¹¹ For this is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. ¹² Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous. ¹³ Do not be surprised, my brothers and sisters, if the world hates you. ¹⁴ We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death. ¹⁵ Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him.

¹⁶ This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. ¹⁷ If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? ¹⁸ Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

For the past couple of weeks we have been studying what the children of God look like and how to tell them apart from the children of the devil. One of the greatest indicators of a child of God is simply one who practices righteousness. One who has an inner desire to please God, their Father. This is natural tendency of a spiritual child of God that is unnatural to the fleshly nature. It shows that God has indeed put his own spirit within us that cries out, Abba, Father!

The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” – Romans 8:15

 As adopted children, God has given us of his very own Spirit and our spirit calls out to his spirit, the depths of our heart call out to the depth of his. (Psa. 42:7) There is a new spirit imparted to us, and it is a spirit of love, for God himself is love.

 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. – 1 John 4:8

 As God’s adopted children, we begin to walk somewhat clumsily at first, according to this new spirit within us, to this new nature and our old nature is slowly being put to death as our new nature is growing as we look to God as our Father, as we seek to imitate Him, to imitate Christ, making Jesus our idol in a big brother, hero worship way as small children do. They imitate that which they are around, love and admire. This is what it means to practice righteousness since he is righteous.

“We are built to imitate. If we don’t place ourselves in front of God, we will imitate that which we are in front of. Your boss at work, friends that you look up to. You will imitate what you are in front of.”

“We don’t just hear from God one time at salvation and then in obedience walk in it forever. We are consistently shined on by God to shine on others. We consistently need to receive from God, let it take root, and give to others. That is a daily, hourly routine. To the end we stop seeking revelation, we will cut off the source for everything else. That is why we press the scriptures so hard. It is the fuel for the rest of your Christian life.” – Barry Keldie, Sermon, Breadth, Width, Height & Depth.

In this new life of walking in the Spirit of love that God has planted in us, and of imitating Jesus, one of the ways we seek to imitate Jesus is through loving our brothers and sisters in the family. We love others as Christ loved us. This goes right back to 1 John 2:7-11 when we talked about the importance of walking in love according to the new commandment that Jesus Christ gave us.

 ³³ Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come.’ ³⁴ A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ³⁵ By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” – John 13:33-35

This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this that someone lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:12-13)

And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us – 1 John 3:23

For this is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another.

 This new commandment that Jesus gave us is the message we have heard from the beginning. It has not changed. Once again we are not learning anything new but are being reminded of the core creed of the Christian, our call to love others as Christ as loved us. It is by this love that all men recognize us as Christ’s disciples.

 “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” – John 13:35

A couple of weeks ago we talked about the extraordinary love of God our Father, which he has richly lavished upon us. It is this same love that we are called to lavishly pour out on our brothers and sisters in Christ specifically as God, the Father continues to pour it out on us. We are called to love others, to love our neighbors, to love our enemies, but there is to be a special, unique impenetrable love among us as brothers and sisters in Christ that binds us together as family.

Most of us have a brother or sister or have children with a brother and or sister if we were an only child, or have a parent with a brother or sister. We can attest to the unique relationship that exists between brothers and sisters or should exist. Many times, when it does not exist and brothers and sisters are estranged from one another, we know that something is seriously wrong. It’s not supposed to be this way. It’s not normal for brothers and sisters not to talk. As they grow older and begin to build their own families, move away, get busy they may not talk as much or be as close as they once were, however, there is a bond between them that no matter how long it has been they can pick right up where they left off just like it was yesterday. Sometimes this is a good thing and sometimes it’s a bad thing when we pick up right where we left off with our quarrels.

Siblings have unique and a somewhat mysterious relationship that others with siblings can understand instantly. They can understand the unique pain that comes with interacting with a sibling, there are unique stresses. Though you can pick your friends you cannot pick your siblings, they are assigned to you by God and sometimes you have to wonder how you two ended up as siblings. Sometimes you share nothing in common despite sharing the same bloodlines, the same background and heritage. Sometimes you have or meet siblings and they have everything in common, so much so that it is eerie how much they are alike. They have the same habits, tastes, gifts, temperament, sense of humor, hobbies, etc…

Siblings are fun. I don’t fight with anyone as much as I do my sister, even as an adult. It baffles my mind. I have a younger sister and I have an older sister. My older sister and I use to be close but as we grew older and married we diverged and went separate ways in tastes, religious views, opinions. It is healthy because I use to idolize her greatly. If she liked anything, I liked it period. I imitated her in everything. Use to follow her around constantly and annoy her to death. Today even though we have grown apart somewhat from distance and marriage, there is still a unique bond between us. I love Irving Berlin’s song Sisters from White Christmas.

