According to 5:4, everything that has been begotten of God overcomes the world. We have seen that “everything” points to the human spirit. Therefore, it is the regenerated human spirit that overcomes the world. Regarding overcoming the world, we should not trust in our own ability or effort. From experience I can testify that we need to trust our spirit. Our spirit is well able to overcome Satan and the world, the evil system. But in ourselves we cannot overcome the world. When we exercise our spirit, stay in our spirit, and walk by our spirit, we shall see that our spirit has the life ability to overcome all negative things. This is why we need to exercise our spirit to have fellowship with the Lord and pray concerning the enjoyment of the Lord. We also need to exercise our spirit to call on the Lord’s name and to pray-read the Word. This exercise stirs up the ability in our spirit to overcome the world.
It is the divine life in our spirit that has the ability to overcome the evil, satanic world. We are surrounded by temptations. What can overcome them? The divine life in our spirit can overcome temptation. We all need to see that our spirit is mingled with the divine life and is the organ that can overcome the world.
In 5:4b John says, “And this is the victory which overcame the world—our faith.” This is the faith that believes that Jesus is the Son of God (5:5) that we may be begotten of God and have His divine life, by which we are enabled to overcome the Satan-organized-and-usurped world.
Actually, our trust should not be in our faith itself. The faith by itself does not overcome the world. Our faith brings us into an organic union, and it is this organic union, not the faith directly, that overcomes the world. We may use switching on electrical current as an illustration. The act of switching on is not the power itself. It is the means by which appliances are brought into union with electricity. In a similar way, we may say that faith is the means for us to “switch on” to the Triune God. By believing in the Lord Jesus, we are brought into organic union with the Triune God; we “switch on” to Him. This union, produced by faith, then overcomes the world.
In 5:5 John continues, “And who is he who overcomes the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” Such a believer is one who has been begotten of God and has received the divine life (John 1:12-13; 3:16). The divine life empowers him to overcome the evil world energized by Satan. Such believers are in contrast to the Gnostics and Cerinthians, who were not this kind of believer, but remained the pitiful victims of the evil satanic system. But our believing that Jesus is the Son of God brings us into an organic union with the Son, who is the embodiment of the Triune God. It is this organic union with the Triune God in the Son that overcomes the world.