1 John 1:6-7 teaches that we cannot claim fellowship with God while walking in darkness, because such a life contradicts the truth about who God is. But when we walk in the Light—living openly, honestly, and in alignment with God’s goodness and truth—we experience genuine fellowship with Him and with other believers. In this place of Light, the blood of Jesus continually cleanses us from every sin including the unintentional sins.
In 1 John 1:6-7, John counters the false claim that someone can enjoy fellowship with God while walking in darkness, contrasting walking in darkness with the genuine fellowship and ongoing cleansing that believers experience when they walk in His Light.
1 John 1:6 - 2:3 consists of seven conditional statements contrasting walking in darkness and walking in the Light. This shows that true fellowship with God requires honesty about our sin, reliance on Jesus’s cleansing, refusal to deny the truth about our moral condition, and seeking to please Him by keeping His commandments.
So far in this letter, John the Apostle has assured his readers that his message is “from the beginning” and the things he personally heard and saw when he was Jesus’s disciple in Galilee and Judea (1 John 1:1-3).
John is writing to believers who have already received the Gift of Eternal Life (1 John 2:12-14). They have already been born into God’s forever family (John 1:12) by God’s grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8-9) in Jesus Christ and His sacrifice on the cross and resurrection from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). Their sins have already been forgiven for His name’s sake (1 John 2:12b). Many of them have already overcome great temptations in their lives (1 John 2:13b), and some of them have already known Jesus for a long time (1 John 2:13a).
Receiving the Gift of Eternal Life is the most important thing a person can receive. It is a new birth (John 3:3). The Gift of Eternal Life is freely given by God’s grace to whosoever believes in Jesus (John 3:16).
But being born is not the pinnacle of our life experience. In physical birth, we remember it annually on our birthday. It is important to remember those who gifted our lives to us. But we spend almost all our time pursuing the daily goals of life.
Again, John is writing to believers who had already received the Gift of Eternal Life. They were already born into God’s family. But John wanted these believers to not miss out on all that God has for them. Who we are is a gift; what we become depends on our choices.
John wrote this letter to explain to believers how they can experience and enjoy the fullness of experience of eternal life in Jesus. John is writing this letter “so that you [his readers] may have… fellowship with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ” (1 John 1:3b). He is writing so that both his and his readers’ “joy will be made complete” (1 John 1:4b).
The fellowship and joy John is describing are part of what can be referred to as “the Prize of Eternal Life.” The Prize of Eternal Life is received by actively emulating Jesus and following Him as we overcome life’s trials by faith. The Prize has present blessings and future rewards in store for those who are faithful.
In the Parable of the Talents, Jesus used the same Greek word translated “joy” in 1 John 1:4 to refer to coming to possess the reward of inheriting great responsibility in His kingdom that is to come:
"His master said to him, 'Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.'” (Matthew 25:21)
The same word is used to describe the prize Jesus looked to that caused Him to live on earth in a manner that He was “despising the shame.” That prize was to sit down “at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2). Paul exhorts believers to have that same mindset (Philippians 2:5-9). Jesus promises to believers who overcome as He overcame that He will reward them by sharing His responsibility with them (Revelation 3:21). He will give them the reward of being a “son” who will “inherit these things” (Revelation 21:7).
Jesus, Paul, James, and Peter describe the future rewards of the Prize of Eternal Life in many places, including: Matthew 5:4-9, 12, 6:1, 6, 19:27-29, 24:46-47, 25:14-23, 34, Luke 9:23-26,Romans 8:17-18,1 Corinthians 3:11-15, 9:24-27, 2 Corinthians 4:17,Ephesians 1:19-21,Philippians 3:13-14,2 Timothy 2:12,James 1:12,1 Peter 1:3-4, 4:19, Revelation 3:21.
Jesus, Paul, James, and Peter also describe the present blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life: Matthew 5:3, 10, 6:33-34, 7:24-25, 13:44-45, 21:31, John 15:4, 7-11, 14-16, 16:33, 17:3, Romans 12:2,Galatians 5:16, 23-25, Philippians 3:7-10, 4:4-7, James 1:2-4, 21-25, 1 Peter 3:1-9,2 Peter 1:5-11.
In 1 John, John is primarily describing the present blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life through the terms “fellowship” and “joy.”
The Greek term that is translated as “fellowship” throughout 1 John is κοινωνία (G2842—pronounced “koi-nō-niá”). “Koinōniá” describes a partnership, community, camaraderie, or friendship. It is being part of a high-functioning team. One of the present blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life is enjoying “koinonia” with God. When we partner with God and actively participate as a member of His team, we experience joy.
After his introduction (1 John 1:1-4), John states the core truth upon which the message he is delivering is based: “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5b).
John’s message that God is Light is used as the ethical basis by which to judge the conditional statements that follow in 1 John 1:6 - 2:3.
Light is a description of God’s character. Light describes God’s truth, goodness, and holiness. The main action resulting from walking in the Light is love for others (1 John 2:10).
Darkness, in this metaphor, represents sin and anything contrary to God’s character. It is walking in sin, which is to walk apart from God’s design. Darkness is a description of the ways of this world (1 John 2:8, 17). Darkness describes the falsehood, corruption, and sin in the world. Sin divides while love unifies. The main actions manifested by walking in darkness are hatred and lust (1 John 2:9, 11, 16).
The main point of 1 John 1:5 is that there is no fellowship between Light and darkness, God and sin. Therefore, if a believer wants to have fellowship with God, they cannot also be in fellowship with the world. A believer cannot be an active participant on both teams. He must choose whom he will serve—God or the world. Unlike being born again, this is not a one-time choice, it is a daily, ongoing decision.
After stating this essential truth: “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5b), John then writes seven conditional statements to demonstrate how this reality affects his audience.
1 John 1:6-7 contains the first two of these conditional statements.
All seven conditional statements use the pronoun we. In this context—we—means all believers (including John). Each condition describes a different outcome.
Three of these conditions have negative consequences. And four conditions have positive consequences.
The three conditions that have negative consequences all begin with a false claim. They are based on what we say about ourselves rather than reality: All three of these conditions that have a negative consequence begins with the phrase: If we say that we have… ___________ (v 6, v 8, v 10).
If we say we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness (v 6)
“If we say we have no sin…” (1 John 1:8)
“If we say we have not sinned…” (1 John 1:10)
One of the seven conditional statements promises us that Jesus still intervenes on our behalf even “if we sin” (1 John 2:1).
Three of the four conditions that have positive consequences concern a real action based on what is true rather than an empty claim:
But if we walk in the Light as He is in the Light (v 7)
“If we confess our sins…” (1 John 1: 9)
“If we keep His word” (1 John 2:3)
THE FIRST CONDITIONAL STATEMENT
The first conditional statement is: If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth (v 6).
The first condition: If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in darkness.
The scenario of this condition describes a self-rationalization. We tell ourselves we have fellowship with Him while in actuality we walk in darkness. This is one way any believer can say about themselves something that conflicts with the reality of their lives.
These believers say that they have fellowship with God who “is Light and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). When these believers saythat they have fellowship with God, they are claiming that they are partners with God, that they share a close friendship, intimacy, and camaraderie with God.
They are claiming they are together with God in the trenches of life, resisting the darkness and working together with Him to advance the Light. Therefore, they are teammates, partners in the Light. But instead of having fellowship with the Light like they claim, they walk in darkness. They say one thing, yet they are doing another.
The verb walk is used as an idiom that refers to the way we live and behave (Genesis 5:24,Deuteronomy 5:33,Psalm 1:1). Walk describes how a person lives and the overall pattern of their daily choices: who they trust, their perspective, and their actions.
Scripture is consistent throughout in demonstrating that one of the most fundamental things humans have stewardship over is their choices, and our choices basically boil down to whether we choose life or death, good or evil, light or darkness, benefit or destruction. Scripture’s story of humanity begins with a choice whether to trust God or eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:17). It goes to a covenant/treaty between God and Abraham’s descendants whether they will choose life or death (Deuteronomy 30:19). It reaches to the New Testament where the Apostle Paul says:
“Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?” (Romans 6:16)
The expression walk in darkness means that the pattern of their daily choices goes against God’s good design for their lives. They are choosing independent knowledge rather than trusting God. They are walking according to the ways of the world rather than according to the commands of God. To walk in the darkness is to live apart from trusting God’s word that His commands bring life and Light.
