Introduction to 1 John
1 John is one of five books (the Gospel of John, 1, 2, 3 John, and Revelation) in the New Testament attributed to the Apostle John, making him the second most prolific writer in the New Testament after Paul. There is some scholarly debate about this authorship, but most Christian circles from the earliest Church Fathers regard John as the author of the books attributed to him. This is a view greatly supported by the thematic, linguistic, and stylistic unity of the first four books especially.
1 John itself appears to be a circular letter intended for a group of churches, often presumed to be the churches in Asia Minor later listed in Revelation. In this letter, John seeks to set out a concise summary of the Gospel he either is or has preached to these churches already. Because of some of the language and focus of 1 John, some scholars believe that John’s primary audience was mixed Jewish-Gentile churches founded in traditionally Jewish communities.
As with all Bible studies, commentaries or guided studies are useful resources to help keep the study on track. A good place to start is with the People’s Bible Commentary available from the Northwest Publishing House of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod. Here also is a link to the public domain commentary on 1 John available at BibleGatway.com, the source of the Bible references used in these Bible studies.
This study is part of the three-year Bible study available from the WELS and begun on 1 January 2006 on this weblog.
Context for 1 John 1:1-2:2
These first verses of 1 John present a powerful description of the relationship between the Father, the Son, and sinful humans in the light of the Gospel. In the same eloquent and poetic style that John summed up the Gospel being revealed in John 3, he presents that same Gospel fulfilled in 1 John 1.
John’s writings in the New Testament are the potatoes to the meat of Paul’s epistles in the spiritual we are encouraged to partake of as we expand our understanding of the Gospel and feed our faith so that it can grow. Where Paul’s writings are full of clear thinking and logical argument, John’s writings are full of high philosophy and beautiful poetry. Together, they create a full picture of our faith taken from all angles.
1 John reminds us of the presentation made in John 1:1-15, only in 1 John we are hearing the same message from the perspective of its fulfillment preached as the Gospel of Jesus Christ. John’s message is clear and simple: God is the perfect light and those who are in darkness cannot be part of that light, yet by the confession of our sins through our faith in Jesus Christ, we are brought into God’s light and, therefore, into His kingdom. This is not to say that our confession saves us, rather as John says, that our confession acknowledges what Christ has already done on our behalf for the salvation of our souls.
DLH
