The BROTHERLY Spirit of
the Lord's Prayer
"Our Father." Matthew 6:6
The Lord Jesus having presented the Paternal character
of God, and the consequent filial spirit of His children, naturally
blends with it the fraternal relationship which the children of God
sustain to each other. He could not separate the Fatherhood from the
Brotherhood. The existence of the one relationship necessarily involved the
existence of the other. If I am a child of God, I am a brother to all God's
children. In returning to God as my Heavenly Father, I do not turn my back
upon my spiritual kindred. In earnestly seeking to be well assured of my
adoption, I do not sink the social relationship in the personal
relationship of my religion; and in putting in a humble title to a filial
union with God, isolate myself in affection, sympathy, and fellowship from a
fraternal union with the whole household of faith.
In this light prayer is never exclusive and selfish. I am
indeed privileged--and oh, how great and precious that privilege is!--to
call God "My Father;" but I must never forget that Jesus taught me to say,
in concert with the one family, "OUR Father." And that when I enter into my
closet it is my privilege, as my duty, to bear before my Father, not my
personal sins and sorrows only, but those also of the holy brotherhood to
which, by a divine affiliation, I belong.
The UNITY of His Church was a truth dear to the heart of
Christ. As the hour of His mysterious sufferings darkened, this truth
dilated before His mind and occupied a more distinct and prominent place in
His discourse. Foreseeing the divisions of sect and the differences of
judgment and the alienation of affection which would spring up in His Church
after His ascension to glory--defacing its beauty and impairing its
strength--standing as beneath the shadow of His cross, He prostrates Himself
at the feet of His Father, and binding the whole brotherhood around His
heart, He prays, "That they all may be one, as You, Father, are in me, and I
in You, that they all may be one in us; that the world may believe that You
have sent me."
This sublime petition of the Great Intercessor is being
partially answered now in every act of brotherly love, in every recognition
of fraternal relation, in every lowly, loving effort to manifest and promote
the visible unity of the Church. Upon all such shall belong the blessing of
the "peacemakers!" But the full, the perfect accomplishment of this desire
of the Savior's soul awaits the day of His second coming. Not until then
will the world fully believe in His Divine Messiahship and mission, for not
until then will the whole Church appear in its visible unity.
The Lord's Prayer pre-eminently breathes a UNIVERSAL
spirit. The inspiration of the Spirit of love, taught us by Him who is the
Incarnation of love, and clustering us as one family around the feet of Him
who is "Love," it would he marvelous did it not teach us to love as
brethren. The fraternal affection is cognate to the filial. If I love my God
who begat me, I must love, from the very necessity of the case, all others
who are begotten by God. If my affection for God be truly filial, my
affection for the children of God will be truly fraternal. My return to God
as my Father is the impulse and measure of my return to man as my brother.
The prodigal in the Gospel, when he severed the tie that
bound him to his father, by the same act of selfish exile, severed the tie
that bound him to his brother. "Give me the portion of goods that falls to
me." Thus man's revolt from God, was man's alienation from man.
Hence the sinful hatred of nations, the strife of parties, the jealousies,
the feuds, the injustice, and the wrong which have armed nation against
nation, church against church, man against man, and have made this once fair
and beauteous world a very Aceldama. All springs from one cause--man became
the enemy of God, and so became the foe of his race.
But the Lord Jesus came to gather together His people of
all nations and tongues around one mercy-seat, teaching them to say--"OUR
Father;" thus uniting in the one "household of faith" Jew and Gentile, male
and female, bond and free--all one in Christ, and all one with each other.
Let us now proceed to illustrate the universal spirit of this beautiful
formula.
The foundation truth is--the one Father of us ALL. I
speak now only of the election of grace--the family of God. We who through
grace believe, have not many, but one Father. "Have we not all one Father?"
By one and the same act of predestinating grace God has adopted all His
children. "Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus
Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise
of the glory of His grace, wherein He has made us accepted in the beloved."
Still more emphatically does the apostle state this truth in another
place--"For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, of whom the whole family in earth and in heaven is named."