Since walking in the light is the opposite of walking in the darkness, and walking in the light involves being cleansed from all sin (v 7), walking in the darkness can then be interpreted not as merely walking in ignorance, but as walking in sin. But when a believer is willing to come out of the darkness and into God’s light (John 3:20-21) by confessing his sins (1 John 1:9), he can have fellowship with God even though he does not have complete victory over the sin in his life of which he is unaware.
Instead of trusting the goodness of God’s commands and obeying Him, believers who walk in darkness trust that what the world says is good is best, then they adopt the world’s perspective, and they behave like the world. These believers seek harmony with the world instead of God’s kingdom (Matthew 6:33). They havefellowship with the darkness and consequently they have no fellowship with God because in God there is no darkness whatsoever.
The consequence of the first condition: we lie and do not practice the truth.
The consequence of saying that we have fellowship with God and yet walk in darkness is that we lie and do not practice the truth.
These believers havefellowship with the darkness. These believers do not have fellowship with God because in God there is no darkness whatsoever.
Believers who walk in darkness are lying whenever they say they have fellowship with God.
The construction of this conditional statement implies that believers who claim to have fellowship with God while walking in the darkness know they are lying. The statement presumes that they do not actually believe that they are really walking in the Light. They are lying to others, and perhaps to themselves, in order to deceive. They pretend to have fellowship with God and others, but deep down they know better.
They lie to others and may deceive them. And they lie to God, but God is not deceived or mocked (Galatians 6:7).
Believers who walk in darkness do not practice the truth.
Truth is one of the main attributes of Light. Truth and Light both reveal reality for what it is and foster clarity and opportunity for blessing and growth. Truth, particularly in John’s epistles, is not simply something a person knows but something they practice or do (2 John 1:4,3 John 1:4).
In this context, to practice something means to make it a habit or a consistent part of our life. It is a consistent pattern of choices.
To practice the truth means to practice living in reality. Those who are not practicing the truth are not in reality. They are living a lie. God’s word shows us reality (Psalm 119:105).
God calls believers to practice the truth and to live according to the truth of His word. The Bible consistently presents truth not only as something to be believed but as something to be practiced (Psalm 119:1,John 3:21,James 1:22,1 John 2:3-4,2 John 4). God is the authority on what is true, not the world (Psalm 100:3). We are to trust thetruth of God’s word and practice it (Proverbs 3:5-6). Trusting and obeying God’s word is practicing the truth and it yields blessing (Proverbs 3:7-8).
Believers who walk in darknesspractice living the lies of the world. The reason the world’s way is a lie is because it is the opposite of what God has declared to be good. What the world promises will bring life actually brings death. What God says is real, true, and good is right. What the world says is real, true, and good is a lie. The world’s perspective is limited, corrupted, and warped because it is in darkness.
Jesus warned His disciples that having a bad eye (a wrong perspective—like the world’s perspective) will lead to greater confusion and painful consequences,
“The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” (Matthew 6:22-23)
Because the world is in darkness, it has a shortsighted view of what life is truly about. What the world says is true is actually false. What the world says is good will end in ruin. The world will not last (1 John 2:17a), but what God declares will last forever (Isaiah 40:8). It is therefore foolish to base one’s life on the dim lies of the world (Matthew 7:26-27). But it is wise to base one’s life on the eternal truth of God’s word (Matthew 7:24-25,1 John 2:17b).
At this point (and throughout all seven of these conditional statements) we would do well to remember that John is describing believers who already have the Gift of Eternal Life. This means that he is describing people whose sins are already forgiven and who are eternally redeemed by Jesus. All believers will one day live with God forever in eternity, even if they presently walk in darkness and do not practice the truth in this life.
We do not receive the Gift of Eternal Life based on our actions (Ephesians 2:8-9). Neither can we lose the Gift of Eternal Life if we fail to obey God. John addresses and affirms this in his sixth conditional statement when he writes “If anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1). So, having the Gift does not automatically cause us to behave any better. It does not guarantee that we will begin to better practice the truth or obey God in this life.
A person can believe in Jesus and therefore be a recipient of the Gift of Eternal Life and still habitually choose to sin, live a lie, walk in darkness, and to not live in reality by not practicing the truth. That is implied by these admonitions of John. He would have no urgency to write this letter and make these claims were it not possible for believers to walk in darkness. In fact, in verse 8, John will say that we deceive ourselves if we claim to have no sin. This means we will all deal with sin until we are delivered from this body of death and are given a new, spiritual body (Romans 7:24-25, 13:11).
The Gift of Eternal Life has nothing whatsoever to do with our works. It is freely Given by God’s grace and received through simple faith in Jesus as God’s Son. But in order to experience the fullness of that gift we must learn to walk in the Light.
Jesus said that it only takes enough faith to look upon Him to receive the Gift of Eternal Life, just as the Israelites were healed by the venom of snakebites in the wilderness by having the simple faith to look on the bronze serpent (John 3:14-15).
John is not describing the qualifications of the Gift of Eternal Life in 1 John 1:6-10. John is describing what it takes to inherit, enter into, and/or experience the present (and future) blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life. In this passage, John is talking about fellowship with God not being born into God’s family.
Being born, like receiving the Gift of Eternal Life, is a one-time event. Once a person has been born or received the Gift of Eternal Life, they are forever born and will always have the Gift (Romans 11:29). This is similar to physical birth, which is likely why Jesus chose the metaphor of being born again. Physical birth is a one-time event, but to walk in fellowship and partnership with others requires an ongoing choice.
Having fellowship is a continual choice a person must walk in. Choosing to practice the truth and live in reality is a daily decision.
A believer decides every day whether he will live in the reality of God’s truth or the world’s lies.
A believer decides every day whether he will walk in the Light as Jesus is in the Light or walk in the darkness of the world.
A believer decides every day whether he will take up his cross and follow Jesus or seek to gain the world in exchange for his very self (Luke 9:23-25).
A believer will decide each day whether to take the difficult path of setting aside self and rejecting the world in order to experience life or take the path of least resistance and follow the world’s ways that lead to destruction (Matthew 7:13-14).
If a believer is to havefellowship with God, he must continually choose to participate as a member of God’s team. And he must continually walk in His ways and practice the truth. Therefore, to really know God and to share fellowship with Him means putting the truth into practice and choosing to live in the Light.
As John describes believers who walk in the darkness, but actually lie and do not practice the truth, he is describing people who have been born into God’s family, but who have no fellowship with God. They have no ongoing fellowship with God because they are not walking in obedience and following His ways.
Paul describes believers who live according to the pattern of the world as “men of flesh” and “fleshly” (1 Corinthians 3:1-3). Peter says they are “blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins” (2 Peter 1:9b).
Jesus will give a sober admonition to believers who say: we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness and do not practice the truth when they finally meet. Jesus warned His disciples:
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.” (Matthew 7:21)
Jesus then went on to describe what this interaction could look like. These statements refer to the judgment of Christ when He will judge the deeds of believers to determine their rewards (2 Corinthians 5:10):
“Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’” (Matthew 7:22-23)
It is a person’s faithfulness to God—their walk—and not merely their words that determine if they have fellowship with God and will inherit the Prize of Eternal Life and enter His kingdom.
One final thought before moving on to the next conditional statement: any religious activity that is done without faith is not partnering God. To have fellowship with God a believer must walk by faith in God and with an ambition to please God (2 Corinthians 5:7-9). For:
“without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.” (Hebrews 11:6)
It is fine and good to do good things. But if we do good things (giving to the poor, praying, reading our Bible, attending church, etc.) in our own power, in our own name, and to gain rewards from the world, then we are not partnering with God. Rather, we are still walking in the darkness of the world which seeks to lord over others. If we are about our own kingdoms instead of God’s kingdom, we are competing with Him instead of sharing fellowship with Him and we are not practicing the truth or living in reality.
Sadly, Jesus indicates there are “many” believers who will miss the narrow gates of the kingdom because they are not living in reality (Matthew 7:13, 22) and “few” believers who are living in reality who will find the narrow gate and enter in by it (Matthew 7:14).
