"The [one] loving the brother of him in the light is remaining and a stumbling block in him there is not."
-Here we find one who is loving their brother. The New Command (John 13.34)! Love is a positive action. This one does not simply have positive feelings towards their brother. It is not mere tolerance. This person is laying their life down for their fellow believer. He/she is moving towards their need to meet it (cf 1John 3.17, James 2.15-16, Luke 10.33-37). It could be a physical need, or emotional, or spiritual. He/she is giving, with no expectation of return, giving of their time, their ability, their finances, sure. But we’re talking about mercy in action. This is entirely what Jesus was doing when He flipped the question of who is my neighbor on it’s head. it wasn’t about verifying the who of another (who is my neighbor?), it was about Validating the who in me (am I a good neighbor?). In this case, we’re not going around trying to assess who might be my brother. We are going around acting like a brother. We are going around - walking - in love (i.e. in the light!). Doing the love thing towards those in need, specifically towards those who are of the household of faith. Loving shows that we are light-walking. Joe light-walker - that’s me and you...! Or should be.
-The command to love - since it is a positive action - then creates the possibility for a sin of omission. You transgress by NOT doing what has been commanded. And here is where the bar gets set really high. It’s not a zero sum game. We’re not merely trying to eliminate a finite number of missteps, to clean up our act, so to speak. No, God’s love is everlasting. It is infinite. There are no limits or boundaries whatsoever. There is no end to those who need to be loved, to the needs which can be met, to the love which can be shown to others. Which is why we measure this not in terms of deeds, not in terms of individual steps, but in terms of a walk. An innumerable number of step strung together in and out of season and over the course of a life. A lifestyle. A life wherein there is an inexhaustible storehouse of love at the ready, ready and waiting to be poured out, would-be compassion-in-action which just can’t wait to be energized and unleashed, opened up on my (unsuspecting?) brother, stirred up by simply seeing his need (cf Matthew 9.36)(seeing is feeling!). But then, we gotta stop...! We gotta be willing to stop and drop what we’re doing. I haven’t done anything if I fail to stop. Feelings are a dime a dozen. So are those who don’t stop, who just keep going about their business, their busy-ness, too busy to be bothered with things like needs and neighbors who have them. Brothers and sisters, let us not be other-side walkers. Let us be love walkers. Light-walkers. Failing here, we fail ultimately.
-This stumbling block, this cause of stumbling - most commentators agree that it is not that I would be causing another to stumble altho that is certainly possible, if one who knows that I claim to have the God of everlasting love in my life happens to see me stop short of love in some way, yeah, they could stumble over my sin of omission and quite possibly be more inclined to question the validity of my faith or of Christianity in general. But the other possibility is that since I am the one who is doing the walking - whether in darkness or in the light - that I am the one who would stumble. Or not. Since love-walking is in fact light-walking, living into a lifestyle of love is the means to lighting my own path. As I live (increasingly, steadfastly) into what God wants, I find illumination for the rest of life. Bonus! Got love?
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