Let us turn to the Gospel of John.
Let us read John 13:34-35.
A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
Let us also turn to 1 John 4:11-12.
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
No man hath beheld God at any time: if we love one another, God abideth in us, and His love is perfected in us.
Again, 1 John 4:20-21:
If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, cannot love God whom he hath not seen.
And this commandment have we from Him, that he who loveth God love his brother also.
Let us bow down and pray.
Lord, we really thank You and praise You, because You loved us and gave Yourself for us. We thank You that, before Your table, You fully revealed to us how You love us.
We thank You that through Your Spirit, You have filled us with Your love. Today, we can say that we love You because You have loved us first.
We can share brotherly love because You have placed this love in us. We thank You and praise You because You are the fountain of love.
We also praise and thank You because You deserve all the love. We put forth this time in Your hands.
We look to Your Holy Spirit to quicken Your word in the heart of everyone, so that not only can we hear it, but we can see it from within.
Lord, every word of Yours is with power, and Your word will not return in vain. So we look to You, Lord, to accomplish Your word in us, so that You can find Your testimony on this earth and gain all the glory.
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
We thank our Lord that He has led us together for several days.
I believe that at this final session, we all know the theme of this time. The theme is brotherly love.
Maybe you wonder, “How come, in the past few days, I have never talked about brotherly love?”
Because, brothers and sisters, this is how I feel in my heart: love among brothers is not just words. Love among brothers has to come out from life.
Today we can talk about brotherly love, but how do we walk it out? Do we consider brotherly love too common? Do we consider this as something that we can do?
So, dear brothers and sisters, we thank God. Now we have come to the last session, and now we can talk about love among brothers.
Because we have seen that in us there is no such love. We have seen that the source of this love is in God, because God is love.
If we are not born of Him, there is absolutely no such love. We cannot love God, and we cannot love our brothers.
But thank and praise our God: he who has this love is born of God, and he knows God.
We thank God that it is He who put this love in us. He also gave a commandment to us: that we shall love Him and that we shall love the brothers.
What we cannot do, He Himself comes and accomplishes. Therefore, today we can love our God.
Not that we loved Him, but that He loved us first. He loves us, and He put His love in us so that we can love our God with this love.
We have already said that whatever love we use to love God, if it is not from God, then it does not please God. When God told us to love Him, that love is His love.
Oftentimes, we want to love God with our natural love. As a result, we see not only that it is not acceptable to God, but that we have given God so much trouble.
In the experience of a Christian, in the experience of loving God, we have to learn how to put this natural love under the cross.
We cannot be disciples of the Lord if we do not love Him more than our father, mother, sister, and even our own life.
We have a natural love toward our parents, our husband, our wife, our children, and even our own life. We often use this love to love our God.
The Lord has shown us that this natural love has to be put to death. Then we can use the love that God has given us to love Him.
This love that God has given us is what the Bible calls the first love. According to time, this is the love we had when we were first saved. According to its essence and nature, this love is supernatural love; it is the love of God.
Then we can love God as He loves us. The same principle applies because we have this love: we are able to love our brothers and sisters.
When the Bible speaks of love among one another, that love is not natural love. It is that supernatural, holy love.
Therefore, brothers and sisters, we thank God. We see that only God is love. Outside of God, there is no love.
We also thank God because, in His mercy, He gave birth to us. He put this love in us.
We thank God because He loved us in such a way that we can also love Him. Now we can love one another.
That night, our Lord had the last gathering with His disciples. John 13 tells us that Jesus knew that His hour had come, that He should depart out of this world unto His Father.
He loved His own unto the end. Now, “unto the end” is not the end in terms of time, as if once He loved us, He would love us merely to the end of time.
In the original language, “unto the end” has another meaning. It means that in everything, He loves us to the uttermost. In every circumstance and every condition, He loves us and brings us to the end.
He knew that the Father had given Him all things. Not only was this the will in eternity, but He was facing the cross and was about to accomplish the work of redemption.
God had already given Him all things. At that moment, when all had been seated, He rose up. He took off His outer garment, girded Himself with a towel, put water in a basin, and came to wash the feet of His disciples.
I believe, brothers and sisters, that we all know the story. According to the custom of the Jews, when guests came to your house for dinner, there would be a housemaid at the door to wash their feet.
At that time there were no paved highways; all the roads were covered with dust. They also did not have our present-day shoes. They only had sandals.
