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Wednesday, July 23rd, 2025
the Week of Proper 11 / Ordinary 16
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Read the Bible

THE MESSAGE

1 John 4:8

This verse is not available in the MSG!

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Blindness;   Commandments;   Fellowship;   God;   God Continued...;   Righteousness;   Thompson Chain Reference - John, Beloved Disciple;   The Topic Concordance - God;   Knowledge;   Love;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - God;   Ignorance of God;   Love of God, the;  

Dictionaries:

- Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Knowledge;   Love;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - God;   Love;   Testimony;   Easton Bible Dictionary - Goodness of God;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Love;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Atonement;   Hate, Hatred;   John, the Letters of;   Love;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Anger (Wrath) of God;   John, Epistles of;   John, Theology of;   Sin;   Spiritual Gifts;   Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament - Communion (2);   Example;   Father, Fatherhood;   Fellowship (2);   God;   Gospel (2);   John Epistles of;   Love;   Love (2);   Perfection (Human);   Punishment (2);   Righteous, Righteousness;   Sanctify, Sanctification;   Sin (2);   Socialism;   Unity;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - God;   Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary - John the Baptist;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Brotherly Kindness;   Johannine Theology, the;   John, the Epistles of;   Light;   Love;  

Devotionals:

- Daily Light on the Daily Path - Devotion for March 31;   Every Day Light - Devotion for November 28;   Today's Word from Skip Moen - Devotion for August 31;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
King James Version (1611)
Hee that loueth not, knoweth not God: for God is loue.
King James Version
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
English Standard Version
Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
New American Standard Bible
The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
New Century Version
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
New American Standard Bible (1995)
The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
Berean Standard Bible
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Contemporary English Version
God is love, and anyone who doesn't love others has never known him.
Complete Jewish Bible
Those who do not love, do not know God; because God is love.
Darby Translation
He that loves not has not known God; for God is love.
Easy-to-Read Version
Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Geneva Bible (1587)
Hee that loueth not, knoweth not God: for God is loue.
George Lamsa Translation
He who does not love, does not know God; for God is love.
Good News Translation
Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
Lexham English Bible
The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Literal Translation
The one who does not love has not known God, because God is love.
Amplified Bible
The one who does not love has not become acquainted with God [does not and never did know Him], for God is love. [He is the originator of love, and it is an enduring attribute of His nature.]
American Standard Version
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
Bible in Basic English
He who has no love has no knowledge of God, because God is love.
Hebrew Names Version
He who doesn't love doesn't know God, for God is love.
International Standard Version
The person who does not love does not know God, because God is love.1 John 2:4;">[xr]
Etheridge Translation
For Aloha is Love; and every one who loveth not, knoweth not Aloha.
Murdock Translation
Because God is love; and whoever loveth not, doth not know God.
Bishop's Bible (1568)
He that loueth not, knoweth not God: for God is loue.
English Revised Version
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
World English Bible
He who doesn't love doesn't know God, for God is love.
Wesley's New Testament (1755)
He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love.
Weymouth's New Testament
He who is destitute of love has never had any knowledge of God; because God is love.
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
He that loueth not, knowith not God; for God is charite.
Update Bible Version
He that doesn't love doesn't know God; for God is love.
Webster's Bible Translation
He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love.
New English Translation
The person who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
New King James Version
He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
New Living Translation
But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
New Life Bible
Those who do not love do not know God because God is love.
New Revised Standard
Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
He that doth not love, doth not understand God, because, God, is, love.
Douay-Rheims Bible
He that loveth not knoweth not God: for God is charity.
Revised Standard Version
He who does not love does not know God; for God is love.
Tyndale New Testament (1525)
He that loveth not knoweth not God: for God is love.
Young's Literal Translation
he who is not loving did not know God, because God is love.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
He that loueth not, knoweth not God: for God is loue.
Mace New Testament (1729)
he that has not social affection, does not know God; for God is love.
Simplified Cowboy Version
Those who don't love don't ride for the brand.

Contextual Overview

7My beloved friends, let us continue to love each other since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with God. The person who refuses to love doesn't know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can't know him if you don't love. This is how God showed his love for us: God sent his only Son into the world so we might live through him. This is the kind of love we are talking about—not that we once upon a time loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins and the damage they've done to our relationship with God. 11My dear, dear friends, if God loved us like this, we certainly ought to love each other. No one has seen God, ever. But if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us, and his love becomes complete in us—perfect love! 13This is how we know we're living steadily and deeply in him, and he in us: He's given us life from his life, from his very own Spirit. Also, we've seen for ourselves and continue to state openly that the Father sent his Son as Savior of the world. Everyone who confesses that Jesus is God's Son participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. We know it so well, we've embraced it heart and soul, this love that comes from God.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

knoweth: 1 John 2:4, 1 John 2:9, 1 John 3:6, John 8:54, John 8:55

God is: 1 John 1:5, Exodus 34:6, Exodus 34:7, Psalms 86:5, Psalms 86:15, 2 Corinthians 13:11, Ephesians 2:4, Hebrews 12:29

Reciprocal: Psalms 52:1 - goodness Nahum 1:7 - Lord Zechariah 9:17 - how great is his goodness Matthew 19:17 - there Mark 10:18 - that is Mark 12:31 - Thou John 16:3 - because 1 Corinthians 13:2 - and have 1 Corinthians 16:14 - General Philippians 2:1 - if any comfort James 2:13 - and 1 John 3:10 - neither 1 John 3:14 - because 1 John 4:6 - he that knoweth 1 John 4:7 - love is 1 John 4:10 - Herein 1 John 4:16 - God is love

