Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 John 3:16

Hereby perceive we the love [of God,] because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren.

16. Hereby perceive we the love of God ] Better, Herein know we love: see on 1Jn 2:3. The Greek is literally, ‘we have perceived,’ and therefore we know, as R. V., and there is no ‘of God’. The A. V. here collects the errors of other Versions: Tyndale and Cranmer have ‘perceave’, Wiclif and the Rhemish insert ‘of God’; the Genevan is right on both points, ‘Herby have we perceaved love.’ We have obtained the knowledge of what love is, in the concrete example of Christ’s vicarious death. Christ is the archetype of self-sacrificing love, as Cain is of brother-sacrificing hate. Love and hate are known by their works.

because he laid down his life ] For ‘herein’ followed by ‘because’ see on 1Jn 2:3. ‘To lay down’ may mean either ‘to pay down’ in the way of ransom or propitiation, or simply ‘to lay aside.’ Classical usage sanctions the former interpretation: Demosthenes uses the verb ( ) of paying interest, tribute, taxes. And this is supported by ‘for us’ ( ), i.e. ‘on our behalf’. But ‘I lay down My life that I may take it again ’ (Joh 10:17-18), and ‘layeth aside His garments’ (Joh 13:4; comp. Joh 13:12), are in favour of the latter: they are quite against the rendering ‘He pledged His life’. The phrase ‘to lay down one’s life’ is peculiar to S. John (Joh 10:11; Joh 10:15; Joh 10:17, Joh 13:37-38, Joh 15:13). In Greek the pronoun ( as in 1Jn 2:6 and 1Jn 3:7) marks more plainly than in English who laid down His life: but S. John’s readers had no need to be told.

and we ought ] The ‘we’ is emphatic: this on our side is a Christian’s duty; he ‘ought himself also to walk even as He walked’ (1Jn 2:6). The argument seems to shew that though ‘the brethren’ specially means believers, yet heathen are not to be excluded. Christ laid down His life not for Christians only, ‘but also for the whole world ’ (1Jn 2:2). Christians must imitate Him in this: their love must be (1) practical, (2) absolutely self-sacrificing, (3) all-embracing. ‘God commendeth His own love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us’ (Rom 5:8). Tertullian quotes this dictum of the Apostle in urging the duty of martyrdom: “If he teaches that we must die for the brethren, how much more for the Lord” ( Scorp. xii.). Comp. Pro 24:11. See on 1Jn 4:18.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Hereby perceive we the love of God – The words of God are not in the original, and should not have been introduced into the translation, though they are found in the Latin Vulgate, and in the Genevan versions, and in one manuscript. They would naturally convey the idea that God laid down his life for us; or that God himself, in his divine nature, suffered. But this idea is not expressed in this passage as it is in the original, and of course no argument can be derived from it either to prove that Christ is God, or that the divine nature is capable of suffering. The original is much more expressive and emphatic than it is with this addition: By this we know love; that is, we know what true love is; we see a most affecting and striking illustration of its nature. Love itself – its real nature, its power, its sacrifices, its influences – was seen in its highest form, when the Son of God gave himself to die on a cross. For an illustration of the sentiment, see the notes at Joh 3:16; Joh 15:13.

Because he laid down his life for us – There can be no doubt that the Saviour is here referred to, though his name is not mentioned particularly. There are several instances in the New Testament where he is mentioned under the general appellation he, as one who was well known, and about whom the writers were accustomed to speak.

And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren – For the good of our fellow Christians, if it be necessary. That is, circumstances may occur where it would be proper to do it, and we ought always to be ready to do it. The spirit which led the Saviour to sacrifice his life for the good of the church, should lead us to do the same thing for our brethren if circumstances should require it. That this is a correct principle no one can doubt; for:

(1)The Saviour did it, and we are bound to imitate his example, and to possess his spirit;

(2)The prophets, apostles, and martyrs did it, laying down their lives in the cause of truth, and for the good of the church and the world; and,

(3)It has always been held that it is right and proper, in certain circumstances, for a man to lay down his life for the good of others.

So we speak of the patriot who sacrifices his life for the good of his country; so we feel in the case of a shipwreck, that it may be the duty of a captain to sacrifice his life for the good of his passengers and crew; so in case of a pestilential disease, a physician should not regard his own life, if he may save others; and so we always hold the man up to honor who is willing to jeopard his own life on noble principles of self-denial for the good of his fellow-men. In what cases this should occur the apostle does not state; but the general principle would seem to be, that it is to be done when a greater good would result from our self-sacrifice than from carefully guarding our own lives. Thus, in the case of a patriot, his death, in the circumstances, might be of greater value to his country than his life would be; or, his exposing himself to death would be a greater service to his country, than if that should not be done.

Thus, the Saviour laid down his life for the good of mankind; thus the apostles exposed their lives to constant peril in extending the principles of religion; and thus the martyrs surrendered their lives in the cause of the church and of truth. In like manner, we ought to be ready to hazard our lives, and even to lay them down, if in that way we may promote the cause of truth, and the salvation of sinners, or serve our Christian brethren. In what way this injunction was understood by the primitive Christians, may be perceived from what the world is reported to have said of them, Behold, how they love one another; they are ready to die for one another. – Tertullian, Apol. c. 39. So Eusebius (Eccl. His. vii. 22) says of Christians, that in a time of plague they visited one another, and not only hazarded their lives, but actually lost them in their zeal to preserve the lives of others. We are not indeed to throw away our lives; we are not to expose them in a rash, reckless, imprudent manner; but when, in the discharge of duty, we are placed in a situation where life is exposed to danger, we are not to shrink from the duty, or to run away from it. Perhaps the following would embrace the principal instances of the duty here enjoined by the apostle:

1. We ought to have such love for the church that we should be willing to die for it, as patriot is willing to die for his country.

(2)We ought to have such love for Christians as to be willing to jeopard our lives to aid them – as in case of a pestilence or plague, or when they are in danger by fire, or flood, or foes.

(3)We ought to have such love for the truth as to be willing to sacrifice our lives rather than deny it.

(4)We ought to have such love for the cause of our Master as to be willing to cross oceans, and snows, and sands; to visit distant and barbarous regions, though at imminent risk of our lives, and though with the prospect that we shall never see our country again.

(5)We ought to have such love for the church that we shall engage heartily and constantly in services of labor and self-sacrifice on its account, until, our work being done, exhausted nature shall sink to rest in the grave. In one word, we should regard ourselves as devoted to the service of the Redeemer, living or dying to be found engaged in his cause. If a case should actually occur where the question would arise whether a man would abandon his Christian brother or die, he ought not to hesitate; in all cases he should regard his life as consecrated to the cause of Sion and its friends. Once, in the times of primitive piety, there was much of this spirit in the world; how little, it is to be feared, does it prevail now!

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

1Jn 3:16-18

Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren,

Lofty ideals perilous unless applied

Even the world sees that the Incarnation of Jesus Christ has very practical results.

Even the Christmas which the world keeps is fruitful in two of these results–forgiving and giving. Love, charity (as we rather prefer to say), in its effects upon all our relations to others, is the beautiful subject of this section of our Epistle.

I. We have here love in its idea. Hereby know we the love. It is continuous unselfishness, to be crowned by voluntary death, if death is necessary. The beautiful old Church tradition shows that this language was the language of St. Johns life. Who has forgotten how the apostle in his old age is said to have gone on a journey to find the young man who had fled from Ephesus and joined a band of robbers; and to have appealed to the fugitive in words which are the pathetic echo of these–if needs be I would die for thee as He for us?

II. The idea of charity is then practically illustrated by an incident of its opposite (verse 17). The reason for this descent in thought is wise and sound. High abstract ideas expressed in lofty language are at once necessary and dangerous for creatures like us. They are necessary, because without these grand conceptions our moral language and our moral life would be wanting in dignity, in amplitude, in the inspiration and impulse which are often necessary for duty and always for restoration. But they are dangerous in proportion to their grandeur. Men are apt to mistake the emotion awakened by the very sound of these magnificent expressions of duty for the discharge of the duty itself. Every large speculative ideal then is liable to this danger; and he who contemplates it requires to be brought down from his transcendental region to the test of some commonplace duty. It is helpful compassion to a brother who is known to be in need, manifested by giving to him something of this worlds good–of the living of this world which he possesses.

III. We have next the characteristics of love in action. My sons, let us not love in word nor with the tongue; but in work and truth. There is love in its energy and reality; in its effort and sincerity–active and honest, without indolence and without pretence.

IV. This passage supplies an argument against mutilated views, fragmentary versions of the Christian life.

1. The first of these is emotionalism, which makes the entire Christian life consist in a series or bundle of emotions. This reliance upon feelings is in the last analysis reliance upon self. It is a form of salvation by works, for feelings are inward actions.

