#wordsinred

LUK 6:35-36 (NIV)

"But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful."

This is definitely a hard pill to swallow, and a tough teaching from Jesus in the gospel of Luke … He wants us to not only not hate our enemies but to LOVE them, and to do anything we can to help them without expecting anything in return — WHAT?! That is completely against our very nature, and probably why it’s so difficult for us to do. But it is not impossible; don’t doubt what you can accomplish when it is God’s will.

Jesus is clear about this, and shares that our reward will be great if we do such things, in loving our enemies. So then, do we do these things because of the reward we will receive? No. We need to check our hearts, for He knows our every intention and the sincerity of our actions. Christ says because of what God has done for us, we must choose to love His people, and that includes our enemies. And the reward that He is referring to will be given to us in the end; everlasting life!

We owe Him everything, and if we are truly grateful for all He has done for us our lives & choices should reflect that. We do good to others because of the good He first did for us. We love others because He first loved us. Isn’t it easy to do good and love those who do the same to us? Is there any reward in doing this? Of course, we feel good about it, but isn’t the feeling greater when we do these things for our enemies? It should be, because we know in our hearts that is the right thing to do whether we want to or not.

His mercy & grace was given to us without necessity nor being deserved, and if we truly comprehend even a fraction of the depth of this, then we too should extend mercy & grace to everyone, especially our enemies. Regardless of how we feel, God asks us to do what is right. We love our enemies, do good to them, and lend to them in times of need because that is when Jesus can be clearly seen. He wants to use us to help soften hearts and bring those separated from Him, to the foot of the cross. After all, isn’t this what He did for us? Before we were friends, we were strangers to Christ. Even more than strangers, we were enemies. But because of God’s love for us, and the willing sacrifice of Jesus, we are all united as one family, brothers & sisters in the body of Christ.