1 John 4:10
Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Study Note
Study Note
The definition of love offered in 1 John 4:10 — 'not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins' — inverts the natural assumption that love's direction is human to divine and grounds the entire ethic of love in divine initiative. The aorist 'he loved us' (ēgapēsen hēmas) points to the historical event of the cross as the defining instance of that love, connecting the theological statement directly to salvific history. The structure of verse 10 directly parallels Romans 5:8 ('God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us'), indicating shared early Christian theological grammar. The practical consequence — 'if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another' (verse 11) — makes the horizontal love ethic a participation in and extension of the vertical love received.
Other Translations
Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
in this is the love, not that we loved God, but that He did love us, and did send His Son a propitiation for our sins.
And this is love, not that we had love for God, but that he had love for us, and sent his Son to be an offering for our sins.
Cross References
The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any …
But because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, …
Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an …
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not …
Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth …
Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the …
To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which …
But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being …
For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he …