요한일서 3

¹Consider the kind of love the Father has given us: we are called children of God, and we really are his children.^a The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. ²Dear friends, we are children of God now, and what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he truly is.^{b 3}Everyone whose hope is set on him in this way makes themselves pure, just as he is pure.

Children of God and children of the devil

⁴Everyone who goes on sinning is also practicing lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. ⁵You know that he was revealed so that he could take sins away, and he has no sin in him.^{c 6}Whoever remains in him does not go on sinning; whoever goes on sinning has neither seen him nor come to know him.^{d 7}Dear children, do not let anyone mislead you: it is the person who practices righteousness who is righteous, just as he is righteous. ⁸Whoever goes on sinning belongs to the devil, because the devil has sinned from the beginning and has never stopped. This is why the Son of God was revealed: to undo the works of the devil. ⁹Whoever has been born of God does not go on sinning, for God’s seed remains in them; they are not able to go on sinning, because it is from God that they have been born.^{ef 10}This is how it becomes clear who are God’s children and who are the devil’s children: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not from God, and neither is anyone who does not love their brother or sister.

Love one another

¹¹For the message you heard from the beginning is this: we should love one another. ¹²We must not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil, and his brother’s were righteous. ¹³Do not be astonished, brothers and sisters, if the world hates you. ¹⁴We know that we have moved out of death into life, because we love our brothers and sisters. Whoever does not love remains in death.^{g 15}Whoever hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that eternal life does not remain in any murderer. ¹⁶This is how we have come to know what love is: he laid down his life for us. And we in turn owe it to our brothers and sisters to lay down our lives for them. ¹⁷Suppose someone has enough of this world’s goods and notices a brother or sister in need, yet shuts their heart against them. How can the love of God remain in such a person? ¹⁸Dear children, let us love not by what we say or with our tongues, but by what we do and in truth. ¹⁹This is how we will know that we belong to the truth, and how we will set our hearts at rest in his presence ²⁰whenever our hearts condemn us: God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.^{hi 21}Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we can approach God boldly, ²²and whatever we ask, we receive from him, since we are keeping his commands and doing what is pleasing in his sight. ²³This is what God commands: that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and that we love one another, following the command he gave us. ²⁴Those who keep his commands remain in God, and God remains in them. We can be sure that he remains in us because of the Spirit he has given us.