<p>3:24- see on 1 Jn. 2:24.</p><p><em>And he that keeps His commandments abides in Him and He in him. And hereby we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit which He gave us</em>- As noted on :23 and 2:3, the &quot;commandments&quot; here refer effectively to the one great commandment, to love as He loved us. To have His Spirit abiding in us is parallel in effect to living in the spirit of love as He loved us. The indwelling of the Spirit is therefore connected to our living in love. The Lord's spirit could be summarized in that word, &quot;love&quot;. Into our hard hearts there comes His heart, His spirit into our spirit, His word / <em>logos</em> / essence of being into ours. And the most essential spirit of Jesus was love for the Lord's people, unto death for our salvation. Here then is real help and hope for those who have been so bruised by life that they feel they can never love. And indeed, who can seriously think that in their own strength, they could love as Christ loved us, unto the death of the cross? The fact is, we have been given His spirit, and this is how He abides in us; and He abides in us if we keep His commandment to love. It's not that we get the Spirit as a reward, as it were, for being loving. We are given the Spirit when we are baptized, when we first believe. It is the empowerment to keep the great commandment of love. For His spirit in the end is the spirit of His love, in a word. &quot;The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto us&quot; (Rom. 5:5). Hence we read of &quot;the love of the Spirit&quot; (Rom. 15:30); and love is <em>the </em>singular fruit of, or brought forth by, the Spirit.</p>