Magnificent truth! The whole family of God one, and as
one, clustering at the feet of their one Father!--the Church on earth and
the Church in heaven. How real and how near is heaven! The ties that bind
some hearts to the saints above, are closer and holier than the ties that
bind us to the saints below. This may be explained on the principle that we
admire and love, and feel closer fellowship with, that which is perfect. Do
you not feel that the saints of God who are the most holy, who in their
spirit and walk the most closely resemble Jesus, attract to them your
warmest love and sympathy? Thus it is that the saints now made perfect, whom
once we knew, by whose side we traveled, whom we accompanied to the river of
death, and saw pass over and disappear within the veil of heaven; but who,
because they are beautiful in holiness, perfected in love, resplendent with
glory, seem to hold our hearts in the spell of a stronger, holier love and
fellowship.
Sweet thought is it, also, that nothing but the
rivulet of death sunders us from their fullest and eternal communion.
There is but a step between you and them. How close are they to us even now!
Heaven is nearer to us than earth!--nearer than India, than China, than
Australia, than the Crimea. And the more heavenly we grow, and the closer
our connection with the unseen, the nearer shall we feel to the "family in
heaven." Let us endure as seeing the invisible!
But to go forth in silent converse with the saints in
glory, need I separate myself from the communion of the saints on earth?
Assuredly not! The tie is one and the same, with this difference only, that
its association with heaven, its perfect freedom from all taint of sin and
from all trace of infirmity, imparts to it a tenderness and invests it with
a sanctity and solemnity which no tie on earth possesses. But prayer is
the great cement of the saints below. There is not an engagement so
uniting, so healing, so hallowing as prayer. In this holy atmosphere nothing
can live but the pure, the holy, the loving. Sectarianism vanishes, bigotry
expires, coldness dissolves, wounds are healed; and the saints, clustering
together around the feet of the one God and Father of all, realize their
spiritual unity, exhibit their indivisible oneness, and present a spectacle
of holy love such as earth, with all its boasted alliances never saw, and
such as heaven, from amid its perfect harmony, looks down to see.
Oh, were there a deeper and more universal spirit of
united prayer pervading Christ's Church, it would tide over those sectarian
differences and party jealousies which so much deface its loveliness, impair
its power, and shade its luster; and flowing with the effulgence which
encircles the throne of grace, she would go forth, luminous and invincible,
to subdue and bless the world, "fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and
dreadful as an army with banners."
What a family-uniting truth, then, is this--OUR Father.
The very breathing of the word seems to diminish the magnitude of those
minor differences that separate the children of God; while its influence
upon the heart draws forth the sweetest charity and the deepest love towards
all who bow their knees with us in prayer, and say--"OUR Father!" Again, I
ask, should not the one Fatherhood of "the adoption of grace" be more
distinctly recognized, and constitute a more uniting truth among the true
children of God? To know that whatever partition separates, or polity
divides, or forms distinguish the saints; the moment persecution is
awakened, or affliction befalls the Church, all arise and give themselves to
prayer; and, traveling to one mercy-seat--converging as lines to a common
center--find that, after all, they are children of one family, brethren one
of another, and that into the ears of one Father all pour the breathings of
their hearts.
Surely this divine, sanctifying, cementing truth,
attended with the anointing of the Holy Spirit, must promote more visible
union among the saints of the most high God. Let us study it more closely,
get it in-wrought in our hearts, realize fully our personal adoption, learn
to call God "Father" with a less faltering tongue, then will our hearts be
drawn forth with a deeper fraternal affection towards all who worship in
spirit and in truth the same Father, and whom that Father recognizes as His.
Alas! the reason why we stand aloof from God's children
so much, is because we love the Father so little! Did we, under a clearer
sense of our adoption of God, with a deeper conviction of the debt we owed
Him for this signal bestowment of His grace, walk in closer converse with
God, the things which separate us from the family of God--the differences of
ecclesiastical polity, of modes of worship, the hard speeches, the slights,
the woundings, the misunderstandings which engender so much suspicion,
coldness, and alienation among the saints--would be buried and lost sight of
as the rugged rocks disappear beneath the flowing tide. Love--love to the
one Father--would prompt us to throw the mantle of love over the one
brotherhood, veiling every feature but, "the Father's image in the
children's face."
