Love your brother; love your sister . . . love your dog?

Swift Current Creek - good

Pacific Ocean - good

Unidentified Panamanian 3 inch bug - good

Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister. (1 John 4:20-21 NIV)


Franciscan Richard Rohr’s daily meditations (https://cac.org/category/daily-meditations/) have focused recently on a bottom-up way of interpreting scripture; instead of visualizing God “up there” and his creative power coming down to earth, he proposes that we more accurately visualize God as the base of creation, the bottom, the foundation. As opposed to the ruler, king, possibly. The upshot being that what we understand scripture to mean always rests upon our understanding of the nature of God; any misconception at the basis of our faith necessarily leads to misconceptions, for instance, when we read passages like 1 John 4:20-21, a harsh, threateningly-toned admonition if God is understood as stern, vengeful. 
 
How have you understood this passage? How have I? On it’s face, it seems clear: the one who loves God is incapable of hatred and so anyone who, for instance, performs an act of hatred against a brother or sister is clearly lying about his love of God. And what response on our part does that imply as readers of John? Well, if we hate (here we have to interpret what’s included in “hate”) another person (assuming brother and sister are brother and sister in Christ in John's mind, not necessarily siblings), we are actually hating God? And where does that leave us if our ja****s neighbour pis**s us off repeatedly. Do we bury our feelings and make nice to prove we love God?

A top-down view of God might well lead to such a fundamentalist view of John’s words. Not to mention an excuse to judge our neighbour. So let’s take a bit of a Richard Rohr look at the verse—and hope he forgives us for potentially putting words in his mouth. 
 
At the foundation of all creation is God, is Jesus, is the Holy Spirit: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.(John 1: 1-5) If that’s not foundational, I don’t know what is. It’s basic; it’s concept building. In effect, another way of interpreting our passage follows from this. God/Jesus/Holy Spirit (let’s say “Trinity” for convenience sake) are the power, the energy that created the amazing miracle of life on a lifeless planet in a vast universe, and what was created was “good.” And God saw that it was good. (Genesis 1:9) Ergo, goodness is described well by finding God in what was created by him: flowers, birds, puppies and people. And in that catalogue of creation is as surely the brother and sister—whom we love or hate—as are the flowers, the birds, the puppies and the dolphins. 
 
To despise anything that the Trinity has created is to slap the creator in the face; that’s why a love of God must needs result in a love for the flowers, the birds, the puppies and our brothers and our sisters. In the dictionary, one definition of “God,” should be, simply, “good.” God and his creation are a oneness and so, because it is all “good,” it follows that we love all of it, even when some of it repeatedly pis**s us off! 
 
Well the “How do I love a brother I hate?” is a legitimate question. Let’s forget about the “falling in love,” “I love you,” use of the word “love,” and let’s be informed by James, who wrote, if you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right. (James 2:8) To “love” your brother or sister is not primarily an emotion; it’s made up of actions that revere the creator who made them. These actions come naturally to those who have honestly come to honour and obey the Trinity that is foundational to all that we will ever know as humans on earth. 

Given this view of God, "falling in love" with creation in all it's parts, is a distinct further, bonus, possibility.

Abusing nature, misusing the plants and animals, fouling the air or water in the interest of profit, exploiting people and neglecting their needs, allowing hatred to dominate the politic by which we govern our relationships, all these can justifiably be seen as examples of a kind of “hatred” for brother and sister that John warns us about. 
 
We need to take off our shoes; we’re walking on Holy Ground! 

And he said, “draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off they feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. (Exodus 3:5, KJV)

What on earth does that say to you? to me? Walk barefoot on God’s earth to show reverence? Vulnerability? Humility? I walked (or tried to) barefoot on the sandy beach at Las Olas a few days ago; hot! hot! I had to “put [on] my shoes [upon] my feet!”

Either that, or decide to "draw not nigh hither."