1 John 5:8

For there are three that bear witness, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and the three agree in one.

There are three that bear witness ... Note the use of the present tense, contrasting with the past tense of 1 John 5:6, a fact that indicates the three agreeing witnesses as giving their testimony at the time of John's writing and continuously thereafter.

The Spirit ... There is no doubt regarding the identity of this witness, the same being the inspired testimony of the holy apostles of Jesus Christ as revealed in the New Testament; and apart from that New Testament, there is no other authentic written source of the historical events which are the foundation of Christianity. Of the many claims in our own times regarding people claiming to "have the Spirit," not any one of them, nor all of them put together has ever produced a single line of intelligible teaching regarding the holy religion of Christ. In a lesser sense, of course, the earnest of the Holy Spirit given to all believers in Christ on condition of and subsequent to their repentance and baptism imparts the blessed fruit of love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, etc. (Galatians 5:22).

And the water ... At the time John wrote, the baptism of Christ could hardly have been spoken of as "witnessing" anything. It was a past event, by a whole generation; and John here spoke of the water as "witnessing" in the present tense. How could this be true? The grand initiatory rite of the Christian religion is a continual witness in all generations of the essential facts of the gospel; namely, the death, burial, and resurrection of the Son of God. The very form of the ordinance with its burial and resurrection to "walk in newness of life" was designed for that very purpose; and how Satan does hate it! In all ages and communities, a believer's baptism "into Christ" declares the gospel message. It is a continuing witness of almost cosmic dimensions, taking place thousands of thousands of times in every place and at every time throughout history. As Macknight stated it: "The water is the rite of baptism regularly administered in the Christian church to the end of the world."[14]

And the blood ... "The blood signifies the commemoration of the shedding of the blood of Christ for the remission of sins, in the Lord's Supper."[15] As the apostle Paul declared, "As often as ye eat this bread, and drink the cup, ye proclaim the Lord's death until he come" (1 Corinthians 11:26), thus clearly designating this grand ordinance of the religion of Christ as a continuing witness of the holy gospel until the end of time, "until he come." How could there be any doubt that John spoke of the same thing here?

[14] James Macknight, op. cit., p. 112.

[15] Ibid.