The passage before us opens with a renewed exhor- tation to brotherly love. For the third time in this dis- course our Lord thinks it needful to press this precious grace on the attention of His disciples. Rare, indeed, must genuine charity be, when such repeated mention of it is made ! In the present instance the connection in which it stands should be carefully observed. Christian love is placed in contrast to the hatred of the world.
We are shown first, in this passage, what true Chris- tians must expeet to meet in this world^ — hatred and per- secution. If the disciples looked for kindness and grati- tude from man they would be painfully disappointed. They must lay their account to be ill-treated like their Master. — "The world hateth you. Be not moved or surprised. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you ; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also."
Facts, painful facts in every age, supply abundant proof that our Lord's warning was not without cause. Persecution was the lot of the Apostles and their com- panions wherever they went. Not more than one or two of them died quietly in his bed. — Persecution has been the lot of true believers throughout the eighteen Christian centuries of history. The doings of Roman Emperors and Roman Popes, the Spanish inquisition, the martyrdoms of Queen Mary's reign, all tell the samei story. — Persecution is the lot of all really godly peo- ple at this very day. Ridicule, mockery, slander, mis- representation, still show the feeling of unconverted people against the true Christian. As it was in St. Paul's day, so it is now. In public and in private, at school and at college, at home and abroad, " all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." (2 Tim. iii 12.) Mere churchmanship and outward pro- fession are a cheap religion, of course, and cost a man