{"id":3326,"date":"2013-09-12T17:10:23","date_gmt":"2013-09-12T17:10:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pjhmail.wordpress.com\/?p=3326"},"modified":"2013-09-12T17:10:23","modified_gmt":"2013-09-12T17:10:23","slug":"1john-41-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/3326\/1john-41-2\/","title":{"rendered":"1John 4:1-2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi, Pastor John –<\/span>
\nI had a question about the translation of 1 John 4:2 that was on the first page of the “The Spirit of Antichrist” chapter that we went over a while back. \u00a0(The real spirit of God confesses Christ whenever it enters\u00a0someone’s\u00a0fleshly temple: <\/span><\/p>\n

By this, the Spirit of God is recognized: every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ when he has come into the flesh is of God…”)<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I was reading through that chapter again the other day, and I had just seen that verse in\u00a0ESV\u00a0not long before, and the difference struck me. \u00a0I poked around on the web and came across the http:\/\/scripture4all.org\/<\/span><\/a><\/span>\u00a0\u00a0website, which gives the original Greek and the literal and figurative translations. It showed\u00a0elEluthota\u00a0(“having-come”) as being masculine, so it doesn’t seem that it could be referring to “the spirit having come into flesh” but would have to be referring to “Jesus Christ having come in flesh” (since\u00a0pneuma\u00a0is neuter, which I learned from the\u00a0Pneuma\u00a0study that Amanda gave me a copy of a while back). \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Can you clear up my confusion on this?<\/span>
\nThanks!<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0joe<\/span><\/p>\n

===============<\/p>\n

Hi Joe, and thanks for writing.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

First, notice the phrase leading up to that Perfect Tense verb to which you refer. \u00a0“Every Spirit that confesses”. \u00a0“Every”, and “that”, and “confesses” are all neuter. So, we can be assured that it is the Spirit of God that is doing the confessing.\u00a0John is not talking about a person claiming that he has Jesus in his heart.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Secondly, Jesus told his disciples that the Spirit was with them but would soon be in them (Jn.\u00a014:17) and that when the Spirit came into them, both he and the Father would come into them, too (Jn.\u00a014:23). \u00a0That is why John used a masculine verb instead of a neuter one when he said “has come”. He was talking about the spirit confessing\u00a0that the Father and the Son have entered the heart. \u00a0In speaking of the Son of God entering a heart, of course a masculine verb should be used.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

It should be pointed out that John’s entire point in those opening verses from 1John 4 was that without the Spirit testifying to the entering of Jesus in a heart, the confession of people that Jesus has come into them is evil. \u00a0No human being has authority to make that claim. \u00a0In the very next verse, John wrote,<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and\u00a0this is that spirit of\u00a0antichrist<\/b>, whereof\u00a0you\u00a0have heard that it should come, and even now already is it in the world.”<\/em><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, John leaves the reader with two choices: (1) receive the real Spirit of God that confesses that Jesus has come or (2) just claim it and be among the antichrists.\u00a0Christianity is the religion that promotes the second of those choices.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Lastly, and on a lighter note, let me point out the obvious fact that Jesus himself is inside\u00a0nobody’s\u00a0flesh, no matter what kind of verb John used. (One person per body, please.) \u00a0I heard my father once say that the only person who has ever had Jesus on the inside was Mary his mother, and\u00a0after about nine months,\u00a0she was greatly relieved to get him out!<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Do keep up the search, and stay in touch. \u00a0It is an important issue that you raised, one that everybody who cares about his soul will consider.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Pastor John<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi, Pastor John – I had a question about the translation of 1 John 4:2 that was on the first page of the “The Spirit of Antichrist” chapter that we went over a while back. \u00a0(The real spirit of God confesses Christ whenever it enters\u00a0someone’s\u00a0fleshly temple: By this, the Spirit of God is recognized: every […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3326","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-qa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3326"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3326\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}