1 John 2:15 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Love not the world, &c.— By the world, is sometimes meant the whole creation; sometimes the visible part of it, more commonly this earthly globe, with its appendages. Sometimes the world includes this animal life,together with the place of our present abode, and the things which support this life, or render it agreeable in a temporal sense. The love of such a state is then criminal, when it is exorbitant, and disproportioned to the worth and value thereof; when it is regarded as the chief good of man, and a due regard to God and religion, to holiness and to a better world, is thereby neglected: and as the many set too great a value on present and sensible things, they are sometimes called the world. See ch. 1 John 5:19. If it should be objected, that we ought to love the wicked, and all mankind, the answer is obvious: we ought to love all mankind with a love of benevolence or good will; but we ought not to love a wicked world with a love of complacence or delight: we should shuntheir company as much as possible, lest we be tainted by their customs, and corrupted by their bad examples. By the things which are in the world, we may understand the good things, or the enjoyments thereof; the inordinate love of which is in the next verse reduced to three heads, and all most justly condemned. God is considered as the Creator and Father of all men, (but more especially of real Christians,) who has amply manifested his paternal affection for them. An inordinate love of earthly things is inconsistent with that love which we owe our Heavenly Father. When conscience under the Spirit of Christ governs, and the passions, affections, and appetites are regulated thereby; when the rules of the gospel are our guide, that is the government of God over us; but when a worldly disposition governs us, and the passions and appetites bear sway, the love of the Father is not in us, nor do we behave at all as his obedient children. Hence it was that in the primitive church adults, when baptized, renounced the world, that is, the unlawful pursuit or love of riches and honours; the flesh, that is, all sensual impurity, or criminal pleasures; and the devil, that is, idolatry, and all the vices which it supported and encouraged: and Christians are still under the same obligations; for the love of these things is utterly inconsistent with the love of God. See the next note.