Sisters, sisters
There were never such devoted sisters
Never had to have a chaperone, no sir
I’m there to keep my eye on her
Caring, sharing

Every little thing that we are wearing
When a certain gentleman arrived from Rome
She wore the dress, and I stayed home
All kinds of weather, we stick together
The same in the rain and sun

Two different faces, but in tight places
We think and we act as one those who’ve seen us
Know that not a thing could come between us
Many men have tried to split us up, but no one can
Lord help the mister who comes between me and my sister
And lord help the sister, who comes between me and my man

In thinking about the closeness and attachment of siblings, I found these wonderful quotes on siblings that highlighted the unique relationship between siblings which made me laugh and will make you laugh too as we build up this background we need to paint tonight.

Disclaimer: I found these quotes on Goodreads and can’t recommend any of the books because I didn’t see any on here that I recognize. I just always have enjoyed a good quote and these are some great ones.

“Christian is staring at us. He’s an only child and could never understand the delicate joys of sibling abuse.” ? Cynthia Hand, Hallowed

“It was the sibling thing, I suppose. I was fascinated by the intricate tangle of love and duty and resentment that tied them together. The glances they exchanged; the complicated balance of power established over decades; the games I would never play with rules I would never fully understand. And perhaps that was key: they were such a natural group that they made me feel remarkably singular by comparison. To watch them together was to know strongly, painfully, all that I’d been missing.” ? Kate Morton, The Distant Hours

 He’s my brother, my blood. He annoys the hell out of me most of the time, but when it comes right down to it I want to see him graduate from college and have little annoying mini-Alexes and mini-Brittanys running around in the future” ? Simone Elkeles, Rules of Attraction

“It’s a commonly expressed and rather nice, romantic notion that we are all “sisters” and “brothers.”
Let’s be real. Fact is, we might be better served to accept that we are all siblings. Siblings fight, pull each other’s hair, steal stuff, and accuse each other indiscriminately. But siblings also know the undeniable fact that they are the same blood, share the same origins, and are family. Even when they hate each other. And that tends to put all things in perspective.” ? Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

Siblings that say they never fight are most definitely hiding something” ? Lemony Snicket, Horseradish

We’re family, right? We foul up and say we’re sorry and let it go.” ? Christina Daley, Seranfyll

I think one of the things that stood out to me in these quotes and stood out to me in my own personal experience is that siblings fight a lot. They just do. There is no one in this world that I fight more with even now as an adult then my older sister. My younger sister I always related more to in a mother like fashion then a sibling. Because I had to take care of her and my younger brother. My older brothers had already moved out but my sister and I were siblings of the truest sort. The kind that pulled your hair, tattle tailed and would fight constantly but if someone outside the family tried to fight us that was another story. We could fight each other but no one else could fight my sister.

That was the other strong dynamic, you fight but there was a strong attachment, a bond that could not be broken. Siblings are our first lesson in learning how to love others unconditionally. Our spouses in marriage is our second level lesson. Everyone else in the world if you get mad at them, you can walk away and you don’t have to deal with them again. Not so with siblings, maybe as an adult sadly enough. You can see it happen but you know it’s a broken relationship. Not so with marriage relationship unless you divorce but once again although you see it happen, you know that it is a broken relationship and it shouldn’t be that way. Instead, these unique relationships are God’s classrooms to teach us how love unconditionally, how to forgive, how to bear with one another, how to persevere and so on.

There will always be disagreements among us and let downs and fights in both our sibling relationships and in our marital relationships because of our human nature, but instead of letting go God would have us to hold tight. Love never fails but perseveres.