This is why John’s letter and message about the fellowship of eternal life is so urgent and important for believers to heed. John wants believers to have a full reward (2 John 1:8). He shares Paul’s sentiment that he does not want anyone to cheat them of their heavenly reward (Colossians 2:18).
THE SECOND CONDITIONAL STATEMENT
The second conditional statement is: But if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin (v 7).
The second condition: But if we walk in the Light as He is in the Light.
The second conditional statement contrasts the first statement. This contrast is made clear with the conjunction: But.
The first conditional statement describes believers who are walking in darkness. This conditional statement describes believers who are walking in the Light.
The full expression of this condition is: But if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light.
The pronoun He refers to God Himself who “is Light” (1 John 1:5).
When we compare the statement “God is Light” (1 John 1:5) with the expression from verse 7—as He Himself is in the Light—we see that God is not only Light, but that He is also in the Light.
God isthe Light and He Himself is in the Light. This indicates that God is in fellowship with Himself. God is able to be in fellowship with Himself because He is paradoxically Three and One Persons. God is God the Father, and God is God the Son, and God is God the Holy Spirit. And God is One.
The expression walk in the Light parallels and contrasts its opposite: walk in darkness.
The expression walk in darkness means to live without following God’s commands and to seek harmony with the world by trusting the world, adopting its foolish perspective, and actively pursuing sin. In stark contrast, the expression walk in the Light means to live life with God, and seek to please Jesus by trusting Him, adopting His perspective, and actively striving to obey God’s commands.
These are the only two ways a person can walk—in the Light with following God’s commands or in the darkness without following God’s commands. There are no other options. We either have fellowship with God or we donot have fellowship with God. These two options are only available to believers in Jesus. The only way for unbelievers (who have not received the Gift of Eternal Life) to walk is in darkness.
Unbelievers cannot walk with God intheLight as He is in the Light. If unbelievers wish to walk in the Light, they must first receive the Gift through faith in Jesus and become a believer in Him. To some extent, they can walk in God’s ways because they are made in His image and have a conscience to know what is right (Romans 2:14). But that capacity is limited. Believers in Jesus are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and therefore have an infinite, supernatural capacity to walk in the Light.
Believers are invited to have fellowship with God in this lifetime. And the only way we can have fellowship with God in this lifetime is to walk in the Light as God Himself is in the Light.
The expression walk in the Light as God Himself is in the Light means to walk and live like Christ by following His commands. We get a clear picture of how God walked and lived through His Son, Jesus—who is God in human form. Therefore, to walk in the Light as He is in the Light means to live as Jesus lived. His Great Commission was to make disciples by teaching them to obey His commandments (Matthew 28:18-20).
Jesus is the exact representation of God’s nature (Colossians 1:15, 2:9). To observe His walk—i.e. His words, His actions, and His manner of life—is to see God’s Light expressed in human form (John 1:18, 14:9, Hebrews 1:3). Since we have Christ in us, the way to walk in the Light is to follow the Spirit (Galatians 5:16,Colossians 1:27).
Jesus perfectly revealed God the Father’s character and way of life. He did nothing independently but lived in complete dependence upon and obedience to the Father (Luke 22:42,John 5:19, 8:28-29). Jesus overcame His trials as a human by trusting and depending on God—even unto death (Luke 23:46,Philippians 2:8,Hebrews 12:2).
Jesus encountered every kind of temptation that we can encounter but did not sin (Hebrews 4:15). Jesus overcame temptations by trusting God and obeying His commands instead of His own desires (Luke 22:40,Philippians 2:5-8). So one defining attribute of what it means to walkin the Light as He is in the Light is to choose to reject sin and to trust and obey God.
Anyone (believers and unbelievers) who choose sin over trusting God is walking in the darkness. Anyone (believers only) who overcomes sin by faith and chooses to entrust their lives to God (like Jesus did) walks in the Light as He is in the Light.
As John writes later: “the one who practices sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8a) and “No one who is born of God practices sin” (1 John 3:9a). Jesus told Peter he was doing the work of Satan because he had his mind on the things of the world rather than the things of God (Matthew 16:23). Similarly, any believer who follows the ways of the world is following the ways of Satan.
Believers are called to become like Jesus and walk as Jesus walked. Believers are called to emulate His life as the pattern for their own conduct (1 John 2:6,John 13:15). This is what it means to follow Him—to follow His example and teachings. Jesus’s obedience, love, truthfulness, and righteousness show us what it looks like to live fully aligned with God’s will.
And by looking to Jesus, believers learn how to walk in theLight as God Himself walks in the Light (Luke 9:23-25,John 15:10,1 Peter 2:21,Ephesians 5:1-2).
When we follow Jesus’s example of choosing to trust and obey God instead of choosing to obey the ways of the world and desires of our flesh, we walk in the Light as He is in the Light. But when we obey the world or the desires of our flesh, we reject Jesus and walk in darkness.
The consequence of the second condition: we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
John describes two present blessings believers experience when they live like Jesus and walk in the Light as God Himself is in the Light:
We have fellowship with one another.
The blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
The first present blessing believers experience as they walkin the Light as He is in the Light is that we have fellowship with one another.
One another refers to other likeminded followers of Jesus who are also in this fellowship of eternal life.
The term John used that is translated as fellowship is once again “koinōniá.” This is the last time this term appears in 1 John, but its prominence in the opening verses causes its theme to echo throughout the rest of John’s letter like a recurring motif.
To have fellowship with one another means to share fellowship with like-minded followers of Jesus. It means to share in the joy and community of eternal life with other people who are working together to proclaim, expand, and establish God’s kingdom. It is having an active, contributing role on Team-Jesus and being teammates with other believers who are likewise using their gifts and talents to please God.
And as John previously said, that fellowship with other Christ followers also includes fellowship with Jesus Christ, God’s Son, and with God the Father (1 John 1:3). This makes sense because all believers are a part of the body of Christ, so living in harmony with other believers is also having fellowship with Christ, for we are His body.
It is interesting to note that John does not explicitly state that those who walk in the Light will “have fellowship with God,” but rather with one another. But, if we take it in the context of 1 John 1:3, we see that “our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” Therefore, it is inferred that those who walk in the Light and/or have fellowship with one another will also be in fellowship with God, for indeed God is the Light that we walk in.
John’s emphasis infers that there is no fellowship with God that does not involve fellowship with one another. Again, this makes sense given that believers are the body of Christ. It is also consistent with Matthew 6:14-15, where Jesus says the reason that we should pray for God to forgive us as we forgive others is because He does not forgive those who refuse to do so. The inference is that refusing to seek restoration of fellowship with fellow believers is a condition of having fellowship with God.
During what is sometimes called Jesus’s “high priestly prayer” (His last recorded words in the Gospel of John before His arrest), Jesus prayed for His disciples and for all those who would come to believe in Him through their word to have unity (John 17:20). In this prayer, Jesus prayed for all His followers to have unity with one another and have perfect unity withHim and His Father,
“The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity… Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am…” (John 17:22-24a)
As Jesus prayed this, He was praying for His followers to have fellowship with one another and with Himself.
Having fellowship with God and with one another is an amazing blessing in this present life. Fellowship with Christ and His church is one of the present rewards of the Prize of Eternal Life. The present blessings of having fellowship with God and one another include:
We are united into a community that loves us and seeks our best interest. Our fellowship with one another encourages us with wisdom and truth; and it comforts and helps us as we face difficulty or temptation (Romans 12:10,2 Corinthians 1:3-4,Galatians 6:1-2,Ephesians 4:15-16,Philippians 1:2,Colossians 3:16,1 Thessalonians 5:11,Hebrews 3:12-13,James 5:16).
We are stirred up to do great things for God’s kingdom by one another (Hebrews 10:25).
We have God with us as we face difficulty and trials. As we share in Christ’s sufferings, so He shares in ours. God Himself is with us to exhort, guide, empower, and comfort us (Matthew 10:19-20, 28:20b, John 15:4-5, 16:13, Galatians 5:16, 22-23, Philippians 3:10).
We know God intimately by faith as we obey His command to love one another. This is enormously important as Jesus stated in John 17:3 that knowing God and Jesus Christ is the very definition of eternal life (John 14:21, 15:10, 12-17, 17:3, 1 John 2:3, 4:7).
