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Author Ellie Wakeman                                    
"encourage.enrich.inspire...because we're in this together"
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Loving Your Enemies (Mt. 5:43-47; Lk. 23:23-49; Eph. 5:1)

6/5/2015

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You’ve decided to read through the New Testament and picked an obvious starting point, the Book of Matthew.  Shortly into the book, Chapter 5 to be exact, Jesus begins talking to His disciples (to us) about how to live life the way His Father designed it to be.  And so you come to vv.43-47 where He says to “love your enemies” and “pray for people who persecute you…” 

What??  If you’re anything like me, it’s at this point that the one-way conversation becomes two-way, and you respond with, “God, my enemies…what a ‘lofty ideal’ but You could not have possibly thought that through!” 

And in that split second pause that it took you to take a deep breath before pouring out, in detail, just what kind of enemies you have, you hear God answering you…

“My Beloved, I’ve not only thought it through, I have lived it!  This is the life you see in Jesus who didn’t respond when He was mocked; who told quizzical, sometimes humorous, stories that forced others to think differently in response to being challenged; who took the pain when He was struck; who carried the worst bit of Roman equipment on his back to the place of his own execution; who, when nailed to the cross, prayed for them.*

In living a life of loving your enemies, you are imitating me!  At the very core of my being that is who I am!  I send rain on both the just AND the unjust.   I make the sun rise on the bad AND the good alike.  I am long-suffering because my desire is that none should perish. 

In Jesus you see the Emmanuel – the God-with-us person.  In seeing Jesus you are seeing Me, my heart, who I am.  And so, my sweet one, in telling you to ‘love your enemies’ I am asking you to become like me.  Remember, I chose you to be my light in this darkened world - reflecting my love into a world that needs it so badly.”

Praying for us as we live lives that love like Jesus :)

*indebted to NT Wright for his beautiful description of Jesus’ life 

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