2. The next of these mutilated views of the Christian life is doctrinalism–which makes it consist of a series or bundle of doctrines apprehended and expressed correctly, at least according to certain formulas, generally of a narrow and unauthorised character. According to this view the question to be answered is–has one quite correctly understood, can one verbally formulate certain almost scholastic distinctions in the doctrine of justification?

3. The third mutilated view of the Christian life is humanitarianism–which makes it a series or bundle of philanthropic actions. There are some who work for hospitals or try to bring more light and sweetness into crowded dwelling houses. Their lives are pure and noble. But the one article of their creed is humanity. Altruism is their highest duty. With others the case is different. Certain forms of this busy helpfulness–especially in the laudable provision of recreations for the poor–are an innocent interlude in fashionable life; sometimes, alas! a kind of work of supererogation, to atone for the want of devotion or of purity–possibly an untheological survival of a belief in justification by works.

4. Another fragmentary view of the Christian life is observationism, which makes it to consist in a bundle or series of observances. Frequent services and communions, perhaps with exquisite forms and in beautifully decorated churches, have their dangers as well as their blessings. However closely linked these observances may be, there must still in every life be interstices between them. How are these filled up? What spirit within connects together, vivifies, and unifies this series of external acts of devotion? Now, in distinction from all these fragmentary views, St. Johns Epistle is a survey of the completed Christian life, founded upon his gospel. It is a consummate fruit ripened in the long summers of his experience. It is not a treatise upon the Christian affections, nor a system of doctrine, nor an essay upon works of charity, nor a companion to services. Yet this wonderful Epistle presupposes at least much that is most precious of all these elements.

(1) It is far from being a burst of emotionalism. Yet almost at the outset it speaks of an emotion as being the natural result of rightly received objective truth (1Jn 1:4).

(2) This Epistle is no dogmatic summary. Yet combining its proemium with the other of the fourth Gospel, we have the most perfect statement of the dogma of the Incarnation.

(3) If the apostles Christianity is no mere humanitarian sentiment to encourage the cultivation of miscellaneous acts of good nature, yet it is deeply pervaded by a sense of the integral connection of practical love of man with the love of God.

(4) No one can suppose that for St. John religion was a mere string of observances. This Epistle, with its calm, unhesitating conviction of the sonship of all to whom it is addressed; with its view of the Christian life as in idea a continuous growth from a birth the secret of whose origin is given in the gospel; with its expressive hints of sources of grace and power and of a continual presence of Christ; with its deep mystical realisation of the double flow from the pierced side upon the Cross, and its thrice-repeated exchange of the sacramental order water and blood, for the historical order, blood and water; unquestionably has the sacramental sense diffused throughout it. The sacraments are not in obtrusive prominence; yet for those who have eyes to see they lie in deep and tender distances. Such is the view of the Christian life in this letter–a life in which Christs truth is blended with Christs love; assimilated by thought, exhaling in worship, softening into sympathy with mans suffering and sorrow. It calls for the believing soul, the devout heart, the helping hand. It is the perfect balance in a saintly soul of feeling, creed, communion, and work. (Bp. Wm. Alexander.)

The sacrifice of love

The laws of nature and the laws of grace come from the same Lawgiver, and they have the same fundamental quality. All life depends on this–that some one is willing to lay down his life for another. From the very earliest stages to the very oldest and highest this is the condition not only of progress but of the continuance of life. The tree grows, produces its leaf, its bud, its blossom, its fruit, in order that it may drop seeds upon the wings of the wind, or give them to the birds, that those seeds may be carried to the soil and from them other trees may spring up. And when the tree has given forth this consummation of its life, its years work is over, and it goes to sleep that it may get ready to repeat the operation next year. The annual dies in giving its life to another; the perennial does not die, but it gives its life, then ceases for a little while, gathers up its forces, and resumes its life the next year in order to repeat the gift. The babe is not dropped out of the clouds into the life of the waiting family. The mother hazards her own life that she may give a new life to the world; and when she has given it, then she begins to devote her life to it; her thoughts concentrate on it, her life flows out to it. It is for this child that the father does his work; it is for this child that the mother gives her prayers, her night watchings, her energies. Her own life is laid down for another life. The child, we say, grows older, wiser. How does it grow older? how does it grow wiser? how does it grow in wisdom and in stature? In stature, because a hundred lives are busy all over the world gathering fruit for it, and food for it, and ministering to it; and wiser, because a hundred brains are thinking for it and a hundred hearts are gathering equipment of love and pouring into it. The teacher is giving her life to her pupils, laying down her life for them. If she does not care for them, if she simply goes into the schoolroom for her six or eight hours to earn her salary, and then goes away, and no life flows out from her, she is a mere perfunctory thing and no true teacher. We build a fence around a tribe of Indians and shut them up by themselves and say, Now grow. A hundred years go by, and they are the same barbarians they were a hundred years before. Then we say, Let civilisation see what it can do with them–a selfish civilisation. We will let in the railroad, we will let in the trader, the whisky dealer, we will let in selfishness. And barbarism simply grows more barbaric; the growth is degeneracy. Not until you can find an Armstrong or a Pratt who will lay down his life for them, not until you can find men and women who will devote their lives to pouring truth and purity and life into these barbaric minds, is there growth; and the moment you find such life given, true growth begins. Life goes by transmission, and there is no hope for a lower race except as some higher race will transmit its life thereto. This is the significance of, the fundamental principle underlying, all foreign missionary service. Now, the Bible takes this generic law and carries it up a little higher. Follow up the stream to its source and you will find the springs among the hills; and these, you say, fed it. But where did these springs come from? You must look up, and there in the blue above sails the clouds; and the rainfall from these clouds has first fed the springs that fed the rills that fed the streams that made the river. So all life, its progress, its development, come from the One above all, who pours out His life that others may live. This is what love means. Love is life giving. Love is not caress. The mother does not love her child simply because she folds it to her arms and caresses it with her kisses. This is but the expression of love. Love is not joy. The mother does not love her child because a strange joy thrills her heart as she looks into babys eyes. This is simply the fruit of love. Love is giving ones life to another. To lay down ones life for another is not, then, the same as to die for another. That is very clear. Hereby we know love, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. Ought we all to die for the brethren? Not at all. No man thinks that. But we all ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. That is another matter. To live for another may involve with it dying for another, and certainly does involve willingness to die for another, but the value is in laying down the life, not in dying. Here are two nurses going out into a city that is plague stricken. One catches the plague, dies, is buried in a nameless grave under a nameless headstone in the cemetery. The other lives through the plague and goes back to her home. One has laid down her life for the plague stricken city as truly as the other. To lay down ones life is not to die; it is only to be willing to die. But no man does lay down his life truly and really for another unless he is willing to die. If a young man goes into the medical profession, and, when pestilence appears in a house, he says, I cannot go there; I should risk my life and the life of my children, he has not laid down his life. The value of Christs life was not in the crucifixion. It was not by His death that He saved the world. I know how that sentence will be picked out, and perhaps sent abroad, and I misinterpreted; nevertheless, I repeat it–it is not by His death He saves the world, but by laying down His life for the world. Passion week began when He was born. From the beginning to the end His life was laid down for humanity. So to lay down ones life does not necessarily involve pain and suffering. It may or may not. You may be a lover without pain; you cannot be a saviour without pain. And when the Christ came into the world, bringing the message of infinite and eternal love, it was not the spear thrust that made Him the Saviour–it was the spear thrust that proved Him the Saviour; it was the spear thrust that showed that there was such love in this heart of the Christ that He was willing to die for loves sake. The Cross is the glory of Christ, because it shows how far love would carry Him in laying down His life for sinful man. Christs Cross is witness of the Divine life that is saving the world. Christ lays down His life for us. We are to lay down our lives for one another. This is the simple lesson of this communion Sunday–Life poured out from one full heart into another empty heart; from one joyous heart into an aching heart; from one pure heart into a sinful and shameful heart. (Lyman Abbott, D. D.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 16. Hereby perceive we the love of God] This sixteenth verse of this third chapter of John’s first epistle is, in the main, an exact counterpart of the sixteenth verse of the third chapter of St. John’s gospel: God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, c. Here the apostle says, We perceive, , we have known, the love of God, because he laid down his life for us. Of God is not in the text, but it is preserved in one MS., and in two or three of the versions but though this does not establish its authenticity, yet , of God, is necessarily understood, or , of Christ, as Erpen’s Arabic has it; or , his love to us, as is found in the Syriac. A higher proof than this of his love Christ could not have possibly given to the children of men.