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.⁸ Love never fails. – 1 Cor. 13:4-8

God would have us learn to love and grow in love through these unique sibling relationships and marriage relationships where he has binded us together as family units to love one another and to remain attached. Other relationships, employers, neighbors, friends, etc.. we have no such attachments.

This picture of siblings is a wonderful picture of us as church members and how we are called to love one another. We too have a unique relationship, a unique binding together through the sharing of God as our Father, through sharing his Spirit, through sharing the blood of Christ, through sharing the experience of salvation and sanctification and pains of spiritual grown and upbringing. God calls us to love one another and to relate to one another with the attachment of siblings. Yes, sometimes we fight and disagree, (Siblings that say they never fight are most definitely hiding something”) but instead of breaking up and leaving the family we forgive and bear with one another.” (We’re family, right? We foul up and say we’re sorry and let it go.”) Sometimes we wonder at our siblings who we share nothing in common with. We wonder how we can be part of the same family. That’s normal too. Sometimes we run into a brother or sister in Christ that we connect with and have so much in common with as our spirits are united that it is eerie but wonderful. In such cases, a sibling can understand you better in an instant having shared the same mind of Christ, the same struggles that you can communicate a thousand words with just a glance of the eyes. The world may not understand, but your sibling understands. Siblings are often a blessing from God.

One of my favorite verses is Psa. 68:6, “God sets the lonely in families.” So God has set us in families by giving us the church. In this church body, we protect one another, we provide for one another, we look out for one another, we rejoice with one another, we bear with one another, we confront one another, we annoy one another, we enjoy the delicate joys of sibling abuse as we tease one another. We are familiar with one anthers greatest weaknesses and strengths. We are one another’s greatest champions. The church is designed to be a place of rest, to be the place to receive all the spiritual support, emotional support, physical support of a healthy, functional family. In a time when so many families are broken and dysfunctional this world needs the church. You and I need the church. Saying one does not need the church or attend the church is like saying you do not need a family. It’s nonsense. God designed the family unit and he designed us to grow in families not only physically but also spiritually.

Many people see their relationship with God as a one way relationship. As long as they see themselves as good with God then they have no need to be good with everyone else. This is their idea of a “personal relationship with Jesus Christ.” It’s a private relationship. Although God does relate to each one of us individually and personally, he also relates to us corporately as a body, with him as a head. There are no living unattached body parts. If a body part is unattached it is dead. If a tree branch is unattached it is dead. In order to be alive, to be fully functioning member of a body you must be attached to the body. This is what it means to abide.

I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. ² He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. ³ You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴ Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

⁵ “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶ If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. ⁷ If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. ⁸ This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. (John 15:1-8)

Apart from staying attached to Christ’s body, we cannot bear fruit. Unattached Christians are fruitless Christians. No one can be the body to themselves. We are all individual parts placed in the body according to the spirit and God’s will. (1 Cor. 12)

We can only grow as we remain attached to the body. We can only bear fruit as we remain attached to the body. Being part of a body, we naturally, look out for the welfare and benefit of the entire body because if one part hurts we all hurt. If one part is missing, we all get overworked to cover for it.

A body does not attack itself…yet this is what we see happens. This is where illnesses come from. Autoimmune diseases. Cancer.

Many chronic diseases are the result of the body’s immune system mistakenly perceiving that the body is under attack from foreign bodies. A counterattack is then launched — an inflammatory response meant to vanquish the intruder. In reality, the immune system has misinterpreted the threat and is actually attacking the body’s own cells and tissue. –Science Daily

This same happens within the church body. “Normal” disagreements happen between members, between siblings and we as a body forget this essential truth from Eph. 6:12:

“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” – Eph. 6:12

Instead of fighting the foreign enemy, Satan, turning to God in prayer, seeking reconciliation, we turn against our own body and attack our own members as foreigners to be rejected from the body. The church body immune system misinterprets the threat and attacks itself.

Love one another. Love your siblings. Hang on. Stay attached. Remember who our enemy is and that we do not struggle against flesh and blood. The body should never attack itself but should always be looking out for the good and benefit of the body.

Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. – Romans 12:15-16

It’s abnormal to attack the body, to attack your own family and sibling. It’s the worse situation that any parent can imagine when one sibling harms another sibling. Yet it happens and Cain and Abel were the start of it back in Genesis 4.

