 I say this because many deceivers who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming into the flesh have gone into the world. But pause here for a moment. Remember, John is battling Gnosticism. And one of the big things that the Gnostics believe is that the flesh itself was sinful. So Jesus could not have come as a human. So they denied the incarnation, believing he was nothing more than a phantom spirit. He appeared to be human, but he wasn't human.