DO WE KEEP THE COMMANDMENTS?
By J. G. Wilson
Our love to God must be supreme. Heart, soul, strength, mind,—all to the utmost must be in this love; and “if any man love God, the same is known of him.” We may say much about our love to God, but he knows the heart. We must recognize the fact that love to God carries with it love for whatever God loves, and therefore it follows that love to man is necessary to meet the requirements of the law. Love to God and man is only one love, and is not divisible. But our love to God is measured by our love to our fellow men. “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?” 1 John 4 : 20. This does not stop with our natural brother, nor with our brother in the church. But even if it did, how many are wanting! The love of God extends to every soul. Oh, for such a love to be seen among the professed people of God—a love that embraces the whole human family! We may think that, had we been on earth when Jesus Christ walked among men, we should have ministered to his needs, sympathized with him in sorrow, and followed him even to prison and to death; and we should have said, with Peter and the others, “Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended.” Matt. 26 : 33. Let us not deceive ourselves with beautiful thoughts of what we “would have done” for Christ, when all around us are souls for whom he died,—souls who need just such care and sympathy as we think we should show to Christ,—and yet we are indifferent to their needs. O Christian, would you bankrupt yourself to minister to Christ if he were on earth now? Would you share your abundance or your little with Jesus? “O yes,” you say, “nothing would be too good for him.” You need not look far for an opportunity; for he says, “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” Matt. 25 : 40. Look at the human side of Jesus, in humanity all around you; and remember that when you feed the hungry, when you minister to the needy or the afflicted, it is the same as if you did it to Christ. When you lodge that poor tramp, let not your eyes fail to look beyond a wretched man to the One who died for him. Christ is identified with every soul; and if we would minister to him, we must recognize his human side—man. Then there are those who are slighted, neglected, and turned away. The Lord, whom we profess to love, says to us: “I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.” When, Lord?—When you thus neglected humanity; for “inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.” Matt. 25 : 45. O Christ, how often thou art neglected to-day, even by professed friends! Christ taught the young ruler, in Luke 18 : 20–22, that he had failed to keep the commandments when he used his property for himself, and neglected the poor and needy. He says the same to all who do the same thing in our day. Shall we hear his words with sorrow because we love our possessions more than we love our Lord? Shall we turn from following him now, in this eleventh hour, to the things of this world? Love to God and to man—this alone fulfills the law.