1 John 3:11

For this is the message,.... Sent from God by Christ, or what he in his ministry declared, and is the commandment which was so frequently urged by him, John 13:34; that ye have heard from the

For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. The message , [ angelia (G31)] - 'announcement,' as of something good; not a mere command, as the law.

From the beginning: see ,8: q.d. They cannot be of God, therefore, that cross so fundamental a precept, so expressive of his nature and will.

11 For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Ver. 11. That we should love, &c.] This beloved disciple was all for love.

(4) LOVE THE FLOWER OF THE DIVINE LOVE IN THE DIVINE BIRTH (1 John 3:11-18).—In 1 John 2:10 St. John showed the necessary connection between righteousness and love; there is no contradiction between the two: the one is necessary to the other. Justice will become sternness without love; love will be weakness without justice. The two thoughts are introduced and connected in both halves of the Epistles. (See 1 John 2:3-11.) Here the duty of love is still more strongly insisted on, as the general subject is the love of God, as in the first half of the Epistle it was the light of God. We have (a) the command or message of Christ; then (b) the contrast of Cain; then (c) the similar conduct of the world (a thought which had occurred before, in 1 John 2:1); then (d) the comfort of the connection between love and life, as contrasted with hatred and death; then (e) the identification of the hater with the murderer, and the impossibility of associating the idea of eternal life with the destroyer of temporal life; then (f) the example of God’s love in the death of the Son, urging us even to the same extremity of self-sacrifice; then, (g) as a minor premise, the thought thrust home, for a practical conclusion, that the smaller self-sacrifice of daily assistance to others is an, essential to the Christian life. (4 a.) (11) For states the reason why brotherly love was added to righteousness at the end of the last paragraph: because it was the earliest and most prominent feature of Christianity presented to them. Love one another.—The injunction is perfectly general, without the restrictions of society; wherever Christian love is due, there it must immediately be paid. (Comp. 1 Peter 1:22.) (4 b.) (12) Not as Cain, who was of that . . .—Rather, Not as Cain was of that . . .; an abrupt conversational form. (Comp. John 6:58.) Cain is introduced as the prototype of envy, jealousy, and the inward hatred which the evil feel at the good. (4 c.) (13) The conduct of the world to Christians is of a piece with this invariable characteristic of those who are in darkness, exemplified in Cain. (Comp. John 15:18-19; John 17:14; 2 Timothy 3:12.) Marvel not is equivalent to “Be not dismayed; be of good courage.” (4 d.) (14) This is a characteristic instance of St. John’s logic. From the terseness and pregnancy of his style, he does not give all the steps of an argument, but frequently turns it upside down, in order more speedily to bring out a forcible spiritual truth. But for this he would have written, “We love the brethren, because we have passed from death unto life; but he that abideth in death loveth not.” But wishing to put these ideas in the form of a direct encouragement, in face of a hating world, he puts the reason as the conclusion, and the conclusion as the reason. This unexpected turn rivets the attention far more than a rigid deduction.

Verse 11. For this is the message] See 1 John 1:5. From the beginning God hath taught men that they should love one another. How essentially necessary this is to the comfort and well-being of man in this state of trial and difficulty, every sensible man must see. All are dependent upon all; all upon each, and each upon all. Mutual love makes this dependence pleasant and doubly profitable. Nothing can be more pleasing to an ingenuous and generous mind than to communicate acts of kindness.

11. For this is the message that ye heard, &c.] Or, Because the message which ye heard from the beginning is this: ‘this’ is probably the predicate (see on 1 John 1:5). ‘From the beginning’ as in 1 John 2:7 : it was one of the very first things conveyed to them in their instruction in Christianity and had been ceaselessly repeated, notably by the Apostle himself. Jerome tells us that during S. John’s last years ‘Little children, love one another’ was the one exhortation which, after he had become too old to preach, he never ceased to give. “It is the Lord’s command,” he said; “and if this is done, it is enough.” ‘Love one another’ addressed to Christians must primarily mean the love of Christians to fellow-Christians; and this shews what ‘loving his brother’ must mean. But the love of Christians to non-Christians must certainly not be excluded: the arguments for enforcing brotherly love cover the case of love to all mankind.

For this is the message - Margin, “commandment.” In the received text, this is ἀγγελία angelia - “a message brought;” in several manuscripts, and in later editions, it is ἐπαγγελία epangelia -

4. This purification is manifested in love to our brother and in actual benefaction, 1 John 3:11-18.11. The message… from the beginning—The original announcement by Christ was the law of love.