Section 5–12

It is good to help those who teach the truth

Read 5–12 carefully.

Section Theme: This section contains the main points John is writing to Gaius about. He praises Gaius for helping the traveling Christian preachers and encourages him to follow the good example of Demetrius rather than the bad example of Diotrephes.

Paragraph 5–8

Read 5–8 in both Berean Standard Bible and Good News Translation. Compare the two versions.

Paragraph Theme: John praises Gaius for helping the traveling preachers. He explains that Christians should help these people because they are serving Christ and relying on fellow Christians to supply all they need.

5

you are faithful: (Focus) John is not simply praising Gaius for being faithful. He is saying that the help which Gaius gives to the brothers proves that he is faithful.

faithful: (Lexical Problem) In your translation you may need to state who Gaius is faithful to John probably means that Gaius is faithful to God or Jesus.

what you are doing: (Translation) John does not state exactly what Gaius did, but from the rest of the letter it is clear that he welcomed the brothers into his house and provided them with what they needed.

are doing: (Tense) This probably refers both to what Gaius has done in the past for some brothers and to what he is still doing for those who come to him.

strangers: (Meaning) The meaning here is that some of the brothers were not previously known to Gaius (they probably came from distant towns or provinces). But he nevertheless helped them just because they were Christians.

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All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible. BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.