of miracles and prophecy. Instead, they base it on their inward testimony of the Spirit with and by the truth in our hearts. Those who have this inward testimony need no other. They do not need to be told by others what truth is; this same anointing convinces them what truth is and that truth contains no lies.

So, Christians were not to believe every spirit. They were to try the spirits whether they were of God. And the test or criterion or trial was the external, authenticated revelation of God, as spiritually discerned and demonstrated by the inward operations of the Spirit. So now, when atheists tell people there is no God, no sin, no retribution, no need of a Savior, or expiation, or faith, that Jesus of Nazareth is not God’s Son manifest in the flesh, they need not listen. Faithful Christians do not need to be told that these are what the Apostle calls lies. They have an inward witness to the truth of God’s record of His Son.^[2]

Any claim to infallibility on the part of the Apostles was duly authenticated, not only by the nature of the truths they communicated but also by the power which those truths exerted over the minds and hearts of people and by the inward witness of the Spirit. Miraculous gifts also confirmed it. As soon as the Apostles were endowed with power from on high, they spake in “other tongues;” they healed the sick and restored the lame and the blind. “God also,” as the Apostle says, “bearing them witness, both with signs, and wonders, and with various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His will.”[3] The Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians that the signs of an Apostle had been carried out among them “in all patience, in signs, and wonders, and mighty deeds.”[4] The mere working of miracles was not evidence of a divine commission as a teacher.^[5]

Without using complicated language, Albert Barnes (1798-1870) states that the witness the Apostle John shares here cannot refer to any distinct and immediate revelation that Jesus is the Anointed One. To an individual’s soul, it is not independent of the external evidence of that truth or superseding the necessity of that evidence. The “witness” here referred to is the fruit of all the evidence, external and internal, on the heart, producing this result; that is, a profound conviction of the truth that Jesus is the Son of God. There is also evidence derived from the fact that the soul has found peace by believing in Him. It comes from the fact that the troubles and anxieties of the mind on account of sin have been removed by faith in the Anointed One. It spawned new views of God and heaven which results from faith in the Lord Jesus. The effect of this is disarming death of its terrors, plus the whole influence of the Gospel on the intellect and the affections of the believer’s heart and the life.

These things constitute a mass of evidence for the truth of the Christian religion, whose motivation the believer cannot resist making them ready to sacrifice anything rather than their faith. They are prepared to go to the stake rather than renounce their Savior.[6] They have no interest in making God a liar.[7] The idea is that in various ways – through His baptism, death, and miracles – God became a witness that He sent the Lord Jesus as a Savior. To doubt or deny this exhibits the same character as doubting or denying any other testimony. It was practically charging those who claimed to be witnesses with spreading falsehood.[8] ^[9]

With impressive theological vision, Richard Rothe (1799-1867) notes that the first clause of verse nine should have been included here to make it clear that God’s witness is an actual testimony and not merely something inferred from a series of reflections. The Apostle John expressly adds that those who believe what God said should realize that God spoke of Himself. John offers it as a reality of which he has experimental knowledge. Therefore, John cannot doubt. But, of course, the unbeliever cannot have such an experience as this witness. John implies that the Spirit he received from God is essential to God’s testimony. It concerns the Anointed One and authenticates the evidence by water and blood. By the Spirit with the believer’s spirit, the witness of God is the object of an experimental certainty.^[10]

According to Robert Jamieson (1802-1880), Andrew Fausset (1821-1910), and David Brown’s (1803-1897) way of thinking, the Apostle John’s acclamation that everyone who believes that Jesus is God’s Son and accepts it as accurate is safe. But those fools who refuse to believe that Jesus is God’s Son make God out to be a liar by rejecting what God said about His Son. This is the highest form of faith; because the object has the highest credibility.[11]

With noticeable spiritual comprehension, Henry Cowles (1802-1881) says there is a form of testimony unknown to the ungodly, peculiar to what the Christian has in themselves for every believing soul. They know there is joy and peace in believing, which no delusion could ever give; they know that through Jesus, they have communion with God; they know that for Jesus’ sake, God hears their prayers. They are deeply conscious of the Holy Spirit’s power in connection with certain truths of God’s Word. In this self-conscious, witnessing testimony, they are strangers to God’s intermediation. It lies wholly outside their conscious experience. They will know what it is only when they honestly believe in God’s Son. The last clause of verse ten looks toward external testimonies only. Those who do not believe make God a liar. God’s record as to His Son is clear, explicit, and unmistakable significance. Therefore, those who will not believe this record accuse the witness of speaking falsehoods.^[12]

With his lifework well-illustrating, the biblical and reformation ideal of a pastor-theologian Robert S. Candlish (1807-1873) says that all of what the Apostle John says in verse ten is still a question about the faith that overcomes the world.[13] That is a particular function ascribed to trust: the light in which believers regard their beliefs. Doubtless, Gospel faith is the same; no matter what light and process they contemplate, it always has the same object. But the manner of its exercise may not be the same. And therefore, it is to be noted that it is not justifying faith, nor as generally working by love, but faith that arrests worldly living. This faith rests on testimony, as all faith must do.

And the testimony on which it rests is sufficient to sustain it, for it is divine.[14] Human testimony is a trustworthy ground of faith; we rely on it daily and act accordingly, assumed to be confirmed as admitted. But we have what is far better and more convincing than human testimony; we have “the testimony of God.” Humans are fallible and frail; the Psalmist “said in his haste, ‘All men are liars.’”[15] Still, we receive their testimony, and we cannot help it; we must come to a standstill if we do not. How much more confidently may we receive God’s testimony who can neither deceive nor be deceived; who knows all things for He is truth itself. To reject His testimony and refuse to proceed on its faith while we receive and act upon the testimony of mankind is inconsistent and utter folly.

