1 John 4:2-12

2 This is how you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit who confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh^[a] is from God.

3 But every spirit who does not confess Jesus^[b] is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist; you have heard that he is coming, and he is already in the world now.

4 You are from God, little children, and you have conquered them, because the One who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.

5 They are from the world. Therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them.

6 We are from God. Anyone who knows God listens to us; anyone who is not from God does not listen to us. From this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of deception.

Knowing God through Love

7 Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

9 God's love was revealed among us in this way:^[c] God sent His One and Only Son into the world so that we might live through Him.

10 Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the^[d] propitiation^[e] for our sins.

11 Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.

12 No one has ever seen God.^[f] If we love one another, God remains in^[g] us and His love is perfected in us.