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Text: Hebrews 13:1-4
Brotherly love is more than an emotion, it is a sacrifice for someone you love. It is measured by the sacrifice it makes – greater love hath no man than this that a man lay down his life for his friends.
There is not a more practical subject in all the Bible than the subject of brotherly love. Some of you have notes in your Bible about Jehovah’s Witnesses, Roman Catholics, Mormans, conspiracy theories, political ideologies, etc. We could go on and on about why JWs are wrong and why the government covered up this, and why Islam is terrible, and how to rightly divide your Bible, but if you can’t live with and love brothers and sisters and the lost world, then the most basic aspect of Christianity has been neglected. Knowledge really doesn’t matter if you can’t get along with people.
If the instruction is to LET brotherly love continue, then people need to quit hindering it.
Hindrances to brotherly love (vs 1)
- Too burdensome
- Romans 15:1-3 We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. 2 Let every one of us please his neighbour for his good to edification. 3 For even Christ pleased not himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me.
- Galatians 6:2 Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.
- Parent relationship best illustrates this. As a parent, there is nothing your kids can do that will make you not love them or want the best for them.
- He Ain’t Heavy – In 1972 a two year old Chinese boy, Hu Jen-chuan, fell from a table and went into a coma. When he woke up after six days he was not able to talk or move. Like any parent, his mother, was terribly distressed. Yet her distress was multiplied by the fact that she could not afford to place him in a nursing home. Instead she cared for Hu Jen-chuan herself, and her care has shown the unfathomable depth of her mother-love. You see, because he is unable to move Hu Jen-chuan is liable to get terrible bed-sores. So for the past thirty years his mother has done the unbelievable – she has carried her son on her back. As of May 2002 Liu Kuei-lan was 65 years old and weighed 40 kilograms. Her son, now a grown man, weighed 82kg. On many occasions Liu has fallen and fractured bones while carrying her son. Yet she continued to carry him. When asked how she carried such a heavy burden her reply was simple: “he ain’t heavy, he’s my son.
- Too cynical
- You’re not going to care for anyone that you’ve written off.
- Psalms 116:10-12 I believed, therefore have I spoken: I was greatly afflicted: 11 I said in my haste, All men are liars.
- It wasn’t that I lost faith in humanity. I got frustrated with people and I lost faith in God’s power.
- Barnabas illustrates this brotherly love well. He trusted God’s power to change a man’s life and understood the dynamics and organization of the early church better than anyone else. Acts 4:36-37, 9:26, 11:19-26, 15:36-41
- Barnabas salvaged a soul and look what Paul is saying at the end of his ministry (2 Timothy 4:10-11).
Brotherly love in hospitality (vs 2)
- Don’t forget to entertain strangers.
- One of the natural things we do is get cliquish. We forget there are others around us.
- Nice to a stranger who turns out to be someone with more influence than you thought.
Brotherly love in empathy (vs 3)
- Good way to pray.
- Good way to consider your ministry. What would I appreciate if I were in their position?
Brotherly love in marital love (vs 4)
- Loving unity on God’s terms.
- Love is not lust.
- Adultery is unity on the devil’s terms or the flesh’s terms, but not on God’s terms.
