And we have known and have believed the charity which God hath to us. God is charity: and he that abideth in charity abideth in God, and God in him.
και ημεις εγνωκαμεν και πεπιστευκαμεν την αγαπην ην εχει ο θεος εν ημιν ο θεος αγαπη εστιν και ο μενων εν τη αγαπη εν τω θεω μενει και ο θεος εν αυτω μενει OMIT μενει
12 Church Fathers comment on this verse
See 1 Jn 4:15. Those who confess in this way and have the abiding Spirit within them, that is, God, themselves also abide in God. How? Through love for one another. Having recalled love, he repeats everything he has said about love, in order to establish the teaching on love more firmly.
"And we have known and believed the love that He has for us." And again, how did you know this? "God is love." He has already said this earlier, and now he repeats it.
No more generous praise of love could be spoken than to say that God is love. Perhaps you would despise the gift of God. But will you despise God Himself?
"God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him." They abide in one another: the One Who contains, and the one who is contained.
You abide in God, but this is so that He may contain you. God dwells in you, but so that He may contain you and keep you from falling.
Do not think that the house of God is like the house that carries your flesh. If the house in which you are is removed, you will fall. But if you remove yourself, God will not fall without you.
He will remain unharmed when you leave Him, and unharmed when you return to Him. You are healed, but you give Him nothing by this. It is you who are cleansed, restored, and corrected.
He is healing for the unhealthy, correction for the crooked, and a dwelling for the abandoned. All this benefit is yours.
Take care not to think that your return to God, or even His possession of you, brings some benefit to God. Would God lack servants if you refused to serve, or if everyone refused?
God does not need servants, but servants need God. Therefore the psalm says, "I said to the Lord: You are my Lord." He is the true Master. And what does the psalm say?
"My goods are of no need to You" (Ps 15:2). You yourself need benefits from your servant. A servant needs your benefits, so that you may feed him.
And you need benefits from your servant, so that he may help you. You cannot draw water for yourself, cook for yourself, run before your horse, or care for your cattle by yourself.
You see that you need benefits from your servant. You need his services. Therefore you are not a true master, since you need one lower than yourself.
But God is the true Master. He seeks nothing from us. Yet woe to us if we do not seek Him. He seeks nothing from us, and He sought us when we were not seeking Him.
One sheep had gone astray. He found it and joyfully laid it on His shoulders (Lk 15:4-5). But did the shepherd need the sheep, and did not the sheep rather need the shepherd?
The more willingly I speak about love, the less I wish to finish the interpretation of this Epistle. There is no more burning praise of love. There is nothing sweeter to preach to you, and nothing more healing to drink.
But drink profitably and strengthen within yourselves the gift of God. Do not be ungrateful for so great a grace from Him Who, having an only-begotten Son, did not wish Him to be alone.
He wished Him to have brothers, and He adopted for Him those who, together with Him, will inherit eternal life.
Whatever the Holy Spirit may be, He is something common to the Father and the Son. This very common reality is consubstantial and coeternal. If it is pleasing to call it friendship, let it be so called.
Yet it is more fittingly called love. It is also essence, for God is essence, and God is love.
When our consideration reached love, which in Holy Scripture is called God, then the Trinity began little by little to appear: namely, the Trinity of the Lover, the Beloved, and Love.
If John truly says that God is love, then the devil must necessarily be hatred. Therefore, as one who has love has God, so one who has hatred nourishes the devil within himself.
Many have written much about love, but it can be found only among the disciples of Christ. They alone, having Him, had true Love as the teacher of love. Of this it is said: “If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, but have not love, it profits me nothing” (cf. 1 Cor 13:2-3). Therefore, he who has acquired love has acquired God Himself, since God is love.
Why, then, do the theologians sometimes prefer to call Him God Loving Desire, erwta, and Love, alaphu, and sometimes Desired and Beloved, erastou kai alaphtou? Because of the one He is the cause, so to speak, the producer and begetter, while the other He is.
Those who do not wish to be one in spirit in the Church of God cannot abide with God.
The virtue of love is so greatly exalted that the blessed apostle John calls it not only a gift of God, but God, saying: “God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.”
