6 This is he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. 7 For there are three that testify:8 the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree. 9 If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning his Son. 10 Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has borne concerning his Son. 11 And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.12 Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. 1 John 5:6-12
Introduction
The heading over this section of verses in the ESV says, “Testimony Concerning the Son of God.” I think that is an accurate and well-titled heading; and that is the subject which John now turns to address in verses 6-12 which will be looking at today. John had just ended verse 5 by saying that the one who overcomes the world is the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God. Now in these verses he is seeking to further prove that Jesus is the Son of God. In going along with the theme of assurance that is throughout this letter, these testimonies concerning the Son of God in these verses do help to strengthen and firm up assurance in the heart of the believer. John is giving us rock solid testimonies, or witnesses, that testify to Jesus being the Son of God.
The Outward Testimony, v6-9
These verses here are some of the most difficult verses to interpret. As such there hasn’t been a uniform understanding in church history as to what John is referring to when he says that Jesus Christ came by water and blood. What is the water and the blood referring to? That is the difficulty and the question. I think the main thing that makes it so difficult to determine is that John has not explicitly been talking about water and blood up to this point, other than saying in chapter 1, verse 7, that the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin. So I’m going to present to you several views on this and then tell you which one I believe is the best understanding.
View 1: The Sacramental View: This view, advocated by Luther for one, teaches that the water and blood represent the two sacraments or ordinances of the New Testament Church, baptism and the Lord’s Supper. The water here would be obvious; the blood would represent the wine of communion which represents the blood of Christ.
View 2: A second view teaches that the water and the blood mentioned here is a reference to the water and the blood that flowed from Jesus’ side when he was pierced after his death. Some think this to be the case since John is the only one to include that detail of the death of Christ in his gospel account.
View 3: A third view teaches that the water is representative of regeneration. This would be clued in on via John’s gospel in John 3:5 where Jesus says, speaking to Nicodemus, “…unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” This would refer to the washing of regeneration, like in Ezekiel 36 where God says, “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.”
In a lot of ways this understanding would make some sense as John has talks so much about being born of God, referring to the new birth and regeneration; and our new birth with its fruits do testify to the work of Jesus Christ in our lives. However, I just don’t think this makes senses with the way John puts it, that Jesus Christ came by water and blood. Jesus has already come; being born of God is a work of the Spirit, to quicken our hearts to know Christ, and to apply the work of Christ to our hearts.
View 4: There is another view that says that the water and the blood refer to the water and blood that is involved with his physical birth into this world. However that seems to fall short in many ways to me, as that is nothing unique to Jesus, and doesn’t make sense with John saying that He came “not by the water only but by the water and the blood.”
View 5: Another view is that he water and the blood refer to the Old Covenant signs and shadows. There were certain laws of purification that required washing with water; and of course blood from the sacrificial system. However, if you insert that understanding in to this text, it just doesn’t seem to flow and make sense with what John is saying.
View 6: Another view would say that the water represents the word of God, as there a places in Scripture that refers to the Word as water, such as in Ephesians when it says the “washing of water with the Word.” But again, I don’t see that as John’s flow of thought.
View 7: Now, a final view here, that I believe is the best understanding of what John is saying, is that the water and the blood refer to the baptism of Jesus and the death of Jesus on the cross. The reason I believe that is this: John’s whole point here is that these things testify to the reality that Jesus is the Son of God; and that these testimonies are God’s testimonies about His Son; as it says in verse 9, “for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning His Son.” So how does Jesus’ baptism and death testify that He is the Son of God?
At Jesus’ baptism, a voice from heaven testified to who Jesus was saying, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased. You can read the following accounts of Jesus’ baptism at these references: Matthew 3:16-17, Mark 1:9-11, Luke 3:21-22, and John 1:29-34.
At the death of Jesus, there were those who mocked Him according to His rightful title, the Son of God. Furthermore, as you may recall, at His death, the sun turned dark, the temple curtain tore in two from top to bottom, there was an earthquake with splitting rocks and dead people coming to life, and a soldier, after seeing all this looked with awe upon Christ and said, “truly this is the Son of God.” You can read these accounts of Jesus’ death here: Matthew 27:37-54 and Mark 15:25-39.
So we have these two huge events in the life of Jesus, that testify that He is the Son of God. That is the point that John is trying to make – Jesus is the Son of God, He came by water and blood, His baptism and death, and these things testify that He is the Son of God. This understanding also makes even more sense when we understand some of the false teachings going on in John’s day that he was writing to combat. As I have mentioned before, various forms of Gnosticism were going around that John combats, and one belief was that the Spirit came upon Jesus at His baptism, but the divine nature left Jesus before His crucifixion so that it was only the man Jesus who was crucified; and thus, that is why John says that Jesus came, “not by the water only but by the water and the blood!” And this is vitally important because if Jesus Christ is only the Son of God at His baptism, and not at his death, then we utterly lost, for our sins have not been atoned for by the God-man Jesus Christ, the only Son of God able to save sinners. Martyn Lloyd-Jones says, “Through that (Jesus’ baptism) He identifies Himself with our sin, and it is upon the cross that He deals with them…”
We also see here that the Spirit testifies, and that the water, the blood, and the Spirit all testify and they agree. Now Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones says that when it talks about the Spirit testifying in verse 6-8, it is referring to Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came upon the believers there and many spoke in tongues, and Peter preached a sermon and many were saved that day. So Lloyd-Jones is saying that we have these three great miraculous events that testify and agree together that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and we should believe Him.