We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.] We should risk our life to save the lives of others; and we should be ready to lay down our lives to redeem their souls when this may appear to be a means of leading them to God.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

He laid down his life for us: the intimate union between the Divine nature and the human in Christ, gives ground for the calling Christs life as man the life of God; as, Act 20:28, his blood is said to be Gods

own blood. And this testimony of Gods love to us, his laying down his life for us, ought so to transform us into his likeness, that out of the power of that Divine principle, the love of God in us, (so that implanted love is called, 1Jo 3:17,

the love of God), we should never hesitate, or make a difficulty, to lay down our lives for the Christian community, or even for the common good and welfare of men, being duly called thereto.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

16. What true love to thebrethren is, illustrated by the love of Christ to us.

HerebyGreek,“Herein.”

the love of GodThe words “of God” are not in the original.Translate, “We arrive at the knowledge of love”; weapprehend what true love is.

heChrist.

and weon our part, ifabsolutely needed for the glory of God, the good of the Church, orthe salvation of a brother.

livesChrist alone laiddown His one life for us all; we ought to lay down our livesseverally for the lives of the brethren; if not actually, at leastvirtually, by giving our time, care, labors, prayers, substance: Nonnobis, sed omnibus. Our life ought not to be dearer to us thanGod’s own Son was to Him. The apostles and martyrs acted on thisprinciple.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

Hereby perceive we the love [of God],…. The phrase “of God” is not in the Oriental versions, nor in the Greek copies, but is in the Complutensian edition, and in the Vulgate Latin version, and is favoured by the Syriac version, which reads, “by this we know his love to us”; and so the Ethiopic version, “by this we know his love”. That is, the love of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is truly and properly God, the great God, the mighty God, the true God, and God over all, blessed for ever. His love is manifested to his people, and perceived by them in various instances; but in nothing is it more clearly seen than in the following one:

because he laid down his life for us: of the life of Christ, and his laying it down in the room of his people, [See comments on John 15:13], which shows his love, his free grace and favour; for this arose not from any merit or worth in the persons he died for; not from their love, loveliness, or duty, but from his rich mercy, and the great love wherewith he loved them; and which, though it cannot be equalled, should be imitated:

and we ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren: not in such sense, or for such ends and purposes, as Christ laid down his life for us; for no man, as by giving his money, so by laying down his life, can redeem his brother, or give to God a ransom for him: but the meaning is, that saints ought to risk their lives, and expose themselves to dangers, for the sake of their brethren, when they are called to it, and the case requires it: as Priscilla and Aquila laid down their necks, or ventured their lives for the Apostle Paul, Ro 16:3; and they should also, when called unto it, freely lay down their lives in the cause of Christ, and for the sake of his Gospel, for the gaining of souls to Christ, and for the confirming of the faith of the brethren in him, as the apostles of Christ, and the martyrs of Jesus, have done; this is an argument for brotherly love, in the highest instance of it, taken from the example of our Lord Jesus Christ, than which nothing is more forcible, or can lay a greater obligation on the saints.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Know we (). Perfect active indicative, “we have come to know and still know.” See 2:3 for “hereby” ( ).

Love ( ). “The thing called love” (D. Smith).

He for us ( ). as in 1John 2:6; 1John 3:3; 1John 3:5, here alone in this Epistle, though common in John’s Gospel (1John 10:11; 1John 10:15; 1John 11:50, etc.) and in 3Jo 1:7.

Laid down his life ( ). First aorist active indicative of , the very idiom used by Jesus of himself in John 10:11; John 10:17.

We ought ( ). Emphatic again. For see 2:6. Of course our laying down our lives for the brethren has no atoning value in our cases as in that of Christ, but is a supreme proof of one’s love (John 13:37; John 15:13), as often happens.

Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament

Hereby [ ] . See on 2 3.

Perceive [] . Rev., correctly, know.

The love. Omit the italics of A. V., of God, and render as Rev., hereby know we love.

Laid down His life [ ] . See on Joh 10:11. We ought [] . See on 2 6.

Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament

1) Hereby perceive we the love of God.” (Greek en touto) In this we know or recognize the love of God. Yes, God’s love is recognizable, perceptible Joh 3:16; Joh 11:36.

2) “Because he laid down his life for us. The (huper emon) means “on behalf of us”. He laid down His life (Greek psuchen) His soul, like the good shepherd lays down His life in behalf of His sheep Joh 10:11; Joh 10:17-18; Joh 15:12-13.

3) “And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” The term “ought” means “obligation.” Every child of God has an obligation to God to lay down his own life – his selfish desires – “in behalf of the brethren.” Rom 16:4; Php_2:4.

OTHERS

Lord help me live from day to day In such a self-forgetful way, That even when I kneel to pray My prayer shall be for others.

Help me in all the work I do. To ever be sincere and true. And know that all I do for you, Must needs be done for – others.

Let – “self” be crucified and slain, And buried deep; and all in vain

May efforts be to rise again, Unless to live for others,

And when my work on earth is done, And my new work in heaven’s begun, May I forget the crown I’ve won While thinking still of – others.

Others, Lord, yes others, Let this my motto be; Help me to live for others, That I may live for Thee.

Charles D. Meigs

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

16 Hereby perceive we, or, By this we know. He now shews what true love is; for it would not have been enough to commend it, unless its power is understood. As an instance of perfect love, he sets before us the example of Christ; for he, by not sparing his own life, testified how much he loved us. This then is the mark to which he bids them to advance. The sum of what is said is, that our love is approved, when we transfer the love of ourselves to our brethren, so that every one, in a manner forgetting himself, should seek the good of others. (79)

It is, indeed, certain, that we are far from being equal to Christ: but the Apostle recommends to us the imitation of him; for though we do not overtake him, it is yet meet, that we should follow his steps, though at a distance. Doubtless, since it was the Apostle’s object to beat down the vain boasting of hypocrites, who gloried that they had faith in Christ though without brotherly love, he intimated by these words, that except this feeling prevails in our hearts, we have no connection with Christ. Nor does he yet, as I have said, set before us the love of Christ, so as to require us to be equal to him; for what would this be but to drive us all to despair? But he means that our feelings should be so formed and regulated, that we may desire to devote our life and also our death, first to God, and then to our neighbors.

There is another difference between us and Christ, — the virtue or benefit of our death cannot be the same. For the wrath of God is not pacified by our blood, nor is life procured by our death, nor is punishment due to others suffered by us. But the Apostle, in this comparison, had not in view the end or the effect of Christ’s death; but he meant only that our life should be formed according to his example.

(79) There is no authority for adding of God after love in this verse; nor indeed is it right, for what follows clearly shows that the love of Christ is what is referred to. The antecedent to “he,” (“because he laid down,” &e.) is “the Son of God” in 1Jo 3:8. The passage may be thus rendered, “By this we know love, that he laid down his own life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for our brethren.” — Ed.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

16. Of God, as the italics indicate, is not in the Greek, and should be omitted. He has no antecedent, and refers to our true Abel, the unnamed Jesus. Between him, the Unnamed, and Cain is a solemn contrast; the latter exemplifies what hate is in its completion, the former the consummation of love. As hate is the element that murders a brother, so love is the element that would die for a brother.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘By this we know love, because he laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.’

He now draws attention to what that love must be like. It is a love known through experience (‘we know’), for love is what Jesus showed in His life and practised, and through which we have benefited. Jesus, he points out, gave us an example of it, by laying down His life for us. He did the opposite to Cain. Instead of taking life He gave His life. It is therefore sacrificial love. It is an all-giving love. It is practical love. It is love that is full of consideration for others. Indeed if we so truly love we will be ready to lay down our own lives for the brethren, and especially for those who bring us the truth.

But the thought goes deeper than that, for here John is linking love for the brethren with the love that brought Jesus to the cross. This is Christian love, love linked with the cross, love that is unlike any known before, love that gave itself on the cross to bear men’s sins, love that takes part in Christ’s sacrifice of Himself and lives it out (Gal 2:20), and thus it is love that is dead to sin and reveals true Christian faith (compare 1Jn 4:9-10; Joh 10:15-18).

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Exhortation That Our Christian Love Should be Practical ( 1Jn 3:16-24 ).

