Font Size
A whole series of relations are summarized in this paragraph: the relation between faith and love, belief and the new birth, the new birth and victorious living, faith and triumph over evil, faith and enabling grace (from the Son). Each of these could be the subject of a major theological dissertation. Nonetheless, all are necessary to a full-orbed presentation of truth about the Christian life. We focus on the one really new element: Overcoming the world.
There is a play on words in the clause This is the victory that has overcome the world that cannot be reproduced in English. In the Greek a different form of the same root is used for both victory and overcome. The first refers to an individual experience in the past, a victory won. It is this conquest that enables ongoing victory over the world. The world is the world of darkness, antagonistic to the children of God (see notes on 3:11-15). In his death on the cross, Jesus entered into mortal combat with the powers of darkness and overcame them in his death. When by faith we appropriate the benefits of his atoning work, we enter into the power by which he gained this victory and thus in him we have (and do) overcome the world (v.4). It is the finished victory at the cross (past tense) that is the source of the present victory available to persons of faith: “To believe that Jesus has been victorious is to have the power that enables us to win the battle, for we know that our foe is already defeated and therefore powerless” (Marshall, 229). This focus on the victory of the Son as the source of the believer’s life leads to a comment on the Son and the witnesses to his validity.