February 1, 2016
Scripture Reading: 1 John 4
1Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.
4You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 5They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. 6We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.
7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
13This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 17This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 18There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
19We love because he first loved us. 20Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.
Questions for Reflection:
Today we begin our study of 1 John 4. If you’ve been tracking through this study so far, you may be asking: Why do we read a whole chapter at the beginning of each week? There’s a few reasons for that. First, we want the text to be a bit more familiar as you study it later in the week in small sections. It won’t be the first time that you come across the passage. Second, the book of 1 John was written as a letter. Chapter and verse division was placed on it later for quick referencing but John never included a division in the letter. Finally, we want to teach you to study the Scriptures on your own.
If you’ve had children, you know that one of the things that you teach your children is how to feed themselves. When a baby is born, they are completely dependent on their parents for the milk they need to grow and develop. As they get older, you begin spoon-feeding them a variety of concoctions. (Off topic but whoever thought that pureed ham would be a good idea for baby food?) As they become a toddler, you let them start feeding themselves. It might be messy and more food ends up on the tray and on their face than in their mouth, but it’s progress. Soon they’re eating on their own and your only responsibility is cutting the meat up for them and then one day they don’t even need you to do that.
Bible study is very similar. We want you to grow and develop the skills necessary to feed yourself. We want you to learn how to look at God’s Word on your own, ask thoughtful questions and apply it to your life. Look at today’s questions as a step toward learning how to feed yourself from the Bible.
We’ll begin our study by reading through the whole chapter. As you read it through, it’s important to start with observation. Ask yourself some basic investigatory questions about the text: Who? What? Why?
Who are the people involved? Who is writing 1 John 4? Who is he writing to? What do we learn about them from the text?
The question of What helps us understand what the text is addressing. What is happening in the text? What does the author communicate to his audience? What words or phrases are repeated? What is the point? If you were asked to summarize the passage into a sentence, how would you summarize this passage?
The final question to ask is Why. As Bible scholar Howard Hendricks points out, “There is an infinity of Why? questions to ask the biblical text. Why is this included? Why is it placed here? Why does this follow that? Why does this precede that? Why does this person say that? Why does that person say nothing? Why? is a question that digs for meaning.”
Finish your time today in prayer asking God to make your time of study in this chapter fruitful this week. Ask Him to challenge you, comfort you, grow you.