So, will you still refuse to give God credit? Will you still dare to question His sincerity, His being in earnest, when He pleads with you? Will you not believe that He means what He says when He tells you that He is waiting to be gracious in His Son coming by water and blood? You do Him a great injustice by treating Him in a way you would not venture to treat an honorable person. You receive the testimony of others. Is not the testimony of God more remarkable? Is He not entitled to be believed in His simple word, much more in His solemn oath? Is He not one you can trust without constantly testing His faithfulness?

Let there be an end to doubt, hesitancy, halting, and delay. It is insulting to God, making Him a liar. Do not commit so great a sin; do not shut your eyes to its greatness. Consider well how it is not with mere facts of history or the dead letter of books of evidence that you are dealing with the true and living God. Alleged facts you might question, books of evidence you might criticize, without offense to the recorders of the facts or the writers of the books. But here is God, the God of truth, commending to you His Son from heaven and summoning you to believe in His Son on the assurance of His truth. Your refusal to do so is a personal affront; it cannot but be construed as “making Him a liar.”^[16]

With an inquiring mind, Daniel D. Whedon (1808-1885) states that since the Spirit gives force and life to the water and blood, by which they become witnesses, He becomes indwelling with three-fold testifying power in the believer’s soul. And as that Spirit is God and truth, we have an inward surety of demonstration far above what other witnesses, or narratives, can impart. The testimony, witness, and record are within us as a divine intuition, possessing the highest possible certainty. The Apostle John gives the unbeliever no chance of saying it is not God who testifies. It is not only a sure testimony, but it is just as sure that the testifier is God. Therefore, if we deny the truth of the testimony, the divine authenticity is impeached. It is a personal issue between God and us. The record and witness are the same Greek noun martyria signifying testimony in all these versesand should have been translated uniformly.^[17]

In line with Apostle John’s point, Henry Alford (1810-1871) says that John’s use of the perfect tense “which He has testified” (KJV), “which He has given” (NIV) in verse nine. It shows that God’s witness is not merely historical[18] but is abiding and present. And these verses explain to us what that statement is. “Those who believe in God’s Son have that evidence in them.” The two readings do not differ in meaning. The object of the divine declaration is to produce faith in the Anointed One. John points to those who unceasingly believe in God’s Son is a person who possesses the testimony ‒ which John does not say until verse eleven.

But we can synthetically put together and conjecture what testimony of which John is speaking: the Spirit by whom we are born again to eternal spiritual and eternal Life, the water of baptism by which the new birth brought to pass in us by the power of the Holy Spirit,[19] the blood of Jesus by which we have reconciliation with God, and purification from our sins,[20] and eternal life.[21] These three contribute to and make up our faith in the Anointed One, composing that testimony, which the Apostle designates here in verse eleven.

Not only that, it is the resting trust of faith: this is the mere first step of giving credit to a witness. Thus, it is assumed that one who does not believe in the Son of God gives no credit to God and makes Him a liar. That’s because the state of disrepute implies a definite rejection continuing. Hence, the expression “because he has not believed in”[22] is a shameful rejection of God’s word and a refusal to rely on God’s testimony concerning His Son.^[23]

As a faithful and zealous scholar, William Graham (1810-1883) asks what the Apostle John means by, “He that believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself?”[24] It may mean, says Graham, “The believer has the witness-bearer in himself.” In this sense, it is parallel with “For the Spirit, itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.”[25] By the very act of believing, he has the evidence of the presence of the witness-bearer. Nevertheless, it seems to be different from the testimony given by the Fruit of the Spirit and the good deeds of a righteous life, for the Spirit bears witness through our spirit, but with our spirit, that we are the children of God.”^[26] With the zeal of a scriptural text examiner, William E. Jelf (1811-1875) claims that believers have an impression of the truth that arises from and adds to their faith besides the external evidence. Faith over and above its foundation is a witness to itself. The interpreters of one of the extreme schools take these words to mean – “those who believe in the Anointed One has in themselves, in their experience, evidence of the Anointed One’s work on and in them.” But there is no mention of this work here, but that to which testimonies of various kinds are directed ‒ the Anointed One’s Divinity.

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[1] Lücke, Gottfried C. F., A Commentary on the Epistles of St. John, op. cit., p. 275

[2] Hodge, Charles: Systematic Theology, Vol. 1, op. cit., Mysticism has no Foundation in the Scriptures, p.99

[3] Hebrews 2:4

[4] 2 Corinthians 2:12

[5] Hodge, Charles. Systematic Theology, Vol. 1, op. cit., The Testimony of Paul, pp. 162-163

[6] See 1 Peter 3:15

[7] 1 John 1:10; 5:10

[8] Romans 8:16

[9] Barnes, Albert: New Testament Notes, op. cit., 1 John 5, pp 4884-4885

[10] Rothe, Richard: Exposition of the First Epistle of St. John, op. cit., The Expository Times, May 1895, p. 374

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

[12] Cowles, Henry: The Gospel and Epistles of John, op. cit., pp. 356-357

[13] 1 John 5:4-5

[14] Ibid. 5:9

[15] Psalm 116:11

[16] Candlish, Robert S., The First Epistle of John Expounded in a Series of Lectures, op. cit., Lecture XXXIX, p. 475-486

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

[18] Matthew 3:17

[19] John 3:5; Titus 3:5

[20] 1 John 1:7; 2:2

[21] John 6:53

[22] See 1 John 1:10

[23] Alford, Henry: The Greek Testament, op. cit., Vol. IV, pp. 506-507

[24] 1 John 5:10

[25] Romans 8:16

[26] Graham, William: The Spirit of Love, op. cit., pp. 326-327

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LX) 02/03/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

