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I. THIS IS A DEBT WHICH EVERY MAN OWES. There are relations in which men seem slow to recognise dues and obligations. They recognise the relation between the ordinary creditor and debtor, master and servant, as well as the obligations founded upon it. They forget that the very existence of certain relations involves a corresponding obligation, whether we have voluntarily assumed them or not. The child enters into relations with its parents without any act of its own; and yet the child is bound to render filial honour, obedience, and love. The highest relation man can have is to God. This exists before the act of any recognition on the part of the creature; but it imposes certain obligations which the creature is bound to meet. In the preceding verses Paul speaks of the relation of the subject to the ruler; the citizen to the state. Our birth introduces us to the rights of citizenship, but we are born to duties just as much as to rights; and as long as we remain under the protection of the State, we are bound to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, just as we are bound to render unto God the things that are God's; and that, as Paul informs us, "for conscience' sake." The debts we owe the State are just as binding as any debts we voluntarily contract. And these dues (ver. 7) lead Paul to speak of that greatest debt, loving one another. Although you may say with a feeling of independence and superiority, "I do not owe a dollar to any man,"here is a debt you owe to every man. "The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God"; and the same spirit spoke through Cain — "Am I my brother's keeper?" The atheist denies his relation to God and the obligation which it involves; the spirit of selfishness refuses to recognise its relation to its neighbour; but the Spirit of Christ teaches a different lesson. It is not left to my choice or caprices — it is a debt. I owe it not to a select number of men, but to every man, for every man is my neighbour. According to Paul this debt is love (Matthew 22:36-38).

II. WHAT ARE WE TO DO WITH THIS DEBT?

1. We must pay this debt as every other. The Lord is not satisfied with our recognition of the duty, for He says, "Thou shalt love." We must pay it —

(1) By scrupulously abstaining from doing any evil to our neighbour, for "love worketh no ill to his neighbour."(2) By doing all the positive good to him we can.

2. And yet this is the one great debt which we are always to owe. Love is the inexhaustible fountain out of which all words and deeds of kindness flow. That fountain must ever remain open and full. Without such a fountain all the streamlets would fail. Let a man love, and he will strive to render unto all their dues, and to owe no man anything. The absence of love makes cruel creditors and unprincipled debtors. Love is indeed "the fulfilment of the law," and the unfulfilled law everywhere reveals the absence of love. By the law is the knowledge of sin, and of this great sin, too, that we owe this great debt of love, and have become great debtors by not paying it. But the law is also "our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ." We shall never be able to pay this greatest of all debts until we have become the pardoned debtors of our Heavenly Father. The love of God begets our love. He alone can enable us to be diligent in paying a debt that can never be entirely paid off.

(G. F. Krotel, D.D.)

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KJV: Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.

WEB: Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.