As throughout John is now concerned that those he speaks to should examine their hearts to ensure that they really are true Christians. He has been speaking of faith, but now he comes down to practicalities. And his word is that those who are truly Christ’s will reveal it practically in the way that they show love to their fellow-Christians. Indeed his concern is lest they be making a profession of being Christians and yet be revealing themselves in their lives to be a sham.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

1Jn 3:16. Hereby perceive we the love of God, This text, as it stands in our version, has generally been mentioned as equivalent to Act 20:28. In which, as he who laid down his life for us, is God as well as man, God is said to have done that, which the man united to him did. The verse may be thus paraphrased: “How contrary is this unmerciful temper to that which God the Son has shewn towards us: we may conceive something of the greatness of his compassionate love, from the most transcendent instance that could be given of it; since he, who is the eternal Word, and was made flesh, and so was truly and properly God incarnate (Joh 1:14.), has loved us, and given himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour (Eph 5:2.). And we ought to be so deeply affected with, and influenced by this unparalleled loveof Christ, as to stand ready after his example, and in imitation of his love, to expose or lay down our own lives, whenever he calls us to it, (as St. Paul did his, Php 2:17.) for encouraging the faith and hope of the brethren; and for the preservation and safety of those who are eminently serviceable to his church, as Aquila and Priscilla laid down their own necks for that great apostle’s life. Rom 16:4.” In what sense the primitive Christians understood this injunction of the apostle, may appear from what the world is said to have reported concerning them; “Behold, how they love one another, and how ready they are to die for one another!” We have here a sixth reason why Christians should love one another,even the astonishing and unparalleled love of Christ in dying for them.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

1Jn 3:16 . Whilst he who belongs to the world hates his brother and is therefore an , Christians, on the contrary, are by the example of Christ to lay down their life for their brethren.

refers to the following .

] “ we have known the love , i.e. the character or the nature of the love ” (Bengel, de Wette, Baumgarten-Crusius, Lcke, Sander); some commentators (Carpzov, Paulus, etc.) erroneously supply with as a more particular definition: ; others (Grotius, Spener, etc.): . In Christ’s self-devotion to death, love itself became concrete. Without adequate reason Ebrard supplies with an , so that forms the predicate of ; thus: “we have known love as consisting in this;” and is only used as an accessory.

] i.e. Christ; comp. 1Jn 3:7 , chap. 1Jn 2:6 . “ He , says the apostle, without mentioning him by name, for He is to every believer the well-known,” Rickli.

The phrase: , besides here and frequently in the Gospel of John, never appears elsewhere either in the N. T. or in the classics. Meyer on Joh 10:11 explains it by the “representation of the sacrificial death as a ransom paid: to lay down , to pay; according to the classical usage of , according to which it is used of payment; “Hengstenberg (on the same passage) explains it by Isa 53:10 ; but it is unsuitable to supply the idea “ ransom ” or “ an offering for sin ,” for the is not merely ascribed to Christ, but is also made the duty of Christians; besides, in that case could not be wanting, as is the case in the Gospel of Joh 10:17-18 . The derivation of it from the Hebrew (Ebrard) is equally unsuitable, because “here the is essential” (Meyer). According to Joh 13:4 , may in this phrase also be interpreted = deponere (so most commentators), which is so much the more appropriate as in Joh 10 . is conjoined with , just as in Joh 13:12 it runs: ; “comp. animam ponere in Propert. II. 10, 43, and animam deponere in Corn. Nep. vita Hannib. I. 3” (Brckner). Perhaps might also be taken in the meaning of “to give up” (Il. xxiii. 704: , , in Pape see ).

is: “for our good” i.e. to save us from destruction; for the idea, comp. chap. 1Jn 2:2 .

. . .] comp. chap. 1Jn 2:6 . By this the climax is stated (Joh 15:13 ); but even every self-denying sacrifice for our brethren belongs to the , to which we are bound by the example of Christ by virtue of our fellowship with Him.

The reading is just as conformable to the N. T. usus loquendi as the Rec. , for is sometimes connected with the pres. inf., and sometimes with the aor. inf. For the idea, comp. Rom 16:4 . [228]

[228] The thought of this verse is, according to Ebrard, the surest proof that John in this section is not treating of the “ general and vague (!) idea of brotherly love,” but of “the relation of the to those who are not ,” because the apostle cannot possibly “limit the duty of loving sacrifice of life to the relationship of the regenerate to one another.” But (1) the idea of Christian brotherly love is very far from being a vague idea; (2) when Christians are exhorted so to love one another as to lay down their lives for one another, that is not a limitation of the commandment of love; (3) those who are not , and are therefore , John cannot possibly call without any further statement; (4) the whole section is an explication of , ver. 11; but by cannot be understood the children of God and the children of the devil in their relation to one another; comp. besides, 1Jn 4:2-11 .

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

1Jn 3:16-18 . Description of true love.

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

DISCOURSE: 2448
THE LOVE OF CHRIST A PATTERN FOR US, TO EACH OTHER

1Jn 3:16. Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

IN contemplating Christianity as a system, we scarcely know whether to admire more, the depth of its mysteries, or the height of its requirements. Of all mysteries, that specified in our text, the death of our incarnate God for the sins of men, is beyond all comparison the greatest: and, of all requirements, there is not one so arduous as that, which also is here inculcated, of laying down our lives for the brethren. The two taken together present Christianity in a most endearing view; and exhibit it as alike conducive to the perfection of our nature and the completion of our bliss. Let us notice,

I.

The extent in which God has manifested his love to us

If we survey the works of creation, we shall see love inscribed upon them all. There was not one which the Creator himself did not pronounce to be very good: and, if there be any thing within the whole compass of it that is noxious to man, it was not so according to its original constitution, but has been rendered so by sin. If we mark also the dispensations of providence, we shall find in all of them too the same blessed character of love: for the very anger of God, is only an exercise of paternal love; and his judgments, an effort to bring his offending creatures into a state of reconciliation and acceptance with him. But it is in redemption that his love is chiefly displayed: for, in order to effect it, Jesus Christ assumed our nature, and actually laid down his life for us.

In order that we may behold somewhat of the love displayed in this stupendous act, let us consider,

1.

What our situation was that rendered such an effort necessary

[We were fallen, after the example of the angels that kept not their first estate; and with them we must have taken our portion to all eternity. To deliver ourselves was absolutely impossible: nor could the whole creation afford us any effectual aid. The judgments denounced against sin must be executed, either on the sinner himself, or on one capable of standing in his place, and of satisfying all the demands of law and justice. But where could such an one be found? The first archangel was unequal to the task. None but God himself could interpose with effect, even that God, whose law we had violated, and whose majesty we had offended. Such was our helpless and hopeless state, when Almighty God determined to rescue us from our misery, by sending his only dear Son into the world to offer up himself a sacrifice for sin, and, by dying in our stead, to redeem us from all the penal consequences of our transgression.]

2.

What by that effort is accomplished for us

[Our guilt is expiated And God is reconciled unto his offending creatures We may now go to him in the name of his dear Son. We may plead the merit of his obedience unto death. The vilest sinner in the universe has no occasion to despair. All that is necessary for his acceptance with God has been done; and he needs only to lay hold on the hope set before him, and to embrace the salvation that is freely offered him. If only we believe in Jesus, justice itself is become our friend and our advocate: because its utmost demands having been satisfied in Christs obedience unto death, it claims, on behalf of all who believe in Jesus, the transfer of those rights to which, through the intervention of our Surety, we are entitled ]

3.

What wonders of love are contained in it

[To what, but love, can we trace this merciful interposition of the Deity in our behalf? was there any thing in us to merit, it at Gods hands? We, alas! were in the very state of the fallen angels, ungodly, sinners, enemies, filled with all evil, and destitute even of a good desire. But, if God could find no inducement from any thing that was in us to exercise this mercy towards us, was there none to be found within his own bosom? No, not any. He would have been equally happy and equally glorious, if neither men nor angels had ever existed: and, if neither his happiness nor his glory have been at all affected by the ruin of the one, neither would it have been by the ruin of the other, if we, like them, had been left to perish to all eternity. To his sovereign love and grace alone can we trace this stupendous act of mercy: and to that it is uniformly traced in the Holy Scriptures: God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son [Note: Joh 1:16.]: Herein is love; not that we loved God; but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins [Note: 1Jn 4:9-10.]: God commendeth his love towards us, in that, when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us [Note: Rom 5:8.]. To all eternity will this be the one subject of wonder, and adoration, and thanksgiving to all the hosts of the redeemed; To Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, be glory and dominion for ever and ever [Note: Rev 1:5-6.].]

Our meditations on this subject will be the best preparation for considering,

II.

The extent in which we should exercise love to our brethren

To imitate our blessed Lord and Saviour, as far as possible, is our bounden duty: and especially are we commanded to do so in the exercise of love. Again and again does he require us to love each other as he loved us [Note: Joh 13:34; Joh 15:12.]: and the duty is enforced from the very same consideration as is proposed to us in the text [Note: 1Jn 4:11.].

Consider then our duty,

1.

