Brotherhood by Faith
The Playbook of Faith • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Fellowship Meal - today after the service, come join us for some great food and fellowship in the Fellowship Hall! We’re having BBQ sandwiches, potato salad, chips, watermelon, and homemade ice cream! Hope you brought your stretchy pants!
Happy Fourth of July!
Wednesdays: This Wednesday we’re doing a men’s and a women’s Bible study. Come get involved - we’ve got a spot saved for you! Also, men: if you have not yet gotten a book, let me know and I’ll get that to you. We’ll be starting Henry Blackaby’s book Experiencing the Cross, so it’s a great week to jump in!
Also want to let you know that next Sunday we’re having Communion during Sunday Worship. During this week, take some time to reflect on all Christ has done for you. Spend time in prayer, confessing sins to God and trusting him to guide you. Communion will be so much more meaningful when you’ve prepared your heart.
Next Wednesday evening will be our quarterly business meeting. We’ll start at 6:30 in the Fellowship Hall.
Reading: Hebrews 13:1-4
1 Let brotherly love continue.
2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
3 Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.
4 Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.
Pray
This morning, we’ll consider the calling of brotherly love. The author of Hebrews right at the start gives us the general idea of our passage. Look at verse 1:
1 Let brotherly love continue.
Not much to that sentence, is there? But boy is there a lot to learn! God calls us as believers to demonstrate brotherly love in all relationships with one another. Within this body of Christ, we should show brotherly love to one another. I don’t think anyone here would doubt that statement. I’m sure no one would argue that we should not love one another in Christ. But maybe some of us might wonder what that really means. What does brotherly love really look like? How do we live it out day-to-day? So let’s take a little time this morning and figure out what God is telling us about brotherly love.
What is brotherly love?
Sometimes when I preach, I get to teach you a new word. But today, I don’t have a new word to teach you…you already know it. We have a city here in the United States that is called the “City of Brotherly Love.” Do you know what that city is named?
Philadelphia! Philadelphia is the Greek word for brotherly love, and of course it’s made up of two words: the word for friendly affection (phileo) and the word for brother (adelphos). Now as Christians, we are brothers and sisters in Christ. Since that is true, then brotherly love is the natural way we ought to relate with one another.
This type of brotherly love shows up in numerous Scriptures. Take Matthew 18 for example: Jesus tells the disciples what to do when a brother (not just a sibling) sins against them: they are to go to the brother and seek reconciliation.
Just after that, when Peter asked Jesus how many times they should forgive a brother who wrongs him, Jesus tells the disciples
22 Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.
These methods of seeking reconciliation and offering forgiveness over-and-over again are brotherly love in action. They show how affection works itself out through loving beyond the other person’s faults and mistakes. The author of Hebrews wants his readers to continue loving one another.
That’s a key point about brotherly love. Love is not automatic. You don’t love by default. No matter how much affection you have for someone, you must continue to choose to love them.
But the author doesn’t just want to speak about brotherly love in the abstract. He wants to put some “boots on the ground.” How do we live out this brotherly love? Our author gives us three recipients to which we demonstrate brotherly love. Each of these target groups represents someone we might tend to overlook or take for granted. First:
Show Brotherly Love to Strangers
Show Brotherly Love to Strangers
When I say strangers here, I mean fellow believers that we do not know well yet. Look at verse 2:
2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
When it comes to strangers, we are called to demonstrate brotherly love through hospitality. Notice that the author doesn’t say “Show hospitality...” but “do not neglect to show hospitality...” This isn’t just a matter of doing something hospitable. We should look for opportunities to be hospitable.
And there’s a benefit that’s involved in showing hospitality - the second half of the verse tells us that by doing this, some have had angels as their guests.
Consider Abraham. While he was at the oaks of Mamre, some visitors came to Abraham’s tent. The Bible describes Abraham as not just welcoming, but hurrying to have food prepared so they could eat. It says he immediately went to several people including his wife, and he bid them to hurry. Abraham was anxious to provide a full-fledged welcome. The result was a promise from God:
10 The Lord said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife shall have a son.” And Sarah was listening at the tent door behind him.
In the very next chapter, those same angels find Lot down in Sodom. Just like his uncle, Lot shows genuine hospitality and is rewarded for it as these angels rush them out of the city before they are destroyed. In both of these situations, these men were hospitable toward angels without knowing it. In both, the angels brought some form of blessing from God.
