In part one I mentioned the word ‘flow’ with regard to God’s love always flowing outward to others. He is a giver to and lover of others. He flows His love to all who will receive Him and His love expressed in the giving of His Son for us as Savior and to us to be our new life. John wrote of how God sent His love to us.

John wrote, “In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live (have life) through him.” (1Jn 4:9). John writes not just that God showed his love among us but that he did so by sending the Son into the world but “that we might live’ (Gk. zao, have His the eternal life).

God's life-giving love, then, is the theme of this passage. As John develops this theme, he makes three important points: God is the source of all love (4:7-8); God models what genuine love is (4:9-10); and God beseeches believers to love each other (4:11-12).

We move from the assertion that God is love to… we are to love each other. The whole point of the passage is to trace the relationship between God's love and the believer’s expression of God’s love now in them, to show how the believer’s love is not his own. Thereby flow of love is God’s endless river of love flowing to and through us.

“Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of (from) God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. ⁸He that loveth not knoweth not (has not experienced) God; for God is love.” (1 Jn 4:7-8)

In considering the relationship between God's love for us and our love for each other, John makes two statements: love comes from God (v 7), and God is love (v 8). The second statement is more far-reaching than the first. To comprehend the sweeping character of the statement God is love, substitute the name of anyone you admire, your mother, a friend, a well-known Christian or hero of the faith or even yourself… in place of the word "God." We could hardly describe anyone simply by the word ‘love.’ Yes, Mom may be the most loving person you’ve known. She may have shown you what mature, self-giving, genuine love is like. But no matter how full, rich and steadfast her love, the statement ‘Mom is loving’ can never be changed into ‘Mom is love.’ A good mother’s love, as wonderful as it may be, does not characterize her as it characterizes God’s agape love.

It is because God is the only genuine love in the universe and so love only comes from God. God is the source of all genuine love. Like the electricity running through electrical wires, love comes from God, through the Son, to us. Then His love is to flow through us to others in the community. When John exhorts believers, “let us love one another,” he is encouraging them to allow God's love to flow through them. For because “God is love,” love must characterize those who claim to be “born of God.” they know God (v 7; 3:10, 14; 4:20-21). Those who claim to be doing the will of God and reflecting God's activity in the world will be known by the love they manifest for God and for each other. This was also what Jesus told his disciples in John 13:35.

It is typical of the John that, having stated his case in positive terms, he then states it negatively: “Whoever does not love, does not know God.” The word know here is the Greek ginosko, meaning one does not know God and His love by personal experience. Where there is a lack of love for fellow Christians, it reveals that they don’t personally know of God’s love by experience. Claiming to know God while failing to love others is like claiming to have intimate knowledge of a foreigner while remaining ignorant of his or her native tongue. Although these people undoubtedly claimed to know God, John deems such a claim is false; how can one who lacks love for God's children be said to really “know” the God who is love? Their lack of love shows they are not personally in touch with the source of love (v 4:8, 16), and they do not follow the model of love given to them by the cross (3:16; 4:10). In short, their claim to ‘know God’ is hollow.

Sadly, a most common reason for this lack of knowledge among believers is that so many believers live under the preaching of “the Law” in their churches, thus they do not yet know the pure love and pure grace of God. “… ye are not under the law, but under grace.” (Romans 6:14b)