Children of God and Children of the Devil

"In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother" (1 John 3:10).

The Teaching of Zane Hodges and Joseph Dillow
The fruitful believer The partaker or heir The believing believer The overcomer	The barren believer The carnal one (non-heir) The saved person who stops believing The non-overcomer
This believer by his righteous living and love for his brethren clearly manifests that he is a child of God. Righteous living proves that a person is saved.	This saved person does not practice righteousness and does not love his brother. He lives like those who are children of the devil but this does not prove that he is lost.

See Bible Knowledge Commentary, page 895, for Hodges’ interesting comments concerning 1 John 3:10. According to Hodges, righteous living proves that a person is saved but wicked living does not prove that a person is lost. Apparently a person can gain assurance if he is living righteously, but if he is living wickedly he need not worry too much. Hodges teaches that saved persons can live just as wickedly as unsaved persons. Dillow says this: "When a Christian is ‘of the devil,’ John means that, when he commits even one sinful act, in the doing of that act, the source of it was Satan" (p.172).

But John is not speaking of one sinful act or a single occurrence of unrighteousness. He speaking of a person who does not practice righteousness. His life is characterized by practicing unrighteousness. He does not love his brother. He is likened to Cain, who was "of that wicked one" (v.12). Because he hates his brother he is likened to a murderer (v.15), "and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him" (v.15). It is hard to imagine what stronger words could have been used to describe an unsaved person!