We are called to show hospitality to strangers, but especially to those who are within the body of Christ. We don’t do it for the blessing of hosting an angel or receiving a promise from God - we do it because we truly love God and therefore love his people.
Some practical steps to showing hospitality to strangers:
Open your home to missionaries who are passing through.
Share your resources with someone in need.
Offer your expertise to someone who could use a little know-how.
Show Brotherly Love to the Shackled
Show Brotherly Love to the Shackled
God Calls Us to not only care for the stranger, but also for those who are imprisoned and mistreated. Verse 3:
3 Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.
This was nothing new for the readers of this letter. In Hebrews 10:34, they were commended for their compassion:
34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.
So now, the author encourages them to remember the ones who are in prison. That idea of remembering is not passive - he’s telling his readers to make sure you remember. Do whatever it takes to never forget.
And remember also the context: the ones in prison are likely being persecuted for their faith in Jesus Christ. If F. F. Bruce is correct, this epistle was likely written just a year or so before the persecution of Christians under Nero in A.D. 65. The call here, then, is to remember those who are suffering for the name of Jesus.
Not only do we just remember these individuals, but we should remember them in a certain way:
3 Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.
If the Christian church is a body of many members, and some of those members are suffering, then we should have a role in bearing that suffering ourselves. Don’t just think about your brother’s difficulty while you remain “over there somewhere.” Remember him as though you are bound right next to him! Don’t just pity your imprisoned brother, identify with him. Be there. Show them God’s kind of love.
And not just the imprisoned - do the same for the mistreated:
3 Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.
Not everyone who is shackled is in prison. Some are mistreated in various other ways. Some are shackled by an abusive relationship. Some are shackled by destructive life patterns. Some are shackled by doubts or fear, or guilt. Some are shackled in a modern-day slave trade. One ministry estimates that about 500,000 people in the U.S. are being trafficked as slaves. RIGHT NOW.
We as the body of Christ are called to remember them - to show them brotherly love. That love is the tie that binds us together with all the church. We are one in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
When Jesus spoke of the final judgment, he tells how the sheep and the goats will be separated. He’ll commend the sheep for doing all sorts of great works to him. When they ask “when did we see you...” Jesus will answer:
40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’
When we help bear the sufferings of others, we are serving Christ. Being members of the body together, we should remember, pray for, and encourage our brothers and sisters who are enduring suffering for the name of Christ. So what does brotherly love toward the shackled look like?
Keep a list of imprisoned and/or mistreated brothers and sisters.
When you can, send cards, make phone calls, or be there for the shackled.
In some cases, you should fight for their freedom. You might give toward groups that help persecuted believers, or you might volunteer for ministries engaged in loving the shackled.
Show Brotherly Love to our Spouses
Show Brotherly Love to our Spouses
One person that we can easily overlook and take for granted is your own spouse. How does brotherly love fit into a marriage? Look at verse 4:
4 Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.
Notice the idea of honoring our marriages. Marriage is a beautiful, priceless treasure. Just like fine china is valuable and precious, so is your marriage husband…wife. Honor that marriage. Cherish it.
More importantly, cherish your spouse. You cannot claim your marriage is valuable to you while you treat your spouse like dirt.
But the call is also to keep our marriages undefiled. Holiness in life means being holy in all things, including marriage. Our culture has been devaluing marriage for a long time. When you do that, when you go outside of God’s intentions for marriage, you open yourself up to catastrophe and pain.
That’s because of how God looks at marriage. God sees marriage as sacred. Look at 1 Corinthians 6:9-11:
9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality,
10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
Paul is telling the Corinthian believers that those who are unrighteous (including those who defile marriage) will be judged by God.
God calls us to a better way of life. He has cleansed us from sins and sanctified us, making us right with God. That same God calls us to having unblemished marriages for the sake of Christ.
So how demonstrate brotherly love in our marriages?
Love your spouse. Luther was once quoted as saying (my paraphrase), “Love your neighbor…and your wife is your closest neighbor.”
Adore your spouse. Keep falling in love with them. Speak fondly of them to others.
Honor your spouse. Put them and their needs above your own.
Brotherly love is a beautiful testimony to the love of God. Let brotherly love continue.