After skillfully scrutinizing the Apostle John’s theme, John Brown of Haddington (1722-1787) announces with the Apostle John that whoever trusts this divine evidence believes in this incarnate Son of God as their only and all-sufficient Savior. Not only do they receive God’s witness in their heart, but has in their soul an experimental and satisfying testimony of the excellency of the Anointed One; and of His ability, willingness, and authority to deliver them from all sin and misery and bring them all spiritual and eternal happiness. But, whoever rejects the testimony God gave concerning His Son in the Gospel as altogether sufficient for salvation, flatly contradicts and gives the lie to the highest, holiest, and most faithful God. ^[1]

For example, a man with a heartfelt friendship with hymn writer^[2] John Newton (1726-1807), Thomas Scott (1747-1821) makes the point that during the Apostle John’s era, the testimony of two or three credible individuals was, by the law, deemed sufficient to prove any matter of fact. It applied to almost all human affairs, even when people’s lives, or the interests of whole nations, lie at stake, are conducted and determined by “receiving the testimony.” Although it is known that all are liable to be deceived or mistaken and prone to being deceived. Yet, would refuse to act following human testimony, and should require another kind of demonstration, in all the various concerns of life, must soon, not only give up conducting any business by refusing a most needful resource.

If then, “an individual’s testimony” must be received, how absurd is it to reject that of God! It must be “greater,” or more indisputably certain,[3] as He knows all “things,” cannot mistakenly be imposed to deceive His creatures, is essential Truth, and “cannot lie.”[4] Therefore, “God’s testimony” is the highest kind of witness: and we only need to inquire about the evidence that He has spoken.  And as to the meaning of His words, in which the honest, humble, and diligent seeker will not be left mistaken; we obtain the utmost conceivable certainty in things of the highest possible importance.[5] Thus faith appropriates the information in “God’s testimony” in a most compact form, leaving a person “wise to salvation.”

The principal truth, “God has testified” in His holy Word, relates to His Son and the way of salvation through Him. Therefore, those who trust “the witness of God” will believe in His Son and rely on Him for that which He came into the world to procure for sinners by His righteousness and redemption. Consequently, for this faith, the Christian receives another, more satisfactory testimony to the truth of the Gospel, which also seals their interest in the Anointed One’s salvation.

This testimony proves that the scripture is God’s Word. Therefore, it helps to understand its most essential parts and become partakers of the blessing announced by Him.[6] On the other hand, those who do not believe in God or respect His testimony to His Son can never receive “the witness in themselves.” They can only expect God’s heavy displeasure seeing “they make God a liar” by treating His word as a lie, utterly unworthy of credit or confidence. It is the case of everyone who does not believe the testimony “God gave of His Son,” confirmed in all the ways mentioned in earlier verses. As all revelation centers in this fundamental doctrine, it is in vain for any person to claim they believe while they reject God’s testimony.^[7]

At age fifteen, a potential young theologian who preached and held cottage and prayer meetings, Joseph Benson (1749-1821), notes that the Apostle John taught that those who believe in God’s Son could use the same faith to receive the Spirit’s testimony in themselves. In other words, they can experience that God’s testimony concerning His Son and salvation is genuine. They know they are saved from the guilt, power, and punishment of sin and transformed into the image of God and a state of communion with Him. They know by experience that Jesus is the Son of God in such a sense as to be an all-sufficient Savior and that He came by cleansing water and atoning blood, receiving justification and sanctification.^[8]

Straightforward preacher Charles Simeon (1759-1876) remains convinced that the truth of our holy faith is confirmed by every kind of evidence that the heart can desire. Not only was it established by an appeal to prophecy, but by miracles without number. But there’s more. Moses had different rites appointed to commemorate the main events which marked that dispensation. First, they observed the Passover feast to remember the destruction of the Egyptian firstborn and the preservation of Israel. Then the feast of Pentecost, to celebrate the giving of the law. Also, the feast of Tabernacles memorializes their living in tents in the wilderness. So, likewise, Christianity has been attested by the Holy “Spirit” given to the Apostles, and “the water” of baptism, administered on that day, and “the blood” of the cross commemorated by the cup which is drunk by all in the supper of the Lord. But, convincing as these testimonies are, the true believer has one peculiar thing troubling their heart, arising from their experience. It is the witness of the Anointed One and His salvation, its significance, suitableness, and sufficiency.^[9] 

Considering everything the Apostle John has said so far, Adam Clarke (1774-1849) states that God’s truthful witness is the most important and essential to mankind. God testifies that those who believe in his Son will be saved and have everlasting life. Furthermore, they will have the witness in themselves as God’s Spirit bears witness with their spirit that they are a child of God. Therefore, knowing, feeling sins forgiven, and having assurance in the heart from the Holy Spirit is the privilege of every true believer in the Anointed One.^[10]

James Harrington Evans (1785-1849) an Anglican priest whose legacy was being a strong nonconformist. He was known for not “conforming” to Church and State governing asks, “witness”of what?” Are we to understand it to be the same as what we read in the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Romans?[11] I think “the witness” here is to the truth connected with verse nine. The declaration of the text, then, amounts to this: that those that truly believe in God’s Son of God have internal proof that God’s Word is true. They read in the Bible declarations concerning mankind as a guilty, lost, ruined, weak, and helpless creature. Sinners know that they are sinners.[12] But this witness primarily refers to the Lord Jesus as the significant sum and substance of the Gospel. The believer in Him has an internal witness “that Jesus is the Anointed One.”

So, “How is it that a believer has such an internal witness? First, it is a spiritual phenomenon, the work of the Holy Spirit. If you ask by what it is it supplied, the answer is, by faith. “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”[13] A person does not know the truth until they believe it; an individual does not really know the Anointed One until they believe in Him. It is faith that gives substance to factual evidence; it is faith that reveals the Anointed One to mankind’s soul. But if you ask, what is it that confirms it? A person sees what effects it produces and observes the consequences. They have been working hard to live right, and they have the Anointed One’s revelation and righteousness to pacify their conscience. And if you ask in what school it is that the Lord the Spirit teaches believers and instructs them, I answer, in the school of experience.