Wewalk in the great things that God created us to accomplish with Him and experience lasting purpose (Ephesians 2:10).
So, if we walk in the Light as God is in the Light, we share fellowship and unity with one another as well as being united with Jesus as we face the trials of this life.
The second present blessing believers experience as they walkin the Light as He is in the Light is that the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
By the blood of Jesus His Son refers to Jesus’s bloody execution on the cross when His sacrificial death atoned (paid the penalty) for the sins of the world. John repeatedly recalls this sacrifice throughout this letter:
“And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.” (1 John 2:2)
“In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” (1 John 4:10)
Here in verse 7, John says that the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses those who walk in the Light as He is in the Light.
Notice how the verb cleanses is in the present tense. This verb is also in the present-continuous tense in Greek. This means that the cleansing is perpetual and ongoing as we walk in the Light as He is in the Light. By using the verbs walk and cleanse in the present tense (v 7), John implies that this cleansing is an ongoing process.
If we walk in the Light as He is in the Light, which means to choose obedience and to reject temptation, Jesus’s blood is constantly cleansing us from all sin.
Because this is a present and ongoing cleansing, the cleansing of all sin referred to in 1 John 1:7 is not the pardon of sin and its penalty of eternal damnation. Believers received the pardon from the penalty of eternal damnation when they received the Gift of Eternal Life. The Gift of Eternal Life’s forgiveness becomes forever ours the moment we believe in Jesus and trust in His sacrifice on the cross. The Gift’s pardon forgives us of all past sins, present sins, and future sins that we may commit.
Once we receive the Gift of Eternal Life:
“God made [us] alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.” (Colossians 2:13-14)
“Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1)
Once we are born into God’s family and forgiven, there is no sin so great, there is nothing and no one, that can take us out of God’s hand or separate us from His love (John 10:28-29,Romans 8:38-39). All sins are nailed to the cross, but we still have our flesh, our old man (Romans 7:17). And Jesus is our Advocate if we sin (1 John 2:1).
But we still have inner desires that seek to lead us astray (James 1:14-15). Our awareness of our sin is a gradual process of learning.
This means that even as we walk in the Light as He is in the Light, we still have sin (see 1 John 1:8: “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us”). The inference is that at any point in time, we have sin of which we are unaware. But if we walk in the Light based on what we know and understand, then Jesus takes care of the rest. His blood cleanses us.
When Jesus washed Peter’s feet, He told Peter that he was already clean but needed to have his feet washed. This is a picture of a believer’s fellowship. Believers are unconditionally placed into Christ through the cross. But to be clean requires confession of our sins. 1 John 1:9 will tell us that if we confess our sins, Jesus will forgive them.
So the picture we derive from 1 John 1:7-9 is as follows:
Believers still have a fleshly nature that is sinful.
Therefore, we cannot say we have no sin.
But if we will confess the sins about which we are aware, Jesus cleanses the rest Himself.
This is an amazing picture of a patient teacher helping us grow and learn. As we learn to be sanctified, set apart from the world to live for Him, Jesus graciously covers the sins of which we are unaware, and focuses on teaching us to crucify the sins of which we become aware.
As James 1:21 states, the solution to the sin we have within us is to set it aside and replace it with God’s word. This is an ongoing process of sanctification. This is God’s will for the lives of believers, that we be sanctified (1 Thessalonians 4:3).
Jesus’s constant cleansing of all our sin shows us that when we walk in obedience to the Light we know, we still need the cleansing of Jesus’ blood because there is more we do not know. Even in our walk of faith it is ultimately through Jesus’s death and resurrection that we can havefellowship with God. When we walk in obedience in the resurrection power of Jesus, He takes care of what we cannot.
Intentional and Unintentional Sins
If walking in the Light as He is in the Light means we reject sin and choose to follow God by faith, how can we still have sin? Doesn’t sinning and having sin mean that we are walking in darkness? How can we have sin and still be in the Light?
To answer these questions biblically, we need to distinguish between intentional sin and unintentional sin.
Intentional sin is deliberate disobedience to God’s word. Intentional sin is any action that we undertake or attitude that we harbor with a sense of understanding that it goes against God’s commands or His will for our lives. Intentional sin is something that we know defies God’s word.
Unintentional sin is something that we do unknowing that defies God’s word. Unintentional sin is sinning in ignorance. Unintentional sin is still sin. It causes offense and its wages are still death. Therefore, unintentional sin requires cleansing by the blood of Jesus.
The Law of Moses explained how to deal with unintentional sins. Most of Leviticus 4 deals with various sin offerings for unintentional sins. It gave different sacrificial requirements for:
the anointed priest’s unintentional sin (Leviticus 4:2-12)
the congregation’s unintentional sin (Leviticus 4:13-2)
a leader’s unintentional sins (Leviticus 4:22-26)
common people’s unintentional sins (Leviticus 4:27-31)
The Book of Numbers also prescribed sacrifices for unintentional sins (Numbers 15:27) and penalties for deliberate sins of defiance (Numbers 15:30-31). There was no sacrifice for sins done willfully (Numbers 15:8-30,Hebrews 10:26).
David meditated about the difference between intentional and unintentional sins.
David rhetorically asked himself about unintentional sins: “Who can discern his errors?” (Psalm 19:12a). The expected answer is: “no one can discern his own errors.” Then David asked God to: “acquit me of hidden faults” (Psalm 19:12b).
Next David spoke about intentional sins. David asked God to:
“Also keep back Your servant from presumptuous sins; Let them not rule over me.” (Psalm 19:13a)
Finally, David said that if God would protect him from intentionally sinning, “Then I will be blameless and I shall be acquitted of great transgression” (Psalm 19:13b).
Together, these passages show that John is not redefining sin but is rather carrying forward the same biblical categories already present in the Law and the Psalms. For believers to share fellowship with Him, God expects us to deal with the sins we know about by confessing and repenting of them (Matthew 4:17,1 John 1:9), and He takes care of the rest. But He also expects us to recognize that we have a continuing need, because even when we are walking in the Light we still have sin (1 John 1:8).
Walking in the Light does not reaching a state of sinless perfection, as 1 John 1:8 insists. It means living in a posture of faith, obedience, and honesty before God, where sin is neither embraced nor hidden. Intentional, defiant sin—what David called “presumptuous sins” (Psalm 19:13)—places a person in opposition to God’s will and aligns with walking in darkness.
By contrast, unintentional sin occurs even while a believer is genuinely oriented toward God, seeking to obey Him, and walking in His Light. Such sin does not characterize one’s walk, nor does it define one’s allegiance, but it does require cleansing and restoration.
This is why John says that those who walk in the Light still have sin that the blood of Jesus continually cleanses away. The blood of Jesus continually cleanses away all sin—even the unintentional sins of those who walk in the Light (1 John 1:7). Unintentional sin is still committed even by those who walk in the Light but they do not result in lost fellowship with God. It is intentional sins that break fellowship with God and cause us to walk in darkness.
The author of Hebrews describes the unpleasant experience that believers who choose to intentionally continue in sin and to walk in darkness will experience at their judgment:
“For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.” (Hebrews 10:26-27)
The author of Hebrews contrasts this fearful and dreadful experience with the hope and confidence faithful believers can enjoy when they boldly enter the presence of Jesus with their “hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience” (Hebrews 11:19-22, quoted: Hebrews 11:22).
Like 1 John, the author of Hebrews is talking about the loss of fellowship and the Prize of Eternal Life in these verses. Neither Hebrews or 1 John, nor anywhere else in scripture indicate that a believer can lose the Gift of Eternal Life (Romans 11:29). But scripture is also consistent that when His people choose to walk in the ways of the world they will experience serious adverse consequences, because sin separates us from our design, and that separation is death (Deuteronomy 30:17-19,Romans 1:24, 26, 28, 6:16).
The author of Hebrews describes unfaithful believers who sin willfully as being those who trample over the Son of God as they walk in darkness. The author describes the consequences they will suffer as being much more severe than the consequences laid out for willful disobedience in the Law of Moses (Hebrews 10:29).