The other understanding would just be that this is what the Holy Spirit does. When He comes into our life and we are saved, He testifies to us that Jesus is the Son of God, and He does so through the water and the blood, and we believe these things by faith. So it is more of an experiential testimony that the Spirit gives to us.
The Comma Johanneum
If you use a King James Version, you will notice that verse 7 is quite different from verse 7 in the ESV, NASB, or probably most other translations. 1 John 5:7 in the King James Version says, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one.” Now, I debated with myself whether or not I would bring this up, since we don’t use the KJV in the pulpit. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I needed to bring it up, because, 1) You need to be aware of this if you encounter an unbeliever who uses this difference to try and cause you to doubt the Bible, or some use this to try and prove that we cannot trust the Bible; and 2) You need to be aware of the issue for the fact that there are those who are KJV Onlyists – who believe that only the King James is the Word of God and all modern translations are corrupt, and some would even say, of the devil. You need to know why this verse is not in our modern translations and how this came to be. To be clear I agree with the ESV and the translations that do not include what the King James includes in 1 John 5:7, which is called the Comma Johanneum, because I do not believe that John wrote it, and the evidence overwhelmingly supports that. I’m just going to give you a few brief bullet points here.
When you translate the Bible, in very over simplified terms, you take the earliest and best manuscripts in the original language, which for the New Testament would be Greek, and you translate from that into English or whatever other language. The fact is, that the Comma Johanneum, does not appear in Greek manuscripts until only very late, in the 14th century, and beyond. That is over a thousand years after it was written. Otherwise it was only found in Latin manuscripts, which is not the language John wrote in.
Here are a couple other things you need to know: 1) the doctrine of the trinity is not dependent upon this verse (as some would accuse the modern translations of denying the trinity); and 2) the early church fathers did not use 1 John 5:7 as a proof text for the trinity, and you better believe they would’ve loved to use it if was there, but it was not.
The Inward Testimony, v10a
If you believe in the testimony of God that Jesus is the Son of God, and if you believe the external testimony to Christ then you have the testimony with in you, John says; because, as he has been saying up to this point, we have the Spirit of God abiding with us as we abide in Him. The Spirit comes into us, and testifies to our hearts that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that He has taken our sins upon himself and dealt with them at the cross, and that we are loved and received by God as sons and daughters and that He has given us eternal life. John Calvin says this, “…for without him (the Holy Spirit) the water and the blood would have flowed without any benefit; for it is He who seals on our hearts the testimony of the water and the blood; it is He who by His power makes the fruit of Christ’s death come to us; yea, He makes the blood shed for our redemption to penetrate into our heart, or, to say all in one word, He makes Christ with all His blessings to become ours.”
The Rejected Testimony, v10b
Then John says there are those who do not believe the testimony that God has given concerning His Son and so they make God out to be a liar! They do this because they are not believing this external testimony of Jesus Christ, His baptism and death. So John is saying to the Gnostics, “you cannot say that you have the testimony within you, you cannot say that you have the Spirit of God with you, if you do not believe the very testimony of God concerning His Son! Unbelief is accusing God of lying.
We have many people in our world today, who want to believe that they have the Spirit, or that they know God, or that they have eternal life, and yet they do not believe the testimony that God has given concerning His Son. We saw it with heresies, false prophets, and antichrists, and now we see it on an individual level – you either rise or fall at Jesus Christ. Eternal life or the eternal torment hinges upon Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This has been one of John’s central themes because he knows that if we do not get this right, then we get nothing right. We must keep Jesus Christ, His person and work, our central theme.
The Objective of the Testimony, v11-12
It is a great wonder and benefit of the gospel that God has given us eternal life. This is a great means of assurance, because if we believe in Jesus Christ the Son of God, and have the Spirit within us, then we already have eternal life. Eternal life is ours at conversion because God gives it as a gift of free grace, not a reward for our works.
Verse 12 may seem exclusive and that is because it is. This free gift of eternal life is only received in the Lord Jesus Christ. You cannot have eternal life and yet not submit your life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Just because our culture will label us many nasty things for this belief in the exclusivity of salvation and eternal life in Jesus Christ does not mean that we should shy away from preaching Christ alone as the Savior of sinners, but it means that we should exclaim it all the more, because it is clear that there is a great and urgent need for men and women to to know and belief in the Lord Jesus Christ.
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