So, “What qualifies this inward witness?” First, it is a Scriptural witness. The Spirit uses God’s Word as the great medium of all reconciliation and sanctification. Not that we limit the Spirit. After all, who knows what direct communication He may have with us? But it must be tested by the Word of God. Bring it to the Word of truth; if it is of God, it will stand the test of truth; for all truth is to be tried, and whatever comes from God must be that which leads to the Anointed One.^[14]

In his captivating teaching style, Jewish convert Augustus Neander (1789-1850) observes that the Apostle John shows that it depends on the person themselves to receive or reject God’s witness. It is necessarily converted from an outward to an inward witness when obtained. For those who, through that external witness of the Spirit, were led to believe in God’s Son, it is no longer mere visible testimony. It has become a part of their inner life. What God first testified is from without is now by means of faith testify inwardly to their living consciousness. They bear the divine witness in themselves. It is the Spirit’s testimony in their heart. Consequently, through their inward experience of their spiritual life, it is perpetually established for them that Jesus is God’s Son.

But those who do not believe God’s testimony of His Son are making God a liar. If through the operations of His Spirit God testifies of His Son, yet not received as God’s Son; what is this but saying, that God contradicts Himself, while thus by these divine facts accrediting him as his Son who is not so? Unbelief cannot recognize God in his workings, as him that is true. It stamps the divine as the undivine. It can see in the ways of God nothing but contradiction. From these words of John, we may deduce a truth most important for our age. That Jesus is the Son of God is attested by what God has wrought through the Gospel. Having no susceptibility in themselves for receiving it, do not yield themselves with a humble and receptive heart to the witness of the Spirit, that it may thereby become to them an inward witness. It is the individual character and disposition that must here make the decision. It belongs to one’s personal will to decide whether they will yield themselves to that witness of the Spirit. Otherwise, they are accusing God’s plan of salvation as that of liar.^[15]

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

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

[3] 1 John 3:20

[4] Numbers 23:19

[5] See Hebrews 11:1-2; 1 Peter 3:13-16

[6] John 14:15 24; 2 Corinthaisn 1:21, 22; 2 Peter 1:19-21; Revelation 2:17

[7] Scott, Thomas: Commentary on the Holy Bible, pp. 408-409

[8] Benson, Joseph: Commentary on the Old and New Testaments, op. cit., 1 John 5

[9] Simeon, Charles: Horæ Homileticæ, op. cit., Vol. XX, Discourse 2466, p. 537

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

[11] Romans 8:16

[12] Luke 18:13

[13] Hebrews 11:1

[14] Evans, James H., The Biblical Illustrator, Vol. 22, First Epistle of John, op. cit., p. 434

[15] Neander, Augustus: The First Epistle of John, Practically Explained, op. cit., pp. 293-295

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LIX) 02/02/23

^5:10 All who believe this know in their hearts that it is correct. If anyone doesn’t believe this, they say God is lying because they refuse to believe what He said about His Son.

To apply this, we must recognize God’s witness about the Anointed One always involves accepting Jesus as His Son. We accept proof from teachers, accident eyewitnesses, and Delta airlines’ commitment to its planes’ airworthiness. This is the standard, everyday practice of people. Companies will lose credibility or business if they deceive us, so we generally do not doubt their witnessess’ accuracy. It is normal to trust what people say. How much greater is God’s credibility and witness to Jesus the Anointed One? We could have no more excellent source for our amazement of the Lord Jesus than the Father. The most important reason we should believe in the person and work of the Anointed One is that God the Father is the witness to Him.[1]

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 AD), concludes that this means whoever believes in God’s Son and does what the Son commands have God’s witness in them and is counted among God’s children. Jews and heretics are wasting their time when they claim to believe in God, because they reject the Anointed One and refuse to believe in Him. Whoever refuses to honor the Son does not glorify the Father who sent him.[2]

In the Heidelberg Catechism (1563), we find the question: “Why do you say that you are righteous by faith alone?” The answer is not that I am acceptable to God, on account of the worthiness of my faith^[3] but by the righteousness and holiness of the Anointed One before God;^[4] and that I cannot receive and apply the same to myself any other way than by faith alone.^{[5] [6]}

As a firm spiritual disciplinarian, John Owen (1616-1683) states that the whole nature of justifying faith does not consist merely in the approval of the mind, be it ever so firm and steadfast, nor whatever effects of obedience it may produce. Its duty and office in justification have that particular value we are attempting to explain in that it does not equal all divine revelation. Still, it has a peculiar object proposed in Scripture. And whereas both of these will be in our description of the proper object and nature of faith, I will present a few things I find wrong in their description, sufficient to manifest how alien it is from the truth:

• Some say this consent is an act of understanding only – an act of the mind with respect to its truth, no matter its intent.

• All divine truth is equally the object of this consent. It does not respect its unique nature or use of any single fact, whatever kind it is, more than another; nor can it do so, since it regards only divine revelation.

• This consent to all divine revelation may be genuine and sincere, with no previous work of the law or any conviction of sin.

• It is not a way of seeking relief for a convicted sinner because they stand guilty before God. Such sinners are capable subjects of justification and do or can seek it in any manner.