The author of Hebrews reminds his readers that vengeance belongs to God, and that the LORD will judge His people, before concluding that it is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of a living God (Hebrews 10:30-31). In saying this, he quotes Deuteronomy 32:35. However, he ends the thought by quoting the next verse, which says:
“For the LORD will vindicate His people, And will have compassion on His servants, When He sees that their strength is gone, And there is none remaining, bond or free.” (Deuteronomy 32:36)
This tells us that even when God’s judgment is severe, when His refining fire burns hot, His full intent is still for our best. His ultimate aim is to have compassion upon His people.
And though John is writing so that “we may not sin,” he still assures us that even if we do walk in the darkness and sin, God does not reject us (even though He disapproves of our behavior), because “if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1).
But ifwe walk in the Light as He is in the Light, the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all our unintentional sin. This is a great comfort. If, as believers we will deal with the sin we know, Jesus takes care of all the rest so that we can continue to have joy and fellowship with God and remain in the Light with Him. It is also a sobering challenge, for if we fail to recognize and confess our sin, we can expect severe adverse consequences to be the result.
1 John 1:6-7
6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth;
7 but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
Set to dark mode
1 John 1:6-7 meaning
In 1 John 1:6-7, John counters the false claim that someone can enjoy fellowship with God while walking in darkness, contrasting walking in darkness with the genuine fellowship and ongoing cleansing that believers experience when they walk in His Light.
1 John 1:6 - 2:3 consists of seven conditional statements contrasting walking in darkness and walking in the Light. This shows that true fellowship with God requires honesty about our sin, reliance on Jesus’s cleansing, refusal to deny the truth about our moral condition, and seeking to please Him by keeping His commandments.
So far in this letter, John the Apostle has assured his readers that his message is “from the beginning” and the things he personally heard and saw when he was Jesus’s disciple in Galilee and Judea (1 John 1:1-3).
John is writing to believers who have already received the Gift of Eternal Life (1 John 2:12-14). They have already been born into God’s forever family (John 1:12) by God’s grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8-9) in Jesus Christ and His sacrifice on the cross and resurrection from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). Their sins have already been forgiven for His name’s sake (1 John 2:12b). Many of them have already overcome great temptations in their lives (1 John 2:13b), and some of them have already known Jesus for a long time (1 John 2:13a).
Receiving the Gift of Eternal Life is the most important thing a person can receive. It is a new birth (John 3:3). The Gift of Eternal Life is freely given by God’s grace to whosoever believes in Jesus (John 3:16).
But being born is not the pinnacle of our life experience. In physical birth, we remember it annually on our birthday. It is important to remember those who gifted our lives to us. But we spend almost all our time pursuing the daily goals of life.
Again, John is writing to believers who had already received the Gift of Eternal Life. They were already born into God’s family. But John wanted these believers to not miss out on all that God has for them. Who we are is a gift; what we become depends on our choices.
John wrote this letter to explain to believers how they can experience and enjoy the fullness of experience of eternal life in Jesus. John is writing this letter “so that you [his readers] may have… fellowship with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ” (1 John 1:3b). He is writing so that both his and his readers’ “joy will be made complete” (1 John 1:4b).
The fellowship and joy John is describing are part of what can be referred to as “the Prize of Eternal Life.” The Prize of Eternal Life is received by actively emulating Jesus and following Him as we overcome life’s trials by faith. The Prize has present blessings and future rewards in store for those who are faithful.
In the Parable of the Talents, Jesus used the same Greek word translated “joy” in 1 John 1:4 to refer to coming to possess the reward of inheriting great responsibility in His kingdom that is to come:
"His master said to him, 'Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.'”
(Matthew 25:21)
The same word is used to describe the prize Jesus looked to that caused Him to live on earth in a manner that He was “despising the shame.” That prize was to sit down “at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2). Paul exhorts believers to have that same mindset (Philippians 2:5-9). Jesus promises to believers who overcome as He overcame that He will reward them by sharing His responsibility with them (Revelation 3:21). He will give them the reward of being a “son” who will “inherit these things” (Revelation 21:7).
Jesus, Paul, James, and Peter describe the future rewards of the Prize of Eternal Life in many places, including: Matthew 5:4-9, 12, 6:1, 6, 19:27-29, 24:46-47, 25:14-23, 34, Luke 9:23-26, Romans 8:17-18, 1 Corinthians 3:11-15, 9:24-27, 2 Corinthians 4:17, Ephesians 1:19-21, Philippians 3:13-14, 2 Timothy 2:12, James 1:12, 1 Peter 1:3-4, 4:19, Revelation 3:21.
Jesus, Paul, James, and Peter also describe the present blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life: Matthew 5:3, 10, 6:33-34, 7:24-25, 13:44-45, 21:31, John 15:4, 7-11, 14-16, 16:33, 17:3, Romans 12:2, Galatians 5:16, 23-25, Philippians 3:7-10, 4:4-7, James 1:2-4, 21-25, 1 Peter 3:1-9, 2 Peter 1:5-11.
In 1 John, John is primarily describing the present blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life through the terms “fellowship” and “joy.”
The Greek term that is translated as “fellowship” throughout 1 John is κοινωνία (G2842—pronounced “koi-nō-niá”). “Koinōniá” describes a partnership, community, camaraderie, or friendship. It is being part of a high-functioning team. One of the present blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life is enjoying “koinonia” with God. When we partner with God and actively participate as a member of His team, we experience joy.
After his introduction (1 John 1:1-4), John states the core truth upon which the message he is delivering is based: “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5b).
John’s message that God is Light is used as the ethical basis by which to judge the conditional statements that follow in 1 John 1:6 - 2:3.
Light is a description of God’s character. Light describes God’s truth, goodness, and holiness. The main action resulting from walking in the Light is love for others (1 John 2:10).
Darkness, in this metaphor, represents sin and anything contrary to God’s character. It is walking in sin, which is to walk apart from God’s design. Darkness is a description of the ways of this world (1 John 2:8, 17). Darkness describes the falsehood, corruption, and sin in the world. Sin divides while love unifies. The main actions manifested by walking in darkness are hatred and lust (1 John 2:9, 11, 16).
The main point of 1 John 1:5 is that there is no fellowship between Light and darkness, God and sin. Therefore, if a believer wants to have fellowship with God, they cannot also be in fellowship with the world. A believer cannot be an active participant on both teams. He must choose whom he will serve—God or the world. Unlike being born again, this is not a one-time choice, it is a daily, ongoing decision.
After stating this essential truth: “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5b), John then writes seven conditional statements to demonstrate how this reality affects his audience.
1 John 1:6-7 contains the first two of these conditional statements.
All seven conditional statements use the pronoun we. In this context—we—means all believers (including John). Each condition describes a different outcome.
Three of these conditions have negative consequences. And four conditions have positive consequences.
The three conditions that have negative consequences all begin with a false claim. They are based on what we say about ourselves rather than reality: All three of these conditions that have a negative consequence begins with the phrase: If we say that we have… ___________ (v 6, v 8, v 10).
One of the seven conditional statements promises us that Jesus still intervenes on our behalf even “if we sin” (1 John 2:1).
Three of the four conditions that have positive consequences concern a real action based on what is true rather than an empty claim:
THE FIRST CONDITIONAL STATEMENT
The first conditional statement is: If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth (v 6).
The first condition: If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in darkness.
The scenario of this condition describes a self-rationalization. We tell ourselves we have fellowship with Him while in actuality we walk in darkness. This is one way any believer can say about themselves something that conflicts with the reality of their lives.
These believers say that they have fellowship with God who “is Light and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). When these believers say that they have fellowship with God, they are claiming that they are partners with God, that they share a close friendship, intimacy, and camaraderie with God.
They are claiming they are together with God in the trenches of life, resisting the darkness and working together with Him to advance the Light. Therefore, they are teammates, partners in the Light. But instead of having fellowship with the Light like they claim, they walk in darkness. They say one thing, yet they are doing another.
The verb walk is used as an idiom that refers to the way we live and behave (Genesis 5:24, Deuteronomy 5:33, Psalm 1:1). Walk describes how a person lives and the overall pattern of their daily choices: who they trust, their perspective, and their actions.
