Dual Panel1I WRITE these things to you, my children, to help you to avoid sin. But if a man should sin, remember that our advocate before the Father is Jesus Christ and he is just,
2the one who made personal atonement for our sins (and for those of the rest of the world as well).
3It is only when we obey God's laws that we can be quite sure that we really know him.
4The man who claims to know God but does not obey his laws is not only a liar but lives in selfdelusion.
5But the more a man obeys God's laws the more truly and fully does he show his love for him. Obedience is the test of whether we really live "in God" or not.
6The life of a man who professes to be living in him must be lived as Christ lived.
7I am not writing to tell you of any new command, brothers of mine. It is the old command which you had at the beginning; it is the old message which you have heard before.
8And yet as I write it to you again I know that it is truein your life as it was in his. For the darkness is beginning to lift and the true light is already shining.
9Anyone who claims to be "in the light" and hates his brother is, in fact, still in complete darkness.
10The man who loves his brother lives in the light, and has no reason to stumble.
11But the man who hates his brother is shut off from the light and gropes his way in the dark without knowing where he is going. For the darkness has made him blind.
12I write this letter to you all, as my dear children, because your sins are forgiven for his name's sake.
13I write to you, fathers, because you have known him who has always existed. And to you young men I am writing because you have defeated the evil one.
14I have written to you, dear children, because you have known the Father; to you fathers because you have known the one who has always existed, and to you young men because you have all the vigor of youth, because God's truth is at home in you and because you have defeated the evil one.
15Never give your hearts to this world or to any of the things in it. A man cannot love the Father and love the world at the same time.
16For the whole worldsystem, based as it is on men's desires, their greed ambitions and the glamour of all that they think splendid, is not derived from the Father at all, but from the world itself.
17The world and all its passionate desires will one day disappear. But the man who is following God's will is part of the permanent and cannot die.
18Even now, dear children, we are getting near the last hour. You have heard about the coming of antiChrist. Believe me, there are antichrists about already, which confirms my belief that we are near the last hour.
19These men went out from our company, it is true, but they never really belonged to it. If they had really belonged to us they would have stayed. In fact, their going proves beyond doubt that men like that were not "our men" at all.
20God has given you all a certain amount of spiritual insight, and indeed I have not written this warning as if I were writing to men who don't know what error is.
21I write because your eyes are clear enough to discern a lie when you come across it.
22And who, I ask you, is the real liar? Surely the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ. I say, therefore, that any man who refuses to acknowledge the Father and the Son is the antichrist.
23The man who will not recognise the Son cannot possibly know the Father; yet the man who believes in the Son knows the Father as well.
24For yourselves keep faithful to what you heard at the beginning. If you do, you will be living in fellowship with both the Father and the Son.
25And that means sharing his own life for ever, as he has promised.
26I had to write to you about these men who try to lead you astray.
27Yet I know that the touch of his Spirit never leaves you, and you don't really need a human teacher. You know that his Spirit teaches you about all things, always telling you the truth and never telling you a lie. So, as he has taught you, live continually in him.
28Yes, now, little children remember to live continually in him. So that if he were to reveal himself we should have confidence, and not have to shrink away from his presence in shame.
29You all know that God is really good. You may be just as sure that the man who leads a really good life is a true child of God.