CHRISTIAN LOVE
‘Love worketh no ill to his neighbour.’
Holy Scripture shows that universal kindness and benevolence is the true spirit of Christianity.
I. The obstacle is our natural selfishness, which is our strongest characteristic. The desire to get on is natural; the desire for amusement is natural. Natural affection is not necessarily a Christian virtue.
II. Christian love is the gift of God. It can be sought and obtained. By the spirit of love shall we know that we are Christ’s disciples.
III. The result will be that our way will ever be growing brighter and happier because no unregenerate ill and no coldness or deadness or unselfishness.
—Archdeacon William Sinclair.
Illustration
‘Without taking the extreme case—a man who hates me as his enemy—how am I to feel brotherly love for the selfish, the mocker, the ungrateful, the mean, the sordid, the depraved, the impure, and the liar? Jesus Christ gives more than a hint of how this can be done. We must try to look on all men as God does. We must try to see our brother men even at their worst as God sees them. We must learn to know that behind all these superficial vices and defects there is a poor, suffering, blinded, ignorant, precious, human soul for whom Christ died on the Cross. We must recognise that the seemingly ungrateful are probably most grateful, and that, with the fewest possible exceptions, every living soul is trying to do his best according to his lights and understanding, so far as his partial knowledge or complete ignorance will permit, so far as his hereditary defects, uncongenial surroundings, and training will allow. God, we must remember, hates only the sin and loves the sinner. We must endeavour to draw the same distinction, remembering at the same time the words “Judge not, that ye be not judged.” We do not know what another man’s temptation may be, nor how we might fare if we had them to face ourselves. But we do know that all men are tempted to sin, and that few indeed consciously and wilfully sin with deliberate intent. Let us therefore strive to see our fellow-men as God sees them. While hating their sins as we hate our own, let us learn to love them as precious souls, for whom the Lord of glory died.’