Since we are approaching Valentine's Day, I thought an article on LOVE would be appropriate!
Loving Our Enemies the Way God Loves His
Scott Armstrong, Issue Number 9, June 2006
The king of cutthroat, Donald Trump, superintends—no, he rules—a TV show called The Apprentice, a reality television program where young professionals vie to be the last one standing, the grand prize a position in Trump’s company. If you’ve seen the program (or any of many reality shows like it—Survivor, The Bachelor, etc.), you know that when faced with elimination, the competitors can be vicious, each one hoping to persuade “The Don” that the others are weaker and undeserving. In turn, their victims wait to mete out revenge. It is a dog-eat-dog, survival-of-the-fittest world.
We live in a kingdom of this world that, at its core, trades on retribution and revenge. Like the Middle East past, present (and undoubtedly future), the “eye for an eye” culture is full of enemies to be pilloried and hated. And though many people want peace, the cost of giving up the right to exact judgment or collect on debts is too great. Proud and wounded hearts simply do not understand how great their own debts of darkness are. Loving an enemy makes no sense in a non-Christian worldview. Enemies are enemies and they deserve judgment for their sins against us, and since there is no implicit trust in a God who will carry out justice, it is up to us to impose it, and to keep the score even.
The Extent of Radical Love
So it is no wonder that Jesus’ audience was incredulous about His teachings on relations with the enemy. In Matthew 5:43-48, as part of His Sermon on the Mount discourse, Jesus says that, contrary to the popular belief of the time—hate your enemies—they should love them instead. In verse 44, he describes one way that we can do that: Pray for them. Luke 6:27-36, a parallel passage, goes further: Don’t just pray; bless them. Give them things they don’t deserve, and generally do good to them. Loving an enemy is not simply a thought in the mind, but an action of the heart that involves godly movement toward an enemy. Jesus is no-holds-barred here, and doesn’t hold back the radical extent of love. No wonder he made so many enemies.
Why does Jesus say such radical and unpopular things? “Because, as Bono and B.B. King have both said, “Love came to town.” And it was coming to all sorts of people, including the traditional enemies of the Jews. In the Matthew passage, Jesus tells them to consider the love of the Father, who has mercy on the unrighteous by sending them the life-giving rays of the sun and water for their basic needs. He wants them to see His love for the enemy.
He then challenges His own people. He reminds them that the hated tax collectors are capable of basic love toward those they worked with, and that run-of-the-mill sinners were capable of simple love for fellow sinners. Are they then not much more responsible to love others radically? God’s people, after all, know His abundant and lavish mercy (Luke 6:36).
And what, according to Scripture, might happen if our enemies are loved radically and unexpectedly? They will either have their evil intent and shame exposed (Proverbs 25:22) or they will be become friends (Romans 5:10). When evil encounters love, it must either flee or be transformed.
In the Presence of Our Enemies
New Testament scholar Craig Blomberg says, “The true test of Christianity is how believers treat those whom they are naturally inclined to hate or who mistreat or persecute them.” In other words, loving our enemies is at the core of our faith and our witness.
So do we love our enemies well? If your first thought was, “What enemies?” you may be limiting your definition of an enemy.
Webster says it is “one who feels hatred toward, intends injury to, or opposes the interests of another; a foe.” That may include Osama Bin Laden or a criminal who victimizes you, but from time to time it will be your spouse, child, parent, friend, or co-worker. Where there’s fear, hatred, contempt, unrighteous anger, or a similar feeling, there’s an enemy.
This explains why, when we get cut off on the highway, we angrily call the offending driver a “jerk” or something much worse. When a friend hurts us with words, we relish a good comeback (even if only in our mind). We want to punish people for their sins, to become God’s vigilantes. Giving mercy instead of revenge feels weak to us and doesn’t bring a satisfaction to our bloodthirst. Jesus tells us that our hearts are full of a raging darkness that has nothing in common with following Him.
Why is this so hard? It is because we forget who we are and what we’ve been given. This is Jesus’ point in both the Matthew 5 and Luke 6 passages. When we can no longer see the mercy that’s been given to us, we don’t give mercy to others. (See the parable of the unmerciful servant, in Matthew 18: 21-35.)