Towards our brethren of mankind at large

[There is not a human being towards whom we do not owe a debt of love: and were it in our power, there is not a pain which we should not alleviate, nor a want which we should not supply. This is particularly noticed in the words following our text: Whoso hath this worlds goods, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?
But if this be our duty towards them in reference to their temporal wants, how much more is it in reference to the concerns of their souls! How should we weep over the unhappy state of the heathen world, immersed as they are in darkness, and subjected to the entire dominion of the god of this world! What efforts should we not make for the enlightening of their minds, and for the discovering to them that love, that stupendous love, wherewith our God has loved both us and them! Say, brethren, do ye not blush when you look back upon your conduct in this respect, and see what contracted views you have had of your duty towards them, and how little you have endeavoured to discharge your duty, even as far as it has been seen and acknowledged by you? Consider more especially your duty towards your Jewish brethren, from whom you have received all the light which you yourselves enjoy: should it be no grief to you to see that highly-favoured people so blinded by prejudice, that, with the Scriptures in their hands, they contemn, and even execrate, that very Saviour who has shewn such love to them? Why do we not feel for them? why do we not exert ourselves in their behalf? why do we not endeavour to repay to them the debt of love which we have received from their forefathers? The Apostles, and multitudes of their descendants in the ministry, laid down their lives for us, accounting themselves richly recompensed if they might but lead us to the knowledge of the true God, and of Jesus Christ whom he has sent. O that there were in us a corresponding sense of our duty, and that we could, with one heart and one mind, rise to the performance of it!]

2.

Towards our brethren of the Church in particular

[There is an especial duty towards those who are united to the Church of Christ: We are to do good unto all men, but especially unto them that are of the household of faith. We owe to them a pre-eminent degree of love, because they are so near to us, and because they are so dear to God, and more especially because there is such an identity of interest between Christ and them. They are our brethren in a higher sense than others, being children of the same heavenly Father, and heirs of the same glorious inheritance. From all eternity have they been objects of Gods electing love; and now, the monuments of his grace, the very temples in which he deigns to dwell. Every one of them is a member of Christs mystical body, yea, one spirit with him: so that whatever we do for them, we do for Christ himself, as much as if he were personally present with us, and the visible object of our attentions. What love then do we not owe to these? I hesitate not to say, that our very life should be of small estimation with us in comparison of their welfare; and that martyrdom itself, if endured for the benefit of their souls, ought not to be an object of dread, so much as of desire and joyful self-congratulation. We see this love in Aquila and Priscilla [Note: Rom 16:4.], and in Epaphroditus also [Note: Php 2:30.]; but more especially in the Apostle Paul, who was contented to be in deaths oft for the benefit of the Church, and who, in the near expectation of martyrdom, could say, If I be offered upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all [Note: Php 2:17.].]

For the further improvement of the subject,

1.

Let us contemplate our obligations

[The love of God, which ought to be ever uppermost in our minds, alas! how light an impression does it make upon us! Even the mystery of the incarnation of Gods only dear Son, and of his laying down his life for us, is heard without any emotion, and regarded with little more concern, than if it were only a cunningly-devised fable. What shall I say then, brethren? Must there not be something essentially wrong, where such insensibility exists? are we not ashamed? are we not confounded, when we consider the state of our souls in this respect? Let us rise to a sense of our duty. Let us view our obligations to Almighty God: let us dwell upon them night and day; and let us never rest till our whole souls go forth in love to him, who has loved us, and given himself for us.]

2.

Let us address ourselves to our duties

[Methinks, the duty of love should be no burthen to us: it is in itself most delightful; and brings always its own reward along with it. Let us then exercise it in all its branches. Let every disposition contrary to love be mortified and subdued: all envy, hatred, malice, wrath, uncharitableness, let it all be banished from our hearts; and let the love which hopeth all things, believeth all things, endureth all things, be the one reigning principle in our souls.
Let this principle too be brought into activity for the benefit of all mankind. Our time, our talents, our property, our very life, let it all be consecrated to the Lord for the glory of his name, and for the welfare of his Church and people. Let us not be indulging vain excuses, and saying, This will require sacrifices, which I am unwilling to make: that will require abilities which I do not possess. What sacrifice is there beyond that of life? Even that it is our duty to make for the world and for the Church; and therefore every subordinate sacrifice should be of no account. And as for talents and abilities, if only we will use those which we have, God will glorify himself by them, and render them subservient to the welfare of mankind, if only we will endeavour to improve them with diligence, and to exercise them with fidelity.

You see what God would have us both to be and do: he would have us overwhelmed with a sense of his love to us, and abounding in the most self-denying exercises of love to all mankind. Come, brethren, gird yourselves to the occasion. Your God and Saviour demands it at your hands. The whole universe also joins in one common cry, Come over to us, and help us. And he who most abounds in offices of love to others, shall receive the richest recompence into his own bosom from that God whose name and nature is Love.]

Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)

16 Hereby perceive we the love of God , because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

Ver. 16. Because he laid down ] See Trapp on “ Joh 15:13 “ See Trapp on “ Rom 5:8 “

We ought also to lay down our lives ] If Pylades can offer to die for Orestes merely for a name, or out of carnal affection at the best; should not Christians lay down their own necks one for another, as Aquila and Priscilla did for Paul? Rom 16:4 .

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

16 18 .] Description and enforcement of true love . “Exposui hactenus et probavi, quod dilectio fratrum verissima et optima nota sit discernendi filios Dei et filios diaboli. Sed ne quis hic loci vel seipsum decipiat, vel ab aliis decipiatur,. exponendum etiam erit,. qu sit vera et Christiana caritas.” Seb.-Schmidt, in Dsterd.

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

16 .] Example of true love in Christ, and enforcement of it on us . In this (on , see above, 1Jn 3:10 , and note, ch. 1Jn 2:3 ) we have the knowledge of ( , “we have arrived at and possess the apprehension of:” implying knowledge as an act of the understanding proceeding on intellectual grounds. Here however it is used entirely within the sphere of the Christian life of union with Christ. None can understand true love as shewn in this its highest example, but he who is one with Christ, and has felt and does feel that love of His in its power on himself. See note on ch. 1Jn 2:3 ) love (i. e. what love is: the nature of love true and genuine: “amoris naturam,” Bengel; “veram indolem amoris,” Rosenmller. And Aug [62] , “perfectionem dilectionis dicit, perfectionem illam quam commendavimus.” And so most of the Commentators. Some have held to the insertion of after , which has hardly any authority (only one cursive (“52”) vulg. arm-usc). So Beza, Socinus, Whitby, Grot., Seb.-Schmidt, Calov. And others, as Spener, Carpzov., Episcopius, though they do not read , yet would supply it, or , in the sense of Rom 5:8 , Joh 3:16 . But there can be but little doubt that the other is the right view. The love of God to us is not that which would, as such , be adduced as a pattern to us of brotherly love; it is true that in the depth of the matter, all true love is love after that pattern: but in a passage so logically bound together it is much more probable that the term common to the two, Christ and ourselves, would be, not divine love, which as such is peculiar to Him, but love itself simply, that of which He has given the great example which we are to follow), that He (Christ, as the words beyond question shew) laid down His life for us ( , as “vitam ponere” in Latin, to lay aside life, to die: not as Grot., who in all the places where it occurs maintains that it is only “vitam objicere periculis,” which would entirely enervate the Apostle’s saying here. carries in it and behind it all that we know of the nature of the death which is spoken of: but the vicariousness and atoning power of Christ’s death are not here in consideration: it is looked on here as the greatest possible proof of love, as in Joh 15:13 . It is the very perversity of unsound reasoning to maintain, as Paulas (in Dsterd.), that because our imitation of Christ’s example, insisted on below, cannot have the virtue commonly ascribed to his death, therefore his death had in reality no such virtue): and we ( , emphatic: we on our part, as followers of Christ) ought on behalf of the brethren to lay down our lives (on , Socinus says well: “Non dicit nos debere animam ponere, quasi ut unus pro multis morti sit obstrictus, sed animas , quia singuli pro singulis mori debemus.” The Apostle states the duty generally: and thus stated it is clear enough. As Christ did in pursuance of His love, so ought we to do in pursuance of ours, bound as we are to Him not by the mere force of an outward example, but by the power of an inward life. But naturally and necessarily the precept finds its application only in those cases where our Heavenly Father’s will sets the offering of such a sacrifice in the course and pursuance of our brotherly love, which He has ordained. Of such an occasion the aor. gives perhaps a hint: not , as a habit of mind ever ready: but , once for all, on occasion given. It is not the place here to enter on, or even to enumerate, the various cases of conscience which casuists have raised as to the question, when a Christian ought to lay down his life for a brother. The subject will be found discussed in such commentaries as those of Corn.-a-lap., Justiniani, Estius, Episcopius; and a summary is given by Dsterdieck h. l.).

[62] Augustine, Bp. of Hippo , 395 430

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

1Jn 3:16 . , “the thing called ‘love’ ”. The love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord is the perfect type. Till the world saw that, it never knew what love is. , Christ; see note on 1Jn 2:6 . emphatic, “we on our part”. , see note on 1Jn 2:6 .

