BROTHERLY LOVE
Another evidence is love to the brethren. The Gospel breathes the spirit of
love. Love is the fulfilling of its precepts, the evidence of its power, the
pledge of its joys, and the ripe fruit of the Spirit. “A new commandment,”
says our Lord to His disciples, “give I unto you, that you love one another”
(John 13:34). “And this is his commandment, that we should believe on his
Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another” (I John 3:23). This is emphatically
a new commandment. It has a new object, not specified in the original law of
love and obviously a different affection than that which is required in the
moral law. Brotherly love is an affection which is limited to particular
characters. There can be no doubt but the children of God are kindly
affectioned toward all men because Christian benevolence runs parallel with
rational being.
Genuine love to our neighbor is extended to all, according to their
character and circumstances. It blesses those who curse us, and does good to
those who hate us. This, however, is not the distinguishing nature of
brotherly love. Brotherly love differs materially from the love of a general
feeling of good will. It is the love of good men, and for their goodness
only, and extends only to the followers of Christ. It is an affection which
is directed toward the excellence of religion, and consists in a delight in
holiness. Everyone that is of the truth, everyone that is born of God, of
whatever condition, or nation under heaven, is to be loved with this
affection. There is something in the character of every child of God that
reflects the image of his heavenly Father, and it is this that attracts the
eye and wins the heart. There is something which is amiable and lovely, and
it is this loveliness that gives a spring to the affections and draws forth
the hearts of God’s people toward God Himself.
The children of God are partakers of the Divine nature. From bearing the
image of the earthly, they now bear the image of the heavenly. God has
imparted to them a portion of His own loveliness; He has formed them new
creatures; of His free and distinguishing grace, He has made them more
excellent than their neighbors and hence they are lovely. 59 They are the
excellent of the earth. God loves them, Christ loves them, the Holy Spirit
loves them, angels love them, and they love each other. It is around those
who the virtues cluster; from those who the graces of heaven are reflected,
though shaded, and very often darkened by debasing and reproachful sins.
Love to the brethren is also an affection which rests upon the union which
believers sustain with Christ. The Lord Jesus, together with all true
believers, forms one mystical body. Christ is the Head and they are the
members. The same bond which unites believers to Christ binds them to each
other. The love which is exercised toward the Head extends to the members.
The union necessarily involves a union of affection. Those who love Christ
love those who are like Him and those who are beloved by Him. Here all
distinctions vanish. Name and nation, rank and party, are lost in the common
character of believers, the common name of Christian. Jew and Gentile, bond
and free, rich and poor, are one in Christ Jesus (Gal. 3:28).
They have one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God, and Father of all, who
is above all, and through all, and in them all (Eph. 4:5- 6). Actuated by
the same principles, cherishing the same hopes, animated by the same
prospects, laboring under the same discouragements, having the same enemies
to encounter, and the same temptations to resist, the same hell to shun, and
the same heaven to enjoy, it is not strange that they should love one
another sincerely and often with a pure heart fervently. There is a unity of
design, a common interest in the objects of their pursuit which lays the
foundation for mutual friendship and which cannot fail to excite the
“harmony of souls.” The glory of God is the grand object which commands
their highest affections and which necessarily makes the interest of the
whole the interest of each part, and the interest of each part the interest
of the whole. There are no conflicting interests and there need be no
jarring passions. In a common cause which in point of importance takes the
place of every other and all others, the affections of the sanctified heart
are one. The Lord Jesus has given peculiar emphasis to the duty of brotherly
love, by constituting it the easy and decisive standards of true godliness.
It is by this standard that His disciples are to 60 judge of themselves. “We
know,” says an apostle, “that we have passed from death unto life, because
we love the brethren” (I John 3:14).
This is the criterion also by which He would have the world judge of the
sincerity of their religion and the truth and divinity of His Gospel. “By
this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one to
another” (John 13:35). In that memorable prayer just before His death, He
also prays for His disciples “that they all may be one, as you Father are in
me and I in you, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe
that you has sent me” (John 17:21). With this standard before him, may not
every man ascertain whether he is a child of God? The love of good men is
not one of the native affections of the carnal mind. This cold, degenerate
soil bears no such heavenly fruit. The affection which Christians exercise
toward each other as Christians is the offspring of brighter worlds. It is a
principle of celestial birth. Love is of God, and everyone that loves is
born of God and knows God (I John 4:7).
It cannot be difficult to distinguish this Christian grace from a mere
natural affection or mercenary or sectarian attachment. A parent may love
his child, and a child his parent; a husband may love his wife and a wife
her husband; and there may exist much and reciprocal affection between one
man and another; while the personal religion of the party beloved
constitutes none of the reasons of this affection. People may have been
educated to esteem and respect pious men while this respectful sentiment
falls far below the love of men as Christians and for their Christianity.
Men may love Christians merely because they imagine that Christians love
them. This, like every other affection that is purely selfish, is unworthy
of the Christian name. They may love particular Christians because they are
of their denomination and imbibe their sentiments. This too is nothing
better than that friendship of the world which is enmity with God.
The obvious inquiry is: Do you love the people of God because they are the
people of God? Because you discover in them the amiableness of that religion
which is altogether lovely? Do you love them, not merely because they love
you or have bestowed favors upon you; not because they are of your party,
but because they bear the image of your heavenly Father? Do you love them
for their love of God, their self-denial, their heavenliness, their
usefulness in the world, their reproachless example, their faithfulness and
love of duty? Do you love them when they reprove you, and when their example
condemns you? And do you love them in proportion to the measure of these
excellencies which they possess? Do you feel an interest in them and for
them? Can you bear and forbear with them? Can you forget their infirmities,
or do you rejoice to magnify them? Can you cast the mantle of charity over
their sins and pray for them, and watch over them, and pity, and love them
still? And can you feel thus and act thus toward the poorest and most
despised of the flock and that because he is a Christian? If so, here is
your encouragement “He that loves is born of God” (I John 4:7).