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1 John 5:1 Updated American Standard Version (UASV)
5 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the one[14] loves whoever has been born of him.

We hear it again—one who believes in Jesus is born of God—but with a new twist: the person who loves the Father loves God’s child as well. This is an appeal to the natural order of things. If we love our parents, we should also love his children, our siblings.

Conceivably, a person might love his parents and not love his brother or sister. For the Christian, this is a test of regenerate character: if you love God, you will love your brothers, too. These extreme and stark terms were demanded by the seriousness of the situation in Ephesus. The antichrists were apparently acting hatefully toward Christians, so the Ephesians needed the contrast of love with hate, not perfect love with imperfect love. We do not have to love our brothers perfectly to manifest a regenerate heart. We may love them imperfectly as we all do. If we hate them, as the antichrists did, we cannot have any confidence that we are born again.

By David Walls and Max Anders