• It is no more than what the devils themselves may have, as the Apostle James affirms.[7] That instance of their believing God proves that they also believe this God, who is the first essential truth, reveals it to be true. And it may consist with all manner of wickedness, and without any obedience, and endeavor to make God a liar.[8] And it is no wonder if people deny us to be justified by faith, who know no other faith but this.^[9]

Yet some may ask, “How can I commune with the Father in love? I don’t know whether He loves me, but I must believe He does. What if He does not accept me? I’d rather not perish for my presumption but find sweetness in His heart. God seems to be a consuming fire and everlasting punishment, so I’m afraid to look up unto Him.” The answer would be: “I don’t understand what knowing the love of God means. Although detected in a spiritual sense and experience, it is received purely by believing. Knowing it is accepting it as revealed.”[10] You can have this assurance at the beginning of your walk with God. He who is truth said it, and whatever your heart says or Satan says, unless you accept it on this basis, you are calling Him a liar!^[11]

In addition, that saving faith is our “believing the record that God has given us of His Son,” and what God gives, we can be sure of what it communicates. So grace was promised and given to the elect in Jesus the Anointed One before the world began.[12] It was to be transmitted to them, in and by the mediation of His Son Jesus the Anointed One, as the only way God will give eternal life to anyone. Therefore, it was wholly in Him and obtained from Him. Our acceptance of this testimony provided the only way for sinners to receive saving grace. Any refusal of it threatens our eternal security, and ruin is possible. And it is reasonable that it should be so; for, in our receiving this testimony of God, we “stamp our seal that God is true.”

Consequently, we ascribe to Him the glory of His truth and all the other holy virtues of His divine nature – the most eminent duty we are capable of in this world; by refusing to do so, we make Him out to be a liar. And the gravity wherewith this testimony is stated in verse seven is very remarkable, “There are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one.” Therefore, the holy trinity act distinctly in the unity of their divine nature, to give this testimony: and they do so by those different operations, and work of God saving sinners by Jesus the Anointed One as declared in the Gospel.^[13] Obviously, Owen is not disposed to address the controversy prevalent in his day concerning that verse seven is not authentic and was inserted into the text.

In his fiery manner, John Flavel (1627-1691) suggests that we look at the guilt, misery, and unbelief of those who reject the Gospel message. It is a sin that reflects great dishonor toward God. Rejection makes a person guilty of the vilest contempt of the Anointed One and the whole design of redemption by Him. All of God’s attributes were manifested in the work of redemption by the Anointed One. Therefore, the apostle calls Him “the wisdom of God and the power of God.”[14] And the neglect and rejection of the Anointed One imply the weakness and folly of His redemption.

Distrust includes in it the most painful spiritual judgment inflicted on mankind’s soul, even spiritual blindness and the fatal darkening of the understanding by Satan.[15] Atheism also positions a person to endure the curse and threat written in God’s book, among which is: “They who do not believe are damned,”[16] showing that nothing can be more evident than that condemnation follows spurning the Spirit’s call to salvation. This sin and that punishment are fastened together with chains of stubbornness.^[17]

With all the Apostle John’s themes in mind, John Wesley (1703-1791) points to the Scriptures to accentuate the person and work of the Holy Spirit. (1) “God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, given to us.”[18] “And because we are His children, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba (Aramaic), Pater (Greek)!”[19] And the witness in ourselves continually increased that parental love of God,”[20] and God’s pardoning love to us by “See how very much our Father loves us, for He calls us His children, and that is what we are!”[21] This is because God is the desire of our eyes and the joy of our hearts, our portion in time and eternity.^[22]

With scholarly meditation, James Macknight (1721-1800) also speaks about having God’s witness in us through the Holy Spirit. So here, as in the next verse, the testimony is used for the thing being witnessed. The thing being witnessed is that God has given us eternal life through His Son. Therefore, those who believe in the Son may have eternal life. In themselves by faith in the Son, the thing witnessed is that they have the characteristics of God’s children in them. Thus, the new life that began in them is both a pledge and proof that God in due time will ultimately bestow on them eternal life through His Son. However, those who do not believe in God, that is, don’t think that the witness God gave is invalid concerning Jesus at His baptism, claiming Him as His Son with a voice from heaven. Also, when after His death, God demonstrated Jesus to be His Son, by raising Him from the dead. By refusing to believe these testimonies, John uses the Greek verb poieō (“making”) to make God a liar or false witness.^[23]

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[1] See Matthew 3:17; 17:5; Acts of the Apostles 1:8

[2] Bede the Venerable, Ancient Christian Commentary, Bray, G. (Ed.), op. cit., Vol. XI, p. 224

[3] Ephesians 2:8-9

[4] 1 Corinthians 1:30

[5] 1 John 5:10

[6] Heidelberg Catechism: Lord’s Day 23, Question 61

[7] James 2:19

[8] 1 John 5:10

[9] Owen, John: The Doctrine of Justification by Faith, op. cit., pp. 132-133

[10] 1 John 4:16

[11] Owen, John: Of Communion with God, op. cit., pp. 48-49

[12] 2 Timothy 1:9; Titus 1:2

[13] Owen, John: The Doctrine of the Trinity and the Person and Satisfaction of Christ, op. cit., p. 9

[14] 1 Corinthians 1:24

[15] 2 Corinthians 4:4

[16] Mark 16:16

[17] Flavel, John: The Method of Grace: How the Spirit Works, op. cit., Ch. 32, p. 448

[18] Romans 5:5

[19] Galatians 4:6

[20] 1 John 5:10

[21] Ibid. 3:1

[22] Wesley, John, The Works of: Vol. 4, First Series of Sermons, Sermon 4, p.99

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

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LVIII) 02/01/23

^5:9 We believe people who witness in our courts, and so unquestionably, we can believe whatever God declares. And God says that Jesus is His Son.

