We have walked the ladder of 2 Peter 1 from faith all the way up to godliness, and now Peter takes us into the next step. After we have learned to walk before God in private, the very next thing God wants out of us is brotherly kindness.
We can fake a lot of things in church, but he cannot fake the way he treats his brother week after week. Godliness toward God is supposed to spill over into kindness toward the brethren, and if it does not, something is broken.
Brotherly kindness is the rung most Christians are selective with or even try to skip altogether.
Peter put it right here on purpose because you cannot grow without it.
Webster defined kindness in 1828 as good will, benevolence, that disposition which delights in contributing to the happiness of others, exercised cheerfully in supplying their wants or alleviating their distresses.
Notice the word “delights”. Brotherly kindness is not a duty you grit your teeth through. It is a disposition God puts in our hearts that actually enjoys helping a brother. The opposite is hatred and hardness.
The Picture of Brotherly Kindness in the Bible
Jonathan was the king’s son and the rightful heir to the throne, and the moment he met David his soul was knit to David’s soul. He loved him as his own soul. He took off the royal robe that was on him and gave it to David, along with his sword, his bow and his girdle. He stood between David and his own father when Saul was trying to put a javelin through David’s chest. Jonathan knew David was going to be king instead of him, and he loved David anyway and gave up his own crown so his brother could have what God had promised him.
That is brotherly kindness in its highest form. Most of us would love our brother right up to the point where it cost us something.
Spurgeon told the story of a soldier in a snowstorm high in the mountains. The army had lost its way and the men were dropping one by one. One soldier picked up a fallen brother, threw him on his back, and carried him through the drifts. Then another man fell and he carried him too. He kept going across the white desert with his brothers on his back until at last he himself dropped down, overcome with the cold, and died in the snow. But the brother on his back when he died had soaked up so much warmth from the dying soldier’s body that he survived the night and made it home. That is what brotherly kindness looks like in the church. You spend yourself on the brother who cannot make it on his own, and the warmth of your life keeps him alive even when it costs you everything.
Love One Another Fervently
Brotherly kindness is a fervent love between Christians.
1 Peter 1:22, “Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently.”
Unfeigned means no faking. Pure means no agenda. Fervent means hot.
That is the kind of love the Holy Ghost will produce in a heart that has been purified by obeying the truth. If the love is cold or fake or has an angle to it, the problem is obedience.
1 Peter 3:8, “Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous.”
Brotherly Love Continues and Prefers
Paul lays it out a four-word verse that gives us clear direction.
Hebrews 13:1, “Let brotherly love continue.”
Continue or keep it going. Do not let it cool off because a brother let you down or life got busy or you got older and grumpier.
Romans 12:10, “Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another.”
Preferring one another is putting the brother ahead of yourself. Letting him have the better seat, the better parking spot, the credit for the work you did together. The flesh does not prefer anybody but itself, so every time you prefer a brother, you are walking in the Spirit and starving the flesh at the same time.
Do Good to All, Especially the Brethren
Brotherly kindness has an order to it. We are commanded to be kind to everybody, but the Bible draws a line and says especially the brethren.
Galatians 6:10, “As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.”
The household of faith comes first. That does not mean you are unkind to the lost man at the gas station. It means when the choice is between helping a stranger and helping a brother, the brother gets the first call. Many Christians have never lifted a finger for anyone in their church, and that just shows us where we are spiritually.
1 Thessalonians 4:9-10, “But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren which are in all Macedonia: but we beseech you, brethren, that ye increase more and more.”
Paul says God Himself taught the saints to love one another, and even when they were already doing it, his command was to do it more. Brotherly kindness has no ceiling. You never get to a place where you have loved the brethren enough.
Love Is the Evidence That We Are Saved
Brotherly kindness is the test. A man who does not love the brethren has no proof he was ever saved in the first place.
1 John 3:14, “We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.”
The proof that you have passed from death unto life is your love for the brethren.
1 John 4:20-21, “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God loveth his brother also.”
You cannot drive a wedge between loving God and loving the brother. They come together or they do not come at all, and any man who says he loves the God he has not seen while hating the brother he has seen is, in John’s exact word, a liar.
1 John 4:7-8, “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.”
Brotherly Kindness Builds the Church
Brotherly kindness is the mortar that holds the whole house of God together. Where it is present, the church flourishes and weathers storms that should have killed it.
Colossians 3:12-13, “Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.”
Forbearing and forgiving: these two words carry the weight of every church split that ever happened. Christians who learn to forbear the brother who rubs them wrong and forgive the brother who hurt them will keep a church together for a hundred years.
Living This Out
This week, go out of your way to be friendly when you walk into the building and do not slip in and slip out. Learn the names of the people you do not know yet and use those names the next time you see them, because a name is the first piece of dignity you can give a brother.
Check on the fellow Christian you have not seen in a while. Forgive quickly when someone wrongs you. Prefer your brother’s needs over your own, even when the flesh is screaming for its own way. Do not gossip.
A Christian who pursues brotherly kindness this way will find that the warmth of his life starts to keep others thriving for the Lord.
Next up is charity, the love that crowns the whole ladder and ties every other step together.
