1 John 5:1-12

Contemporary English Version

Victory over the World

5 If we believe Jesus is truly Christ, we are God's children. Everyone who loves the Father will also love his children. ²If we love and obey God, we know we will love his children. ³^(A) We show our love for God by obeying his commandments, and they are not hard to follow.

⁴Every child of God can defeat the world, and our faith is what gives us this victory. ⁵No one can defeat the world without having faith in Jesus as the Son of God.

Who Jesus Is

⁶Water and blood came out from the side of Jesus Christ. It wasn't just water, but water and blood.^[a] The Spirit tells about this, because the Spirit is truthful. ⁷In fact, there are three who tell about it. ⁸They are the Spirit, the water, and the blood, and they all agree.

⁹We believe what people tell us. But we can trust what God says even more, and God is the one who has spoken about his Son. ¹⁰If we have faith in God's Son, we have believed what God has said. But if we don't believe what God has said about his Son, it is the same as calling God a liar. ¹¹^(B) God has also said he gave us eternal life and this life comes to us from his Son. ¹²And so, if we have God's Son, we have this life. But if we don't have the Son, we don't have this life.

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Footnotes

5.6 Water and blood came out from the side of Jesus Christ. It wasn't just water, but water and blood: See John 19.34. It is also possible to translate, “Jesus Christ came by the water of baptism and by the blood of his death! He was not only baptized, but he bled and died.” The purpose of the verse is to tell that Jesus was truly human and that he really died.