The equality of love with which the Father
regards alike all the family, supplies another strong tie of affection in
the Christian brotherhood. There may be different manifestations of
God's love, but, I imagine, no degrees. He must regard with an equal
affection all whom He has everlastingly chosen. As the ground of our
election of God is love--love, like His being, without beginning--so in one
heart of love, which can admit of no grades in the infinitude of its
affection, is bound the one family of God.
In this one family of our Father there are those who
exhibit different degrees of love to God, as different shades of resemblance
to His image--still they are brethren, and as such it is both our duty and
our privilege to recognize and love them. Should not this truth--the
equality of the Father's love to His family--place us all on equal footing
as children of God? Why should we not love, even though we differ? Why
should we not unite, even though we are separated? Why should we not bear
each other's burdens, and sympathize with each other's trials, and aid each
other's efforts, and bow together at the footstool of the same Father, even
though we are laboring for Him in sundered departments of the one house? If
our love to the Father is genuine, our love to the offspring of that Father
will be true. Love to the one will be the measure, as the evidence, of our
love to the other.
Oh, for more love! Were I asked what the first great need
of the Church was, I should unhesitatingly reply--love. And what the
second--love. And what the third--love. I marvel not that our Lord added a
"new commandment," as it were, to the decalogue--"That you love one
another, even as I have loved you." Love would veil infirmities; love
would seal the law of kindness upon the lip; love would rebuke slander,
reprove falsehood, and suppress every thought, feeling, and word that would
dishonor the Father through the child; wound the Savior through the
disciple; grieve the Master through the servant.
Realizing our personal interest in God's love, and
remembering that He loves alike all the children of His family, with what
holy guardedness should we respect the feelings, and shield the reputation,
and promote the happiness of all the sons and daughters of God! Oh, how can
I look coldly upon him on whom God smiles? How dare I disown one whom Christ
accepts? Where is the evidence of my own sonship if I unite not in heart and
voice with my brother in saying, "OUR Father, who art in heaven?"--and while
I breathe the filial words, feel not a brother's love glowing in my heart?
And have we not one and the same Elder Brother--the
Lord Jesus Christ? What a uniting truth is this! He is "the first-born among
many brethren"--the Elder Brother of the Christian brotherhood. How often,
and with what tenderness of tone and expressiveness of meaning, did these
words fall from His lips--"My brethren!" And how ready He ever was to
acknowledge the one Father of Himself and His brethren; thus taking His
place at the head of the family as the First-Born of the many sons whom the
Father is bringing to glory.
Through the one mediation, then, of this our Elder
Brother, we all approach "OUR Father in heaven." We plead alike His personal
merits; we present alike His atoning blood; we breathe alike His endearing
name; we appear before our Father clad in the garment of the Elder Brother,
in whom, and for whose sake, the Father smiles pleased alike upon all. Here
we stand side by side on an equality with each other. No national hate, no
political creed, no ecclesiastical distinction, no social caste, nor
learning, nor rank, nor wealth should be allowed for one moment to interpose
a barrier to Christian recognition, fellowship, and service between those
who, washed in the blood and robed in the righteousness of the Elder
Brother, are members of Him, "of whom the whole Church in heaven and earth
is named."
Christ our Brother! how close and endearing the
relationship! How sweet to travel to Him as to a brother, calling His Father
our Father, His God our God! A Brother, though divine, made flesh like unto
His brethren! A Brother, the heir of all things, and making us, His
brethren, co-heirs with Himself! A brother born for His brethren's
adversity! Contemplate Christ as such. Go to Him as such. Deal with Him as
such. At all times and in all places are you welcome.
You may go to an earthly brother in the day of
your calamity, and find, in his lack of sympathy or his inability to help,
that, "better is a neighbor that is near than he." But never, never shall
you go to Jesus in adversity and not find in Him all the sympathy and
support that you need--yes, sticking closer than a brother.
