Epistle — 1 John 3:10-16
Clement of Alexandria
On 3:10
"Thus we know the children of God, as likewise the children of the devil," who choose things like the devil; for so also they are said to be of the wicked one.
On 3:15
"Every one who hates his brother is a murderer." For in him through unbelief Christ dies. Rightly, therefore, he continues, "And you know that no murderer and unbeliever has eternal life abiding in him." For the living Christ abides in the believing soul.
On 3:15
And if we owe our lives to the brethren, and have made such a mutual compact with the Saviour, why should we any more hoard and shut up worldly goods, which are beggarly, foreign to us and transitory? Shall we shut up from each other what after a little shall be the property of the fire? Divinely and weightily John says, "He that loveth not his brother is a murderer," the seed of Cain, a nursling of the devil. He has not God's compassion. He has no hope of better things. He is sterile; he is barren; he is not a branch of the ever-living supercelestial vine. He is cut off; he waits the perpetual fire.
On 3:16
"For He Himself laid down His life for us;" that is, for those who believe; that is, for the apostles. If then He laid down His life for the apostles, he means His apostles themselves: us if he said, We, I say, the apostles, for whom He laid down His life, "ought to lay down our lives for the brethren;" for the salvation of their neighbours was the glory of the apostles.
Gospel — Matthew 10:26-32
Hilary of Poitiers
On 10:26
Therefore neither threatening, nor evil speaking, nor power of their enemies should move them, seeing the judgment-day will disclose how empty, how nought all these were.
On 10:28
Therefore they ought to inculcate constantly the knowledge of God, and the profound secret of evangelic doctrine, to be revealed by the light of preaching; having no fear of those who have power only over the body, but cannot reach the soul; Fear not those that kill the body, but cannot kill the soul.
On 10:29
Figuratively; That which is sold is our soul and body, and that to which it is sold, is sin. They then who sell two sparrows for a farthing, are they who sell themselves for the smallest sin, born for flight, and for reaching heaven with spiritual wings. (vid. Ps. 124:7.) Caught by the bait of present pleasures, and sold to the enjoyment of the world, they barter away their whole selves in such a market. It is of the will of God that one of them rather soar aloft; but the law proceeding according to God’s appointment decrees that one of them should fall. In like manner as, if they soared aloft they would become one spiritual body; so, when sold under sin, the soul gathers earthly matter from the pollution of vice, and there is made of them one body which is committed to earth.
On 10:29
For it is an unworthy task to number things that are to perish. Therefore that we should know that nothing of us should perish, we are told that our very hairs are numbered. No accident then that can befal our bodies is to be feared; thus He adds, Fear not, ye are better than many sparrows.
On 10:29
Or this, ye are better than many sparrows, teaches that the elect faithful are better than the multitude of the unbelieving, for the one fall to earth, the other fly to heaven.
On 10:32
This He says in conclusion, because it behoves them after being confirmed by such teaching, to have a confident freedom in confessing God.
On 10:32
This teaches us, that in what measure we have borne witness to Him upon earth, in the same shall we have Him to bear witness to us in heaven before the face of God the Father.