If we keep the original word order of the Greek text, 2 Peter 2:17 says, “the brotherhood, you love.” Surely this is of the greatest commandments. Jesus said that to love God is the greatest command and the second greatest is to love your neighbor as yourself. For just a minute, let us examine how and why we should love the brotherhood.

Look at what the Holy Spirit told John to write about loving your brethren:

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

1 John 4:7-12

We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.

1 John 4:19-21

Sometimes we do not treat our brethren as we should. Sometimes we are guilty of anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk although God said these things should not come out of our mouth–Colossians 4:8.

How can we overcome this hateful and bitter disposition and truly be Christians?
1. Remember that you were ungodly, but Jesus died for you anyway–Romans 5:6.
2. Remember that you still have faults–1 John 1:8
3. Remember that God created every person and every Christian–Ephesians 2:10.

I pray that we can go restore not only the proper pattern of Christianity but also restore the heart of Christ in every Christian.