¹² Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother.

After John’s call for us to love another, John tells us who not to imitate in our sibling relationship. Do not be like Cain who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother Abel. Cain and Abel were siblings. They shared the same blood ties, the same two parents, the same heritage and yet one sibling, Cain, slew his younger brother, in his anger and hatred. There is something very unnatural with a sibling killing another sibling.

Cain, was of that wicked one, Cain reflected the nature of Satan, his spiritual and moral characteristics, not that he was literally his offspring. Cain was of the one who is of a bad nature or condition, the wicked one. In a physical sense this means that Cain is of one who is of a bad nature in the sense they are blind or diseased. In an ethical sense it means Cain is of one who is evil, wicked or bad. Those who are of an evil nature are of the wicked one, the evil one who is of a very bad nature. They share the same nature of the devil, imitating him, growing in their bad nature instead of practicing righteousness, growing more cold and uncaring with each sin.

 Our natures are the essential qualities or characteristics by which something is recognized. It’s common for us to say, “That is just his nature.” He is always thoughtful. That is just his nature. She is always inconsiderate, that is her nature. She is always loud, rude, quiet, argumentative, manipulative, . These are the outstanding personality characteristics that we often use to describe others by their nature. These are the things we practice consistently wither intentionally or unintentionally. Often times we do things that are against our nature and others do not recognize us. We may say that is not like him or her. Maybe they were sick. .Maybe there was another influence because that is just not their nature to act this way. They don’t make it a habit or consistently practice such behavior. This is where we are when we sin. It was once our nature to react so but not anymore. Now when we react in such a manner, it’s not like us, because we have a new nature. It used to be our nature before we were saved through Jesus.

 ²⁹ They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, ³⁰ slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; ³¹ they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. ³² Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them. –Romans 1:29

 ¹¹ And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. – 1 Cor. 6:11

 Cain was of the wicked one. Cain was of bad nature. It was Cains nature to practice evil, harm towards others and not self-sacrificial, willful love..

 Cain murdered or slew his brother. The Greek word here is ”sphazo” meaning brutally murdered. There is an implication of violence and mercilessness in the way he put his brother Abel to death. Usually this word “sphazo” is used to refer to animal sacrifice where the animal is butchered and put to death but when it is used for human death it is a gruesome term for killing.

 12 And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous

 Why did Cain kill his brother Abel? Verse 12 tells us because his brothers works were righteous and his own works were evil. Evil is an adjective that describes. It means harmful, that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune. It means mischief-making, delighting in injuring, destructive, having or exerting a malignant influence. Such is the nature of those who are of the wicked one. They delight in doing evil. They find great pleasure in the misfortune of others and often laugh at it. They imitate their father’s nature.

 They exert a malignant influence. They exert a cancerous, dangerous to health, characterized by progressive and uncontrolled growth (especially of a tumor)

 A kakos (evil) man is willing to perish in his own corruption. But a pon?ros (pernicious) person, seeks to drag every one else down with himself into the corruption and destruction that awaits him. That is Satan. – Wuest. 1&2

Evil (poneris) Pernicious – Exceedingly harmful, working or spreading in a hidden and usually injurious way.

 Such is the way that the wicked one operates and all those who belong to him, working in hidden ways that are injurious to others. They hate to the light. They hate having their deeds exposed so they lie, they cover up their deeds or gloss them up. They would destroy with their rage and anger anything that would show their works to be evil.

 Cain murdered Abel because he was envious of him. If you remember the story from Genesis 4 both men offered sacrifices to God. Abel worked the flocks and brought fat portions of some of the first born of his flock. Cain worked the field and Cain brought fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. The Lord looked with favor on Abel’s offering but did not look with favor upon Cain’s offering and Cain went away angry because of this. Cain’s anger shows that he saw this as an injustice.

