We now come to doctrinal tests of truth.
"Test every spirit". Just because someone claims to speak on God's behalf, or claims to be inspired, does not mean that they actually are. Could be talking complete nonsense, they could be deluded, they could seeking to deceive. In Deuteronomy were saw that there were two key tests of the genuineness of a prophet. One was whether what they said turned out to be true, and the other was whether or not it led people to worship only the Lord. The Bible is consistent in urging a level headed approach to all forms of teaching and inspired utterances. We are to test things, for not everything is from God.
A particular test is given here, namely whether or not the teaching/prophecy acknowledged that Jesus came in the flesh. What does this mean? Well it means that Jesus is fully God and fully human, and that He came as a man,right from conception. One of the false teachings going around was that the spirit of God came upon Jesus. Ie He was not God until the Spirit came upon Him. There were other variations that all denied the incarnation of Jesus, ie that God became man. We still get versions of this around today. Any teaching that denies that Jesus was fully God and fully man is wrong.
These sorts of teachings are the spirit of antichrist, ie they are are opposed to Christ.
Now this test is equally true today. However, it is not the only one. The Gnostic type teaching was the heresy that John's hearers were encountering at the time, so it is the one that John addresses here.
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