Matthew 5.43-48

I hope you guys and gals are having a great labor day weekend. I know I have. You should comment to just tell everyone that is a part of this study what is your favorite thing that you have learned so far on this study through the book of Matthew.

Comment and tell everyone what has impacted. Tell what little nugget of teaching or truth you didn't know about that you found very interesting, tell of an exercise that you did over the weekend that was very helpful. I would really like to get some feedback on this, so feel free to comment as much as you want.

Now we come to today's text, which is the sixth example that Jesus gives his disciples to show what righteousness in his kingdom looks like. And each example Jesus is dealing not just with the outward manifestations like murder and adultery and oaths and divorce, but he is dealing with the root of these issues, like hate and lust and selfishness and character.

Now we come to the last and what I think is one of the most unique, hardest passages to live out in the entire New Testament. So here we go.

 ⁴³ “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor^[a] and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I tell you: Love your enemies^[b] 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.


What an incredible passage!! What a hard passage to live out. This was said to a group of Jews in the first century that hated the Romans, their enemies. I think I would have too if I were them. The Romans came in and took over the Jews, taxing them intensely, making them work for them and policing them as if they were teenage troublemakers. The Romans had even placed some of their carven figures in the Jews Temple, which was against their religion. The Jews followed the ten commandments and the law, which said do not worship any idols or put carven images, idols, in the temple. The Romans were trying to make all the lands they have conquered loyal to them. So how did they push their views and their country and their "peace" to their kingdom, by using publicity, propaganda. They didn't have billboards, they used statues and carven images. Hence, the images in the temple. 


The Romans were trying to make loyal subjects out of the Jews, and the Jews saw it as idolatry, going against exactly what they were all about, the worship of one God. The Romans were the Jews' enemies. And as long as the Romans were ruling over the Jews, the Jews felt like the blessing that God blessed to Abraham all the way back in Genesis 12, that they would receive the promise land, that this blessing hadn't come to them even though they were living there. They weren't ruling, they were being ruled. 


These Jews HATED the Romans. These were their #1 enemies. Like us Dallas Cowboy fans, these were the Philadelphia Eagles, the New York Giants. 


And Jesus said to his followers, don't hate your enemies, love them, pray for them. 


...WHAT?!!! 


Love your enemies, the Romans?! Love the people that have conquered you, that kill you, that tax you definitely without representation, that look at you as if your are a second class citizen, Jesus says that you have to love them. 


And the biggest thing is that Jesus says, this action of loving your enemies is the sign that you are a son of God, that you are a son like your Father in heaven. 


And if you think about it, this is exactly what Jesus did. 


Romans 5 says that while we were still sinners, enemies of God, he came down and died for us. He died for his enemies, he loved them so self-sacrificially that he took on all of the injustice, all of the torture, the pain, all of the crap and rebellion that his enemies put him through, and he gave of himself completely to love those who were his enemies. 


And this is what we are called to do. 


We are to love those who hate us, who persecute us, who fly airplanes into towers and whose sole purpose is to kill Christians like Hindu extremists. We are to give of ourselves to completely to serve and love those who everyone else hates. This is the sign of those who belong to God, who follow Jesus. 


So how are you doing?


Do you fight fire with fire? Do we hate those who hate us? 


How are you loving and serving the extreme Muslims in Afghanistan? Are you praying for them, not that God destroys them, but that he uses missionaries to convert them so that they aren't damned to hell for eternity? 


Loving our enemies is the true sign of those who belong to Jesus, so how are we doing? This is how God wants to bless the nations.