Wouldn’t you have loved to hear Jesus preach the Sermon on the Mount in person?
That would have been so cool!
But, if you really think about it, I bet many listeners reacted with their version of, “Say what?!”
Throughout His teaching, Jesus made a number of “You’ve heard that it was said” statements.
One of them was, “You shall love you neighbor and hate your enemy.” Sounds reasonable, right?
Jesus stated His version, “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you (Why?) in order that you may demonstrate that you are sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”
Beloved, it takes being born again to love our enemies.
It’s totally a God thing!
We can’t do it apart from Him.
Remember in Romans 5:10, Paul tells us that God considered us enemies, but yet He made it possible for us to be reconciled to Him through Jesus’ death and resurrection.
Here’s an Old Testament example of this challenge: Jonah.
Why was he so opposed to going to Nineveh?
It was the capital of the Assyrian Empire, the long time enemy of Israel.
In fact, they were the ones God chose as His instrument to punish Israel for all its years of idolatry.
Jonah HATED the Assyrians!
He wanted God to destroy them, not to have mercy on them.
This could be likened to God calling a concentration camp survivor to go to Berlin to call the Nazis to repentance.
Who would want the Nazis to repent and be forgiven?
Well, the Assyrians were the Nazis of Jonah’s day.
He didn’t want to preach a warning and risk their repentance.
At the end of Jonah’s account, we learn that God sent him with this call to repentance because of the children who did not yet know their right hand from their left.
God is compassionate and gracious even to His enemies.
It takes His life IN us to express His love to our enemies.
Today, there are many enemies of the cross.
ISIS, atheists, liberals alike, all want to destroy Christianity.
Beloved, what does Jesus call us to do: Love them and pray for them!
May He supply us His grace to love and pray for them as He commanded.
Blessings!