But the trouble is, as I have told you before, you haven’t accepted this even though you have seen me. But those who do come to me, I will never, never reject. Let me clarify that everything my heavenly Father has entrusted me with will not be lost in the process, not one. I promise to raise those in the grave to have eternal life when this is all over. My Father wants this: anyone who sees the Son and trusts who He is and what He does and is in union with Him will have life forever. My part is to put them on their feet, alive and whole, when the time for salvation on earth is complete.^[1]

Amazingly, the Psalmist David recognized this factor of friendship is built on fellowship. He says friendship with God is reserved for those who reverence Him. With them alone, He shares the secrets of His promises.^[2] Apparently, David passed on this same idea to his son Solomon, who wrote: Don’t walk around spoiling for a needless fight. Don’t try to be like those who keep pushing people around on their way through life. “Don’t be a copycat. The LORD detests such low-minded people but gladly offers His friendship to the godly.”^[3]

The Apostle Paul says that God does not leave everything up to our instincts or intuition. That’s why God gave us His Spirit, who speaks to us deep in our hearts and tells us that we are to live like God’s children.^[4] Not only that, but because we are His children, God had the Spirit of His Son live in our hearts, so now we can rightly call God our dear Father.^[5] Therefore, since we can see and prove that what the prophets said came true, we would do well to pay close attention to everything they have written, for, like lights shining into dark corners, their words help us to understand many things that otherwise would be dark and difficult. But when you consider the wonderful truth of the prophets’ words, then the light will dawn in your souls, and the Anointed One, the Morning Star, will shine in our hearts.^[6]

The articulate writer of the Letter to the Hebrews makes this clear: “In the past, God spoke to our people through the prophets. He spoke to them many times and in many different ways. And now, God has spoken to us again in these last days through His Son. He made the whole world through His Son. And He has chosen his Son to have all things. The Son shows the glory of God. He is a perfect copy of God’s nature and holds everything together by His powerful command. First, the Son made people clean of their sins. Then He sat down at the right side of God, the Great One in heaven. The Son was superior to angels and given a divine name more magnificent than their names.”^[7]

John was fully aware that there were false prophets and various interpreters of Jesus’ reason for being in the world, so he wanted to say it as often as possible that Jesus was the man sent from God with a message for all the world to hear.  Not only that, but Jesus was not the only witness to this truth; the Father in heaven had several occasions spoken of His affirmation that Jesus was the Son of man.  So, to accept Jesus as the Anointed One is tantamount to receiving God’s testimony is true about His Son.

While living in Switzerland, I heard this story of a young girl while climbing around on the rocks looking for edelweiss fell into an alpine crevice and could not extract herself.  So the men in the village were called to help.  But all of them were too big to slide through the small crevice to reach the girl.  So they got a small lad who was very good at climbing and wanted to lower him on a rope into the cavern and bring the young girl up. But the boy refused to take the risk unless his father, who was not as big as the other men holding the rope, was called to participate. When they pointed out to the boy that they were much more robust than his father, the boy replied that this didn’t matter; he wanted his father’s hands on the rope. When asked why? The lad replied, “Because I know my father won’t let go.”

A similar concept is valid for every believer.  There is a knot of faith at the end of their rope of belief.  When all else fails and ridicule has stripped them of all external evidence, this is one thing the world can never take away, that they have put their trust in God’s Son, the Son of God.  Critics cannot pollute our minds to reject it; neither can they delete it or exclude it from the faith we have in our hearts.  When a believer’s strength to fight has waned, and their grip is weakening, they will find an anchor called faith at the rope’s end.  But the miracle is that not only will they hold on to faith, but faith will hold on to them.  Their own experience with Jesus the Anointed One is all the proof they need. 

Now John has a word of caution for those who have trouble believing God’s anointing on Jesus and claiming that He was God’s Son. It was already a prevalent problem in the apostle Paul’s day and increased in John’s last years here on earth.  Many of the Jews already were saying that Jesus was a pretender, that the Anointed One would be much holier than He was.  It came from their inability to believe that God could dwell on earth in human form.

This belief continued to grow until it was introduced after John’s death on a large scale by Julius Cassianus and called Docetism. Although the seeds for this movement started earlier, he is considered the founder of this belief system. Docetism teaches that Jesus’ physical body was only an aberration or an illusion. This idea is borrowed from Gnostic philosophy, which teaches that all matter is evil. Therefore, Jesus could not be God incarnate because the physical body is full of sinful tendencies. Docetism taught that a spiritual entity entered into the human body of Jesus at his baptism and left Him after He was crucified. They believed that Jesus’ main objective was to deliver us from the dominion of matter (which is evil). This divine entity could not come Himself in the form of physical matter since this substance was what He came to conquer. This heresy also denies the resurrection because Jesus’ physical body would still count for something.

There are some similar variations to this belief. The Gnostic “Gospel of Peter” teaches Docetism. Two of the more popular teachers of this heresy were Cerinthus[8] and Ebionites.[9]  People who believe this, says John, are calling God a liar.  When Balaam[10] was challenged because his message to the Israelites was not what King Balak wanted to hear, he told him, “God is not a man; He will not lie. God is not a human being; His decisions will not change. If He says He will do something, then He will do it. If He makes a promise, then He will do what He promised.”^[11]

John the Baptizer was thoroughly convinced of this when he said this of Jesus, “Whoever accepts what He says has proof that God speaks the truth.”^[12] But when asked about John the Baptizer’s statement, Jesus had this to say, “I have proof about Myself that is greater than anything John the Baptizer said. The things I do are My proof. These are what My Father gave Me to do. They show that the Father sent Me. And the Father who sent Me has given proof about me. But you have never heard His voice. You have never seen what He looks like. The Father’s teaching does not live in you because you don’t believe in the one the Father sent.”^[13] So these doubters and skeptics need not come right out and verbally call God a liar.