This should sober our hearts. We were once the enemies of God, won to Him by His unexpected and radical love toward those pitched in battle against Him! The bottom line is this: When God’s mercy grips our hearts and we are able to see the true depth of our sin, then extending mercy to others—especially those who do us evil—becomes just possible, but desirable. We begin to want for them what was given to us.
Love Must Be Sincere ...
But hold on a second. How do I love an enemy who keeps abusing me? Does turning the other cheek mean I lie down and let myself be stepped on repeatedly?
Indeed. It is one thing to be caught off guard by an enemy’s attacks, but quite another to be in regular relationship with someone who seeks your harm.
Author Dan Allender defines a true offer of love to enemies: “Love can be defined as the free gift that voluntarily cancels the debt in order to free the debtor to become what he might be if he experiences the joy of restoration.” It is a gift, but a gift can be refused. And if it is refused, there can be no restoration.
The love Jesus refers to must be genuine and bold. Romans 12:9 states, “Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what it good.”
Love is Not Indifference
“Turn the other cheek” does not mean that Christians should simply allow enemies to routinely abuse them. We teach fellow Christians to “forgive and forget,” telling them that when they are sinned against, it is their responsibility to offer forgiveness and move on, even when the abuser (enemy) remains unrepentant.
But Scripture clearly teaches that forgiveness and restoration only come to those who desire it. Not confronting an enemy who is full of unrighteousness is not love—it is indifference. Jesus’ command to love our enemies meant caring for them, and that requires us to move in close enough to invite a relationship that is built on mercy and care. In all situations, we should offer an enemy mercy which, Allender points out, necessarily means that we must “revoke revenge.” The goal is always to bring about healthy shame that causes repentance (Proverbs 25:22).
Allender states that, “Bold love is a commitment to do whatever it takes (apart from sin) to bring health (salvation) to the abuser.” There cannot be true love without a hunger for justice, and doing good for the enemy may not always feel good to the enemy.
This can mean setting up appropriate boundaries that protect a person from future abuse; it may mean asking God to bring the enemy a “severe mercy” that would cause them enough pain and grief to bring them to spiritual surrender; or possibly even cutting off a relationship that is destructive as a way of saying, “I will stop pretending we have a relationship until you repent of your wickedness.” The difference between revenge and love, then, is not the absence of pain or conflict, it is one of motivation and desire—the former desires to get even and leave a person in destruction, the latter revokes revenge in favor of bringing about restoration.
No two situations are the same. Some require more passive confrontation (not responding to an attack other than to offer forgiveness), while others will require a bolder form of love (perhaps cutting off a relationship to expose an enemy for the purpose of repentance). In each case, though, our response must be predicated by a desire to love rather than to seek retribution or revenge, which belong to God only—this is the whole of His teachings.
The World’s Experience of Our Love
“That is all fine and such,” a skeptic says, “but talk is cheap—Christians don’t really practice this.”
As my wife, daughter, and I plant a church in an urban area, we encounter neighbors who wish they were in a “blue state,” are highly interested in spirituality, and some of whom are homosexuals and have adopted children. Others display tattoos and piercings, and quite a few of them have a strong and distinct opinion about “born-again” Christians: we are bigoted, narrow-minded, hate-filled, war-mongering hypocrites with a poor track record for love of the “other,” especially those opposed to our faith.
Is this caricature of believers correct? Sometimes, absolutely. And so the Church of Jesus occasionally makes unnecessary enemies and responds poorly to true enemies of the faith.
And yet, more often than not, I know that love of an “enemy” is often either ignored or overlooked by a world wanting to avoid the lordship of Christ. I have seen an international church community persecuted to the point of death in places like China, the Sudan, Indonesia, and India, respond with mercy and forgiveness toward their tormentors. It seems that we are to come with open hands to our enemies and ask for forgiveness for the times we have failed to love them.
And then, even our failure affirms the grace and mercy of a God who continues to love us.
Scott Armstrong is a pastor currently planting a church in the historic city neighborhood of Candler Park in Atlanta, Ga. He lives there with his wife, Kerstin, and daughter, Karis.
