Galatians 6:2; Romans 12:15
Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.
Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep.
CHARLES BRIDGES (1794-1869): The gospel does not shut us up in our own private interests, as if we had no sympathy with our neighbour. It is an universal brotherhood of love.
A. W. PINK (1886-1952): If the love of God has been shed abroad in my heart—then I shall sympathize with His children in their varied trials and troubles, be ready to counsel and comfort, and assist them so far as lies in my power. Only thus shall I fulfill the law of Christ’s precepts and the law of His example (John 13:14,15), for He enjoins us to be compassionate to others, and is Himself “touched with the feeling of our infirmities,” Hebrews 4:15.
JOHN NEWTON (1725-1807): Such a compassionate disposition, which excites our feelings for the afflicted, is an eminent branch of the mind which was in Christ.
A. W. PINK: Christ was tender, sympathetic, and full of compassion.
MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): This obliges us to a mutual forbearance and forgiveness, to sympathy with and compassion towards each other―agreeable to His pattern and example, which have the force of a law to us. He bears with us under our weaknesses and follies, He is touched with a fellow-feeling of our infirmities; and therefore there is good reason why we should maintain the same temper towards one another.
JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564): “Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you,” Ephesians 4:32. And as this virtue will never reign in us, unless attended by compassion, He recommends to us to be tender-hearted. This will lead us not only to sympathize with the distresses of our brethren, as if they were our own, but to cultivate that true humanity which is affected by everything that happens to them, in the same manner as if we were in their situation.
MATTHEW HENRY: Compassion is a debt owing to those that are in affliction. The least which those that are at ease can do for those that are pained and in anguish is to pity them—to manifest the sincerity of a tender concern for them, and to sympathize with them―to take cognizance of their case, enquire into their grievances, hear their complaints, and mingle their tears with theirs—to comfort them, and to do all they can to help and relieve them.
JOHN CALVIN: Concern, undoubtedly, produces sympathy.
C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): Some people listen but do not hear. You tell them your story, but it does not help you a bit because their minds are no more moved by your case than if they were far away. They are just saying to themselves, “We will hear this poor old lady’s story; it will please her.” But it does not please her because she perceives that they have no sympathy, no feeling for her. The kind of person you like to tell your story to is one who weeps with you—who is really afflicted with your affliction. It is greatly comforting to have a person with you who feels just as you feel.
JOHN CALVIN: No act of kindness, except accompanied with sympathy, is pleasing to God.
C. H. SPURGEON: A comforter without sympathy would be a strange being, indeed—he would be a mocker of human woes!―Other people’s pity is the pity of inaction. “Oh, I do pity you very much!” says a person to a sick woman, “your husband is dead, your children have to be supported and you have to work hard. Well, my good Woman, I pity you very much, but I cannot afford to give you anything. I have so many who call upon me.” How much pity there is of that kind in the world!
CHARLES BRIDGES: It is not pity in words and looks. It is when our neighbour’s trouble descends into the depths of our hearts, and draws out thence bowels of kindness and practical sympathy.
JOHN CALVIN: There are many apparently liberal, who yet do not feel for the miseries of their brethren.
C. H. SPURGEON: Men who are wrapped up in their own glories are not sympathetic. Is it not a fine thing to spend life in contemplating one’s own magnificence? Those who are amazed at their own greatness have no thought to spare for the suffering. “No,” says the man, “the masses must obey the laws of supply and demand and get on as well as they can. Let them do as I have done. I might have been as poor as they are if I had shown as little push and enterprise as they do.” The gentleman talks on a great scale and he has no sympathy for the small woes of common life. His sympathy is needed at home and his charity begins there—and is so satisfied with its beginning that it never goes any further.
CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): If it be true respecting those who sympathize not with others in their bodily necessities, that “they have not the love of God in them,” 1 John 3:17—much more is it true, that they who “shut up their bowels of compassion from a brother” under the pressure of spiritual troubles, can possess but little knowledge of that mystery which unites all in one body, and causes every member to participate in the feelings and necessities of the whole body.
JOHN CALVIN: We, as much as possible, ought to sympathize with one another, and that, whatever our lot may be, each should transfer to himself the feeling of another, whether of grief in adversity, or of joy in prosperity. And, doubtless, not to regard with joy the happiness of a brother is envy; and not to grieve for his misfortunes is inhumanity. Let there be such a sympathy among us as may at the same time adapt us to all kinds of feelings. Therefore while we have time, let us learn to exercise humanity, to sympathize with the miserable, and to stretch out our hand for the sake of giving assistance.
MATTHEW HENRY: Inhumanity is impiety and irreligion.
CHARLES SIMEON: The very essence of Christianity is love: and it is by bearing one another’s burdens that we very principally fulfil the law of Christ. But how can we fulfil that law, if we do not “rejoice with them that rejoice, and weep with them that weep?” Or how can we possess “true and undefiled religion,” if we do not “visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction,” James 1:27, and endeavour, according to our ability, to “lift up the hands that hangs down, and the feeble knees, and to make straight and smooth paths” for “the feet of those who are ready to slip?” (Hebrews 12:12,13). It was peculiarly characteristic of our blessed Lord, that “He would not break the bruised reed, or quench the smoking flax, till he should bring forth judgment unto victory,” Isaiah 42:3, and, if we do not resemble Him in His compassionate regard for His afflicted saints, whatever we may profess, we have not “the mind that was in Christ Jesus,” Philippians 2:5.