You may, also, find it harder to restore to your
reconciled affection a Christian brother whom you have offended than to win
a strong city. But if you grieve and wound your Elder Brother, and go to His
feet and confess your sin, and sob your grief upon His bosom, you will find
Him prepared, graciously, lovingly, and fully, to be reconciled--forgiving
the offender and remembering the offence no more forever.
Oh, let us cultivate frequent and intimate transactions
with Jesus our Elder Brother. Treat Him not as a stranger. Have confidence
in His love, trust His faithfulness, rely upon His power, embosom yourself
in His sympathy. Alas! how little we deal directly and personally with
Jesus! He would have us entwine Him with our every affection, blend Him with
our every thought, associate Him with every transaction, bring to Him every
need, confess to Him every sin, and repose upon His heart every sorrow.
Should not this truth constrain us to "love as brethren;" and to seek on all
occasions to manifest the essential unity of the brotherhood before a
God-hating, a Christ-rejecting world?
And does not the same Spirit of Adoption dwell alike
in all the children of God? Most assuredly, if they are indeed His
children. It is by this same Holy Spirit that each one cries, "Abba,
Father," when he approaches the mercy-seat. "For through Him we both have
access by one Spirit unto the Father." He it is who seals the uniting word
upon our lips--"Our Father," and so binds us all in one fraternal chain of
holy brotherhood. Refusing, then, to recognize a professing disciple of
Jesus as a brother because he belongs not to my sect, and kneels not at my
altar, and sees not eye to eye with me in all things, I grieve the one
indwelling Spirit, wound the Savior in the house of His friends, bring
barrenness into my soul, and go far to ignore my own fraternal relation to
the family of God.
But behold the true catholic spirit which the Lord's
Prayer breathes--"OUR Father." And in whomsoever that spirit truly dwells,
and whoever breathes that prayer from his heart, is bound, as with the
solemnity of an oath, to "love the brotherhood." For, brethren, to kneel
before the throne and say, "Our Father," and then go forth and in angry
polemics, and heated strifes about questions which admit of perfect freedom
of judgment, and which after all may resolve themselves into mere human
opinion, and "bite and devour one another," until well-near "consumed by one
another," is a spectacle which might bedew an angel's eye with tears, as in
reality it clothes a demon's tongue with exultation.
Yes, beloved, God is "our Father." He enshrines us all in
one parental heart, accepts us all in His beloved Son, seals us all
with one Spirit of adoption--cares for us all, provides for us all,
protects us all, sympathizes with us all alike. And who are you, and who am
I, that we should denounce and despise one of these whom God our Father
claims as His child?
And what a brotherly-uniting truth is this, that our
Father is bringing us all to one parental and eternal home. A part of
the family is already there--"the family in heaven." Those who once shared
our earthly home, sat with us at the family table, clustered with us around
the domestic hearth, and who departed in the faith of Jesus, are not
lost--they are housed in the Home of the Father in heaven, and are gathered
around the Lamb, basking in the sunshine of His ineffable glory. What a
soothing thought is this! how sanctifying, how uniting!
BEREAVED ONE! sorrow not as those who have no hope--raise
your eyes from the shrouded remains, the sepulchered dust of the holy dead,
up to the cloudless world of glory, purity, and bliss into which they have
entered--and think of them only as there! They are not here, they are
there--in heaven! They have ascended where no sin taints, nor sorrow
grieves, nor unkindness wounds, nor sickness wastes, nor death separates.
The sun shall not smite them by day nor the moon by night. No faithless
friendships, nor lying tongue, nor throbbing brow, nor aching heart, nor
weary frame affects them now. They mourn no more indwelling sin, they
struggle no more with ungodly men, they battle no more with the prowling
tempter; they have fought the last fight, have gotten the victory, have
removed the armor, and have exchanged the shield for the palm, and the sword
for the crown--and are forever with the Lord.
What a uniting link is this in the family of God on
earth! What holy love, what powerful attraction, what tender sympathy, what
united prayer, what mutual comfort, should the thought of the present state
of our friends in heaven inspire those who have similar bereavements,
kindred sorrows, like consolations, the same hopes, and are hastening to
join them on high! How closely should these things draw the holy brotherhood
together! Why should we not, though of different communions, break through
the fence and leap over the wall of separation, and pour out our sorrowing
hearts together in mutual fellowship at the feet of our Father in heaven?