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

Hereby = In (App-104.) this.

perceive we = we know, as in 1Jn 3:1.

life. App-110. See Joh 10:15.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

16-18.] Description and enforcement of true love. Exposui hactenus et probavi, quod dilectio fratrum verissima et optima nota sit discernendi filios Dei et filios diaboli. Sed ne quis hic loci vel seipsum decipiat, vel ab aliis decipiatur,. exponendum etiam erit,. qu sit vera et Christiana caritas. Seb.-Schmidt, in Dsterd.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

1Jn 3:16. , love) the nature of love.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

perceive: 1Jo 4:9, 1Jo 4:10, Mat 20:28, Joh 3:16, Joh 10:15, Joh 15:13, Act 20:28, Rom 5:8, Eph 5:2, Eph 5:25, Tit 2:13, 1Pe 1:18, 1Pe 2:24, 1Pe 3:18, Rev 1:5, Rev 5:9

and we: 1Jo 2:6, 1Jo 4:11, Joh 13:34, Joh 15:12, Joh 15:13, Rom 16:4, Phi 2:17, Phi 2:30

Reciprocal: Gen 44:33 – instead Lev 16:10 – to make Deu 15:7 – thou shalt Deu 15:11 – Thou shalt Deu 15:15 – General Jdg 5:18 – their lives 1Ch 21:17 – let thine Psa 112:9 – dispersed Pro 24:11 – General Son 5:4 – my bowels Eze 18:7 – hath given Mat 5:42 – General Mat 25:35 – I was an Mar 8:34 – follow Mar 14:7 – ye have Luk 10:31 – he passed Luk 10:37 – Go Luk 11:41 – rather Luk 12:17 – shall Joh 14:24 – that Joh 21:17 – Feed Act 2:44 – had Act 20:24 – neither Rom 5:7 – scarcely 1Co 13:4 – is kind 1Co 13:5 – seeketh 2Co 4:12 – death 2Co 8:4 – the ministering 2Co 13:14 – the love Gal 1:4 – gave Gal 4:15 – if Gal 5:13 – but Eph 6:20 – boldly 1Th 2:8 – but 2Th 2:16 – which Jam 2:16 – one 1Pe 2:21 – leaving 2Pe 1:7 – brotherly 1Jo 4:16 – we

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

THE LOVE OF GOD IN CHRIST

Hereby perceive we the love of God, because He laid down His life for us.

1Jn 3:16

We forget the sordid details, the anguish of the mother, the disappointment of the disciples, which surrounded and accompanied the Cross of Christ; we remember only that Incarnate Love was lifted up for the sin of the world. Upon the unbelieving world the guilt of that shameful death still rests, but for the Church the event makes for forgiveness and restoration.

I. We must be careful to understand rightly what is meant by Christ having taken away our sin by the sacrifice of Himself.A scoffer might retort, that if that is true, why is sin such a mighty power in the world to-day? Why are selfishness and injustice as rampant as ever? We must understand that what our Lord did upon the Cross was to make satisfaction for the guilt of sin. He blotted out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, nailing it to His Cross. He did not miraculously endow mankind with the power to avoid sin, and to be perfectly holy in the future. What He did was to make it possible for man to co-operate with God, so that he might be re-created into the Divine image, and that his moral and spiritual nature might be restored to its original righteousness. God created man free, and He left him free. In other words, He treats man as a being, with attributes similar to His own.

II. So when Christ left this earth, He did not leave His disciples comfortlesslike helpless orphans bereft of their parents. He promised, and gave them the means to become holy like Himself. He fulfulled His promise of the gift of the Holy Spirit. He instituted and ordained Sacraments as pledges of His love, and as means whereby we may work together with Him, to will and to do after His good pleasure. When we are baptized we claim our share in the blessings of the Cross of Christ. We are baptized into His death. When we draw near with faith, and take the Holy Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, We are partakers of that spiritual medicine and food which is able to heal the sickness of body and soul. This is how Jesus saves us from the power of sin. He does it by once more making us partakers of the Divine nature.

III. Christ did not take away our sins so as to leave us no duties and no responsibilities with regard to them; He works with us as well as for us. He intends us to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling. He supplies us with the means, and he invites us to use them. Let us remember this, then, when we approach the Holy Table. If Christ saved us from the guilt of sin, He will save us, if we humbly and heartily desire it, from its power.

Rev. C. Rhodes Hall.

Illustration

The day on which we celebrate this fact is a good day. It is good news to the world to know that, by the life and death of Christ, it is once more reconciled to God. Henceforth God only looks on us as found in Him. He sees the world represented in the love and obedience of His beloved Son. The name Good Friday is peculiar to the English Church. While we are indebted to other branches of Catholic Christendom of more venerable antiquity for many of the names and customs which make up the Churchs year of festival and fast, we can claim this name as specially characteristic of English Christianity.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

1Jn 3:16. The words of God have been supplied by the translators. The passage means that the Lord gave direct evidence of His love in that he laid down his life for us. This is a beautiful contrast with the man who hates his brother. Such a person not only does not make any sacrifice for another, but takes the other man’s life from him. We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. This cannot necessarily mean that we can literally die for the sake of another, except where the other person’s life is in danger and we might lose ours in protecting him. The passage refers to the interest or devotion we would manifest for our brethren even to the extent of making great and trying sacrifices. (See Rom 16:4.)

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

1Jn 3:16-18. Nothing in the whole Epistle is more impressive or more affecting than the point of juncture in the following words. Against the hate and the murder is set the supreme example of self-sacrificing love. But behind this there is the transition from the principle that the life of sonship must be a life of charity to the thought of that love which gave us the life in the gift of the Son. We may here resume the words, Behold, what manner of love! Here we have the standard of the charity which we must set before us as our aim.

Hereby know we love, because he laid down his life for us. Not the love of God or of the Father as yet, though that will come; but love in its eternal essence and solitary manifestation, as the last expression and first source of all charity. Because Hethere is only One to be thought of heresacrificed His life for our advantage: this expression, occurring only in St. John, is chosen out of many that might have been used in order to combine His pattern in men with our imitation. Which thing is true in Him and in us. And we ought refers not merely to our duty of imitation, but to the obligation resulting from the fellowship of the love common to Him and to His people. The essence of love is the impartation of self to others; towards those who need it, it is self-sacrifice: in Christ there was the laying down or pledging His soul as an expiatory sacrifice or ransom price; but these last ideas are not expressed here, because the apostle is hastening to our imitation, which must simply be the having laid down our individual lives in will and intention for the brethren, the consummate act of self-devotion being left to the will of God.

Then follow two clauses, one of contrast, the other of exhortation. How abideth the love of God, thus shown in Christ, as a proof of regeneration in him who, having the worlds sustenance of life, shutteth his heart against his brothers needwhich he beholds sensibly appealing to him? The strength of the terms must not be overlooked. So far from giving himself, he will not give his mere earthly goods; and he closes his heart instead of opening it for the sacrifice of life. This betokens the utter absence of the ideal life. But the exhortation is a warning to those who have it.

Let us not love in word, neither with the tongue, but in deed and truth:Christ loved in both, and so must we love. But more than that: the word may be a sound theory, uttered only in idle language, without reality; therefore let us not love in tongue only, but in truth.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

Here our apostle presses brotherly love from another argument, namely, from the example of Jesus Christ, who being God, as well as man, laid down his life, as man, for us.

Where note, That the intimate union betwixt the divine and human nature in Christ, gives ground for the calling Christ’s life, as man, the life of God: as his blood is said, Act 20:28 to be God’s own blood; Hereby perceive we the love of God, that is, of Jesus Christ the Redeemer, in that he laid down his life for us.

Thence learn, That the death of Christ for us is a special manifestation of his singular love unto us.

Observe farther, The inference which our apostle draws from Christ’s love in laying down his life for us, namely, that we therefore ought to lay down our lives for the brethren: That is, in a time of persecution, when the glory of God, the edification of the church, and the eternal salvation of our brethren, do require it, and stand in need of it: We must never stick at laying down our lives when God calls us to it, as needful for better ends than our lives. It is not needful that we live, but needful and necessary that we glorify God, both in life and death.

Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament

1Jn 3:16-17. Hereby perceive we the love of God The word God is not in the original: it seems to be omitted by the apostle just as the name of Jesus is omitted by Mary, when she says to the gardener Sir, if thou hast borne him hence, &c., Joh 20:15; in which place there is a very emphatical language, even in silence. It declares how totally her thoughts were possessed by the blessed and glorious subject. It expresses also the superlative dignity and amiableness of the person meant; as though he, and he alone, were, or deserved to be, both known and admired by all. Because he laid down his life Not merely for sinners, but for us in particular. From this truth believed, and salvation received by that faith, the love of Christ, and, in consequence thereof, the love of the brethren, take their rise, which may very justly be admitted as an evidence that our faith is no delusion. But whoso hath this worlds good Worldly substance, far less valuable than life; and seeth his brother have need (The very sight of want knocks at the door of the spectators heart;) and shutteth up Restraineth, whether asked or not; his bowels of compassion Excited, it may be, by the view of misery; how dwelleth the love of God in him? Certainly not at all, however he may talk of it, as the next verse supposes him to do. Thus the apostle having, in the preceding verse, observed, that we know the love of Christ by his laying down his life for us, and that the consideration of his love to us should induce us so to love him as, at his call, to lay down our lives for the brethren; here tells us, that if, so far from laying down our lives for them, we refuse them, when in need, some part of our worldly goods to support their lives, the love of God can in no sense be said to be in us.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Verse 16

To lay down our lives, to be willing to lay them down.

Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament

3:16 {16} Hereby perceive we the love [of God], because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren.

(16) Now he shows how far Christian charity extends, even so far, that according to the example of Christ every man forgets himself, to provide for and help his brethren.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

2. What Love Is 3:16-18

If hatred of a brother Christian is the antithesis of eternal life, what does true Christian love look like? John proceeded to explain.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

In contrast to the murderer Cain’s act, we see love in Jesus Christ’s laying down His life for us (cf. Joh 10:11). This is the opposite of taking another person’s life, as Cain did. Jesus Christ laid down His life once, and we ought to lay down our lives repeatedly in self-sacrificing love, as the tenses of the Greek verbs suggest.

"Most people associate Christianity with the command to love, and so they think that they know all about Christianity when they have understood its teaching in terms of their own concept of love. John found it necessary to explain clearly to his readers what he meant by love . . . .

"Love means readiness to do anything for other people." [Note: Marshall, p. 192.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

Chapter 13

LOFTY IDEALS PERILOUS UNLESS APPLIED

1Jn 3:16-18

Even the world sees that the Incarnation of Jesus Christ has very practical results. Even the Christmas which the world keeps is fruitful in two of these results- forgiving and giving. How many of the multitudinous letters at that season contain one or other of these things-either the kindly gift, or the tender of reconciliation; the confession “I was wrong,” or the gentle advance “we were both wrong.”

Love, charity (as we rather prefer to say), in its effects upon all our relations to others, is the beautiful subject of this section of our Epistle. It begins with the message of love itself-yet another asterisk referring to the Gospel, to the very substance of the teaching which the believers of Ephesus had first received from St. Paul, and which had been emphasised by St. John. This message is announced not merely as a sounding sentiment, but for the purpose of being carried out into action. As in moral subjects virtues and vices are best illustrated by their contraries; so, beside the bright picture of the Son of God, the Apostle points to the sinister likeness of Cain. After some brief and parenthetic words of pathetic consolation, he states as the mark of the great transition from death to life, the existence of love as a pervading spirit effectual in operation. The dark opposite of this is then delineated in consonance with the mode of representation just above. But two such pictures of darkness must not shadow the sunlit gallery of love. There is another-the fairest and brightest. Our love can only be estimated by likeness to it; it is imperfect unless it is conformed to the print of the wounds, unless it can be measured by the standard of the great Self-sacrifice. But if this may be claimed as the one real proof of conformity to Christ, much more is the limited partial sacrifice of “this worlds good” required. This spirit, and the conduct which it requires in the long run, will be found to be the test of all solid spiritual comfort, of all true self-condemnation or self-acquittal.

We may say of the verses prefixed to this discourse, that they bring before us charity in its idea, in its example, in its characteristics-in theory, in action, in life.

I We have here love in its idea, “hereby know we love.” Rather “hereby know we The Love.”

Here the idea of charity in us runs parallel with that in Christ. It is a subtle but true remark, that there is here no logical inferential particle. “Because He laid down His life for us,” is not followed by its natural correlative “therefore we,” but by a simple connective “and we.” The reason is this, that our duty herein is not a mere cold logical deduction. It is all of one piece with The Love. “We know The Love because He laid down His life for us; and we are in duty bound for the brethren to lay down our lives.”

Here, then, is the idea of love, as capable of realisation in us. It is continuous unselfishness, to be crowned by voluntary death, if death is necessary. The beautiful old Church tradition shows that this language was the language of St. Johns life. Who has forgotten how the Apostle in his old age is said to have gone on a journey to find the young man who had fled from Ephesus and joined a band of robbers; and to have appealed to the fugitive in words which are the pathetic echo of these-“if needs be I would die for thee as He for us”?

II The idea of charity is then practically illustrated by an incident of its opposite. “But whoso hath this worlds good, and gazes upon his brother in need, and shuts up his heart against him, how doth the love of God abide in him?” The reason for this descent in thought is wise and sound. High abstract ideas, expressed in lofty and transcendent language, are at once necessary and dangerous for creatures like us. They are necessary, because without these grand conceptions our moral language and our moral life would be wanting in dignity, in amplitude, in the inspiration and impulse which are often necessary for duty and always for restoration. But they are dangerous in proportion to their grandeur. Men are apt to mistake the emotion awakened by the very sound of these magnificent expressions of duty for the discharge of the duty itself. Hypocrisy delights in sublime speculations, because it has no intention of their costing anything. Some of the most abject creatures embodied by the masters of romance never fail to parade their sonorous generalisations. One of such characters, as the world will long remember, proclaims that sympathy is one of the holiest principles of our common nature, while he shakes his fist at a beggar.

Every large speculative ideal then is liable to this danger; and he who contemplates it requires to be brought down from his transcendental region to the test of some commonplace duty. This is the latent link of connection in this passage. The ideal of love to which St. John points is the loftiest of all the moral and spiritual emotions which belong to the sentiments of man. Its archetype is in the bosom of God, in the eternal relations of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. “God is love.” Its home in humanity is Christs heart of fire and flesh; its example is the Incarnation ending in the Cross.

Now of course the question for all but one in thousands is not the attainment of this lofty ideal-laying down his life for the brethren. Now and then, indeed, the physician pays with his own death for the heroic rashness of drawing out from his patient the fatal matter. Sometimes the pastor is cut off by fever contracted in ministering to the sick, or by voluntarily living and working in an unwholesome atmosphere. Once or twice in a decade some heart is as finely touched by the spirit of love as Father Damien, facing the certainty of death from a long slow putrefaction, that a congregation of lepers may enjoy the consolations of faith. St. John here reminds us that the ordinary test of charity is much more commonplace. It is helpful compassion to a brother who is known to be in need, manifested by giving to him something of this worlds “good”-of the “living” of this world which he possesses.

III We have next the characteristics of love in action. “My sons, let us not love in word nor with the tongue; but in work and truth.” There is love in its energy and reality; in its effort and sincerity-active and honest, without indolence and without pretence. We may well be reminded here of another familiar story of St. John at Ephesus. When too old to walk himself to the assembly of the Church, he was carried there. The Apostle who had lain upon the breast of Jesus; who had derived from direct communication with Him those words and thoughts which are the life of the elect, was expected to address the faithful. The light of the Ephesian summer fell upon his white hair; perhaps glittered upon the mitre which tradition has assigned to him. But when he had risen to speak, he only repeated-“little children, love one another.” Modern hearers are sometimes tempted to envy the primitive Christians of the Ephesian Church, if for nothing else, yet for the privilege of listening to the shortest sermon upon record in the annals of Christianity. When Christian preachers have behind them the same long series of virgin years, within them the same love of Christ and knowledge of His mysteries; when their very presence evinces the same sad, tender, smiling, weeping, all-embracing sympathy with the wants and sorrows of humanity; they may perhaps venture upon the perilous experiment of contracting their sermons within the same span as St. Johns. And when some who, like the hearers. at Ephesus, are not prepared for the repetition of an utterance so brief, begin to ask-“why are you always saying this?”-the answer may well be in the spirit of the reply which the aged Apostle is said to have made-“because it is the commandment of the Lord, and sufficient, if it only be fulfilled indeed.”

IV This passage supplies an argument (capable, as we have seen in the Introduction, of much larger expansion from the Epistle as a whole) against mutilated views, fragmentary versions of the Christian life.

There are four such views which are widely prevalent at the present time.

(1) The first of these is emotionalism; which makes the entire Christian life consist in a series or bundle of emotions. Its origin is the desire of having the feelings touched, partly from sheer love of excitement; partly from an idea that if and when we have worked up certain emotions to a fixed point we are saved and safe. This reliance upon feelings is in the last analysis reliance upon self. It is a form of salvation by works; for feelings are inward actions. It is an unhappy anachronism which inverts the order of Scripture; which substitutes peace and grace (the compendious dogma of the heresy of the emotions) for grace and peace, the only order known to St. Paul and St. John. The only spiritual emotions spoken of in this Epistle are “joy, confidence, assuring our hearts before Him”: the first as the result of receiving the history of Jesus in the Gospel, the Incarnation, and the blessed communion with God and the Church which it involves; the second as tried by tests of a most practical kind.

