Robert S. Candlish · 1 John 3:13–16
“Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you. We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”—1 JOHN 3:13–16.
THERE is an emphatic meaning in the address (ver. 13), “my brethren.” It prepares the way for the use of the first person “we” (ver. 14). You are of the company of the brethren, as I am. I address you as such, when I exhort you “not to marvel if the world hate you.”
For why should you not marvel at this? Why should you not count it strange or take it amiss?
For this, among other reasons: because we know,—you and I, as brethren, know,—that to love as brethren is a grace belonging entirely to the new life of which we are partakers. It is the very mark of our possessing that life. Why then should we marvel if the dead are incapable of it? It is the world’s nature to hate the godly; it was our nature once; and if it is not so now, it is because we have undergone a great change; “we know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren.” It must be so. The absence of this brotherly love is, and must be, a fatal sign of death, and of continued death; “he that loveth not his brother abideth in death.” For not to love a brother is to hate him; and to hate him is to murder him; and to murder him is to forfeit life: “Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.” Whereas, on the other hand, the presence of this brotherly love is a blessed sign of life; for it marks our oneness with the Living One; our insight into the manner of his love and our sympathy with it: “Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”
Here then we have, in broad contrast, the way of the world, which is death, and the way of God, which is life. It is the way of the world to hate, and so to hate as to murder. It is the way of God to love, and so to love as to lay down life to save. And it is in virtue of this contrast that the test holds good: “We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren.”
The world’s hatred; God’s love; these are what are here contrasted. And yet there is one point at least of partial similarity. The affection, in either case, fastens in the first instance upon objects opposed to itself. The world hates the brethren; God loves the world, “the world lying in the wicked one.” And in a sense too the ends sought are similar. The world, which hates, would assimilate those it hates to itself, and so be soothed or sated; God, who loves, would assimilate those he loves to himself, and so have satisfaction in them. This indeed may almost be said to be a universal characteristic of sentient and intelligent mind; be it pure and benevolent or depraved and malevolent; be its ruling passion hatred or love. It is, so far, common to the wicked one and the Holy One. The wicked one, in whom the world lies, hates; and his hatred fastens on the brethren. In his hatred he will not scruple about murdering them outright in cruellest fashion. But he is as well, or even better pleased, if he succeeds in murdering them after a milder method; by getting them to listen to his wily speech. The Holy One loves; and his love fastens on the lost. It is a love in spite of which he must, at the last, acquiesce in the inevitable ruin of multitudes, whom alas! its manifestation fails to touch. But his heart is set on winning them to his embrace, and having them to be of one mind and nature with himself. And his love has this advantage over the opposite affection. Who ever heard of the wicked one laying down his life to secure the accomplishment of his object?—or any Cain who is of the wicked one? “But hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”
I. Of the world’s hatred of the brethren two things are said: it is natural, and it is murderous.
In the first place, it is natural; not marvellous, but quite natural. The Lord prepared his disciples beforehand to expect it, warning them not to look for any other treatment at the world’s hands than he had met with. It should not, therefore, be matter of surprise to you if the world hate you. And yet it is sometimes apt to be so. Notwithstanding all warnings, and all the experience of others who have gone before him, the recent convert, the young Christian, fresh, buoyant, enthusiastic, may fancy that what he has to tell must pierce all consciences and melt all hearts. He goes among his fellows, eager to appear in his new character, to bear his new testimony, to sing his new song. Alas! he comes in contact with what is like a wet blanket thrown in his face, cold looks and rude gestures of impatience, jeers and jibes, if not harsher usage still. Instead of the welcome he anticipated, as he hastened forth, with face all radiant from the heavenly fellowship, and lips divinely touched with a live coal from off the altar, crying,—I have found him, come and see; he meets with chilling indifference, or contempt, or anger. He is tempted to give up as hopeless the task of dealing with the dead. But no. Count it not strange, brother, that you fall into this trial. Why should you? Is their reception of you very different from what, but yesterday perhaps, yours would have been of one coming to you in the same character and on the same errand? Surely you know that love to the brethren, brotherly love, true Christian, Christ-like love—willing to give a cup of cold water to a disciple in the name of a disciple, and welcome the least of the little ones for the Master’s sake—is no plant of natural growth in the soil of corrupt humanity; that, on the contrary, it is the fruit of the great change by means of which a poor sinner “passes from death unto life.” Have you not found it to be so in your own case? Would anything short of that have made you love the brethren, and hear them gladly, when speaking in a brotherly way to you? Would anything else have overcome your hatred of them? Then “marvel not,” nor be impatient, “if the world hate you.”
