Life and eternal life are synonymous. There is no life without eternal life. With the God-Man Christ, life appeared in our world, in the world of death and pseudo-life. In the God-Man we saw the right life, only eternal life is the only right life. This is evident only in the God-Man Lord. The whole of the God-Man and all of Him is the breath and radiance of eternal life. There is no thought of His that does not begin in eternal life and is not completed in Him, "in eternal life." Likewise, His every feeling, word, and deed stems from eternal life.

In the God-Man Lord, there is a constant presence of the eternal. And the waves of eternal life overwhelm us with all that is in Him. Do you want to see how to live forever in time? Ask Jesus. Only in the God-Man Jesus is contained everything pertaining to eternal life. For as the Father hath life in Himself, so also hath the Sons life in Himself (John 5:26). This is the most obvious proof and testimony. All this is shown with infinite accuracy in the verse "And the life appeared, and seen, and we testify, and proclaim to you eternal life, which is with the Father, and hath appeared unto us."

Before the coming of the God-Man, death was in us and around us, and people did not know what eternal life was, nor how to attain eternal life. But He did not leave us alone, but came and appeared among us.

1:3. ... If we have seen and heard, we will tell you, that you also have fellowship with us: but our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. (Of the things which we have seen and heard, we declare unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: but our fellowship is with the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ.)

Where does St. John the Theologian take and present this testimony from? From my personal experience. He tasted eternal life, attained communion with it, and won the right to dwell in it through the Lord Jesus. And how could he who lived in Him not have unity with the Lord? He was in eternal life even then. This life is essentially communion with the Trinitarian Deity. Everyone is Trinity-Created, three-fold through the God-Man, and this is nothing other than existence in eternal life. Everyone sees and feels eternal life in Christ for himself. Christians are different from other people because they have eternal life, because they have personal experience and personal contemplation of the eternal. For this reason the eyewitness, St. John the Theologian, testifies with inspiration and truth: "As we have seen and heard, we will tell you, that ye also may have communion with us: but our communion is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ." The life of Christians is life with the Divine Trinity, visible communion with Her, communion with Her life-giving, creative, eternal powers.

Contemplation of the eternal gives people true eternal life. This is not an external observation, but the inner life of the Holy Trinity. This is the true communion of man with God, deification, deification, life in God. In this way, everything is personally experienced, animated, everything is "alive", born anew. The whole God the Word entered into man and became man, entered into a human body and became incarnate. The word is in the body of man, has entered us, has become the same with us (except sin), exists among us.

With Him, all life becomes eternal, and all truth is also eternal, and all love is eternal, and all light is eternal, and all perfection is eternal.

St. John the Theologian is clear here: the entire life of Christians flows in the Holy Trinity "from the Father, through the Son in the Holy Spirit." This is nothing but communion with the Holy Trinity. Our communion with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. Because God is among us to be in us, He is with us to be in us.

1:4. And this we write to you, that your joy may be fulfilled. (And this we write to you, that your joy may be complete.)

From this life in the Holy Trinity, from this communion with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the human essence is filled with true joy, which is nothing other than Divine bliss.

Without it, the human essence is filled with sorrow, bitterness, unhappiness, poverty. Without this blessedness, it cannot but be filled with death and, above all, with sin. By means of each sin, if not a rushing stream of bitterness, then at least an assertive stream of sinful passions settles in the soul, which constantly turns into bitterness and abomination. In each case, the one who sins takes into his heart drop after drop from this bitterness and abomination, which imperceptibly but also mercilessly spills over the soul, which over time grows and turns into torment, anguish, and sheer sorrow without limit. And very often a person wonders where this sadness came from in his heart. Communion with Christ, Who helps in the acquisition of holy virtues, fills the human essence with indescribable joy. From living in the love of Christ, in the truth, kindness, humility and meekness of Christ, the human soul is filled with the unimaginable, Divine Resurrection. And, observing himself, a person is convinced that he is filled with Divine bliss, without the presence in him of sorrow, which is brought by sin, without the presence of fear, which is brought by death. That is why St. John the Theologian preaches the gospel: And this we write to you, that your joy may be filled.

1:5. And this is the promise that we have heard from Him, and we will tell you that God is light, and there is not a single darkness in Him. (And this is the gospel which we have heard from Him, and we declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in Him.)

These words contain an extremely important gospel of the God-man. God is light. He is the beginning and source of all light, all that is good, all that is just and immortal! It is all-truth, all-good, all-justice, all-immortality, and in no case is and cannot be the beginning and source of evil, sin and falsehood. The good news is that Christ said and showed by His life that since God is indisputably and unconditionally light, there is not a trace of darkness in Him, not a single darkness. Where is the darkness in the God-man? Where is sin in Him? No one will ever point out a single sin in Him, since He was completely sinless. Darkness comes from sin, and sin comes from the devil, who is perfect darkness. Since the devil is the devil (Greek, slanderer), everything in him is an essence opposite to God. God is Light, the devil is darkness. God is Life, the devil is death. God is the Truth, the devil is a lie. After all, our Lord Jesus Christ, as the true God, can say of Himself: "I am the Light of the world" (John 8:12), "I am the Light of life." And the devil can say, "I am the darkness of the world," "I am the darkness of life." It is only because of him that the world is in place, people cannot see the meaning of this world and the purpose of life. With his darkness, the devil darkens the eyes of people, so that they do not see that there is essentially the world and what truly is life. If human eyes can see, then Christ necessarily exists. Only with the light of Christ do we see. Therefore, if we do not see, we have eyes in vain.

1:6. If we say that the communion of the Imam is with Him, and we walk in darkness, we lie, and do not do the truth... (If we say that we have fellowship with Him, but walk in darkness, then we are lying and not doing the truth.)