1 John 4

All 21 verses in the Clear Bible Translation. Tap a verse to compare the KJV and read what it means.

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1. 1Dear friends, don't believe every spirit. Instead, test them to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
2. 2Here's how you can recognize the Spirit of God: every spirit that declares Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.
3. 3But every spirit that refuses to acknowledge that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not from God. This is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard is coming, and it is already in the world.
4. 4You belong to God, dear children, and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.
5. 5They are of the world: therefore they speak of the world, and the world hears them.
6. 6We belong to God. Anyone who knows God listens to us; anyone who doesn't belong to God won't listen to us. This is how we can tell the difference between the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
7. 7Dear friends, let's love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
8. 8Whoever doesn't love doesn't know God, because God is love.
9. 9God showed his love for us by sending his only begotten Son into the world so that we could have life through him.
10. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
11. 11Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we should also love one another.
12. 12No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.
13. 13By this we know that we remain in him, and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.
14. 14We have seen it ourselves and can testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.
15. 15Whoever openly declares that Jesus is the Son of God — God lives in that person, and that person lives in God.
16. 16We have come to know and believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever dwells in love dwells in God, and God dwells in them.
17. 17This is how our love is made perfect, so that we may have boldness on the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.
18. 18There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear has torment. Anyone who fears is not made perfect in love.
19. 19We love him, because he loved us first.
20. 20If someone says, "I love God," but hates his brother, he is a liar. For if he does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?
21. 21This is the commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love their brother.