John gives four grounds for assurance and ties them together with a recurring phrase, we know. The first is the Spirit: 13"he has given us of his Spirit." The second is the apostles' testimony, that 14"the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world." The third is confession of Jesus as the Son of God, and the fourth is love itself. The NICNT commentary quotes A. T. Robertson's remark that Paul's chapter on love is a prose poem, while John's is a diamond turned round and round so different angles of light flash from it. The same truth keeps rotating. God's love has come to us, and it is meant to arrive in us.
16"We have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us." Both verbs are in the perfect tense, a knowledge and a trust that were reached and remain.
Then comes a sentence about the day of judgment. 17"By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment." The word for confidence, *parresia*, is one John used in 2:28 and 3:21. The ground is a surprise. John says we will stand on that day 17"as he is," which means we stand where he stands. The Judge is the one who laid down his life for us, and his standing is ours. The NIV Application Commentary observes that love is perfected through its expression more than through analyzing our feelings about it, so the confidence of the last day grows in how we treat people now.
18"Perfect love casts out fear." The Greek for casts out is *ballo exo*, to throw outside, the language of removing something from the house. The word for punishment, *kolasis*, is what fear is always about, the dread that the God we have offended is about to settle accounts. John says that love, when it reaches its goal, evicts that dread. The reverence we owe God remains, and Peter says to fear God (1 Peter 2:17). What leaves is the terror of rejection. Jesus used the same pair of words going the other direction: "whoever comes to me I will never cast out" (John 6:37). Love throws fear outside, and the Savior will never throw his own outside.
19"We love because he first loved us." Everything in the passage rests on that short sentence. The direction of love is from God to us and then onward, and the supply keeps coming from the one who began it.
The passage ends with a hard test. 20"He who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen." It is easy to love an invisible God in the abstract, because he asks nothing in the moment, never interrupts, and never disagrees. The brother or sister in front of us does all of that. John puts the visible person first, because love for the unseen God is proven where the difficulty is.
Ask what fear is still living in you that belongs outside the door.
Prayer
Father, you first loved us, and we love because of you. Give us the assurance of your Spirit, and let your love reach its goal in us. Cast out our dread of punishment, and keep us close to the Savior who will never cast us out. Teach us to love the brothers and sisters we can see. In Jesus' name, amen.