 Both Cain and Abel sought to worship and bring offerings to the Lord. However Cain’s sacrifice was contrary to God’s specified rules for the kind of sacrifice which he should have brought. We are not told what it was about Cain’s sacrifice that displeased God however in Heb 11:4 we are told that Abel by faith brought God a better offering than Cain did. We know that whatever is not of faith is sin. (Rom. 14:23)

 By faith Abel brought God a better offering than Cain did. By faith he was commended as righteous, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith Abel still speaks, even though he is dead. Heb. 11:4

 It is to be remarked, that all the figments by which men mock both God and themselves are the fruits of unbelief: – Calvin

 Afterwards, we see God speak with Cain asking him why he is angry and his face downcast. It reminds me of a father addressing his son, gently correcting him. God sees Cain’s heart. He sees he is upset and angry. God reminds Cain that if he does what is right, he too will be accepted. This tells us that there was a right way that Cain knew of to make an offering but he had gone about his own way and was upset when his own way didn’t find acceptance and yet his younger brother Abel did by following the right way.

 “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? ⁷ If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.” – Gen. 4:6

 In this we can see perhaps an older brother pride ruling over Cain’s heart. Doing things his own way instead of the right way according to God’s will. This idea is confirmed in Jude 1:10-11 when speaking of false teachers who follow their own way and slander what they do not understand. They are said to have taken the way of Cain.

Yet these people slander whatever they do not understand, and the very things they do understand by instinct—as irrational animals do—will destroy them. ¹¹ Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain

There is the way of God and the way of Cain. The way of the world can be seen as the way of Cain as they do things their own way instead of Gods and in the way they get angry at those who do things God’s way. It’s an age old spiritual heart problem that exists between God’s children and the children of the wicked one. We grew up together. In a sense we are siblings. We share the same flesh, the same blood of Adam, the same heritage, the same world. Because we do what is right, the world hates us. We are much like Isaac and Ishmael who shared the same father Abraham but one was illegitimate and one was a child of the promise. Ishmael, the older, illegitimate child was jealous of Isaac and still is today. There is a spiritual battle and there can be no peace between the Israelites and the Muslims.

 So it is with the world and Christians. It is the nature of the wicked to hate the righteous and we should not be surprised when the world attack us.

 ¹³ Do not be surprised, my brothers and sisters, if the world hates you.

 John reminds us that we should not be surprised or astonished or marvel at the fact that the world hates us. The world hates Christians because darkness hates light, they hate having their deeds exposed. This is only natural because it hated Jesus. If we share the nature of God, having the nature of Christ in us, the world will hate us too.

 If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. – John 15:18.

 The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that its works are evil. – John 7:7

 ¹⁸ “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. ¹⁹ If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. – John 15:18-20

 Today much of Christianity is a popularity contest of getting the world to like us, to accept us so they might accept the gospel but this way will not convict non-believers because it dims the light of the gospel which saves. You see this in the seeker sensitive movement when making our churches, our messages and our messages more socially acceptable to the world.

 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 1 Cor.1:18

 John refers to his readers as “my brothers and sisters.” Here you can see John gently assuring them that they are his siblings. He claims and possesses them as his own. You can feel the sibling bond and attachment and love that John feels for his readers.

  ¹⁴ We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death.

 We know

What evidence are you pointing to for your salvation? What outward proof do you have that you are saved? How do you know? Our love for the brothers which is continually growing is our assurance that we are saved. Hate doesn’t settle well in our hearts. Bitterness and resentment are guarded against in our hearts.

 ⁵ Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ²⁶ “In your anger do not sin” : Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, ²⁷ and do not give the devil a foothold. – Eph. 4:25-27

 There will be times when we get angry at a brother but instead of striking out at them with our tongue, with our temperament or with murder or with anything else we can to hurt them as they have hurt us, we should take time to pause. To guard our hearts so we don’t hurt anyone while we are vulnerable to Satan’s attacks on us while we are angry. We should exam our motives. Exam our actions. Have someone objective exam them with us because anger blinds us. We can’t see straight when we are angry.

 I have often found anger to be purifying if examined appropriately in my life. When I am angry, I am often surprised at what is drudged up from the bottom of my heart as my anger boils. All the impurities, bitterness, resentment that had long ago settled there undisturbed since our last argument or disagreement come floating to the surface. I have learned to be on the lookout for these things. Anything that does not have to do with the current incident in the present is an impurity of the past that needs to be confessed and cleaned up as it floats to the surface of my heart. If I don’t deal with it, once everything settles down, it too will settle down and float its way back to the bottom of my heart to rise again at the next good boil. It doesn’t go away and many times I can add stuff to it if I don’t confess them. If I don’t share my hurts. This sludge can and does built up if we do not consistently seek to purify our hearts.

