The love of an enemy.
Text: Matthew 5:38-48 for 2/19/2017 by Pastor Bolwerk
38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ 39 But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. 40 And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. 41 If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. 42 Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. 43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
As Jesus tells us how to live our lives as his believers he says, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (vs. 43, 44). Who do you consider an enemy? Is your enemy someone who hates you, or persecutes you? Is your enemy anyone who wants to kill you? Maybe you see your enemy as that kid at school who is always picking on you, or the boss who seems to go out of his way to make your life miserable. Perhaps you consider an enemy to be anyone who threatens your way of life: someone who is a threat to your job, your family, your leisure, your fun. We see our enemies as anyone who is trying to injure us, overpower us, defeat us, or just plain make our lives worse. There are so many people who we could classify as our “enemies.”
But would you put God in that group? What if God was your enemy? As Christians we might think, “That’s silly. God’s not our enemy. God is the one who made us, and saved us, and has given us life and hope and peace! God is good! He is certainly not our enemy.”
Are you sure? Scripture tells us, “Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior” (Colossians 1:21). To our old, sinful selves God is the enemy! Our sinful, rational minds see God as the enemy because God is the one who is trying to take away from us that which our sinful nature wants.
And what is it that God wants to take from us? God wants to take away everything that would harm or kill our souls. The problem is those are the things our sinful nature wants. So as God uses his law to try to get those sinful attitudes and behavior out of our lives our sinful nature fights back. The Apostle Paul says in Romans, “The sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so” (Romans 8:7). The more God tried to help us, the more we saw him as the enemy.
God never wanted to be our enemy. From the very beginning God wanted to be in a close, personal relationship with the people of this world. But Satan led people into sin, and sin destroyed that perfect relationship with God. It is sin that warps our minds to see God as the enemy and to drive us away from him. And God must punish sin. In his perfect justice God must hand down the only punishment that sin deserves: eternal damnation in hell. Instead of a loving relationship with God, sinners only deserve eternal separation from God. Yet even with that death sentence hanging over our heads, instead of turning to God for help, in our sinfulness we ran away from God; we separated ourselves from him. And our hatred for God spilled over into our lives so that we even hated others, anyone who we felt was not giving us what we deserve. We came into this world seeing God as our enemy, which led us to see others as our enemies.
So, what changed? How is it that we went from being enemies of God to believing and trusting in God? What is it that changed our minds from hating God to wanting to be with God? What changed us was the love of an enemy.
The Bible tells us that, “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by [Christ’s] blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!” (Romans 5:8-10). God displayed his love for us in a way that we could see and hear and understand. God the Father sacrificed that which was most precious to him to pay for the sins of this entire world. God allowed the blood of his Son, Jesus, to be shed on a cross to wash away our sinful hatred; to cleanse us of the sins that separated us from God and made us see him as an enemy. God showed us he is not our enemy by saving us from the eternal death of hell.
That good news of God’s love for us changes us. Notice what that scripture verse says, “were God's enemies.” Through the gospel God changed us with his love, creating faith, forgiving our sins, and giving us a new life. It is a life of faith that no longer sees God as the enemy.
So if God is not the enemy who really is our enemy? Atheists? Pagans, that is, people who worship multiple gods? Are anti-Christian groups our enemies? To answer the question “Who is our enemy?” we need to answer another question first: Who did Jesus die for? Whose sins did Jesus pay for? Jesus died for all sins, of all people, of all time. There is no one whose sins Jesus did not completely pay for.
When come to understand that truth we start to understand just how limited our enemies really are. When it comes to those who are truly trying to destroy us we really only have two enemies: Satan, and old sinful self. Some might say, “What about the world? There are plenty of people in the world who are trying to destroy us.” But the world is only an “enemy” insofar as the sinful temptations it sets before us. God gave us this world as a good gift. Just because someone abuses those good gifts doesn’t make that person our enemy. Even those who are mislead by false gods, or mixed-up Christian teachings, those people are not our enemies. In the end all of those people are victims of Satan. They are victims of their own sinful nature.
So when it comes to the people of this world, whether we view them as enemies or not, Jesus says, "Love them!" Jesus tells us to love them way he loves us. He wants us to love the same way our heavenly Father loves. Jesus said, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (v. 48).
Our Lord wants us to love perfectly. And, of course, Satan speaks up and says us, “You can't do it, so don't even bother trying.” Don’t listen to him. The devil denies the almighty power of God, and that includes the power of the Holy Spirit. The only way we can love as God loves is when he fills us with that love through his Spirit. And he has. Scripture tells us that, “God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:5). That means you, as a believer, have the power of the almighty God living and working in you!
With his almighty power, God the Holy Spirit works to help you in your faith. The Spirit works in you the desire to TRY! We try to live like Jesus even though we know we’re not going to do it perfectly. We try to be perfect like God the Father, even though we know this side of heaven it’s not going to happen. But that doesn’t stop us from trying. God’s Spirit gives us the power to keep trying, to keep working at it, to keep striving to be like our heavenly Father. Christ’s love gives us the desire to keep trying.
So we keep trying. Jesus says, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (v. 44). So what does this “love” look like? How do we show this love to our enemies? We do it the same way that God the Father showed his love to us: we love by sharing the gospel. It is the gospel that changed our hearts and minds, and that gospel has the power to change others.
So, who is your enemy? Is it that boss who ridicules you, or the school kid who picks on you? Is it the college professor or co-worker who makes fun of you because of your faith? Are they your enemies? No, they are not the enemy! They are victims of the enemy.
When you show love to these people by sharing with them the saving message of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit has the opportunity to change them just as he changed you. The Spirit can change them from dead to living. The Spirit can change them from an enemy into friend and fellow believer. That change happens by the love of an enemy; when we love our enemies.
This entire process of change all started when God loved us. Jesus displayed the love of the Father to the world by living and dying to pay for our sins. In Christ’s rising from the dead we are guaranteed forgiveness and eternal life. Jesus loved us, prayed for us, showed us kindness, and forgave us: We who at one time considered him our enemy. Now Jesus tells us to love our enemies just as he has loved us. So we follow our Lord’s example, loving our enemies by praying for them, showing them kindness, and forgive them just as the Father has forgiven us. When we love our enemies in this way we give them the opportunity to have true life. We also show them that we are sons and daughters of our Father in heaven.
Think again about those you consider your enemies. As you think about those people look at them through the eyes of your Lord, Jesus. These are people whose hearts and minds have been affected by the enemy: Satan. These are people who need to hear God’s gracious, saving message. Like us, these are people who need Jesus. Love your enemies just as Jesus loved you. Let the love of your Lord, Jesus, be your strength and motivation to love, today and every day. Amen.
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