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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comVincent Word Studies - 1 John 2:5 - 2:5
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Keepeth His word (τηρῇ αὐτοῦ τὸν λόγον)
Note the changed phrase: word for commandments. The word is the revelation regarded as a whole, which includes all the separate commandments or injunctions. See the use of λόγος word, and ἐντολή precept, in Joh 14:21-24.
Is the love of God perfected (ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ τετελείωται)
Rev., rendering the perfect tense more closely, hath the love of God been perfected. The change in the form of this antithetic clause is striking. He who claims to know God, yet lives in disobedience, is a liar. We should expect as an offset to this: He that keepeth His commandments is of the truth; or, the truth is in him. Instead we have, “In him has the love of God been perfected.” In other words, the obedient child of God is characterized, not by any representative trait or quality of his own personality, but merely as the subject of the work of divine love: as the sphere in which that love accomplishes its perfect work.
The phrase ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ the love of God, may mean either the love which God shows, or the love of which God is the object, or the love which is characteristic of God whether manifested by Himself or by His obedient child through His Spirit. John's usage is not decisive like Paul's, according to which the love of God habitually means the love which proceeds from and is manifested by God. The exact phrase, the love of God or the love of the Father, is found in 1Jo 3:16; 1Jo 4:9, in the undoubted sense of the love of God to men. The same sense is intended in 1Jo 3:1, 1Jo 3:9, 1Jo 3:16, though differently expressed. The sense is doubtful in 1Jo 2:5; 1Jo 3:17; 1Jo 4:12. Men's love to God is clearly meant in 1Jo 2:15; 1Jo 5:3. The phrase occurs only twice in the Gospels (Luk 6:42; Joh 5:42), and in both cases the sense is doubtful. Some, as Ebrard, combine the two, and explain the love of God as the mutual relation of love between God and men.
It is not possible to settle the point decisively, but I incline to the view that the fundamental idea of the love of God as expounded by John is the love which God has made known and which answers to His nature. In favor of this is the general usage of ἀγάπη love, in the New Testament, with the subjective genitive. The object is more commonly expressed by εἰς towards, or to. See 1Th 3:12; Col 1:4; 1Pe 4:8. Still stronger is John's treatment of the subject in ch. 4. Here we have, 1Jo 4:9, the manifestation of the love of God in us (ἐν ἡμῖν) By our life in Christ and our love to God we are a manifestation of God's love. Directly following this is a definition of the essential nature of love. “In this is love; i.e., herein consists love: not that we have loved God, but that He loved us” (1Jo 4:10). Our mutual love is a proof that God dwells in us. God dwelling in us, His love is perfected in us (1Jo 4:12). The latter clause, it would seem, must be explained according to 1Jo 4:10. Then (1Jo 4:16), “We have known and believed the love that God hath in us” (see on Joh 16:22, on the phrase have love). “God is love;” that is His nature, and He imparts this nature to be the sphere in which His children dwell. “He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God.” Finally, our love is engendered by His love to us. “We love Him because He first loved us” (1Jo 4:19).
In harmony with this is Joh 15:9. “As the Father loved me, I also loved you. Continue ye in my love.” My love must be explained by I loved you. This is the same idea of divine love as the sphere or element of renewed being; and this idea is placed, as in the passage we are considering, in direct connection with the keeping of the divine commandments. “If ye keep my commandments ye shall abide in my love.”
This interpretation does not exclude man's love to God. On the contrary, it includes it. The love which God has, is revealed as the love of God in the love of His children towards Him, no less than in His manifestations of love to them. The idea of divine love is thus complex. Love, in its very essence, is reciprocal. Its perfect ideal requires two parties. It is not enough to tell us, as a bare, abstract truth, that God is love. The truth must be rounded and filled out for us by the appreciable exertion of divine love upon an object, and by the response of the object. The love of God is perfected or completed by the perfect establishment of the relation of love between God and man. When man loves perfectly, his love is the love of God shed abroad in his heart. His love owes both its origin and its nature to the love of God.
The word verily (ἀληθῶς) is never used by John as a mere formula of affirmation, but has the meaning of a qualitative adverb, expressing not merely the actual existence of a thing, but its existence in a manner most absolutely corresponding to ἀλήθεια truth. Compare Joh 1:48; Joh 8:31. Hath been perfected. John is presenting the ideal of life in God. “This is the love of God that we keep His commandments.” Therefore whosoever keepeth God's word, His message in its entirety, realizes the perfect relation of love.
We are in Him
Compare Act 17:28. See note on 1Jo 2:15.