Could these happy spirits, who have fled from the
'religious divisions and strifes of the Church on earth', bend from their
thrones and speak, with what holy earnestness, with what glowing love, with
what celestial and touching eloquence would they exclaim--"Your different
forms of church polity and worship are merely human; your essential faith
and heavenly hopes are divine! Oh, love as brethren! We now see the folly of
our divisions, the sin of our contentions, the iniquity of our jealousies,
strifes, and alienations. Here there are no different communions, no
separating walls, no exclusive altars--nothing to impair the power, or shade
the luster, or disturb the music of that love which now knits every heart in
the closest fellowship, and blends every voice in the sweetest song. We are
now with Christ! In the effulgence of His glory, all is absorbed and
annihilated that once created a cloud, or inspired a jarring note. His love
so overflows our souls that we are transformed into love, we are all love,
and nothing but love one toward another. All our thoughts and feelings,
worship and service, so center in Christ, that, forgetting earth's
divisions and strifes, or, remembering them but to deepen our humility and
heighten our song, we now feel, as we never felt before, how human, how
trivial, how insignificant were the things which once separated us--and how
divine, how real, how lasting are those which now unite us in a fellowship
as holy, as close, and as eternal as the unity of the God we adore."
Let us endeavor to approximate, in some measure, to the
sentiments and feelings of the glorified saints. Let us realize in some
degree what that love in heaven is, that unifies the most fierce polemics
and the widest sectarians, who once wrote and spoke and strove with each
other so fiercely and so bitterly, each for his own communion, now to meet
in the embrace of a love that buries all the past of earth's infirmities in
its infinite depths and its eternal flow. Oh, in the light of one close view
of eternity, in the experience of one moment's realization of heaven, how
unimportant and childish the contentions as to "whose doctrines are the most
valid, or whose church polity is the most apostolic!"
Our Father, who art in heaven! look down upon Your one
family! and so fill it with Your love, that, casting out all selfishness,
coldness, and alienation, all may meet at Your feet, and love as brethren,
and worship You as the one God and Father of all.
The topic discussed in this chapter belongs essentially
to practical Christianity. The unity of the Christian Church, the oneness of
the family of God, is not a cold, abstract truth--it is vital, warm,
sanctifying. Am I one of God's children? Do I acknowledge as my brethren--of
every nation and tongue and sect--all who, through the Person, and by the
Sacrifice of Jesus Christ, approach God as their Father? Then how precious
and sacred to my heart should be the character, the reputation, and the
happiness of my brother, thus recognized and thus loved! Would I allow the
tainted tongue of slander, the cruel breath of malice, the floating rumor of
falsehood to rest upon a brother or a sister bound to me by the fond tie of
nature, but with a solemn and indignant protest? Would I not shield
them as myself?
How much nearer and dearer to me should be the Christian
character, and the individual peace of a child of God, a brother or a sister
in Christ Jesus! Refraining myself from all evil speaking and evil
thinking--all that would shade His fame, impair His influence, and wound His
feelings--with what wakeful jealousy and holy indignation should I rebuke
the foul slanderer, silence the tongue of falsehood, and defend the
character and reputation of my brother as I would the sacred and endeared
name of my blessed Lord!
How pointed and holy the divine precepts touching the
duty of saint with saint! "Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He
that speaks evil of his brother, and judges his brother, speaks evil of the
law, and judges the law." "Love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous; not
rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing; but contrariwise blessing."
"Walk in love, as Christ also has loved us." "Let all bitterness, and wrath,
and anger, and clamor, and evil-speaking, be put away from you, with all
malice; and be kind one to another, forgiving one another, even as God for
Christ's sake has forgiven you." "Let brotherly love continue."
Were these divine and holy precepts more conscientiously
and strictly observed, were they entwined more closely with the communion of
saint with saint, and of the saints with the world in daily life, how much
evil would be prevented, how much alienation of affection would be averted,
how many Christian brethren, now sundered in communion and fellowship by
misrepresentations, evil-speaking, and mischief-making, would be united in
the sweetest communion and in the holiest service for Christ! Oh, to
remember that every shaft hurled at a brother's fair name pierces him
through the heart of Jesus! "He that touches you, touches the apple of
mine eye."