So, when you came inside the house from outside, there would be dust on your feet. The first thing was that your feet would be washed.
When your feet were washed, your whole body was refreshed. If your feet were not clean, your whole body would not feel comfortable.
When they ate dinner at that time, it was not as we do today, with our feet under the table. They were reclining, and so their feet were exposed. If they did not wash their feet, it did not look very good.
When our Lord asked the disciples to prepare for the feast, the host opened his house and prepared everything needed. There was water, there was a basin, and there was a towel, but there was no housemaid.
I believe it was not that the host forgot. I believe the Lord had told him secretly.
So when the disciples came into the room, they all hoped there would be a maid to wash their feet. But there was none, and they felt very uncomfortable.
Yet no one thought to wash the others’ feet. They brought their own dusty feet and took their seats.
I believe our Lord was watching and watching what they would do. You know, when they came in, what did they do?
In the Gospel of Luke, we are told that at that feast they were all competing for the greater places.
Of course, when they sat down, there were different seats. I believe our Lord did not simply put everyone’s nameplate at a position at the table. Maybe He let His disciples choose their own seats.
So they were competing: who was the greatest? The greatest would sit in the highest seat, and they were still arguing about this.
Not only had they not thought about washing others’ feet; maybe they thought that others should wash their feet. But no one would yield. No one would do this.
They had followed the Lord for more than three years, but to this point they had not learned. They did not understand love among brothers.
God had already given Him all things. He knew that He was about to go to the Father. So He did this one last thing for His disciples—His last ministry.
He humbled Himself, standing in the position of a little maid, to wash the feet of His disciples.
After He had washed them, He asked, “Do you know what I was doing? You call Me Master and Lord, and I am. But I washed your feet; you also ought to wash one another’s feet.”
Brothers and sisters, outwardly the Lord was washing their feet so that they could be refreshed and enjoy the feast. But the Lord was washing their spirits so that they could enter into a normal spiritual condition.
So the Lord told them, “I have washed your feet, and you ought to wash one another’s feet.”
The Lord said, “I give you a new commandment.” This commandment is that you shall love one another.
Love among one another is not a matter of words or lips. To love one another must be in deed and in truth.
The first time the Lord commanded them to love one another, He took an action, because He wanted to show them that loving one another is not a matter of tongue or words. It is a matter of action, and it is a matter of truth.
Let us turn to 1 John 2:7-8.
Beloved, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning: the old commandment is the word which ye heard.
Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in Him and in you; because the darkness is passing away, and the true light already shineth.
In John 13, the Lord says, “I give you a new commandment.” But in 1 John 2, John says, “What I write unto you is not a new commandment, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning.”
What does the word they heard from the beginning refer to? It is the word written in chapter 1: the Word of life, which was from the beginning.
This Word from the beginning is not only a word; it is also a commandment. It is also a Person—not only the Word and not only the commandment, but the One who is our Lord Jesus.
This is what we have heard from the beginning and what we have received from the beginning. When we receive our Lord, we receive His love.
You cannot separate this love from Him. Then we love Him, and then we love our brothers.
This is very natural, but supernaturally natural. I often like to use this expression, “supernaturally natural.” It does not come from what is natural, but although it is supernatural, it is also very natural.
Today, when we believe in our Lord, no one has to tell us that we shall love Him. Very naturally, we love Him with all our heart, all our understanding, and all our strength. We have a first love toward Him.
This is a commandment, but it is a commandment that we do not have to fulfill by force. It is very natural because we have been filled with His love within.
The day we believe in our Lord, when we meet another brother who knows the Lord, although we see him for the first time, we do not know why, but we love him from within.
Before we know him, we only know that he is a believer. Immediately there is within us a love toward him, because the Lord is in us.
The Lord loves His Father, and the Lord within us causes us to love our heavenly Father. As the Lord loves those who belong to Him, His love in us causes us to love our brothers and sisters.
In fact, this is an old commandment. The day we believe in our Lord, we have received this commandment. We may not have had the knowledge, but we have had the reality.
But this is also a new commandment. Here, “new” does not mean new in contrast to old.
In Greek, there are two different words for “new.” One word refers to something new in contrast to something old, but the other refers to freshness.
So here the new commandment means a fresh commandment. Although the commandment is old, it should never become aged. It should always be fresh.
Therefore, this is a new commandment. This is true in the Lord. While our Lord was on earth, He loved His Father throughout His life, and throughout His life He loved us.
