The Root of Truth

1 John 4:2 KJV

Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God:

According to Albert Barnes, the question at stake in the day of John's writing was whether Jesus Christ was a man. Among the late first century thinkers of Christian teaching, there was little question that Jesus was the Son of God. The question they wrestled with was whether He ever was truly a man or only seemed to be.

• Perhaps, they reasoned, He only seemed to be tempted
• Perhaps He only seemed to have suffered
• Perhaps He only seemed to have died

The question then was concerning the incarnation. Did God truly become man?

The issue has turned around today. Few question the historical veracity that the man Jesus Christ lived. Even among

• Non-Christians
• Secular historians and
• Practitioners of Islam

there is little debate that Jesus lived. The question today is whether the man Jesus Christ was in fact, God. 

This passage holds true from either perspective. The doctrine that Jesus is both God and man is a foundational doctrine of truth. Not that it is the only true essential doctrine or even that is the difference between salvation or not, but it is the essential doctrine upon which all other doctrine must rest.