I once heard two people arguing, and one was becoming exasperated because the other one didn’t believe what they were saying.  So, the one said, “Are you calling me a liar?” The other one answered, “No, I just don’t believe you.” So, the first one said, “If you don’t believe me, then you’re saying I’m lying.” The other one said, “No, I’m not saying you’re lying; I just don’t believe you.” And on and on it went. I don’t think they ever settled it. British poet William Shenstone (1714-1763)[14] observed: “A liar begins with making falsehood appear like truth, and ends with making truth itself appear like falsehood.”^[15] But John is less interested in what men say than what God says. Therefore, we can do no better than our Master. So, the ultimate starting point of testimony about Jesus as the Son of God is from God. The words “has testified” mean that God testified in the past with the result that that testimony stands. God testified about Jesus at His baptism and through His death on the cross. “Of His Son” is literally “concerning His Son.” God’s focus is the person and work of the Anointed One. God puts His focus on the centrality of the Anointed One called “Christocentricity.” Thus, the principle involved is that God verifies that His message centered on His Son is true.

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[1] Ibid. 6:30-40, cf. 6:47; 10:28; 17:2-3

[2] Psalm 25:14

[3] Proverbs 3:30-32

[4] Romans 8:16

[5] Galatians 4:6

[6] 2 Peter 1:19

[7] Hebrews 1:1-4

[8] Cerinthus was probably born a Jew in Egypt. Little is known of his life save that he was a teacher and founded a short-lived sect of Jewish Christians with Gnostic tendencies. He apparently taught that the world was created by angels, from one of whom the Jews received their imperfect Law. The only New Testament writing that Cerinthus accepted was the Gospel of Matthew. Cerinthus taught that Jesus, the offspring of Joseph and Mary, received Anointed One’s Spirit at his baptism as a divine power revealing the unknown Father. This messianic spirit left Jesus before the Passion and the Resurrection. Cerinthus admitted circumcision and the Sabbath.

[9] The Ebionites (from Hebrew, Ebyonim, “the poor ones”) were an early sect of Jewish followers of Jesus that flourished from the first to the fifth century C.E. in and around the Land of Israel. In contrast to the dominant Christian sects that viewed Jesus as the incarnation of God, the Ebionites saw Jesus as a mortal human being, who by being a holy man, was chosen by God to be the prophet of the “Kingdom of Heaven.” The Ebionites insisted on following Jewish dietary and religious laws and rejected the writings of Paul of Tarsus. Thus, Ebionites were in theological conflict with the emerging dominant streams of Christianity that opened up to the Gentiles.

[10] Balaam was a wicked prophet in the Bible and is noteworthy because, although he was a wicked prophet, he was not a false prophet. That is, Balaam did hear from God, and God did give him some true prophecies to speak. However, Balaam’s heart was not right with God, and eventually, he showed his true colors by betraying Israel and leading them astray. See Numbers 22-24

[11] Numbers 23:19

[12] John 3:33

[13] Ibid. 5:36-38

[14] Shenstone was one of the earliest practitioners of landscape gardening through the development of his estate.

[15] Essays on Men and Manners by William Shenstone, Printed by William W. Morse, Philadelphia, 1804, LXXXII, p. 151

NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN

CHAPTER FIVE (Lesson LVII) 01/31/23

^5:9 We believe people who witness in our courts, and so unquestionably, we can believe whatever God declares. And God says that Jesus is His Son.

It is impossible, therefore, that a contrary understanding of the significance of the death of Jesus could be the product of the testimony of the Spirit, for the witness of the beloved disciple to the water and blood upon Jesus’ death is confirmed by the Spirit’s ongoing witness to the community. And while John speaks of three witnesses – the Spirit, the water, and the blood – in reality, he envisions one threefold witness to the fact and significance of Jesus’ crucifixion. Together, Spirit, water, and are one testimony, but the Spirit does not testify without or apart from the blood. The statement that the Spirit, the water, and the blood agree to shows that the Spirit’s saving work is not independent of or effective apart from what Jesus accomplished through His death.^[1]

As a lover of God’s Word, Peter Pett (1966) states that if we are willing to receive the witness of men, the witness of God is superior, for the witness of God is that He is an eyewitness concerning His Son. Here John establishes what he has been saying about Jesus, God’s Son. Jesus the Anointed One did not just come by water (through His natural birth or, more probably, through His baptism). His baptism was one way He presented Himself, but equally, He offered Himself through His physical death. It was a theory of various false teachers that the Anointed One’s Spirit came on Jesus’ body as divine inspiration at His baptism but left before His death.

No, says John, He was the Anointed One in His death and life. Indeed this is confirmed by the Spirit, for He is the Spirit of truth. He came on Jesus with power at Jesus’ baptism, proclaiming Jesus to be the only Son and the Servant who was pleasing to God, and He came to Him powerfully after His death when He raised Him from the dead.[2] So, all three agree that Jesus is the Anointed One – the Spirit, the water, and the blood. All concur and are united in revealing Him as God’s Son. In both His life and His death, he was the Anointed One. The Spirit bears witness to Him through God’s witnesses, first the Apostles, then those whom the Apostles appointed, and then through the leaders of the true churches.

But God Himself is also the witness to His Son. He bore witness, for it was he who sent the Holy Spirit on Him at His baptism, and made His declaration of who He was as His Son, and how pleasing He was as His Servant, and it was He who powerfully raised Him from the dead through His Holy Spirit at His resurrection. And His witness is superior to any witness of mankind. So if we accept the witness of men, the witness of those who knew Jesus and knew Him in His life and who saw these remarkable events, we must, even more, accept the witness of God who not only gave Him His Holy Spirit, who was both with Him in His baptism and in His death and resurrection but also has from that time given Him the power to give life to whom He will. God’s witness is that He has borne witness to His Son by this.^[3]

In his unorthodox Unitarian way, Duncan Heaster (1967) says that the Apostle John’s mention of the outflow of water and blood from the Lord, an account testified by the Spirit, backed up the disciples’ testimony.[4] Although those told of John’s Gospel record received that witness, the greater witness was God, the witness of the Spirit within the believers. God’s testimony concerning His Son was not just in the words of those who had visibly, personally witnessed the Lord’s death and the outflow of water and blood, which symbolized the gift of the Spirit within the believer who also testified within them. It was the essential witness to which God testified of His Son. The Comforter would make that witness, confirming the faith exhibited in the crucifixion record.[5] This experience of an acceptive mutuality between God and man is undoubtedly at the very core of our spirituality; it should be part of an inner spiritual shell that nothing, nothing can shake: not aggression from our brethren, disillusion with other Christians, persecution from the world, or painful personal relationships.^[6]

Bright seminarian Karen H. Jobes (1968) observes that the Apostle John is the one “who testifies to these things and who wrote them down. We know that his testimony is true.”[7] Testimony is a central theme of John’s Gospel, God’s testimony about Jesus. John’s testimony is “what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have perceived, and our hands have touched.”[8] Perhaps verse nine is an invitation to read John’s Gospel as a speech on God’s deposition concerning the identity of Jesus.