This is true in us because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. This true light is God Himself. God is light, and He has shone upon us in His life.
The past darkness fades away, and more and more we receive this light. As we are shone upon again and again, the darkness in us begins to fade away.
Brotherly love came to us from the first day, but this love among brothers grows every day. More and more, we enter into brotherly love.
At the beginning, indeed, we love, but perhaps there is still darkness in us and we do not see. When God gives more light within us, we love our brothers more deeply and more truly.
The Lord said, “I give you a new commandment, that ye love one another. Even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”
This indeed is a new commandment. When we turn back to the Old Testament, we know that the summary of the law and the prophets is this: the greatest and first commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your understanding, and all your strength.
The second is like it: “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”
But when the Lord spoke to His disciples, He said, “Ye shall love one another.” This is a new commandment.
In the Old Testament, the commandment is to love your neighbor as you love yourself. Neighbors are those who live in your neighborhood. It is an external relationship.
But the Lord says, “Ye shall love one another.” This is among brothers. Brotherhood is a matter of inward relationship.
Whether a brother lives in your neighborhood or far away, you have a relationship with him that is inward, because this is an inward relationship. This is a new commandment.
Second, the Lord says, “Even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” To love your neighbor is to love him as yourself. If you can do that, you are doing very well.
We know that the lawyer was not able to do this, and the young ruler could not do this. Even if you could, the standard of love would still be to love another as yourself.
But now we have this new commandment: “As I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” The standard is totally different.
The standard is not you. The standard is the Lord. As the Lord loves us, that is how we should love one another.
Oftentimes, we think it is enough that we love our brother, and we use ourselves as the measure. We think that we have loved our brother with all our mind, but indeed we have many shortcomings.
The Lord said, “As I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” To love one another is without limit, as the Lord loves us without limit.
Third, this is a new commandment because the old commandment is a law. The law is for you to keep.
The new commandment also needs to be kept. The Lord says, “If ye love Me, ye will keep My commandments.” That commandment is to love the brothers.
But when we keep this commandment, it is not according to ourselves; it is according to the grace within us. Who is able to love his brother as the Lord loves us?
If we could not keep the commandment of the law in Old Testament times, the commandment the Lord gives us now is far beyond the commandment of the Old Testament. How can we keep it?
Thank God: it is His own love within us, and His grace within us, that enables us to keep His commandment. Therefore, this is a new commandment.
To love brothers, there is a basis. The first basis is God’s love. God loves us. It is not that we loved Him, but that He loved us first. We experience His love.
Second, when we experience God’s love, we begin to love God. Only with this heart of love toward God can we speak of loving the brothers.
If we are not touched by the love of God, if we do not love God, we are not able to love one another. These are the bases of love.
Therefore, in this final session, we consider how we love one another.
Let us first look at the negative side. Let us turn to 1 John 2:9-10.
He that saith he is in the light and hateth his brother, is in the darkness even until now.
He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is no occasion of stumbling in him.
Let us also consider 1 John 3:12:
Not as Cain was of the evil one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his works were evil, and his brother’s righteous.
It is very striking that when John speaks of brotherly love, he also mentions hating the brothers. In 1 John there are many contrasts; one of them is love and hatred.
God’s commandment is for us to love the brothers, but on the other side there is another thing called hating the brothers.
It sounds impossible. How can I hate my brother? We are all brothers. We are all members. We can only love one another; we cannot hate one another.
But very regrettably, we see that this is very common. Among God’s children, hatred is prevailing.
You ask, “Where have I hated my brother?” If you do not forgive your brother, you hate your brother.
Peter came to the Lord and said, “My brother sinned against me. I forgave him, but he sinned against me seven times. Now I do not have to forgive him anymore.”
The Lord said, “I say not unto thee, Until seven times; but, Until seventy times seven.”
Brothers and sisters, today among God’s children there are many spirits that do not forgive.
When your brother or sister sins against you, perhaps you do not fight back. You say, “Because we are brothers, there is nothing I can do. Forget it.” But you cannot forget.
Outwardly there seems to be nothing, but inwardly you cannot let it go. Because of this, how many problems have been caused within the church?
Brothers and sisters cannot be one. We live a life of falsehood. We cannot treat each other with no obstacle between us. We cannot be transparent inwardly, and our fellowship is obstructed.
We do not know how much death has been brought in because of this.
Peter went to the Lord and said, “My brother sinned against me.” I often think, who was Peter’s brother? Andrew was Peter’s brother.