Scripture is consistent throughout in demonstrating that one of the most fundamental things humans have stewardship over is their choices, and our choices basically boil down to whether we choose life or death, good or evil, light or darkness, benefit or destruction. Scripture’s story of humanity begins with a choice whether to trust God or eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:17). It goes to a covenant/treaty between God and Abraham’s descendants whether they will choose life or death (Deuteronomy 30:19). It reaches to the New Testament where the Apostle Paul says:
“Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?”
(Romans 6:16)
The expression walk in darkness means that the pattern of their daily choices goes against God’s good design for their lives. They are choosing independent knowledge rather than trusting God. They are walking according to the ways of the world rather than according to the commands of God. To walk in the darkness is to live apart from trusting God’s word that His commands bring life and Light.
Since walking in the light is the opposite of walking in the darkness, and walking in the light involves being cleansed from all sin (v 7), walking in the darkness can then be interpreted not as merely walking in ignorance, but as walking in sin. But when a believer is willing to come out of the darkness and into God’s light (John 3:20-21) by confessing his sins (1 John 1:9), he can have fellowship with God even though he does not have complete victory over the sin in his life of which he is unaware.
Instead of trusting the goodness of God’s commands and obeying Him, believers who walk in darkness trust that what the world says is good is best, then they adopt the world’s perspective, and they behave like the world. These believers seek harmony with the world instead of God’s kingdom (Matthew 6:33). They have fellowship with the darkness and consequently they have no fellowship with God because in God there is no darkness whatsoever.
The consequence of the first condition: we lie and do not practice the truth.
The consequence of saying that we have fellowship with God and yet walk in darkness is that we lie and do not practice the truth.
These believers have fellowship with the darkness. These believers do not have fellowship with God because in God there is no darkness whatsoever.
Believers who walk in darkness are lying whenever they say they have fellowship with God.
The construction of this conditional statement implies that believers who claim to have fellowship with God while walking in the darkness know they are lying. The statement presumes that they do not actually believe that they are really walking in the Light. They are lying to others, and perhaps to themselves, in order to deceive. They pretend to have fellowship with God and others, but deep down they know better.
They lie to others and may deceive them. And they lie to God, but God is not deceived or mocked (Galatians 6:7).
Believers who walk in darkness do not practice the truth.
Truth is one of the main attributes of Light. Truth and Light both reveal reality for what it is and foster clarity and opportunity for blessing and growth. Truth, particularly in John’s epistles, is not simply something a person knows but something they practice or do (2 John 1:4, 3 John 1:4).
In this context, to practice something means to make it a habit or a consistent part of our life. It is a consistent pattern of choices.
To practice the truth means to practice living in reality. Those who are not practicing the truth are not in reality. They are living a lie. God’s word shows us reality (Psalm 119:105).
God calls believers to practice the truth and to live according to the truth of His word. The Bible consistently presents truth not only as something to be believed but as something to be practiced (Psalm 119:1, John 3:21, James 1:22, 1 John 2:3-4, 2 John 4). God is the authority on what is true, not the world (Psalm 100:3). We are to trust the truth of God’s word and practice it (Proverbs 3:5-6). Trusting and obeying God’s word is practicing the truth and it yields blessing (Proverbs 3:7-8).
Believers who walk in darkness practice living the lies of the world. The reason the world’s way is a lie is because it is the opposite of what God has declared to be good. What the world promises will bring life actually brings death. What God says is real, true, and good is right. What the world says is real, true, and good is a lie. The world’s perspective is limited, corrupted, and warped because it is in darkness.
Jesus warned His disciples that having a bad eye (a wrong perspective—like the world’s perspective) will lead to greater confusion and painful consequences,
“The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!”
(Matthew 6:22-23)
Because the world is in darkness, it has a shortsighted view of what life is truly about. What the world says is true is actually false. What the world says is good will end in ruin. The world will not last (1 John 2:17a), but what God declares will last forever (Isaiah 40:8). It is therefore foolish to base one’s life on the dim lies of the world (Matthew 7:26-27). But it is wise to base one’s life on the eternal truth of God’s word (Matthew 7:24-25, 1 John 2:17b).
At this point (and throughout all seven of these conditional statements) we would do well to remember that John is describing believers who already have the Gift of Eternal Life. This means that he is describing people whose sins are already forgiven and who are eternally redeemed by Jesus. All believers will one day live with God forever in eternity, even if they presently walk in darkness and do not practice the truth in this life.
We do not receive the Gift of Eternal Life based on our actions (Ephesians 2:8-9). Neither can we lose the Gift of Eternal Life if we fail to obey God. John addresses and affirms this in his sixth conditional statement when he writes “If anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1). So, having the Gift does not automatically cause us to behave any better. It does not guarantee that we will begin to better practice the truth or obey God in this life.
A person can believe in Jesus and therefore be a recipient of the Gift of Eternal Life and still habitually choose to sin, live a lie, walk in darkness, and to not live in reality by not practicing the truth. That is implied by these admonitions of John. He would have no urgency to write this letter and make these claims were it not possible for believers to walk in darkness. In fact, in verse 8, John will say that we deceive ourselves if we claim to have no sin. This means we will all deal with sin until we are delivered from this body of death and are given a new, spiritual body (Romans 7:24-25, 13:11).
The Gift of Eternal Life has nothing whatsoever to do with our works. It is freely Given by God’s grace and received through simple faith in Jesus as God’s Son. But in order to experience the fullness of that gift we must learn to walk in the Light.
Jesus said that it only takes enough faith to look upon Him to receive the Gift of Eternal Life, just as the Israelites were healed by the venom of snakebites in the wilderness by having the simple faith to look on the bronze serpent (John 3:14-15).
John is not describing the qualifications of the Gift of Eternal Life in 1 John 1:6-10. John is describing what it takes to inherit, enter into, and/or experience the present (and future) blessings of the Prize of Eternal Life. In this passage, John is talking about fellowship with God not being born into God’s family.
Being born, like receiving the Gift of Eternal Life, is a one-time event. Once a person has been born or received the Gift of Eternal Life, they are forever born and will always have the Gift (Romans 11:29). This is similar to physical birth, which is likely why Jesus chose the metaphor of being born again. Physical birth is a one-time event, but to walk in fellowship and partnership with others requires an ongoing choice.
Having fellowship is a continual choice a person must walk in. Choosing to practice the truth and live in reality is a daily decision.
If a believer is to have fellowship with God, he must continually choose to participate as a member of God’s team. And he must continually walk in His ways and practice the truth. Therefore, to really know God and to share fellowship with Him means putting the truth into practice and choosing to live in the Light.
As John describes believers who walk in the darkness, but actually lie and do not practice the truth, he is describing people who have been born into God’s family, but who have no fellowship with God. They have no ongoing fellowship with God because they are not walking in obedience and following His ways.
Paul describes believers who live according to the pattern of the world as “men of flesh” and “fleshly” (1 Corinthians 3:1-3). Peter says they are “blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins” (2 Peter 1:9b).
Jesus will give a sober admonition to believers who say: we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness and do not practice the truth when they finally meet. Jesus warned His disciples:
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.”
(Matthew 7:21)
Jesus then went on to describe what this interaction could look like. These statements refer to the judgment of Christ when He will judge the deeds of believers to determine their rewards (2 Corinthians 5:10):
“Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’”
(Matthew 7:22-23)
It is a person’s faithfulness to God—their walk—and not merely their words that determine if they have fellowship with God and will inherit the Prize of Eternal Life and enter His kingdom.
One final thought before moving on to the next conditional statement: any religious activity that is done without faith is not partnering God. To have fellowship with God a believer must walk by faith in God and with an ambition to please God (2 Corinthians 5:7-9). For:
“without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.”
(Hebrews 11:6)
It is fine and good to do good things. But if we do good things (giving to the poor, praying, reading our Bible, attending church, etc.) in our own power, in our own name, and to gain rewards from the world, then we are not partnering with God. Rather, we are still walking in the darkness of the world which seeks to lord over others. If we are about our own kingdoms instead of God’s kingdom, we are competing with Him instead of sharing fellowship with Him and we are not practicing the truth or living in reality.
Sadly, Jesus indicates there are “many” believers who will miss the narrow gates of the kingdom because they are not living in reality (Matthew 7:13, 22) and “few” believers who are living in reality who will find the narrow gate and enter in by it (Matthew 7:14).
