1.  God highly commends it wherever he finds it in act and exercise; 1 Thess. iv. 10, “and indeed,” says he, “ye do it towards all the brethren.”  To this duty, and to manifest his high approbation of it, God hath promised a great reward, Heb. vi. 10.

2.  God commands it and vehemently exhorts to it often in the gospel.  Oh how importunately did the Lord Jesus enjoin it, and frequently press it on his disciples when he was on earth!  John xiii. 34, “A new commandment give I unto you.”  What is that new commandment?  Why, “That ye love one another, as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”  And in John xv. 12, 17, “This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you;” i.e.  Take the pattern of my love to you for your pattern in loving one another.  I have loved and will love you—­1.  With great love, John xv. 13:  so do you likewise. 2.  My love to you is free, without any desert in you:  let yours be free, without carnal respects one to another also. 3.  My love to you is real, hearty, and unfeigned:  so let yours be one to another, 1 Pet. i. 22. 4.  My love to you is an exceeding fruitful love.  I loved you so, as to labor, toil, sweat, and die for you:  so must you love one another with a fruitful, profiting love. 5.  My love to you is a pitying, sparing, and forgiving love; a forbearing and tender-hearted love:  so must you be to one another, Col. iii. 12, 13. 6.  I love you with a warm and fervent love:  so do you love one another. 7.  I love with a holy, spiritual love, as new men who have my image stamped on, and my holy nature in you, and as you are made perfect by the comeliness and beauty I have put on you:  so do you love one another, because you are a lovely and holy people unto me. 8.  I love you with a constant and unchangeable love; notwithstanding of all your weaknesses, yea, unkindness too, and unworthy walkings before me:  thus you are bound to love one another.

O that church members and all other Christians would seriously, sincerely, diligently, and constantly mind and practise this grand and indispensable duty to one another, in all their ways and actions, and not lay it aside as a little, useless, or indifferent matter, which they may neglect at their own will and pleasure.

2.  As we are indispensably bound to love one another; so we are as absolutely and perfectly bound to walk in a loving and encouraging manner towards one another.  Our behavior ought to be such in all things, as to invite all to love us, as holy, humble, and blameless saints, and brethren in Christ.  The Lord Jesus expects church members to walk lovingly towards one another, as well as to love one another.  They ought, therefore, as much as possible, to provoke and encourage each other, and to remove out of the way of love all such stumbling-blocks as may any way hinder it, as we cannot love a sour, peevish, contentious, and cross-grained professor, with as much complacency as a meek, quiet, humble, affable, and courteous one.