What the Apostle said earlier in general, he now applies to himself and the other apostles, as unquestionable witnesses of how the Son of God accomplished the redemption of men on earth.
Having said, “We have seen and testify that the Father sent the Son as Savior of the world” (1 Jn 4:14), he showed how beneficial the knowledge and confession of Jesus, the Son of God, are. “Whoever confesses thus,” says the Apostle, “abides in God, and God in him.”
Now he shows the power of this knowledge and confession in himself, saying, “And we have known and believed the love that God has for us.” That is, we have known how great and boundless the love of God is.
We have known how God the Father revealed His eternal, boundless love by sending His Only-begotten Son into the world for the salvation of men.
We have known how the Son of God, out of love for men, gave Himself over to sufferings and death on the Cross, in order to grant eternal life to those who believe in Him.
We have known this because we saw with our own eyes the Son of God, the Savior of the world. And we believed in this boundless and incomprehensible love of God.
“God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.” Having said, “We have known and believed the love,” the Apostle seems to have wished to say: and we abide in love, and abiding in love, we abide in God, and God in us.
Yet his humility again speaks not of what already belongs specifically to him and the other apostles, or of what they possess, but of what they share inseparably with all who love God. By God’s goodness, this is appropriated to everyone who loves God.
“God is love.” This eternal property of God is the essential cause why he who abides in love, toward God and neighbors according to the Lord’s commandment, abides in God, and God in him.
Our love for God and neighbors, according to God’s commandment, draws us near and unites us with God. It also attracts to us the grace of divine love.
St. John the Theologian and the other apostles knew the love of God, and with perfect love they loved God. Already during their earthly life they abode in God, and God was in them.
“God is love,” and so forth. See 1 Jn 4:8, 15. God is love, and this eternal property of God is the ground and cause of this: “he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him” (1 Jn 3:24).
From where do the children of God draw assurance of their knowledge of God and union with Him? “By this,” says the Apostle, “we know, because He has given us of His Spirit” (1 Jn 4:13).
The manifestation of this is, on the one hand, our firm confession of Jesus Christ as the Son of God. On the other hand, it is love, which casts out every fear of punishment and instead inspires confidence that we shall one day appear justified at God’s judgment.
“Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God... Love is perfected with us in this, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment... There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear” (1 Jn 4:14-18).
The apostle again speaks of his immediate vision of the Savior in order to bear witness to the reality of the coming into the world of the Son of God in the person of Jesus Christ.
He also points out to all the possibility of entering into communion with God through faith in Him. Following the apostles’ example, they may know love by experience, and through love understand that God is love, since love can be understood only by love.
Having spoken of the beginning of love and its effects upon believers, the apostle also indicates wherein its possible fullness must consist, namely, in union with God.
This fullness can be attained in no other way than by imitating the love of Jesus Christ. As is known, He especially movingly exhorted His disciples to act as He acted.
This took place at the Mystical Supper and afterward during the Savior’s farewell discourse with His disciples. After this He prayed to the Father for the union of believers with Him.
“We have known and believed...” By saying “we,” the Apostle has in mind the apostles and the other closest disciples and eyewitnesses of Christ. They were the first to be vouchsafed to learn from Him how great God’s love for men is, manifested through Him.
They were the first to believe in this love with their whole soul and to find salvation in its bosom. “God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.”
God, by His very nature, is a being abounding in love. Before creatures came into existence, He was united by the bonds of love with His consubstantial Son and the Spirit. Yet from the fullness of love He desired to have partakers of it outside Himself.
For this reason beings of the visible and invisible world were lovingly called into existence by Him. Among these objects of His love appeared man.
Man’s fall made him unworthy of God’s love and brought upon him the wrath of God. Yet not desiring the death of the sinner, He sent His Only-begotten Son into the world for his salvation.
He poured out His love upon us in such abundance that “he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” Loving all, He commanded that we too love all.
Blessed is the one who fulfills this commandment in holiness. He is made worthy of the closest communion with God, becomes akin to Him, and is made His temple.
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 33 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS