1 John 4:12-16

¹² No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us.

¹³ By this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.

¹⁴ And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world.

¹⁵ Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.

¹⁶ And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.

No one has seen God (v.12) — This is not quite the same statement as in John 1:18. … [There] the word is simply “to see,” and the declaration there is that God is invisible. Here, however, the verb implies contemplation, something of more comprehensive character than merely seeing. In both statements the stress is on the word “God,” which in each case stands first in the sentence in the original. — Vine, page 82-83.

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The connection with the preceding statement (v.12) seems to somewhat as follows: “While for anyone to behold God is an impossibility, and His presence is not discernible by contemplation, yet we may have the definite experience of His very presence, and this experience is made good in our case if we love on another. Moreover, His presence is not simply external, for He abides in us. He is not simply existent but resident. More still, since God is love, it follows that if we love one another, as is enjoined in His Word, His love has been perfected in us.” — Vine, page 83.

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His love (v.12) — is not simply our love to Him, nor again is it simply His love to man; the meaning seems to be that the love which characterizes Him (v.8), and has been manifested by Him (v.9), finds its expression and counterpart in the love which we exercise, and thus His love is perfected; that is to say, it reaches its fulfillment, in us. That this is the meaning is confirmed by verses 16 and 17 below. — Vine, page 83.

know (v.13) = know by continuous experience — both that we abide in Him and He abides in us

we (v.14) — John and the other apostles

has sent (v.14) — tense indicates a past event with continuing results

The connection [of verse 14 with the first 12 verses] is somewhat as follows: “While no man hath beheld God at any time, yet the Apostles had seen the Son of God, whom the Father had sent to be the Savior of the world, and who, being the Son of the Father, combined manhood with Deity, and is the great expression of God’s love. As, then, God has manifest His love in Christ, we are to show the same nature, the spirit of love, and this is possible only because the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from the Father, dwells in us. By this means God still reveals Himself through us. The Apostles, in companying with the Son of God in the days of His flesh, and subsequently to His resurrection, had themselves received personal evidence of this. To it they were bearing witness. Accordingly, through their testimony we are to continue to bear the same witness.” — Vine, page 84.

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There is a connection (v.15) with verse 2. The confession referred to there was in respect of the real humanity of Christ; here it has to do with His Divine Sonship. … In each place the confession is shown to be produced by the Holy Spirit, and here it involves the same spirit of love as was manifested by Christ, and a life that bears testimony to His saving power. … The tense of the verb rendered “confesses” conveys that thought not so much of time, as of decisiveness in the confession. — Vine, page 85.

we (v.16) — stressed, refers to all believers, those who have confessed that Jesus is the Son of God

That God is love (v.16) expresses His nature as made known to us in Christ. … Only by abiding in the love of God can true union with Him be realized. … The sending of His Son is a proof of God’s love, and the out-working of that love in us, in the exercise of love one to another, constitutes the great sign of the abiding presence of God within us and of our abiding in Him. — Vine, page 86.