Cross-References

Genesis 4:3
Time passed. Cain brought an offering to God from the produce of his farm. Abel also brought an offering, but from the firstborn animals of his herd, choice cuts of meat. God liked Abel and his offering, but Cain and his offering didn't get his approval. Cain lost his temper and went into a sulk.
Genesis 4:6
God spoke to Cain: "Why this tantrum? Why the sulking? If you do well, won't you be accepted? And if you don't do well, sin is lying in wait for you, ready to pounce; it's out to get you, you've got to master it."
Genesis 4:9
God said to Cain, "Where is Abel your brother?" He said, "How should I know? Am I his babysitter?"
Genesis 4:10
God said, "What have you done! The voice of your brother's blood is calling to me from the ground. From now on you'll get nothing but curses from this ground; you'll be driven from this ground that has opened its arms to receive the blood of your murdered brother. You'll farm this ground, but it will no longer give you its best. You'll be a homeless wanderer on Earth."
Genesis 4:15
God told him, "No. Anyone who kills Cain will pay for it seven times over." God put a mark on Cain to protect him so that no one who met him would kill him.
Matthew 23:35
"You can't squirm out of this: Every drop of righteous blood ever spilled on this earth, beginning with the blood of that good man Abel right down to the blood of Zechariah, Barachiah's son, whom you murdered at his prayers, is on your head. All this, I'm telling you, is coming down on you, on your generation.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

He that loveth not, knoweth not God,.... If a man loves not the children of God, those that are born of him, he does not know, so as to love God, the Father of them; for to pretend love to God, the begetter of them, whom he sees not, and not love those who are begotten by him, and are visible objects of respect, is a contradiction, and cannot be reconciled: see 1 John 4:20. This clause is left out in the Ethiopic version, and is transposed in the Syriac version, which reads the text thus, "for God, is love, and whoever loveth not, knoweth not God". By which reading, the following reason stands in close connection with 1 John 4:7.

For God is love; he loves himself; there is an entire love between the three divine Persons, who are in the strictest, and in the most inconceivable and inexpressible manner affected to each other; their love is natural and essential: God loves all his creatures as such, nor does he hate any of them, as so considered; and he bears an everlasting, unchangeable, and invariable love to his elect in Christ Jesus; of which an instance is given in the following verses, and is a reason why the saints should love one another; that they might be like their heavenly Father, by whom they are begotten, and of whom they are born, and whose children they are; seeing he is love itself, and in his breast is nothing else but love. So the Shekinah is, by the Cabalistic Jews t, called אהבה, "love".

t Shirhashirim Rabba, fol. 15. 1. & Lex. Cabal. p. 43, 44.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

He that loveth not, knoweth not God - Has no true acquaintance with God; has no just views of him, and no right feelings toward him. The reason for this is implied in what is immediately stated, that “God is love,” and of course if they have no love reigning in their hearts, they cannot pretend to be like him.

For God is love - He is not merely benevolent, he is benevolence itself. Compare the notes at 2 Corinthians 13:11. Never was a more important declaration made than this; never was more meaning crowded into a few words than in this short sentence - “God is love.” In the darkness of this world of sin - in all the sorrows that come now upon the race, and that will come upon the wicked hereafter - we have the assurance that a God of infinite benevolence rules over all; and though we may not be able to reconcile all that occurs with this declaration, or see how the things which he has permitted to take place are consistent with it, yet in the exercise of faith on his own declarations we may find consolation in “believing” that it is so, and may look forward to a period when all his universe shall see it to be so. In the midst of all that occurs on the earth of sadness, sin, and sorrow, there are abundant evidences that God is love.

In the original structure of things before sin entered, when all was pronounced “good;” in the things designed to promote happiness, where the only thing contemplated is happiness, and where it would have been as easy to have caused pain; in the preservation of a guilty race, and in granting that race the opportunity of another trial; in the ceaseless provision which God is making in his providence for the wants of unnumbered millions of his creatures; in the arrangements made to alleviate sorrow, and to put an end to it; in the gift of a Saviour more than all, and in the offer of eternal life on terms simple and easy to be complied with - in all these things, which are the mere expressions of love, not one of which would have been found under the government of a malignant being, we see illustrations of the sublime and glorious sentiment before us, that “God is love.” Even in this world of confusion, disorder, and darkness, we have evidence sufficient to prove that he is benevolent, but the full glory and meaning of that truth will be seen only in heaven. Meantime, let us hold on to the truth that he is love. Let us believe that he sincerely desires our good, and that what seems dark to us may be designed for our welfare; and amidst all the sorrows and disappointments of the present life, let us feel that our interests and our destiny are in the hands of the God of love.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 8. He that loveth not — As already described, knoweth not God-has no experimental knowledge of him.

God is love. — An infinite fountain of benevolence and beneficence to every human being. He hates no thing that he has made. He cannot hate, because he is love. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends his rain on the just and the unjust. He has made no human being for perdition, nor ever rendered it impossible, by any necessitating decree, for any fallen soul to find mercy. He has given the fullest proof of his love to the whole human race by the incarnation of his Son, who tasted death for every man. How can a decree of absolute, unconditional reprobation, of the greater part or any part of the human race, stand in the presence of such a text as this? It has been well observed that, although God is holy, just, righteous, &c., he is never called holiness, justice, &c., in the abstract, as he is here called LOVE. This seems to be the essence of the Divine nature, and all other attributes to be only modifications of this.


 
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