Who is your enemy?
When you hear the term or title enemy who pops into your head? Is it that one coworker who you just can’t stand? Or a family member who annoys you at family functions? Maybe it’s the neighbor who insists on taking your parking spot. Whomever it might be one thing is certain, this person is out to get us…or so it seems. But are these people really our enemies?
Who is your enemy, really?
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives his listeners a practical guide book for how God wants us to live. Within his teaching he dives into the common thought process of tooth for a tooth and hating our enemies. Like most everything the Son of God taught, he flipped our natural thinking upside down.
“But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” Matt. 5:44
The word Jesus uses for enemies means one who is hateful, one who acts hostile towards another. Now think of hearing these words as a first century Israelite living under the Roman regime. The nation of Israel’s past up until the point of Jesus, was littered with nations that hated them and wanted to destroy them. Then add on top of that the dominating power of Rome overseeing your day to day life and implementing harsh laws and rules.
Imagine having a person in your life that absolutely hates you, is hostile towards you every time they see you and may even want to kill you. Then picture hearing Jesus tell you to choose to love them and pray for them. It really humbles our perspective on who our enemies are. If you truly do have someone like this in your life, you can relate better than most to the audacity of the teachings of Christ.
Why do I have to love them?
It seems like if anything we should be wishing harm or bad fortune on our enemies, yet Jesus calls his followers to choose love instead. What is the incentive for loving and praying for these people who bring only harm and displeasure?
“So that you may be sons and daughters of your Father who is in heaven.” Matt. 5:45
Jesus claims that if we choose to love those who hate us and those who harm us we will be in line with God’s character. He goes on to say how God makes the sun rise and the rain fall on the good and evil. To make it even more personal, Paul expounds on how this affects us in Romans 5:10
“…while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son”
At one point and time we were all an enemy of God by doing only what was pleasing to us. But even though we didn’t treat him the way he should have been treated, He loved and continues to love us unconditionally. Jesus himself lived out his own teaching as he was being mocked, tortured and put to death. He didn’t hurl insults back at them or threaten them, but instead he began to pray for them, asking God to forgive them for what they were doing. He chose to love his enemies and pray for them.
Choose to Love
So maybe the next time your enemy insists on being hard to love, come to your Father in heaven and ask him to equip you with everything you need in order to love that person. (Heb. 13:21) Or the next time you are tempted to speak ill of another political party, you instead go pray for them. If it seems impossible, it’s because for us to do this on our own strength it is impossible. (John 15:5) But with God and the power of his Holy Spirit living within us, all things are possible. So let us follow after Jesus and choose to love.