Again, secondly, the world’s hatred of the brethren is murderous, as regards its objects: “He that loveth not his brother abideth in death: whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer.”
“Loveth not,” “hateth,” “murdereth!” There is a sort of dark climax here! Not loving is intensified into hating, and hating into murdering. The three, however, are really one; as the Lord teaches in the sermon on the mount, to which undoubtedly John here points (Matt. 5:21–24). Not to love is to hate; and to hate is to murder. If, therefore, you would be safe from the risk of being a murderer, see that you are not a hater. And if you would not be in danger of being a hater, see that you are a lover.
It is a solemn lesson that is thus taught; and it would seem to be meant for you who are apt to marvel if the world hate you, as well as for the world that hates you. In that application, it may suggest some important practical thoughts.
1. When Abel first caught a glimpse of Cain’s state of mind towards him, he might feel as one who painfully dreamed. He must have been slow to take it in. They had grown up together in the same home; worked and played together; prayed together at the same mother’s knee; listened together to the same father’s teaching; done one another many offices of kindness; enjoyed much pleasant intercourse in house and field. While that strange conversation about God and his worship goes on, Abel is startled as he sees Cain’s dark frown betokening growing wrath. Hate gleams more and more from those kindling eyes. Is it fear that pales the meek martyr’s face, or is it anger that agitates his frame, as that hoarse voice threatens and that cruel arm is raised? Not so. It is horrible surprise at first; and then deep concern, tender pity, bitter grief. That Cain has ceased to love him as a brother,—that is what chiefly wounds him; wounds him more keenly than the stroke that fells him to the ground. Has he lost, can he not win back, a brother’s love? Is there such hatred, so murderous, in one who is still so dear to him? Will he rather slay me than taste and see how good our God is who has provided for us both the same sin-offering of the lamb? It is a bitter sorrow. But it is not the bitterness of a sense of his own wrong; it is the bitterness of the melancholy insight he has got into his poor brother’s dark and miserable heart.
Ah! think;—when you come in contact with some one to whom you would fain commend the Saviour and the sacrifice you have yourself found so precious,—an old familiar friend perhaps with whom your intercourse has been wont to be frequent and sweet,—a humble neighbour who has often been glad to see you under his lowly roof, to accept your alms in his poverty or your kindly sympathy in his distress; and when you begin to discover that, as a child of God, you are not so welcome now as you were when like himself you were a child of the world; when he treats you coldly or rudely, and makes it plain that he would fain in any way get rid of you;—think rather of his case than of your own. It may be hard for you to bear with his irritability and incivility; and you may be provoked, if not to retaliate, yet to let him alone and make your escape. But consider him; and have pity upon him. This malignant spirit of dislike to righteousness, and to him whose works are righteous, is far worse for him to cherish than for you to suffer. Leave him not. Rather stay by him and plead with him; even though his hatred rise to murder.
2. For you need, for yourselves, and with special reference to the world’s hatred of you, to be ever on your guard, lest somewhat of the old dark spirit should creep in again into your own hearts. And remember it may insinuate itself very insidiously and stealthily.
Consider once more the stages or steps: not loving; hating; murdering. Ah! how easily may the first of these begin: not loving. It is a simple negation; no taking of any positive step; but only, as it were, not taking any step at all; or not this or that particular step; giving up; letting alone; using less energy of prayer and pains; feeling less interest.
