Enemies

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"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, so that you may be sons of your Father in heaven." (Matthew 5:43-45a)

The deepest question about anyone is this: what do you love? Every lie of Satan, in one way or another, is really an attempt to deflect our love away from its proper objects: God and our neighbors. The Scriptures rightly teach that if we would simply love God and love others, there would be no need for any other laws.

Our normal practice, however, is to love ourselves. Even our love for our friends and family is often self-serving: we love them for what we get from them. It is when we face enemies that the poverty of our love is really brought to the surface.

In Jesus' day, many people decided that He was the enemy and so they put Him to death on a cross. But at that very moment Jesus demonstrated what His Father is like more clearly than it had ever been seen before. He died on a cross because He loved the very people who were killing Him, the people whose sins made the cross necessary. Jesus, on the cross, prayed for the very people who were killing Him. That was yet another proof that He truly is the Son of God, for He was acting just as His Father in heaven does, with perfect love.

Starter Prayer:

Father, we thank you that you love your enemies, that you are gracious. We thank you that you sent Jesus, your only Son, to save us. We celebrate His amazing love for His enemies. We celebrate the cross, where the most wicked act in human history became the source of our salvation.

Amen.