1 John 1:5

God Is Light, So We Must Walk in the Light

1:5 Now ¹  this is the gospel ²  message ³  we have heard from him ⁴  and announce to you: God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all. ⁵ 

Psalms 2:7

2:7 The king says, ⁶  “I will announce the Lord’s decree. He said to me: ⁷ 

‘You are my son! ⁸  This very day I have become your father!

Psalms 22:22

22:22 I will declare your name to my countrymen! ⁹ 

In the middle of the assembly I will praise you!

Isaiah 66:19

66:19 I will perform a mighty act among them ¹⁰  and then send some of those who remain to the nations – to Tarshish, Pul, ¹¹  Lud ¹²  (known for its archers ¹³ ), Tubal, Javan, ¹⁴  and to the distant coastlands ¹⁵  that have not heard about me or seen my splendor. They will tell the nations of my splendor.

John 17:25

17:25 Righteous Father, even if the world does not know you, I know you, and these men ¹⁶  know that you sent me.

Acts 13:32

13:32 And we proclaim to you the good news about the promise to our ancestors, ¹⁷ 

Acts 13:41

13:41 ‘Look, you scoffers; be amazed and perish! ¹⁸ 

For I am doing a work in your days,

a work you would never believe, even if someone tells you.’” ¹⁹ 

Acts 20:27

20:27 For I did not hold back from ²⁰  announcing ²¹  to you the whole purpose ²²  of God.

Acts 20:1

Paul Travels Through Macedonia and Greece

20:1 After the disturbance had ended, Paul sent for the disciples, and after encouraging ²³  them and saying farewell, ²⁴  he left to go to Macedonia. ²⁵ 

Colossians 1:1

Salutation

1:1 From Paul, ²⁶  an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

Hebrews 2:12

2:12 saying, “I will proclaim your name to my brothers; ²⁷  in the midst of the assembly I will praise you.” ²⁸ 

[1:5]  ¹ tn The καί (kai) at the beginning of 1:5 takes on a resumptive force, indicated by the phrase “heard from him and announce to you,” which echoes similar phrases in 1:2 and 1:3.

[1:5]  ² tn The word “gospel” is not in the Greek text but is supplied to clarify the meaning. See the note on the following word “message.”

[1:5]  ³ tn The word ἀγγελία (angelia) occurs only twice in the NT, here and in 1 John 3:11. It is a cognate of ἐπαγγελία (epangelia) which occurs much more frequently (some 52 times in the NT) including 1 John 2:25. BDAG 8 s.v. ἀγγελία 1 offers the meaning “message” which suggests some overlap with the semantic range of λόγος (logos), although in the specific context of 1:5 BDAG suggests a reference to the gospel. (The precise “content” of this “good news’ is given by the ὅτι [Joti] clause which follows in 1:5b.) The word ἀγγελία here is closely equivalent to εὐαγγέλιον (euangelion): (1) it refers to the proclamation of the eyewitness testimony about the life and ministry of Jesus Christ as proclaimed by the author and the rest of the apostolic witnesses (prologue, esp. 1:3-4), and (2) it relates to the salvation of the hearers/readers, since the purpose of this proclamation is to bring them into fellowship with God and with the apostolic witnesses (1:3). Because of this the adjective “gospel” is included in the English translation.

[1:5]  ⁴ tn The referent of the pronoun “him” is not entirely clear in the Greek text; it could be either (1) God the Father, or (2) Jesus Christ, both of whom are mentioned at the end of v. 3. A reference to Jesus Christ is more likely because this is the nearest possible antecedent, and because God (the Father) is specifically mentioned in the following clause in v. 5.

[1:5]  ⁵ tn The key to understanding the first major section of 1 John, 1:5-3:10, is found in the statement in v. 5: “God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.” The idea of “proclamation” – the apostolic proclamation of eyewitness testimony which the prologue introduces (1:2, 3) – is picked up in 1:5 by the use of the noun ἀγγελία (angelia) and the verb ἀναγγέλλομεν (anangellomen), cognate to the verb in 1:3. The content of this proclamation is given by the ὅτι (Joti) clause in 1:5 as the assertion that God is light, so this statement should be understood as the author’s formulation of the apostolic eyewitness testimony introduced in the prologue. (This corresponds to the apostolic preaching elsewhere referred to as κήρυγμα [khrugma], although the term the Apostle John uses here is ἀγγελία.)