If you read the Bible, you can sense that these two brothers had different dispositions. Peter was very extroverted. He was a charging person, and he was very straightforward.
This kind of person most easily offends others. What kind of person was Andrew, his brother? Andrew was a very careful person.
At one time there were thousands of people, and the Lord said, “Give them to eat.” Andrew was able to find, out of the thousands, a little boy who had five loaves and two fish.
Would you imagine that such a careful person would offend people very often? I believe it was Peter who offended his brother, but Peter thought Andrew had offended him. This is our condition.
When we say, “I forgive you, so I am really great,” after the seventh time we cannot do it anymore.
Dear brothers and sisters, even if your brother is wrong, you have to think of how much you owe your Lord, and the Lord forgave you.
No matter how my brother offended me, it is not as much as I have offended my Lord. How can I not forgive my brother?
The Lord says that if you do not forgive others from your heart, the Lord does not forgive you. Not to forgive your brother is to hate your brother.
You live in darkness. You do not know where to go. Your spiritual condition is in death.
Brothers and sisters, should we ask the Lord to shine upon us?
Another aspect of hating the brothers is jealousy. Whenever you are jealous of your brother, you hate your brother.
Cain hated Abel. For what reason? Because he was jealous of him. He saw that what Abel did was acceptable to God, while what he did was rejected by God.
Jealousy arose in him, and he hated his brother. He killed him.
Brothers and sisters, today when we face our brothers and sisters, do we have jealousy toward any of them?
When we see that a brother or sister has received much grace, has more gifts, has more results, or even has more riches on earth, do we have jealousy in our hearts?
If you have jealousy within you, that is hating your brother. You would wish that his gift would be reduced, his grace reduced, and that he would be less successful.
If he is in trouble, then you are very happy. This is to hate the brothers.
But when we see brothers and sisters being blessed and used by the Lord, and we are not like them, we have to thank and praise our Lord.
“Thank You, Lord, that You use our brother; that You bless my sister.” This is love. Therefore, brothers and sisters, this is something to which we must pay attention.
Third, if we ignore our brothers and sisters, this also is hating our brothers or sisters.
Let us read 1 John 3:16-17.
Hereby know we love, because He laid down His life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
But whoso hath the world’s goods, and beholdeth his brother in need, and shutteth up his compassion from him, how doth the love of God abide in him?
These words continue the previous words. Whoever hates his brother is a murderer.
Therefore, today, if we ignore our brothers or sisters when they have need—whether spiritual need or material need—and shut up our compassion from them, this is hating our brother.
When we see that a brother or sister has a spiritual need, love for the brother should arise naturally within us, and we should go and serve him. We cannot be careless about him.
When we see that a brother or sister has material need, we naturally feel that we need to help him. This is brotherly love, and this is supernaturally natural love.
But when you see this need and suppress that love, that is hating your brother.
Oftentimes this is our difficulty. The Holy Spirit within us kindles our love, and we feel that we need to love our brother, but we suppress it. This is hating the brother.
Also, if we despise our brother, we hate our brother. James 2 says that if someone in beautiful clothing enters your assembly, you ask him to sit in a good place.
Then another person enters with filthy clothing, and you say to him, “Stand thou there,” or, “Sit under my footstool.” This despising of a brother or sister is hating your brother or sister.
Actually, to hate is not to love. If you do not love when you should love, that is to hate your brother.
May God have mercy on us. Negatively, we cannot hate our brothers. May God save us from this sin, so that our hearts can be enlarged and full of the love of God.
Negatively speaking, the Bible also shows us a second thing. In 1 John 3:18, we read:
My little children, let us not love in word, neither with the tongue; but in deed and truth.
Oftentimes, we have this problem. Not only is this how we behave toward God; it is also how we behave toward our brothers and sisters.
Oftentimes we say, “God, I love You. God, I love You.” But do we really love Him? Have we obeyed His commandments? Often, we have not.
Then our love is only on our lips or in our words. This is also how we treat our brothers. We say, “I love you, I love you, I love you.”
Oftentimes, I feel it is better if we say less of that, because love is not merely on your lips or in your words.
I am not saying that you should not say it. We should say to our God, “God, I love You.” But behind this there has to be action, truth, and reality.
Behind it, you keep His commandments, you know His will, and you walk in truth. Then you say, “God, I love You,” and the heart of God is touched.