John assumes that his testimony about the truth stands in unbroken lineage back to God’s testimony about Jesus. He is zealous in protecting it from all other errant claims to truth, such as those offered by him by the antichrists. The witness of the Spirit, the water, and the blood is integral to God’s testimony. Therefore, verse nine is making not just a general claim that God’s testimony is more remarkable than human testimony but specifically that the content of God’s testimony is about Jesus, nothing or anyone else.^[9]

Consistent with the Apostle John’s advice, Heinrich A. W. Meyer (1800-1882) believes that the Apostle John’s purpose for writing verse nine is to demonstrate the value of the Divine testimony and, consequently, to insist on the credit given to it. The conditional clause refers to the fact that human testimony is received as satisfactory and sufficient evidence, according to the common custom of society. If this is so, urges John, we ought to obtain with more conviction, and a more immovable belief, the testimony of God; for it is more significant, that is, greater in its authority and value. There can be no doubt that this verse has a specific connection with what immediately precedes; and that thus the force of the evidence mentioned as divinely-given evidence is called to the readers’ attention.

This is to be affirmed, whatever may be the direct and special reference of it being God’s witness. With regard to this question, the following suggestion is offered as best satisfying the conditions of the passage: namely, that John passes, in the progress of the verses here, from the objective side of the evidence for the Divine Sonship of Jesus to the subjective side. The objective side is presented in verse ten, the Spirit and the water and the blood. The personal side is brought forward in verse eleven, the eternal life given to the soul and possessed by it. But these are, really, not two different things, but two different sides or aspects of the same thing. Jesus the Anointed One, who was seen, heard, handled, is eternal life. The experience of what He is within the soul is the other side – the corresponding internal manifestation of what is testified to by the facts of His earthly career and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost and afterward.^[10]

^5:10 Whoever believes in the Son of God has accepted the truth that God told us. But people who do not believe what God said, and do not trust what He told us about His Son, are saying God is lying.

EXPOSITION

John the Baptizer certainly experienced this. After testifying what happened at Jesus’ baptism, admitting that he would not have known the Anointed One from any other man standing around him, God told him what to look for: “When you see the My Spirit descending and resting upon one person – He is the one you are looking for. He is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.” And I saw it all happen, says John the Baptizer to this one man. So, based on what I was told and saw with my eyes, I unashamedly testify that He is God’s Son.^[11]

Also, one of the soldiers at the crucifixion testified that when Jesus’ side was pierced with a spear, blood and water flowed out. I saw all this myself, said the soldier, and have given an accurate report so that you also can believe. The Apostle John states that when the soldiers did this it was to fulfill the Scripture that says, “Not one of His bones will be broken,”^[12]and, “They will look on Him whom they pierced.”^[13]

Jesus ran into this kind of doubt about who He was and His mission here on earth; they wanted more evidence. So, our Lord told them no one has ever visited God in heaven except the One who came down from His presence, the Son of Man. Just like when Moses lifted the serpent in the desert on a cross so people could have something to see and then believe, the Son of Man must be raised on a cross – and everyone who looks up at Him with trust and hope will be rewarded with eternal life. That’s why the Apostle John added that all those who trust in Him – God’s Son – to save them would receive eternal life. Any person who avoids and distrusts the Son remains in the dark and never experiences eternal life. All they will experience is God’s ultimate judgment.^[14]

On another occasion, after our Lord fed thousands of people, some were not satisfied with that miracle to fully believe in Him as the Anointed One. So, they searched for Him and, after finding Him, told our Master, you must show us more miracles if you want us to believe you are the Anointed One. Moses gave our fathers bread from heaven and granted us complimentary bread every day. Jesus responded that the real significance of the occasion is not that Moses gave them bread from heaven but that my Father is right now offering you bread from heaven, the real bread. Don’t you understand! I am that Bread of Life, and no one who comes to Me will ever be hungry again, and those believing in me will never thirst.

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[1] Thompson, Marianne M., The IVP New Testament Commentary Series, 1-3 John, op. cit., pp. 135-136

[2] Romans 1:4

[3] Pett, Peter, Commentary on the Bible, 1 John, op. cit., loc. cit.

[4] Heaster refers to the blood and water that spilled from Jesus’ body when stabbed by the soldier’s spear. However, most Bible scholars find this to be an erroneous reference since the blood came out first, then the water.

[5] Ibid. 15:26-27

[6] Heaster, Duncan. New European Christadelphian Commentary: op. cit., The Letters of John, pp. 72-73

[7] John 21:24

[8] Ibid. 1:1

[9] Jobes, Karen H., 1, 2, and 3 John (Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on The New Testament Series Book 18), op. cit., p. 224

[10] Meyer, Heinrich A. W., Critical Exegetical Handbook News Testament, op. cit., Vol. 10, p. 814-815

[11] John 1:33-34

[12] Cf. Psalm 34:21; Exodus 12:46; Numbers 9:12

[13] John 19:34-36

[14] Ibid. 3:13-15, 36