By: Curtis Baker
For a number of weeks we have been closely examining Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount that contrasts old notions of righteousness with a more thorough understanding of true inner-goodness. Several of these subjects have been of a very sensitive nature, such as the teachings about sexual desire and divorce. Others have been more confrontational in nature, such as the teaching on anger. But out of all the things Jesus has addressed in Matthew chapter five, the one that stretches us most is our subject for this week–loving one’s enemies.
Remember, Jesus has just finished teaching us about principles of non-resistance (Matt 5:38-42). Because we understand that our life is ultimately secure in God’s kingdom, a Christian does not always have to act from a posture of self protection as so much of the world obviously does. At times we may choose to protect ourselves, and we should certainly protect those given to our care, but Christians view their choices about protection from a completely different perspective. Jesus tells us that the same is true in regard to our enemies.
Following the pattern Jesus has used, he points to the fact that old understandings of goodness said you should “love your neighbor and hate your enemies.” This was not only an understanding common among the Jewish people, but has been the understanding of every people throughout time. As long as humans have been able to gather together in families and community units, people have loved and protected those closest to them, while remaining suspicious of those who were farther off. Suspicion often gives way to aggression, which simply breeds more aggression on the other side, and thus the history of the world can be and is told through conflict. Whether that conflict be between individuals, families, or broader communities, violence and conflict IS the story of civilization.
This reality plays out in ways both trivial and serious. On the more trivial side, sports and athletics demonstrate this principle well. Fans follow teams with great loyalty and passion, often to the point of despising others who root for another team. In politics, people choose sides, often based on nothing more than family history and cultural influence. To a more serious degree, you have clashes between countries and even civilizations, as we see taking place between the West and modern forms of terrorism. In ways that are too many to count, the world is carved up into varieties of “us versus them.” The common view of goodness is “loyalty to your own kind.”
But what Jesus is pointing out is that, in truth, we are all of one kind–we are children of our Father who has made each one of us in his own image. That does not discount the legitimate and serious differences among peoples, but it does put into perspective what we are doing when we hate another human being. We are hating one that God loves. God’s character is such that he has made a world where the sun rises on both the good and the wicked. Likewise, God sends his rain on the righteous and unrighteous. If that is the kind of being God is, and we have been made in his image, Jesus is simply pointing to the fact that our tribalism is not a form of goodness. True goodness loves everyone, including our enemies.
But at this point it is important to understand what “love” means. If we equate love with sentimental emotion, we miss the point of Jesus’ teaching. Indeed, if that were the case, Jesus would be asking us to do something that we in fact CANNOT do. If we felt sentimental emotion for them, they wouldn’t be our enemies! Jesus is not denying that we will have enemies; in a fallen world, that is inevitable. But when we see love for what it truly is–willing good for another person–then we understand better what Jesus is getting at. To love your enemy does not mean to have positive emotional feelings for him. To love your enemy is to seek their good, despite what you feel. That is true inner goodness. According to Jesus, this is what makes you whole being in the same way that your Father in heaven is whole. (Matt 5:48)
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(curtisbaker@hotmail.com)
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