If it is not so, you can say it thousands of times, but God is not moved.
The same principle applies when we love our brothers. I am not saying that we cannot say, “Brother, I love you.” We should say that.
Perhaps this is my Chinese tradition. In ancient Chinese tradition, we do not say this, and that is not right.
But when we say it with our mouths, there need to be deeds supporting it. It must come from deep honesty.
These are the negative aspects.
Now let us look at the positive side. What I want to share is 1 Corinthians 13. We do not have much time, so let us look at it quickly.
First Corinthians 13 is a chapter about love, but this chapter has a very specific context.
It is between chapters 12 and 14. If you take it out of its context and look at it as a single chapter, you have a problem.
But if you put it between chapters 12 and 14, as it should be, it is very proper. Chapter 12 speaks about the body.
Some say chapter 12 speaks about gifts. No—chapter 12 speaks about the body.
Chapter 14 speaks about the operation within the body, among the members of the body. Between them, there is this love. This love applies to brotherly love.
How can we love our brothers? Here we are told in 1 Corinthians 13:4, “Love suffereth long.”
In the original language, more bluntly, it says that love is longsuffering.
We think that when we come among brothers and sisters, it is “home, sweet home.” It is a place of enjoyment. We suffer much in the world, and now we come to the church to enjoy.
But, brothers and sisters, you have to see that among brothers, in the church, in the house of God, and in the body, the first expression of love is longsuffering.
Why? Because we are members of one body. We are connected together. We are so close and so near.
For this reason, sometimes it cannot be avoided that we have some friction. Sometimes you hit me, and then I kick you. Sometimes it cannot be avoided; not only can it not be avoided, but it abounds.
What do you do when you come into such a situation? You come to a point and say, “I have suffered enough. I want to leave.”
But you are a member of the body. You cannot leave. What can you do? If you do not have a willingness to suffer long, you cannot stand it. This is love.
When you are eating a meal and bite your tongue, how many times do you bite it? The next time you bite it, do you throw it away? No. Longsuffering.
To suffer willingly means that brothers and sisters may trouble you much, but the love of the Lord is in you. You endure; you suffer without limit.
Not only that, love is kind. You accept unlimited suffering from your brothers, but though you receive affliction, you return kindness and grace.
This love is the love of our Lord. When the spear pierced His side, there came forth blood and water. The blood atoned for our sins, and the water gave us life.
Every word the Lord speaks to us says, “I love you.” Brothers and sisters, this is brotherly love.
Of course, there are many other things. I can only ask you, brothers and sisters, to read them yourselves. May the Lord shine His light upon us, that we can indeed love one another.
If we love one another in this way, what will be the result? The Bible tells us that if we love one another, we have passed from death unto life.
This phrase is used twice in the Bible. In John 5, if you believe God and believe in Jesus Christ whom He sent, you have eternal life; then you have passed from death unto life.
Likewise, if we love the brothers, we pass from death unto life.
If we love one another, the Lord says that we are His disciples. Do we want to be His disciples?
Do we only accept Him as our Savior so that we may gain something, and that is enough? Or do we have a heart to follow Him and to be His disciples, so that He can conform us to His own image?
If we have this will to love one another, then we are truly His disciples.
If we love one another, we dwell in God, and God abides in us. Then we are one with our Lord.
As He is, so are we in this world. Then fear is taken away, because in love there is no fear.
When we see the days ahead, when we think of the day we shall see Him, even if there is chastening at the judgment seat of Christ, we have no fear. As He is, so shall we be, if we love one another.
No one has ever seen God, but if brothers love one another, the world shall see the Lord.
Consider the beginning churches. What was their testimony? The world pointed to them and said, “See how these people love one another.”
In these last days, the Lord is coming. Brothers and sisters, is it not time that we should return to brotherly love?
We hope that among brothers and sisters there will be no fighting with one another, but that we can love one another and have one heart.
Then, in this last hour, we can have a beautiful testimony. May the Lord have mercy on us.
Let us bow down and pray.
Our Lord, we really feel ashamed. The way we love You is so shallow, and our love for our brothers is so incomplete.
So many times, we put Your name to shame. So many times, we do not love our brothers enough. We really feel, Lord, that we fall short before You.
We come to You, and we thank You. Remind us once again.
We look to Your Holy Spirit to pour out the love of God within us once again, so that we can rise up to love You and love our brothers.
May praise, honor, and glory all be unto You. In the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.