"Must I my brother keep,
And share his pains and toil;
And weep with those that weep,
And smile with those that smile;
And act to each a brother's part,
And feel his sorrows in my heart?
"Must I his burden bear
As though it were my own,
And do as I would care
Should to myself be done;
And faithful to his interests prove,
And as my neighbor love?
"Must I reprove his sin,
Must I partake his grief,
And kindly enter in
And minister relief;
The naked clothe, the hungry feed,
And love him not in word, but deed?
"Then, Jesus, at Your feet
A student let me be,
And learn as it is meet
My duty, Lord, of Thee;
For You did come on mercy's plan,
And all Your life was love to man.
"Oh, make me as You art,
Your Spirit, Lord, bestow;
The kind and gentle heart
That feels another's woe,
That thus I may be like my Head,
And in my Savior's footsteps tread."
How uniting and hallowing is this truth in its influence
upon the family institution! Each domestic circle, trained in the
fear and love of God, morning and evening touchingly illustrates this
fraternal bond in its approaches to the mercy-seat. At the feet of one
heavenly Father all cluster when bending at the family altar. Whatever
selfishness may have divided their interests, whatever dissensions may have
disturbed their unanimity, whatever differences of judgment may for the
moment have rippled the tranquil surface of domestic life--here all meet as
one, and with one heart and with one voice uplift their prayer to God and
say, "Our Father, which art in heaven." How touching the scene! how holy the
bond! how tender, sacred, and uniting the thoughts, the sympathies, and the
love which now beat responsive in each bosom, and diffuse peace and repose
over each mind!
Should not this truth--the one Fatherhood of our
God--sanctify and endear the various ties of the domestic circle, preventing
those jealousies, discords, and divided interests which too frequently
invade the sanctuary and embitter the happiness of the home circle. Let this
truth have its full weight in promoting family love and domestic concord; in
strengthening and hallowing the parental, the filial, and the fraternal
relations; and all pious families will then be centers of spiritual
influence, healthful and far-reaching in their extent, beauteous types of
the Father's house into which all the children of God will before long be
gathered.
And as we approach eternity, and realize more the
heavenly glory, do we not feel a closer drawing towards all who love the
Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity and truth? Standing once by the dying bed of
a child of God, he stretched forth his emaciated hand, cold and clammy with
the moisture of death, and, grasping mine, exclaimed, "The nearer I get to
heaven, the dearer to my heart are the Lord's people of every branch of His
one family." Such, also, was the testimony, a few days before his death, of
an eminent professor of an American university--"The longer I live the more
dearly do I prize being a Christian, and the more signally unimportant seem
to me the differences by which true Christians are separated from
each other." How sweetly these dying testimonies to the unity of the Church
of Christ chime with the dying prayer of Christ Himself for His universal
Church, "That they all may be ONE."
"The last note of this divine strain breathes love and
union, and sweetly closes the most fervent production of any spirit that has
ever tabernacled in the flesh. Let us catch with loving ear this music of
His dying voice, as it rises and swells with the ecstasy of gratitude and
hope; trembles with anxiety for His 'little flock' in the midst of an angry
world, and sinks away in a joyful cadence of eternal glory, love, and
blessedness, in which hover images of peace and union between Himself, His
disciples, and His Father in the everlasting home of heaven."
Into that home we shall soon enter. And could then a
blush crimson our cheek, or a tear bedew our eye, or a pang pierce our
heart, how deep would be our shame, how intense our grief, how inexpressible
our agony, that, in our pilgrimage to its mansions of love, we should ever
have felt unkindly, have thought unkindly, have spoken
unkindly, have acted unkindly towards one who, with us, bent his
knees and bowed his heart at the mercy-seat, and prayed--"OUR Father, who
are in heaven."
"Oh then the glory and the bliss,
When all that pained and seemed amiss
Shall melt with earth and sin away;
When saints beneath their Savior's eye,
Filled with each other's company,
Shall spend in love the eternal day."