4:11 That demonstration of love by God is our model for showing love to others. As God manifested love in (among) us then by sending Jesus Christ, so He manifests His love among us now as we love one another (vv. 12-13).
4:12 No one has seen God in His pure essence without some kind of filter (cf. John 1:18).153Whenever we love one another we make it possible for God to "abide"in close fellowship with us. Furthermore God's love reaches a fullness and depth in us that is possible only when we love one another. It attains its full flower (v. 19).
There are three stages of God's love in 1 John. These stages are love manifested to the world (4:9), love given to the family of God (3:1), and love perfected in a smaller group within this family (i.e., those who abide in God, 4:12). The love of God does not reach perfection until it finds objects of love beyond itself. When it does, God, whom no one has seen, will be visible in this manifestation of love.
"God's love for us is perfected only when it is reproduced in us or (as it may mean) among us' in the Christian fellowship."154
The same phenomenon occurs in human families. When a child says or does something just like one of his or her parents, we see the parent in the child's behavior (cf. 3:9).
"The love of God displayed in His people is the strongest apologetic that God has in the world."155
4:13 A believer's abiding in God and God's abiding in him or her become evident by the demonstration of love that comes "of"(lit. "out of") God's Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the source of the abiding believer's love just as He is the source of our obedience (cf. 3:23-24).
4:14 God's presence is observable in the midst of Christians who love each other. God produces that love. Most of John's readers had not, and all of us have not, seen Jesus Christ in the flesh as the apostles did. However, we can see God too and can bear witness with the apostles that God sent Jesus Christ into the world. We can share the apostles' experience that John said was his goal in writing this epistle (1:1-4). We can see God both in the manifestation of His love and in God's life behind that love as we observe Christians loving one another. This verse then is a high point in John's argument.156
4:15 Confessing that Jesus is God's Son is not the only condition for abiding in God. It is one evidence that one is abiding. One not abiding may or may not make this confession. Confession is the last step, the step of bearing witness (cf. 1:9; 2:23; 4:3; Rom. 10:9-10).
4:16 This verse summarizes this section (3:24-4:16; cf. John 6:69). John was speaking of intimate knowledge ("come to know") and intimate fellowship ("abides"). "We"includes the readers with the apostles. "For us"should be "among us,"as in verse 9.
"The stages in John's thought at this point have now emerged clearly. Faith (acknowledging Jesus as God's Son, v 15; and trusting in the love which God has for us, v 16a) leads to mutual indwelling between God and the believer. Such a personal relationship is consequently expressed in and perpetuated by living in love' (v 16b). The believer's love, for God and for other people (or for God in other people, cf. v 12), is to be active and sustained."157
John's point in this section was that his readers had seen God in a sense similar to the sense in which the apostles had seen Him. The apostles had seen God in that they had seen Him in His Son, Jesus Christ. God had revealed His love to the apostles through Jesus Christ. The readers had seen God in that they had seen Him in His Spirit-indwelt abiding believers. Consequently John's readers could bear witness to the truth as the apostles did, and they could enjoy the same intimate fellowship with God as the apostles did.
