We have seen throughout John's epistle the interweaving of the doctrinal, the ethical, and the relational – faith, obedience, and love, what you know, what you do, what you love.
In chapters 4 and 5 John has stressed the importance of love – where love “is intertwined with the ethical integrity of keeping God's commandments and the confessional integrity of a faith that conforms to the truth of Jesus' coming, his work, and his nature.” (Yarbrough, 296)
Now as John concludes his epistle, he leaves them with some final exhortations. |