2 John: walk in the truth

About the book

At thirteen verses, 2 John is with 3 John one of the two shortest books of the New Testament. Its writer calls himself simply "The elder" (2 John 1:1), a word for an older man and for a leader of a church.

The church has traditionally taken the elder to be the apostle John in his old age. The letter speaks the language of 1 John: the commandment "we have had from the beginning" to love one another (2 John 1:5), and deceivers who deny Jesus Christ come in the flesh (2 John 1:7). An apostle could bear the title: Peter was "a fellow elder" (1 Peter 5:1). On this view John wrote at Ephesus about AD 90; the map under the Jesus tab sets John's three letters last in the era of the church (c. AD 30–90).

Eusebius, the fourth-century church historian, counted 2 and 3 John among the books disputed, though received by many, unsure whether they were the evangelist's or another John's Eusebius, Church History 3.25, and he read in Papias an ‘elder John’ distinct from the apostle Church History 3.39. So many scholars take the elder to be that other John, or a leader among John's followers; many others, among them evangelicals, who stress the authority of Scripture and the telling of the gospel, hold that he was the apostle: Papias calls the apostles too ‘elders’, and may be naming the one John twice.

The letter is addressed "To the chosen lady and her children" (2 John 1:1). Many read the lady as a church and her children as its members, for greetings come from "The children of your elect sister" (2 John 1:13), a sister church, and in Greek the letter often says ‘you’ in the plural. Others read a Christian woman and her family; John Wesley took ‘lady’ (Kyria) for her name Wesley.

How it unfolds

The thirteen verses fall into four parts: the greeting (vv. 1–3); joy over children walking in the truth, and the call to love one another (vv. 4–6); a warning not to welcome deceivers (vv. 7–11); and the hope of a visit face to face (vv. 12–13).

Key passages

In this letter truth and love are never apart, and love itself is defined:

And this is love, that we walk according to His commandments. This is the very commandment you have heard from the beginning, that you must walk in love.

2 John 1:6

Yet love does not help to undo the truth. "Many deceivers have gone out into the world" (2 John 1:7), denying that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, and the elder calls each of them antichrist.

Anyone who runs ahead without remaining in the teaching of Christ does not have God. Whoever remains in His teaching has both the Father and the Son.

2 John 1:9

So one who brings another teaching is not to be taken in: "do not receive him into your home or even greet him" (2 John 1:10). Travelling teachers then lodged in believers' homes, and to take them in was to share in their work (2 John 1:11). This is no call to shun every Christian who differs. Matthew Henry adds that to those who hold the great doctrines of Christ but "differ from us in lesser matters" Matthew Henry we must show kindness. On discernment, see How can I tell a heresy or cult?

The book and Christ

This letter guards the truth of who Christ is: "Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father" (2 John 1:3), who truly came in the flesh, as John's Gospel says, "The Word became flesh" (John 1:14); see The incarnation. Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the life" (John 14:6), so to walk in the truth is to remain in him and to love one another as he commanded.

Reading it

It takes five minutes. Open 2 John and notice ‘truth’ five times in its first four verses. It reads like 1 John's teaching sent in brief to one church, so read it with 1 John, then go on to 3 John: 2 John says not to welcome false teachers, 3 John to welcome those who work for the truth.

Practice