What existed from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we observed and touched with our own hands this is the Word of life!

This life was revealed to us, and we have seen it and testify about it. We declare to you this eternal life that was with the Father and was revealed to us.

What we have seen and heard we declare to you so that you, too, can have fellowship with us. Now this fellowship of ours is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus, the Messiah.

This is the message that we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light, and in him there is no darkness none at all!

This is how we can be sure that we have come to know him: if we continually keep his commandments.

But whoever continually keeps his commandments is the kind of person in whom God's love has truly been perfected. This is how we can be sure that we are in union with God:

Dear friends, I am not writing to you a new commandment, but an old commandment that you have had from the beginning. This old commandment is the word you have heard.

Little children, it is the last hour. Just as you heard that an antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have appeared. This is how we know it is the last hour.

The anointing you received from God abides in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you this. Instead, because God's anointing teaches you about everything and is true and not a lie, abide in him, as he taught you to do.

See what kind of love the Father has given us: We are called God's children and that is what we are! For this reason the world does not recognize us, because it did not recognize him, either.

And everyone who has this hope based on him keeps himself pure, just as the Messiah is pure.

This is how God's children and the Devil's children are distinguished. No person who fails to practice righteousness and to love his brother is from God.

This is the message that you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another.

This is how we have come to know love: the Messiah gave his life for us. We, too, ought to give our lives for our brothers.

This is how we will know that we belong to the truth and how we will be able to keep ourselves strong in his presence.

And this is his commandment: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus the Messiah, and to love one another as he commanded us.

The person who keeps his commandments abides in God, and God abides in him. This is how we can be sure that he remains in us: he has given us his Spirit.

This is how you can recognize God's Spirit: Every spirit who acknowledges that Jesus the Messiah has become human and remains so is from God.

But every spirit who does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist. You have heard that he is coming, and now he is already in the world.

We belong to God. The person who knows God listens to us. Whoever does not belong to God does not listen to us. This is how we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of deceit.

This is how God's love was revealed among us: God sent his unique Son into the world so that we might live through him.

This is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

Dear friends, if this is the way God loved us, we must also love one another.

This is how we know that we abide in him and he in us: he has given us his Spirit.

This is how love has been perfected among us: we will have confidence on the day of judgment because, during our time in this world, we are just like him.

And this is the commandment that we have from him: the person who loves God must also love his brother.

This is how we know that we love God's children: we love God and keep his commandments.

For this demonstrates our love for God: We keep his commandments, and his commandments are not difficult,

This man, Jesus the Messiah, is the one who came by water and blood not with water only, but with water and with blood. The Spirit is the one who verifies this, because the Spirit is the truth.

The person who believes in the Son of God believes this testimony personally. The person who does not believe God has made him a liar by not believing the testimony that he has given about his Son.

This is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is found in his Son.

The person who has the Son has this life. The person who does not have the Son of God does not have this life.

And this is the confidence that we have in him: if we ask for anything according to his will, he listens to us.

If anyone sees his brother committing a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray that God would give him life. This applies to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not telling you to pray about that.