Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
This is how you know the spirit is from God: every spirit that acknowledges Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,
and every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God; and this is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming, and is now already in the world.
You are from God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world.
They are from the world, therefore they speak from the world’s perspective, and the world hears them.
We are from God. Whoever knows God hears us, and whoever is not from God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.
God Is Love
Beloved, let us love one another since love is from God, and everyone who loves is born from God and knows God.
Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
This is how the love of God was revealed among us: that God has sent his only begotten Son into the world so that we could live through him.
In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
Beloved, if God loved us in this way, we also are obligated to love one another.
No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God remains in us and his love has been perfected in us.
This is how we know that we remain in him and he in us: because he has given to us of his spirit.
And we have seen and now testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.
Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God.
And we have known and have believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.
This is how love is perfected with regard to us, so that we will have confidence on the Day of Judgment, because just as he is, so also are we, although still in this world.
There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and the one who fears has not been perfected in love.
We love because he first loved us.
If anyone says, “I love God,” and yet hates his brother or sister, he is a liar; for whoever does not love his brother or sister whom he has seen is not able to love God whom he has not seen.
And we have this commandment from him, whoever loves God must love his brother and sister also.