The Christian's Debt of Love. ment had not before been given. This could not be our Lord's meaning; because He had Himself declared it to be the second commandment of the law. Love is the commanding principle of all religious and moral duty; of religious duty as it has God, and of moral duty as it has man, for its object. Love, saith St. Paul, in a verse following my text, is the fulfilling of the law; and in the very verse of my text, he that loveth another, (by another is signified all others) hath fulfilled the law; that is, hath fulfilled his duty to man. For this, continues he, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not bear false witness; thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other command referring to the duty, which you owe to one another, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. The two great commands, the love of God, and of our neighbour, were delivered by Moses. Of these the decalogue, or ten commandments are branches; the first four containing our duty towards God, and the remaining six our The Christian's Debt of Love. duty towards our neighbour; as is clearly explained in our excellent and well known, but, plain as it is, little understood, and still less considered, Church Catechism. Hence you see that to love one another, was not strictly a new command. But although delivered of old, it was new to the practice and opinions of the times, in which our Lord spoke. The Jewish chiefs and rulers had no just conception of either their duty to God, or their neighbour. Our Saviour plainly told. them they did not love God; and He exposed the lawyer's misapprehension, or doubt, of his love to his neighbour, in the parable of the good Samaritan. The command, therefore, old in the revealed law of God, was both new and strange to the corrupt hearts and lives of men. It was neither in their contemplation, nor their practice; so that, in reference to the moral state of the world, our Saviour justly called it a new commandment. Let us now consider how the keeping of this second great command, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, or according to the expression The Christian's Debt of Love. pression in my text, paying our debt of love to one another, is the fulfilment of the whole moral law, Virtue, righteousness, and goodness are the will of God. They exist in his very nature; and, in them He is independently; ineffably, and eternally happy. These we are to acquire and practise; because, of his Supreme will, He hath commanded them. But, herein He hath commanded our happiness; for, He being always perfectly happy in righteousness, righ teousness is the eternal constituent of happi, Therefore, in cultivating righteousness, we obey God, and necessarily produce our own happiness. But, here a question arises; what is righteousness? What are we to do, for the prac tice of it? To this we may answer that, to do righteousness is to act justly, in conformity with the Divine law; and to imitate God in doing good. But the words of his law tell us more forcibly and significantly; thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with all thy heart and soul, and thy neighbour as thyself: and our Saviour adds; love one another, as I have loved you. x 4 He, The Christian's Debt of Love. He, who truly loves himself, will do every thing for his own welfare, both of soul and body; and, if he love his neighbour, that is other men, as he loves himself, he will do the same for them: he will zealously promote their peace, prosperity, and happiness, both present and future, as he promotes his own. Hence, he will never seek these things, which evidently in their immediate, or probably in their remote consequences, can impede or abridge, the proper comforts or advantages of any man, or society of men; but, on the contrary, he will be solicitous and active to promote the present, with the eternal, welfare of all mankind. A Now, sin is destructive of happiness, and the certain cause of pain and misery. The breach of any part of the Divine law, the doing any thing that God has forbidden, or the neglecting any thing that He has commanded, is soon or late an injury to ourselves, or to others, and generally, I may say always, to both. Therefore, he, who truly loves himself, and others, will abstain from sin, abhor it as hateful, fly from it as from a destroyer, and and diligently keep the whole law of God. Hence, The Christian's Debt of Love. ས Hence, my brethren, you clearly may understand that, if we constantly obey God; if, as life wears away, we do every thing that He has commanded, and refrain from every thing. that He disapproves; we make the required payments of our debt of love. Although it swell with our years, our prosperity, and ability, our liquidations are then proportionate to the increase; so that it shall not stand against us in the great day of account, nor, in the days of mortality, be the cause of any trouble or disquietude. We shall find it a perennial spring of real happiness decreed by God himself, and flowing from Him, which cannot be stopped or intercepted by any casualties or infirmities of our being. But, if men, in forgetfulness or contempt of their debt of love, and of Him, who is the primary object of it, love themselves only or chiefly or unduly, coveting a larger share of the pleasures, riches, splendours or honours of the world than it has pleased Him to grant them, and seeking them by other means than He has prescribed for the obtainment of them; they make to themselves an inexhaustable source |