Who is it that you have ceased, or are ceasing, to love with a true brotherly love like Christ’s?
Is it one still unconverted and unsaved? You have been dealing with him, as you think, faithfully and affectionately; pleading with him for Christ, and with Christ for him. You have had much patience, and have persevered long. Nor has it been mere taskwork with you; it has been a work of love. You have felt a real concern for his soul, a real longing for his salvation. But somehow the case is not very hopeful; it was not very hopeful at first, and it is becoming less so, or at least not more so. You are getting reconciled to the idea of failure and disappointment. You are not at first conscious of a diminished regard for your poor brother; but you are becoming less sanguine, and gradually less earnest. The work of love becomes more like taskwork now. You will do your duty; you will continue to be kind to him, to warn and exhort him, to set Christ before him, and urge him to believe and live. But there is less cordiality in what you do and say; you bestow less of your heart upon him. This may be natural, in a sense and measure perhaps unavoidable, and not altogether unreasonable. There may be a limit to your earnest striving, in love, with an obdurate sinner, as there is a limit to the striving, in love, of God’s own Spirit with him. But beware. It is not because he ceases to love that the Spirit ceases to strive. See that it be not otherwise with you; that it be not your ceasing to love that makes you cease to strive. If it be Christ’s mind that you should shake off the dust of your feet as a testimony of judgment against any one whom you have been plying with the testimony of mercy, he will make that plain enough to you by unmistakeable indications of his will. And you will see all the more clearly, and judge all the more fairly, if there be no ceasing to love; no growing coldness and indifference; no feeling of a sort of apathetic acquiescence in the inevitableness of that poor soul’s fate. No such feeling is there in the tears of Jesus over Jerusalem. Beware, I repeat, of any such feeling insinuating itself into your bosom. Not to love, with a love that yearns to save, and weeps rivers of waters for the lost, is to hate; and to hate is to murder. “Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation.”
Or is it one of Christ’s little ones; one of the fatherless and widows whom you visit in their affliction; one whose feet you have counted it a privilege to wash? The service has been a delight; that suffering saint’s chamber has been to you a Bethel. You have got in it far more than you have given of spiritual refreshment and consolation. So you say and feel, under the impulse of your first love for that brother in Christ. But on further acquaintance you find, or think you find, things in him or about him that are fitted to damp and repel your ardent advances. He is not so perfect as you thought; his person not so pleasant; his room not so tidy. Infirmities come out; disagreeable incidents occur; rude friends interfere. It is not romance now, but reality. You are not quite so enthusiastic as you were in your esteem of him, or quite so frequent and regular in your calls upon him. A sort of weariness comes over you when you knock at his door; a sort of distasteful recoil arrests you as you enter his chamber. It is plain that your Christian admiration, your brotherly love towards him, is not exactly what it was; not so glowing and so gushing. It may be as real and genuine; it may be even more trustworthy, because it is more sober. If so, it is well. But beware. It may be otherwise. There may be an approximation to a state of mind not quite so right or safe; —“not loving your brother,” ceasing to love him as your brother in Christ, allowing natural or accidental causes of estrangement or indifference to cool your brotherly affection. And what then? May there not come something worse? A certain half-unconscious dislike; a certain pleasure, even in hearing him ridiculed or defamed; a not unwilling participation in the idle talk that, exaggerating defects, and overlooking or misrepresenting excellencies, would take away his fair name and reputation, and play the murderer as regards his Christian character and standing?