(2) The next of these mutilated views of the Christian life is doctrinalism-which makes it consist of a series or bundle of doctrines apprehended and expressed correctly, at least according to certain formulas, generally of a narrow and unauthorised character. According to this view the question to be answered is-has one quite correctly understood, can one verbally formulate certain almost scholastic distinctions in the doctrine of justification? The well known standard-“the Bible only”-must be reduced by the excision of all within the Bible except the writings of St. Paul; and even in this selected portion faith must be entirely guided by certain portions more selected still, so that the question finally may be reduced to this shape -“am I a great deal sounder than St. John and St. James, a little sounder than an unexpurgated St. Paul, as sound as a carefully expurgated edition of the Pauline Epistles?”

(3) The third mutilated view of the Christian life is humanitarianism-which makes it a series or bundle of philanthropic actions.

There are some who work for hospitals, or try to bring more light and sweetness into crowded dwelling houses. Their lives are pure and noble. But the one article of their creed is humanity. Altruism is their highest duty. Their object, so far as they have any object apart from the supreme rule of doing right, is to lay hold on subjective immortality by living on in the recollection of those whom they have helped, whose existence has been soothed and sweetened by their sympathy. With others the case is different. Certain forms of this busy helpfulness-especially in the laudable provision of recreations for the poor-are an innocent interlude in fashionable life; sometimes, alas! a kind of work of supererogation, to atone for the want of devotion or of purity-possibly an untheological survival of a belief in justification by works.

(4) A fourth fragmentary view of the Christian life is observationism, which makes it to consist in a bundle or series of observances. Frequent services and communions, perhaps with exquisite forms and in beautifully decorated churches, have their dangers as well as their blessings. However closely linked these observances may be, there must still in every life be interstices between them. How are these filled up? What spirit within connects together, vivifies and unifies, this series of external acts of devotion? They are means to an end. What if the means come to interpose between us and the end-just as a great political thinker has observed that with legal minds the forms of business frequently overshadow the substance of business, which is their end, and for which they were called into existence. And what is the end of our Christian calling? A life pardoned; in process of purification; growing in faith, in love of God and man, in quiet joyful service. Certainly a “rage for ceremonials and statistics,” a long list of observances, does not infallibly secure such a life, though it may often be not alone the delighted and continuous expression, but the constant food and support of such a life. But assuredly if men trust in any of these things-in their emotions, in their favourite formulas, in their philanthropic, works, in their religious observances-in anything but Christ, they greatly need to go back to the simple text, “His name shall be called Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins.”

Now, as we have said above, in distinction from all these fragmentary views, St. Johns Epistle is a survey of the completed Christian life, founded upon his Gospel. It is a consummate fruit ripened in the long summers of his experience. It is not a treatise upon the Christian affections, nor a system of doctrine, nor an essay upon works of charity, nor a companion to services.

Yet this wonderful Epistle presupposes at least much that is most precious of all these elements.

(1) It is far from being a burst of emotionalism. Yet almost at the outset it speaks of an emotion as being the natural result of rightly received objective truth. St. John recognises feeling, whether of supernatural or natural origin; but he recognises it with a certain majestic reserve. Once only does he seem to be carried away. In a passage to which reference has just been made, after stating the dogma of the Incarnation, he suffuses it with a wealth of emotional colour. It is Christmas in his soul; the bells ring out good tidings of great joy. “These things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.”

(2) This Epistle is no dogmatic summary. Yet combining its procemium with the other of the fourth Gospel, we have the most perfect statement of the dogma of the Incarnation. As we read thoughtfully on, dogma after dogma stands out in relief. The divinity of the Word, the reality of His manhood, the effect of His atonement, His intercession, His continual presence, the personality of the Holy Spirit, His gifts to us, the relation of the Spirit to Christ, the Holy Trinity-all these find their place in these few pages. If St. John is no mere doctrinalist he is yet the greatest theologian the Church has ever seen.

(3) Once more; if the Apostles Christianity is no mere humanitarian sentiment to encourage the cultivation of miscellaneous acts of good nature, yet it is deeply pervaded by a sense of the integral connection of practical love of man with the love of God. So much is this the case, that a large gathering of the most emotional of modern sects is said to have gone on with a Bible reading in St. Johns Epistle until they came to the words -” we know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren.” The reader immediately closed the book, pronouncing with general assent the verse was likely to disturb the peace of the children of God. Still St. John puts humanitarianism in its right place as a result of something higher. “This commandment have we from Him, that he who loveth God love his brother also.” As if he would say-“do not sever the law of social life from the law of supernatural life; do not separate the human fraternity from a Divine Fatherhood.”

(4) No one can suppose that for St. John religion was a mere string of observances. Indeed, to some his Epistle has given the notion of a man living in an atmosphere where external ordinances and ministries either did not exist at all, or only in almost impalpable forms. Yet in that wonderful manual, “The Imitation of Christ,” there is scarcely the faintest trace of any of these external things; while no one could possibly argue that the author was ignorant of, or lightly esteemed, the ordinances and sacraments amongst which his life must have been spent. Certainly the fourth Gospel is deeply sacramental. This Epistle, with its calm, unhesitating conviction of the sonship of all to whom it is addressed; with its view of the Christian life as in idea a continuous growth from a birth the secret of whose origin is given in the Gospel; with its expressive hints of sources of grace and power and of a continual presence of Christ; with its deep mystical realisation of the double flow from the pierced side upon the cross, and its thrice-repeated exchange of the sacramental order “water and blood,” for the historical order “blood and water”; unquestionably has the sacramental sense diffused throughout it. The Sacraments are not in obtrusive prominence; yet for those who have eyes to see they lie in deep and tender distances. Such is the view of the Christian life in this letter-a life in which Christs truth is blended with Christs love; assimilated by thought, exhaling in worship, softening into sympathy with mans suffering and sorrow. It calls for the believing soul, the devout heart, the helping hand. It is the perfect balance in a saintly soul, of feeling, creed, communion, and work.

For of work for our fellow man it is that the question is asked half despairingly -“whoso hath this worlds good, and seeth” (gazes at) “his brother have need, and shutteth up his heart against him, how doth the love of God dwell in him.” Some can quietly look at the poor brother; they see him in need. They may belong to “the sluggard Pitys vision-weaving tribe,” who expend a sigh of sentiment upon such spectacles, and nothing more. Or they may be hardened professors of the “dismal science,” who have learned to consider a sigh as the luxury of ignorance or of feebleness. But for all practical purposes both these classes interpose a too effectual barrier between their heart and their brothers need. But true Christians are made partakers in Christ of the mystery of human suffering. Even when they are not actually in sight of brethren in want, their ears are ever hearing the ceaseless moaning of the sea of human sorrow, with a sympathy which involves its own measure of pain, though a pain which brings with it abundant compensation. Their inner life has not merely won for itself the partly selfish satisfaction of personal escape from punishment, great as that blessing may be. They have caught something of the meaning of the secret of all love-“we love because He first loved us.” {1Jn 4:19} In those words is the romance (if we may dare to call it so) of the divine love tale. Under its influence the face once hard and narrow often becomes radiant and softened; it smiles, or is tearful, in the light of the love of His face who first loved. It is this principle of St. John which is ever at work in Christian lands. In hospitals it tells us that Christ is ever passing down the wards: that He will have no stinted service; that He must have more for His sick, more devotion, a gentler touch, a finer sympathy; that where His hand has broken and blessed, every particle is a sacred thing, and must be treated reverently.

Are there any who are tempted to think that our text has become antiquated; that it no longer holds true in the light of organised charity, of economic science? Let them listen to one who speaks with the weight of years of active benevolence, and with consummate knowledge of its method and duties. “There are men who, in their detestation of roguery, forget that by a wholesale condemnation of charity, they run the risk of driving the honest to despair and of turning them into the very rogues of whom they desire so ardently to be quit. These men are unconsciously playing into the hands of the Socialists and the Anarchists, the only sections of society whose distinct interest it is that misery and starvation should increase. No doubt indiscriminate almsgiving is hurtful to the State as well as to the individual who receives the dole, but not less dangerous would it be to society if the principles of these stern political economists were to be literally accepted by any large number of the rich, and if charity ceased to be practised within the land. We cannot yet afford to shut ourselves up in the castle of philosophic indifference, regardless of the fate of those who have the misfortune to find themselves outside its walls.”

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary