I JOHN has been called, by some Bible teachers, the key text of the entire epistle. It is designed to enable us to determine our eternal destiny. No unsaved person can qualify in knowing something about life while he is spiritually dead. Who would expect a deaf man to pass judgment upon sound; or a blind man to pass judgment on color; or a dumb man to respond to a lecture on the fine art of public speaking? Christians are continuously in possession of the experiential knowledge that we have come to know the Lord if we obey His will (I John 2:3-5). Intellectual attain ment proves absolutely nothing. Mere lip service unsupported by this evidence makes one a liar (vs. 4). To know Christ is to love Him, and to love Him is to keep His commandments. Only as we keep the Word of God can we know genuinely and practically that we are in Him. Another test for salvation is love for the brethren (I John 3:14). This is a distinguishing mark of a gen uine conversion. Hatred is com mon to the unbeliever, love char acterizes the life of the child of Cod. It should be a surprising and shocking thing to see one Chris tian acting in an unbrotherly way toward another believer in Christ. The Spirit of .Christ is the spirit of love (Romans 5:5). If there is no fruit of love emanating from us towards others it is a clear mark that we have never received eter nal life. You can be sure that you are saved if you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and we can know that He dwells in us by the mutual wit ness of our human spirit with Him
self (Romans 8:16; I John 3:24; 4:13). It is a fact that if the Holy Spirit does not indwell a man then he cannot be saved (Romans 8:9). Jesus promised that He would send the Spirit to abide in us (John 14:16). Paul emphasizes the fact of the Spirit's indwelling (I Corinthi ans 3:16; 6:19-20). There are many false spirits in the world today. Sometimes it is difficult to make a distinction. Satan is a clever coun terfeiter. He can certainly produce that which looks so much like the real thing, that people are easily deceived. There are different christs today. Make sure the Christ in whom you believe is the Christ of the Bible. You will know by the indwelling Holy Spirit. Too many people today do not have the assurance of salvation. Do not miss the point of this study. You can "know" beyond a shadow of a doubt. God wants us to have assurance from His Word that we are saved by His indwelling Holy Spirit who bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. This will result in the evi dence of a fruitful life for the Lord. We can be thankful that the Lord has provided warnings for us in the Bible. In his first epistle John sets forth some of them in a very prac tical manner. We should know that there are pitfalls which can beset the child of God. The word "world" appears not less than 23 times in this important book. There is a three-fold descrip tion of the world. The first is that of mankind (I John 2:2). Christ died for the sins of every human being. This is the world which God loves and for which Christ died (I John 4:14). This is not the physical universe but rather all individuals
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