2.03.26. Love the brotherhood
XX VL LOVE THE BROTHERHOOD.
“Love the brotherhood.”— 1 Peter 2:17.
ONSIDER now the precise species of affection which is due by Christians to those who are, fellow-members with themselves in the family of God: it is Love. There is a sense in which we ought to love the whole human race; but the love which is due to man as such is diflferent from that which we owe to the disciples of Christ. Love, indeed, is a generic emotion, comprehending several distinct species; and, as often happens in natural history, one of the species bears the same name with the genus. The generic love to mankind branches into pity for those that are without, and love, specifically so called, to those who are within.
1. Love to the brotherhood is an instinctive emotion.
It is not an accident, but a nature. It springs in renewed hearts, as love of her offspring springs in a mother’s breast.
It is the result not of an artificial policy, but of a natural law. The new creature owns and exercises instincts as well as the old. The members of Christ cannot but love their fellow-members. In as far as they have drunk into the Master’s spirit, they will follow the Master’s steps.
2. The Lord Jesus was not satisfied with the measure of this affection which existed among his followers during his personal ministry. He desired that it should be increased. For its increase he pleaded alternately with God and with man. “That they all may be one/’ was his prayer; “ Love one another,” was his command.
3. Those who are destitute of this affection themselves are acute enough to observe the want or weakness of it in Christians. The bitterness, malice, and envy which defile and disturb the Church, afford to scoffers a foundation all too solid for their railing. Among Christians the state of matters is bad, and among those who are not Christians it is counted and called worse than it is. We give some, and they take more, occasion to blaspheme.
4. Brotherly love among Christians, when it really exists, honours the Lord and propagates the gospel. Like the blood of the martyrs, it is the seed of the Church.
It has convinced many who resisted harder arguments.
5. It is the most pleasant of all emotions to the person who exercises it. Other passions may in certain circumstances be right and useful, but none generate so much joy as they flow. You may be “ angry and sin not; “ but you cannot be angry and suffer not. As a great gun recoils violently, and is heated and defiled within by every discharge, a human spirit is shaken and perhaps soiled by discharges of anger, even when it does well to be angry against evil deeds. But love is delightful in the exercise, both to the lover and the loved. It leaves behind no sourness and no sediment. “ Love is of God,” and its character corresponds to its origin. It constitutes the atmosphere of heaven, where there are no pain and no defilement. At home, in the Father’s house, when the whole brotherhood finally assemble, there will be no anger and no fear, — only love.
Love of the brotherhood is the command of God, and, consequently, the duty of men; but another thing goes before it to prepare its way — lies beneath it to bear its weight. Before you can love the brotherhood, you must be a brother. It is the new creature that experiences this hallowed affection. These pulses do not throb through severed limbs; these beautiful blossoms do not open on withered branches. Those who are one with Christ in faith, are in spiritual communion with “ the whole family in heaven and on earth.” When you and I are, and know that we are, members of Christ, we shall love one another as he loved us. Like draws to like. Although the gates of a lost paradise were opened again on earth, and you admitted within the long-forbidden precincts, if there were only, on the one hand, angel-spirits flitting to and fro as flames of fire on their Maker’s errands, never encumbered by a body of flesh; and, on the other hand, the dumb creatures, all tame and all submissive and affectionate according to their powers, — if there were these, and only these, for company, the place would be no paradise for you.
You would long to go forth again. You would rather contend with thorns and thistles outside, but in company of your kind. Man is not made for solitude. He must have a brother on whom he can lavish a brother’s love. Hence in Paul’s esteem heaven was desirable, because the Elder Brother’s presence is enjoyed there.