[2:7]  ⁶ tn The words “the king says” are supplied in the translation for clarification. The speaker is the Lord’s chosen king.

[2:7]  ⁷ tn Or “I will relate the decree. The Lord said to me” (in accordance with the Masoretic accentuation).

[2:7]  ⁸ sn ‘You are my son!’ The Davidic king was viewed as God’s “son” (see 2 Sam 7:14; Ps 89:26-27). The idiom reflects ancient Near Eastern adoption language associated with covenants of grant, by which a lord would reward a faithful subject by elevating him to special status, referred to as “sonship.” Like a son, the faithful subject received an “inheritance,” viewed as an unconditional, eternal gift. Such gifts usually took the form of land and/or an enduring dynasty. See M. Weinfeld, “The Covenant of Grant in the Old Testament and in the Ancient Near East,” JAOS 90 (1970): 184-203, for general discussion and some striking extra-biblical parallels.

[22:22]  ⁹ tn Or “brothers,” but here the term does not carry a literal familial sense. It refers to the psalmist’s fellow members of the Israelite covenant community (see v. 23).

[66:19]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and I will set a sign among them.” The precise meaning of this statement is unclear. Elsewhere “to set a sign” means “perform a mighty act” (Ps 78:43; Jer 32:20), “make [someone] an object lesson” (Ezek 14:8), and “erect a [literal] standard” (Ps 74:4).

[66:19]  ¹¹ tn Some prefer to read “Put” (i.e., Libya).

[66:19]  ¹² sn That is, Lydia (in Asia Minor).

[66:19]  ¹³ tn Heb “drawers of the bow” (KJV and ASV both similar).

[66:19]  ¹⁴ sn Javan is generally identified today as Greece (so NIV, NCV, NLT).

[66:19]  ¹⁵ tn Or “islands” (NIV).

[17:25]  ¹⁶ tn The word “men” is not in the Greek text but is implied. The translation uses the word “men” here rather than a more general term like “people” because the use of the aorist verb ἔγνωσαν (egnwsan) implies that Jesus is referring to the disciples present with him as he spoke these words (presumably all of them men in the historical context), rather than to those who are yet to believe because of their testimony (see John 17:20).

[13:32]  ¹⁷ tn Or “to our forefathers”; Grk “the fathers.”

[13:41]  ¹⁸ tn Or “and die!”

[13:41]  ¹⁹ sn A quotation from Hab 1:5. The irony in the phrase even if someone tells you, of course, is that Paul has now told them. So the call in the warning is to believe or else face the peril of being scoffers whom God will judge. The parallel from Habakkuk is that the nation failed to see how Babylon’s rising to power meant perilous judgment for Israel.

[20:27]  ²⁰ tn Or “did not avoid.” BDAG 1041 s.v. ὑποστέλλω 2.b has “shrink from, avoid implying fear…οὐ γὰρ ὑπεστειλάμην τοῦ μὴ ἀναγγεῖλαι I did not shrink from proclaiming Ac 20:27”; L&N 13.160 has “to hold oneself back from doing something, with the implication of some fearful concern – ‘to hold back from, to shrink from, to avoid’…‘for I have not held back from announcing to you the whole purpose of God’ Ac 20:27.”

[20:27]  ²¹ tn Or “proclaiming,” “declaring.”

[20:27]  ²² tn Or “plan.”

[20:1]  ²³ tn Or “exhorting.”

[20:1]  ²⁴ tn Or “and taking leave of them.”

[20:1]  ²⁵ sn Macedonia was the Roman province of Macedonia in Greece.

[1:1]  ²⁶ tn Grk “Paul.” The word “from” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied to indicate the sender of the letter.

[2:12]  ²⁷ tn Here, because of its occurrence in an OT quotation, τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς (tois adelfois) has been translated simply as “brothers” rather than “brothers and sisters” (see the note on the latter phrase in the previous verse).

[2:12]  ²⁸ sn A quotation from Ps 22:22.