Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Error

1 John 3:24 - 4:6 

24 Now he who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.  4:1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, 3 and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world.  4 You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. 5 They are of the world. Therefore they speak as of the world, and the world hears them. 6 We are of God. He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

If we follow obediently out of love and not duty, we live and move and have our being in Christ.  We know this to be true, that Christ lives and remains in us, by the validation of God’s Spirit living in us; if we do not have Him in us, we are not His and are merely working to become His (as if we ever could by our own efforts).  Because He lives in us and teaches us all things (John 14:26, 1 John 2:27), we are able to validate the truth of what we hear to discern truth from error, to test the source of what we hear by knowing the scriptures and understanding from God’s thoughts (1 Corinthians 2:12-16).  Therefore we are aware of lying spirits and their prophets who deny Jesus Christ came as a man (John 1:1, 14) yet is wholly God as well (Colossians 2:9), for only those who admit, believe, and teach that He is fully man and God are speaking truly.  Those who are opposed to Christ would deceive us if possible as they do the rest of the world, and we do not need to await a final Antichrist to see that same spirit at work already.  We who have been called out into Christ know these things and are wary of false teachers.  Ah, but we need not fear, for God Himself has taken up residence in His children, and we can discern truth from error, the lying spirits from the Holy Spirit of truth.  This is how we overcome the lies of the world and its system of anti-Christian teachings, by listening to the truth as validated by the source of truth within us already.  God who lives in is and never leaves us is greater than all these, and they can continue to speak lies, but we listen to Christ and the truth.  Because we are God’s, those who are His listen to us when we speak truth, but those not of His sheep refuse to listen (John 10:26).  This is the test of those not of God following spirits of error and those called by Him who are of the Spirit of truth.