1 John 4:2-3 --- By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.
Yesterday's study with the Lord in verse 1 was a warning and a command. The warning is not to believe every spirit because there are false prophets/teachers among the church. The command is to test the spirits to see if they're from God. Where I was led was a deep dive on how apart from reading/knowing God's word and His voice, it's simple to be deceived by emotions/feelings alone into believing just about any spirit.
Today in verses 2-3 we're given the true test: JESUS CHRIST
God is so amazing that to such a complex, insanely serious, deadly even situation such as being deceived by spirits and false prophets/teachers, He gives the simplest of solutions.
What does this spirit, prophet, or teacher say about Jesus?
If it doesn't line up exactly with what God has given us in scripture, then you better put the brakes on and turnaround quick because that spirit/prophet has just failed the test laid out by God.
Now get this, the word used for confesses/confess in these two verses reveals something more. The word in Greek is homologeō which means "to say the same thing as another, to agree with, to concede, to profess, to declare openly, speak out freely.
When you break that word down further into its Greek roots it's made up of two words.
First is the Greek word homou and it means "same place, same time, together".
Second is the Greek word logos meaning "Of speech: a word, what someone has said, discourse, act of speaking, teaching, narration, thing spoken of. Of mind: reasoning, account, reckoning, answer or explanation, relation, reason"
Okay, that's a lot of defining I know but what is revealed is this test isn't just about going to someone's website and clicking on their "What We Believe" page. Anyone can say anything about everything, so the proof is in what are they actually saying, and does it line up with exactly what the Bible says about Jesus.
I have personally been to churches where I looked at their website, read the "What We Believe" page. Everything checked the right boxes. So, we went only to experience something that did not line up with the web page and it sure didn't line up with scripture. Needless to say, we were the first ones out of the parking lot and didn't return.
Listen carefully though, none of this matters if you aren't willing to make the sacrifice of your time and get into God's word. End of story. Test over before it begins.
First off if you don't know His voice already, or are caught up in emotions and feelings, false spirits and teaching will just be swallowed hook, line, and sinker every time.
Second, even if you do get a bit of a red flag on some guest speaker's message he gave that was brand new teaching you'd never heard before in all your years of being a Christian, then you have to choose if you go home and pray over it and then be the Berean and search the scriptures to see if it lines up what God's word says. If you aren't willing to do this, then all the red flags or nudges from Holy Spirit are almost pointless.
So, the test is JESUS CHRIST. I hope you're studying up for the test because failing this one can lead to a whole lot more than an F on a paper, it can lead to deception, sin, pain, heartbreak, even leading others away from Jesus without realizing it and ultimately it could lead to destruction.
One of the commentaries I read summed up a lot on this and I want to end by leaving it for you to read. If you read this far take another minute and read this it's worth it:
Guzzik's Commentary on 1 John 4:2-3
Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God: Some think that this is the only test of false doctrine. This is not the only test, but it was the significant issue challenging the church in John’s immediate time. Today a person might confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh yet deny that He is God as the Bible teaches He is God. They also are giving false doctrine because they are not presenting a true Jesus.
i. The principle of presenting a true Jesus is essential to the testing of spirits. No one who presents a false Jesus, or one untrue to the Scriptures, can be regarded as a true prophet.
ii. Today, there is a lot of curiosity about the “true Jesus.” Many modern academics say they want to discover the “true Jesus” and when they say this they often mean, “The true Jesus is not the Jesus of the Bible. The Biblical Jesus is make-believe. We need to discover the true Jesus behind the myths of the Bible.”
iii. Not only is this position ignorant (ignoring the confirmed historical validity of the New Testament) it is also arrogant. Once any academic throws out the historical evidence of the New Testament and other reliable ancient writings, they can only base their understanding of Jesus on their own personal opinion. These academics present their baseless opinions as if they were scholarly facts.
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