1 Beloved, don’t believe every spirit, but
test the spirits, whether they are of God,
because many false prophets have gone
out into the world.

2 By this you know the Spirit of God:
every spirit who confesses thatJesusChrist
has come in the flesh is of God,

3 and every spirit who doesn’t confess
that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is
not of God; and this is the spirit of the
Antichrist, of whom you have heard that it
comes. Now it is in the world already.

4 You are of God, little children, and have
overcome them, because greater is he who
is in you than he who is in the world.

5 They are of the world. Therefore they
speak of the world, and the world hears
them.

6 We are of God. He who knows God
listens to us. He who is not of God doesn’t
listen to us. By this we know the spirit of
truth, and the spirit of error.

7 Beloved, let’s love one another, for love
is of God; and everyone who loves has
been born of God and knows God.

8 He who doesn’t love doesn’t know God,
for God is love.

9 By this God’s love was revealed in us,
that God has sent his only born† Son into
the world that we might live through him.

10 In this is love, not that we loved God,
butthat he loved us, and sent his Son as the
atoning sacrifice‡ for our sins.

11 Beloved, if God loved us inthis way, we
also ought to love one another.