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

The good news of Jesus Christ is historical fact. Some who suppress the truth want to believe that Jesus was not a historical figure but is merely a myth. That position cannot hold up under honest scrutiny of the record. Jesus’ life, miracles, teachings, death, resurrection, and ascension are all attested to by many people who witnessed it all.

John writes of three non-human witnesses: the water, the blood, and the Spirit. Exactly what the water and the blood refer to has been disputed over the centuries. I’m afraid I have to disagree with Augustine, Calvin, Luther, and several others and go along with Tertullian (he lived from around 155 to 220 AD). Since the interpretation of this section is variously understood by many eminent scholars through church history, it is unwise for anyone to become too rigid in their interpretation. That said, what makes the most sense to me at this point is that the water refers to the baptism of Jesus, the blood refers to the blood he shed in his crucifixion, and the Spirit refers to the witness of the Holy Spirit.

At Jesus’s baptism, the Father spoke from heaven, “This is my beloved Son” (Matthew 3:17). This was the introduction of Jesus’ ministry and the Father’s testimony that Jesus is the Son of God. The shedding of his blood was the finishing of his earthly ministry and the blood by which he inaugurated the New Covenant. The book of Hebrews elaborates with these words: “But you have come … to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.” (Hebrews 12:22, 24) The blood speaks and gives testimony or witness to Jesus, the Son of God.

And the Spirit is the one who testifies because the Spirit is truth. He is elsewhere referred to as the Spirit of truth. We most often think of the witness of the Spirit as the inner witness to the truth of the word of God. “Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself.” It is this same Spirit that witnesses to the truth of the water and the blood.

John inserts an interesting argument about receiving the truth. He observes what we all know to be true. We believe the testimony of fellow humans. Not all human testimony, if it is incredible, but in a general sense, we accept human testimony in court. Arguing from lesser to greater if we believe people, how foolish if we do not believe God, who is greater.

Those who hear the word of God concerning Jesus in the gospel and refuse to believe it, by their actions, call God a liar. That is a mind-boggling assertion. From the human perspective, we think that the proclaiming of the gospel just didn’t convince the hearer. Instead, from God’s perspective, God is being called a liar because the truth is being considered unfaithful and not to be believed. That puts the unrepentant hearer in an even more frightening position.

This is God’s testimony: God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. And some (many) people want to argue and call God a liar.

Here are the facts that John lays out for us.

  1. Jesus was baptized by John to fulfill all righteousness
  2. The Father attested to Jesus as his Son who pleased him
  3. Jesus shed his blood as the final sacrifice for the forgiveness of our sins
  4. God the Father attested to these facts about Jesus, the Son of God
  5. And, the final hard fact of the good news is that “Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” That is a harsh reality. That is the exclusive truth. That says that all other attempts to have life fail; whether life is through technology or religion, if one does not have the Son of God, they do not have life. They may live for many years, but they do not have life, eternal life.

Hindus accept Jesus as a god alongside their pantheon of other gods. New Agers think of him as an advanced human, an example for the rest of us to aspire to. Christian Science considers Jesus to be just another man. Latter Day Saints (LDS) believe Jesus to be one of many Gods…and you can become one, too. None of these, and there are many other false beliefs, match up to the Son of God John writes about. None of these “have the Son” and, therefore, do not have life.

What is the point of this?

I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life.

1 John 5:13