 As Christians God is growing us in love. He is stretching our love to mature us in Christ’s image. A love for the people of God is a basic sign of being born again. If this love is not evident in our lives, our salvation can be questioned. If it is present, it gives us assurance.

 By this all people will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. – John 13:35

 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister. – 1 John 3:10

 We can know we have passed from death to life by our love for other Christians. The place of hatred, of jealousy, of bitterness you find yourself in is a place of death. You need to pass from death over to life. We must enter life, eternal life, the life of Christ, through the cross. Through putting our flesh on the cross with Christ so we can walk in the Spirit with him. If you want to walk in the Spirit then you must be dead. There is no other way. No other route, although Cain would look for a different one.

 We know we have passed from death into life… backwards. In this world we pass from life to death, Christ turns it around. We know we have passed from death into life.

¹⁵ Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him.

How is hatred like murder?

To hate our brother is to murder him in our hearts. Though we may not carry out the action (through cowardice or fear of punishment), we wish that person dead. Or, by ignoring another person, we may treat them as if they were dead. Hatred can be shown passively or actively. – Guzik

 “In the heart there is no difference; to hate is to despise, to cut off from relationship, and murder is simply the fulfillment of that attitude.” (Barker)

 You know no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.

       Those who harm life, who seek to take life away from you prematurely cannot have eternal life which always seeks to increase another’s life abiding in them.

 To live in a lifestyle of murder, a lifestye of habitual hatred of our brothers is a demonstration that we do not have eternal life abiding in us. They cannot coexist together. Murder is take life. Christ gives continuous unending life. As children of God, we seek ways to give life, to heal, to reconcile and to restore life. Eternal life and hatred cannot coexist together.

 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. – Matt 5:21-22

 “You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him. Lev. 19:17

Anger is always an attack on the brothers life for it refuses to let him live and aims at his destruction. Every idle word which we think so little of betrays our lack of respect for our neighbor and so shows we place ourselves on a pinnacle above him and value our own lives higher than his. The angry word is a blow struck at our brother, a stab at his heart. It seeks to hit, to hurt and to destroy. A deliberate insult is even worse, for we are then openly disgracing our brother in the eyes of the world and causing others to despise him. With our hearts burning with hatred, we seek to annihilate his moral and material existence. We are passing judgment on him and that is murder. – The Cost of Discipleship Bonhoeffer

16.  This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.

By This We Know Love…

If Christ did not come, would we have known God’s love for us? If so how?

 There is a real sense in which we would not know what love was all about if not for the work of Jesus on the cross. We have an innate ability to pervert the true meaning of love, and pursue all kinds of things under the guise of looking for love. – Guzik.

 Nature can teach us many things about God. It can show us His wisdom, His intelligence, and His mighty power. But nature, in and of itself, does not teach us that God is a God of love. We needed the death of God the Son, Jesus Christ, to ultimately demonstrate that. – Guzik

 We also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren: The focus here is on loving the brethren. Of course, we are also called to love our enemies and those who hate us (Mat. 5:44), but John calls us to a more basic test – if we can’t even love our brethren, what kind of Christians are we

 Lay down our lives: John also reminds us that love, and its demonstration, often involves sacrifice – the laying down of our lives for others. Wishing to be more loving won’t do, because it won’t sacrifice where it is necessary.

 And if we take the analogy from Jesus’ love for us, sometimes the cost of love will make us feel like we are dying – but that is what it means to lay down your life. “Love means saying ‘No’ to one’s own life so that somebody else may live.” (Marshall)

 How different is laying down one’s life from murder taking someone’s life. Quite a contrast. Instead of killing the enemy or seeking revenge you die for him.

 Eph. 5:2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

John 10:11 I am the good shepherd, the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Acts 15:26 men who have risked their lives for the sake of Jesus Christ our lord.

Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

John 15:3 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

 Christ calls us to give our life away. Not to seek it above the lives of others as the world does as it pushes for its own gain. To live for others, to seek the joy of others, the benefit of others, the gain of others at the expense of ones self, is quite a contrast to how the world lives.

 We often consider ourselves ready to lay down our lives in one great, dramatic, heroic gesture; but for most of us, God calls us to lay down our lives piece by piece, little by little in small, but important ways every day.Guzik

 JR Miller – The Everyday Life

Perhaps the every-day of life is not so interesting as are some of the bright particular days. It is apt to be somewhat monotonous. It is just like a great many other days. It has nothing special to mark it. It wears no star on its brow. It is illuminated by no brilliant event. It bears no record of any brave or noble deed done. It is not made memorable by the coming of any new experience into the life, – a new hope, a new friendship, a new joy, and a new success. It is not even touched with sorrow, and made to stand out ever after among the days sad with the memory of loss. It is only a plain, common day, with just the same old wearisome routine of tasks and duties and happenings that have come so often before.

 Yet it is the every-day that is really the best measure and the test of life. Anybody can do well on special occasions. Anybody can be good on Sundays. Anybody can be bright and cheerful in exhilarating society. Anybody can be sweet amid gentle influences. Anybody can make a solitary self-denial for some conspicuous object, or do a generous deed under the impulse of some unusual emotion. Anybody can do a heroic thing once or twice in a lifetime. – JR Miller, The Everyday Life

 JR Miller – Our Debt to the Past True Love Sacrifices

Nearly all the precious things in our lives are made sacred to us by their cost. This is true even of material things. We cannot live a day but something must die to become food for the sustaining of our life. We cannot be warmed in winter but some miner must crouch and toil in the deep darkness, to dig out the fuel of our fires. We cannot be clothed but worms must weave their own lives into threads of silk, or sheep must shiver in the chill air, that we may have their fleeces to cover us. The gems and jewels which the women wear, and which they prize so highly as ornaments, are brought to them through the anguish and the peril of the poor wretches who hunt or dive for them in cruel seas. The furs we wrap about us in the winter cost the lives of the creatures, which first wore them, which have to die to yield the warmth and comfort for us. Think, too, of the sweet songbirds that must be captured and cruelly slaughtered to get wings and feathers for the women’s hats. Every comfort or luxury that we enjoy comes to us at the price of weariness and pain, sometimes of anguish and tears, in those who procure and prepare it for us.

¹⁷ If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?

This is what it means to love in real life in a practicing way with practicable examples. Look around you. Who is in need? Who is hurting? How can you bring them life? Especially your brothers and sisters in Christ. As Christians, we are called to be umbrellas to others in a storm. People who others run to for covering and help and refuge as God’s people. We are called to be band aids who would see those who are wounded and hurting around us and lay our lives down over them as a protective covering, to ease their pain and suffering until they have time to heal.

If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food… James 2:15

 And he answered them, “Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise.” Luke 3:11 (ESV)

 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? – James 2:16

 Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor will also cry out and not be answered. – Prov. 21:13

 Here is a test of this love; if we do not divide our bread with the hungry, we certainly would not lay down our life for him. Whatever love we may pretend to mankind, if we are not charitable and benevolent, we give the lie to our profession.” (Clarke)

 What is the limit to this kind of love? The only limit is the one that love itself imposes. When giving to a person, meeting their perceived or immediate need, does them harm instead of good – then the loving thing to do is to not give them what they ask for, but to give them what they really need instead.

 Stott quoting Lewis: “It is easier to be enthusiastic about Humanity with a capital ‘H’ than it is to love individual men and women, especially those who are uninteresting, exasperating, depraved, or otherwise unattractive. Loving everybody in general may be an excuse for loving nobody in particular.”

¹⁸ Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

Just as faith without works is dead. So is love without works is dead. Don’t just listen to the word do what it says. Work out what God is working in you. We have a lot of good intentions but we must give birth to them for them to come to life and sometimes it takes much labor.

 As women we are to adorn ourselves with good deeds. Our good deeds are how we are known, it is our nature to love, to lay down our life for our brothers and sisters in Christ instead of seeking to take the life of others or demonstrating indifference.