Beloved, do not imitate evil but imitate good. Whoever does good is from God; whoever does evil has not seen God.
I. Diotrephes, unlike Gaius, loved preeminence and refused apostolic authority, spreading malicious words. He did not accept John’s letter and discouraged others from showing hospitality, casting them out of the church. John warns that he will address this behavior when he visits. II.
Commenting on 3 John 1:9-11
Beloved, follow not that which is evil,.... Follow not evil in general, it being hateful to God, contrary to his nature and will, and bad in itself, as well as pernicious in its consequences; and particularly follow not, or do not imitate the particular evil or evils in Diotrephes; as his pride, ambition, love of preeminence, and tyrannical government in the church, and especially his...
Verse 11. Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. There can be no doubt that in this exhortation the writer had Diotrephes particularly in his eye, and that he means to exhort Gaius not to imitate his example.