These things I command you that ye love one another (see Joh_15:12)
Love in the Christian system
The work is all love: love in its hidden source the love of the Father; in its first manifestation, the love of Christ; and lastly, in its full outpouring, the love of believers for each other.
Love is its root, its stem, its fruit. It forms the essential characteristic of the new kingdom, whose power and conquests are owing solely to the contagion of love. This is why our Lord left no other law but that of love to those who had by faith become members of His body. (F. Godet, D. D.)
Brotherly love
As the spokes of a carriage wheel approach their centre, they approach each other: so also, when men are brought to Jesus Christ, the centre of life and hope, they are drawn towards each other in brotherly relationship, and stand side by side journeying to their heavenly home. (J. F.Serjeant.)
Christian love
When a rose bud is formed, if the soil is soft, and the sky is genial, it is not long before it bursts; for the life within is so abundant, that it can no longer contain it all, but in blossomed brightness and swimming fragrance it must needs let forth its joy, and gladden all the air. And if, when thus ripe, it refused to expand, it would quickly rot at heart, and die. And Christian love is just piety with its petals fully spread, developing itself, and making it a happier world. The religion which fancies that it loves God, when it never evinces love to its brother, is not piety, but a poor mildewed theology, a dogma with a worm in the heart. (J. Hamilton, D. D.)