Be on your guard against this spirit of the world finding harbour again in your breasts. I speak to you who have “passed from death unto life,” and who know what it is to love the brethren; to love all men with a true brotherly love in the Lord, a love that looks on them as immortal beings, having near them a Saviour dying for them, having in them a Spirit striving with them, having before them a Father waiting to be gracious. Even you need to be warned against the world’s evil temper of dislike and envy. Consider how insidious it is. It begins with what may attract little observation and awaken little alarm; a change, scarcely noticeable, or if noticed easily explained by altered circumstances, sobering age, sad experience, repeated disappointment, or any of the thousand causes that make the heart beat less wildly as time rolls on. Consider also its deadly danger. The “not loving,” or not loving so purely and so truly, comes to be “hating, avowed or unavowed, distaste, disinclination, displeasure, dislike; estrangement, suspicion, envy. And to hate is to “murder;” one way or other, by neglect or by calumny, by ill thoughts or ill words or ill deeds, it murders. Consider, finally, how natural it is; so natural that only your “passing from death unto life” can rid you of it, and make you capable of its opposite. You need not marvel if the world thus hate; for it is its nature. Nor need you marvel that you should still require to be exhorted not thus to hate; for it is your nature too. Grace may overcome it; grace alone can do so. And even grace can do so only through continual watchfulness and prayer, continual recognition of the life to which you pass from death, and continual exercise of the love which is the characteristic of that life.
II. Of this love, as of the hatred, two things are said. In the first place, it is natural now to the spiritual mind; natural as the fruit and sign of the new life; “We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren.” It is natural to us, in our old state of death, to hate; it is, or should be, natural to us, in our new state of life, to love. For our life is our participation with Christ in his life; and his life, like the Father’s, is manifested in love; or is love. Our life, therefore, is also love; it is our loving as the Father loves, and as the Son loves. And this, secondly, implies that the love in question is the very opposite of the murderous hatred of the devil; it is self-sacrificing, like the love of God himself: “Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (ver. 16).
It is a high ideal of this love to men as brethren that is set before us. It is sympathy with God in his love to us; and in that love as measured by his laying down his life for us. Whom does he thus love? Us: and all such as we are; or as we were, when his love reached us. “Scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” “When we were without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” For us sinners, for us without strength, for us ungodly, he laid down his life. And it was a brotherly love to us that moved him to do so. It was as our brother that he sacrificed himself for us. It is that we may be his brethren that he would have us to perceive his love in sacrificing himself for us, and to believe it.
Oh! to be enabled to enter more and more into this brotherly love of Jesus; to apprehend its nature; to imbibe its spirit! Truly it is the opposite of the hatred of a brother which marks one abiding in death. That hatred prompts to take away another’s life; this love to lay down one’s own. “Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer;” but here is one so loving his brother, that to save him alive he sacrifices himself. Cain was bent on slaying his brother: Abel, was anxious, at the risk of death, to win Cain. We, in our hatred, because he was righteous and we were evil, slew a greater than Abel. He loved us with more than Abel’s love when “he laid down his life for us.”
We know that we have passed from death unto life, when we love our fellow-men with a brotherly love like his; when we are so bent on saving and blessing them, that we are willing not only to give our whole lives for their good, but to suffer all loss, even death itself, at their hands. Even when they are still our enemies, because the enemies of our Lord; even while they hate us, and persecute us, and say all manner of evil against us; how does it become us still to love them as brethren, with a love that would seek them as brethren, and welcome them as brethren, and live and die for them as brethren! Can they be more hostile or injurious to us, than we were to Christ when he loved us and laid down his life for us? Have they wearied us as we have wearied him? or provoked us as we have provoked him? or pierced us as we have pierced him? How shall we not continue to care for them and plead with them, as Christ continued to care for us and plead with us,—oh! how long, how patiently, how tenderly,—if by any means he might bring us to receive him as laying down his life for us! And when, by his Spirit, they are moved and melted, and on the footing of that great propitiation reconciled to God and to us; how shall we set bounds to the warmth and cordiality of our embrace of them as now our brethren indeed! Can we grudge any service or sacrifice to show our love, even should it be the laying down of our lives for them, as he laid down his life for us?
This is our security against the evil spirit of Cain coming in again to trouble us. It is to make full proof of the better spirit of Abel, or of him in whom Abel, like us, believed, even Jesus, who so loved us, even when dead in sins, that he gave himself for us, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God; and who so loveth us, as his brethren, for whom he laid down his life, that he would have us to be sharers as his brethren with him in all the love with which the Father loveth him and all the glory which the Father giveth him.
