1 John 3:4-19

4If a person continues to do wrong things, he is choosing not to obey God's rules. Sin is when we do not obey God's rules.

5You know that Jesus came into the world so that he might take away our sins. He himself is completely clean from sin.

6Anyone who lives together with Christ does not continue to do wrong things. If anyone continues to do wrong things, that person has not understood who Christ is. He does not know Christ.

7My little children, do not let anyone deceive you about sin. It is people who live in a good way that God accepts as right. In the same way, Jesus did only what is good and right.

8People who continue to do wrong things show that they belong to the Devil. The Devil has always been doing wrong things from the beginning. This is why the Son of God came to the world. He came to destroy everything that the Devil has done.

9Everybody who is a child of God does not continue to do wrong things. This is because God has given them a new life. He has caused them to become his children. So they cannot continue to do wrong things.

10In this way, we can see clearly who are God's children and who are the Devil's children. Anyone who does not live in a way that is good and right does not belong to God. People like that do not love other believers.

11Yes, we must love one another. That is the message which you have heard from the beginning.

12We should not be like Cain. He belonged to Satan and he even killed his brother, Abel. Why did he do that? Cain did bad things and he killed Abel because Abel did things that were right.

13So, my Christian friends, do not be surprised when people who belong to this world hate you.

14We know that we now have new life with God. Death no longer has power over us. We know this because we love our Christian friends. But anyone who does not love other believers is still under the power of death.

15Anyone who hates other believers is like someone who murders other people. You know that a person like that does not have true life with God.

16This is how we know what true love is: Jesus Christ gave his own life on the cross. He died on our behalf. So we too ought to give our lives for other believers.

17When another believer has trouble, we need to be kind to him. Maybe you have all the things that you need to live. If you see another believer who needs things like that, you should help him. If you refuse to be kind to him, it shows that you do not belong to God. You do not love people in the way that God loves them.

18My little children, we should not show love for each other only by what we say. We should also show true love by the things that we do.

19Then we will know that we truly belong to God. We will be obeying God's true message. As a result, our thoughts will not make us ashamed to come to God.