This is why John’s letter and message about the fellowship of eternal life is so urgent and important for believers to heed. John wants believers to have a full reward (2 John 1:8). He shares Paul’s sentiment that he does not want anyone to cheat them of their heavenly reward (Colossians 2:18).
THE SECOND CONDITIONAL STATEMENT
The second conditional statement is: But if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin (v 7).
The second condition: But if we walk in the Light as He is in the Light.
The second conditional statement contrasts the first statement. This contrast is made clear with the conjunction: But.
The first conditional statement describes believers who are walking in darkness. This conditional statement describes believers who are walking in the Light.
The full expression of this condition is: But if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light.
The pronoun He refers to God Himself who “is Light” (1 John 1:5).
When we compare the statement “God is Light” (1 John 1:5) with the expression from verse 7—as He Himself is in the Light—we see that God is not only Light, but that He is also in the Light.
God is the Light and He Himself is in the Light. This indicates that God is in fellowship with Himself. God is able to be in fellowship with Himself because He is paradoxically Three and One Persons. God is God the Father, and God is God the Son, and God is God the Holy Spirit. And God is One.
The expression walk in the Light parallels and contrasts its opposite: walk in darkness.
The expression walk in darkness means to live without following God’s commands and to seek harmony with the world by trusting the world, adopting its foolish perspective, and actively pursuing sin. In stark contrast, the expression walk in the Light means to live life with God, and seek to please Jesus by trusting Him, adopting His perspective, and actively striving to obey God’s commands.
These are the only two ways a person can walk—in the Light with following God’s commands or in the darkness without following God’s commands. There are no other options. We either have fellowship with God or we do not have fellowship with God. These two options are only available to believers in Jesus. The only way for unbelievers (who have not received the Gift of Eternal Life) to walk is in darkness.
Unbelievers cannot walk with God in the Light as He is in the Light. If unbelievers wish to walk in the Light, they must first receive the Gift through faith in Jesus and become a believer in Him. To some extent, they can walk in God’s ways because they are made in His image and have a conscience to know what is right (Romans 2:14). But that capacity is limited. Believers in Jesus are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and therefore have an infinite, supernatural capacity to walk in the Light.
Believers are invited to have fellowship with God in this lifetime. And the only way we can have fellowship with God in this lifetime is to walk in the Light as God Himself is in the Light.
The expression walk in the Light as God Himself is in the Light means to walk and live like Christ by following His commands. We get a clear picture of how God walked and lived through His Son, Jesus—who is God in human form. Therefore, to walk in the Light as He is in the Light means to live as Jesus lived. His Great Commission was to make disciples by teaching them to obey His commandments (Matthew 28:18-20).
Jesus is the exact representation of God’s nature (Colossians 1:15, 2:9). To observe His walk—i.e. His words, His actions, and His manner of life—is to see God’s Light expressed in human form (John 1:18, 14:9, Hebrews 1:3). Since we have Christ in us, the way to walk in the Light is to follow the Spirit (Galatians 5:16, Colossians 1:27).
Jesus perfectly revealed God the Father’s character and way of life. He did nothing independently but lived in complete dependence upon and obedience to the Father (Luke 22:42, John 5:19, 8:28-29). Jesus overcame His trials as a human by trusting and depending on God—even unto death (Luke 23:46, Philippians 2:8, Hebrews 12:2).
Jesus encountered every kind of temptation that we can encounter but did not sin (Hebrews 4:15). Jesus overcame temptations by trusting God and obeying His commands instead of His own desires (Luke 22:40, Philippians 2:5-8). So one defining attribute of what it means to walk in the Light as He is in the Light is to choose to reject sin and to trust and obey God.
Anyone (believers and unbelievers) who choose sin over trusting God is walking in the darkness. Anyone (believers only) who overcomes sin by faith and chooses to entrust their lives to God (like Jesus did) walks in the Light as He is in the Light.
As John writes later: “the one who practices sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8a) and “No one who is born of God practices sin” (1 John 3:9a). Jesus told Peter he was doing the work of Satan because he had his mind on the things of the world rather than the things of God (Matthew 16:23). Similarly, any believer who follows the ways of the world is following the ways of Satan.
Believers are called to become like Jesus and walk as Jesus walked. Believers are called to emulate His life as the pattern for their own conduct (1 John 2:6, John 13:15). This is what it means to follow Him—to follow His example and teachings. Jesus’s obedience, love, truthfulness, and righteousness show us what it looks like to live fully aligned with God’s will.
And by looking to Jesus, believers learn how to walk in the Light as God Himself walks in the Light (Luke 9:23-25, John 15:10, 1 Peter 2:21, Ephesians 5:1-2).
When we follow Jesus’s example of choosing to trust and obey God instead of choosing to obey the ways of the world and desires of our flesh, we walk in the Light as He is in the Light. But when we obey the world or the desires of our flesh, we reject Jesus and walk in darkness.
The consequence of the second condition: we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
John describes two present blessings believers experience when they live like Jesus and walk in the Light as God Himself is in the Light:
The first present blessing believers experience as they walk in the Light as He is in the Light is that we have fellowship with one another.
One another refers to other likeminded followers of Jesus who are also in this fellowship of eternal life.
The term John used that is translated as fellowship is once again “koinōniá.” This is the last time this term appears in 1 John, but its prominence in the opening verses causes its theme to echo throughout the rest of John’s letter like a recurring motif.
To have fellowship with one another means to share fellowship with like-minded followers of Jesus. It means to share in the joy and community of eternal life with other people who are working together to proclaim, expand, and establish God’s kingdom. It is having an active, contributing role on Team-Jesus and being teammates with other believers who are likewise using their gifts and talents to please God.
And as John previously said, that fellowship with other Christ followers also includes fellowship with Jesus Christ, God’s Son, and with God the Father (1 John 1:3). This makes sense because all believers are a part of the body of Christ, so living in harmony with other believers is also having fellowship with Christ, for we are His body.
It is interesting to note that John does not explicitly state that those who walk in the Light will “have fellowship with God,” but rather with one another. But, if we take it in the context of 1 John 1:3, we see that “our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” Therefore, it is inferred that those who walk in the Light and/or have fellowship with one another will also be in fellowship with God, for indeed God is the Light that we walk in.
John’s emphasis infers that there is no fellowship with God that does not involve fellowship with one another. Again, this makes sense given that believers are the body of Christ. It is also consistent with Matthew 6:14-15, where Jesus says the reason that we should pray for God to forgive us as we forgive others is because He does not forgive those who refuse to do so. The inference is that refusing to seek restoration of fellowship with fellow believers is a condition of having fellowship with God.
During what is sometimes called Jesus’s “high priestly prayer” (His last recorded words in the Gospel of John before His arrest), Jesus prayed for His disciples and for all those who would come to believe in Him through their word to have unity (John 17:20). In this prayer, Jesus prayed for all His followers to have unity with one another and have perfect unity with Him and His Father,
“The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity… Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am…”
(John 17:22-24a)
As Jesus prayed this, He was praying for His followers to have fellowship with one another and with Himself.
Having fellowship with God and with one another is an amazing blessing in this present life. Fellowship with Christ and His church is one of the present rewards of the Prize of Eternal Life. The present blessings of having fellowship with God and one another include:
(Romans 12:10, 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, Galatians 6:1-2, Ephesians 4:15-16, Philippians 1:2, Colossians 3:16, 1 Thessalonians 5:11, Hebrews 3:12-13, James 5:16).
(Hebrews 10:25).
(Matthew 10:19-20, 28:20b, John 15:4-5, 16:13, Galatians 5:16, 22-23, Philippians 3:10).
(John 14:21, 15:10, 12-17, 17:3, 1 John 2:3, 4:7).
(Ephesians 2:10).
So, if we walk in the Light as God is in the Light, we share fellowship and unity with one another as well as being united with Jesus as we face the trials of this life.
The second present blessing believers experience as they walk in the Light as He is in the Light is that the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
By the blood of Jesus His Son refers to Jesus’s bloody execution on the cross when His sacrificial death atoned (paid the penalty) for the sins of the world. John repeatedly recalls this sacrifice throughout this letter:
“And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.”
(1 John 2:2)
“In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”
(1 John 4:10)
Here in verse 7, John says that the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses those who walk in the Light as He is in the Light.
