By Jeffery M. Leonard, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Religion, Samford University
Fear Not
1 John 4:1–6
Our sessions thus far have focused on the dark side of the spiritual world: Satan, demons and the paranormal. These are areas that are difficult to fully understand, in part because the Scriptures give us so little information about them. What we do know is that these forces stand in opposition to God, so as believers we are called to resist them (James 4:7). But our ability to resist is compromised by the fact that these forces do not always come at us head-on. In 2 Corinthians, Paul warns of the danger of being “outwitted by Satan” and being “ignorant of his designs” (2:11). Later in the same book, he reminds his readers that “Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (11:14). While horror movies may spend their time conjuring up terrifying images of demonic power, the Bible gives a great deal more emphasis to spiritual deception and deceit. Believers are urged to stock up on wisdom and discernment, not crucifixes and holy water.
Unfortunately, spiritual discernment is not easy to come by. In the Hebrew Bible, we see this in the difficulty the Israelites had in distinguishing false prophets from true. Deuteronomy 18:22 instructs the people that a person is a false prophet “if a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord but the thing does not take place or prove true.” The problem, of course, is that this way of identifying false prophets only works in hindsight. It doesn’t tell us how to tell whether a prophet is true or false in advance.
Deuteronomy does give another test of a true prophet in Chapter 13 where the people are instructed not to judge prophets based on their signs but rather on their message. Specifically, they are told that false prophets are those who would urge the people to follow any god other than the true God, the Lord. It is interesting to note how 1 John makes a similar case when it comes to testing spirits.
Test the spirits and believe only those that hold to the truth of Jesus Christ. (1–3)
In Chapter 4, John warns his readers: “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God.” As he does so, John calls attention to the fact that “many false prophets have gone out into the world.” The structure of John’s argument suggests there may well be an allusion to Deuteronomy 13 in his warning. This seems especially likely given the parallels between the two passages’ instruction on how to recognize false prophets (and spirits). Just as Deuteronomy emphasized the true prophets’ confession that only the Lord was Israel’s God, John emphasizes the true spirit’s confession that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. Both texts regard a right view of God as the mark of one sent from God.
In the time of Deuteronomy, the spiritual danger the people faced was idolatry. For John matters were more complicated. Some Christian communities had developed a view of Jesus that was too low, regarding him as nothing more than a man. Others had developed a Christology that was too high, considering him only divine and not human. John’s confession that Jesus (human) Christ (divine) has come (divine) in the flesh (human) insists that Jesus is both God and man.
Christ in us is greater than and victorious over Satan. (4–6)
John’s instruction in this passage concludes with a note of hope for his readers. While there may be competing doctrines and deceptive spirits, John’s readers have no need to fear. Ultimately, our spiritual safety as believers does not depend on our own strength and discernment. It depends rather on our heavenly Father. As John assures us, “The one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.”
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