Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been fathered by God, and everyone who loves the father^a also loves the child fathered by him. ²By this we know that we love the children of God: whenever we love God and keep his commandments. ³For this is the love of God: that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, ⁴because everyone who is fathered by God conquers the world.

God Has Given Us Eternal Life in the Son

And this is the victory which has conquered the world: our faith. ⁵Now who is the one who conquers the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? ⁶This is the one who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ, not with the water only, but with the water and with the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. ⁷For there are three that testify,^b ⁸the Spirit and the water and the blood, and the three are in agreement^c.

⁹If we receive the testimony of people, the testimony of God is greater, because this is the testimony of God that he has testified concerning his Son. ¹⁰(The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. The one who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has testified concerning his Son.) ¹¹And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. ¹²The one who has the Son has the life; the one who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.

Read in Logos

1 John 5:4: For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.

Footnotes

aLiterally “the one who fathers”
bLater Latin manuscripts add the following words to v. 7 and v. 8: “in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit, and these three are one. 8 And there are three that testify on earth”
cLiterally “for the one”