Notice how the verb cleanses is in the present tense. This verb is also in the present-continuous tense in Greek. This means that the cleansing is perpetual and ongoing as we walk in the Light as He is in the Light. By using the verbs walk and cleanse in the present tense (v 7), John implies that this cleansing is an ongoing process.
If we walk in the Light as He is in the Light, which means to choose obedience and to reject temptation, Jesus’s blood is constantly cleansing us from all sin.
Because this is a present and ongoing cleansing, the cleansing of all sin referred to in 1 John 1:7 is not the pardon of sin and its penalty of eternal damnation. Believers received the pardon from the penalty of eternal damnation when they received the Gift of Eternal Life. The Gift of Eternal Life’s forgiveness becomes forever ours the moment we believe in Jesus and trust in His sacrifice on the cross. The Gift’s pardon forgives us of all past sins, present sins, and future sins that we may commit.
Once we receive the Gift of Eternal Life:
“God made [us] alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.”
(Colossians 2:13-14)
“Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
(Romans 8:1)
Once we are born into God’s family and forgiven, there is no sin so great, there is nothing and no one, that can take us out of God’s hand or separate us from His love (John 10:28-29, Romans 8:38-39). All sins are nailed to the cross, but we still have our flesh, our old man (Romans 7:17). And Jesus is our Advocate if we sin (1 John 2:1).
But we still have inner desires that seek to lead us astray (James 1:14-15). Our awareness of our sin is a gradual process of learning.
This means that even as we walk in the Light as He is in the Light, we still have sin (see 1 John 1:8: “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us”). The inference is that at any point in time, we have sin of which we are unaware. But if we walk in the Light based on what we know and understand, then Jesus takes care of the rest. His blood cleanses us.
When Jesus washed Peter’s feet, He told Peter that he was already clean but needed to have his feet washed. This is a picture of a believer’s fellowship. Believers are unconditionally placed into Christ through the cross. But to be clean requires confession of our sins. 1 John 1:9 will tell us that if we confess our sins, Jesus will forgive them.
So the picture we derive from 1 John 1:7-9 is as follows:
This is an amazing picture of a patient teacher helping us grow and learn. As we learn to be sanctified, set apart from the world to live for Him, Jesus graciously covers the sins of which we are unaware, and focuses on teaching us to crucify the sins of which we become aware.
As James 1:21 states, the solution to the sin we have within us is to set it aside and replace it with God’s word. This is an ongoing process of sanctification. This is God’s will for the lives of believers, that we be sanctified (1 Thessalonians 4:3).
Jesus’s constant cleansing of all our sin shows us that when we walk in obedience to the Light we know, we still need the cleansing of Jesus’ blood because there is more we do not know. Even in our walk of faith it is ultimately through Jesus’s death and resurrection that we can have fellowship with God. When we walk in obedience in the resurrection power of Jesus, He takes care of what we cannot.
Intentional and Unintentional Sins
If walking in the Light as He is in the Light means we reject sin and choose to follow God by faith, how can we still have sin? Doesn’t sinning and having sin mean that we are walking in darkness? How can we have sin and still be in the Light?
To answer these questions biblically, we need to distinguish between intentional sin and unintentional sin.
Intentional sin is deliberate disobedience to God’s word. Intentional sin is any action that we undertake or attitude that we harbor with a sense of understanding that it goes against God’s commands or His will for our lives. Intentional sin is something that we know defies God’s word.
Unintentional sin is something that we do unknowing that defies God’s word. Unintentional sin is sinning in ignorance. Unintentional sin is still sin. It causes offense and its wages are still death. Therefore, unintentional sin requires cleansing by the blood of Jesus.
The Law of Moses explained how to deal with unintentional sins. Most of Leviticus 4 deals with various sin offerings for unintentional sins. It gave different sacrificial requirements for:
(Leviticus 4:2-12)
(Leviticus 4:13-2)
(Leviticus 4:22-26)
(Leviticus 4:27-31)
The Book of Numbers also prescribed sacrifices for unintentional sins (Numbers 15:27) and penalties for deliberate sins of defiance (Numbers 15:30-31). There was no sacrifice for sins done willfully (Numbers 15:8-30, Hebrews 10:26).
David meditated about the difference between intentional and unintentional sins.
David rhetorically asked himself about unintentional sins: “Who can discern his errors?” (Psalm 19:12a). The expected answer is: “no one can discern his own errors.” Then David asked God to: “acquit me of hidden faults” (Psalm 19:12b).
Next David spoke about intentional sins. David asked God to:
“Also keep back Your servant from presumptuous sins;
Let them not rule over me.”
(Psalm 19:13a)
Finally, David said that if God would protect him from intentionally sinning, “Then I will be blameless and I shall be acquitted of great transgression” (Psalm 19:13b).
Together, these passages show that John is not redefining sin but is rather carrying forward the same biblical categories already present in the Law and the Psalms. For believers to share fellowship with Him, God expects us to deal with the sins we know about by confessing and repenting of them (Matthew 4:17, 1 John 1:9), and He takes care of the rest. But He also expects us to recognize that we have a continuing need, because even when we are walking in the Light we still have sin (1 John 1:8).
Walking in the Light does not reaching a state of sinless perfection, as 1 John 1:8 insists. It means living in a posture of faith, obedience, and honesty before God, where sin is neither embraced nor hidden. Intentional, defiant sin—what David called “presumptuous sins” (Psalm 19:13)—places a person in opposition to God’s will and aligns with walking in darkness.
By contrast, unintentional sin occurs even while a believer is genuinely oriented toward God, seeking to obey Him, and walking in His Light. Such sin does not characterize one’s walk, nor does it define one’s allegiance, but it does require cleansing and restoration.
This is why John says that those who walk in the Light still have sin that the blood of Jesus continually cleanses away. The blood of Jesus continually cleanses away all sin—even the unintentional sins of those who walk in the Light (1 John 1:7). Unintentional sin is still committed even by those who walk in the Light but they do not result in lost fellowship with God. It is intentional sins that break fellowship with God and cause us to walk in darkness.
The author of Hebrews describes the unpleasant experience that believers who choose to intentionally continue in sin and to walk in darkness will experience at their judgment:
“For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.”
(Hebrews 10:26-27)
The author of Hebrews contrasts this fearful and dreadful experience with the hope and confidence faithful believers can enjoy when they boldly enter the presence of Jesus with their “hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience” (Hebrews 11:19-22, quoted: Hebrews 11:22).
Like 1 John, the author of Hebrews is talking about the loss of fellowship and the Prize of Eternal Life in these verses. Neither Hebrews or 1 John, nor anywhere else in scripture indicate that a believer can lose the Gift of Eternal Life (Romans 11:29). But scripture is also consistent that when His people choose to walk in the ways of the world they will experience serious adverse consequences, because sin separates us from our design, and that separation is death (Deuteronomy 30:17-19, Romans 1:24, 26, 28, 6:16).
The author of Hebrews describes unfaithful believers who sin willfully as being those who trample over the Son of God as they walk in darkness. The author describes the consequences they will suffer as being much more severe than the consequences laid out for willful disobedience in the Law of Moses (Hebrews 10:29).
The author of Hebrews reminds his readers that vengeance belongs to God, and that the LORD will judge His people, before concluding that it is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of a living God (Hebrews 10:30-31). In saying this, he quotes Deuteronomy 32:35. However, he ends the thought by quoting the next verse, which says:
“For the LORD will vindicate His people,
And will have compassion on His servants,
When He sees that their strength is gone,
And there is none remaining, bond or free.”
(Deuteronomy 32:36)
This tells us that even when God’s judgment is severe, when His refining fire burns hot, His full intent is still for our best. His ultimate aim is to have compassion upon His people.
And though John is writing so that “we may not sin,” he still assures us that even if we do walk in the darkness and sin, God does not reject us (even though He disapproves of our behavior), because “if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1).
But if we walk in the Light as He is in the Light, the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all our unintentional sin. This is a great comfort. If, as believers we will deal with the sin we know, Jesus takes care of all the rest so that we can continue to have joy and fellowship with God and remain in the Light with Him. It is also a sobering challenge, for if we fail to recognize and confess our sin, we can expect severe adverse consequences to be the result.