Love Your Enemies

Matthew 5:43-45

Who is my neighbor? Who is my enemy? Can those who were once my neighbor become my enemy? Can someone be both my neighbor and my enemy?

Lately, I have felt very unvalued by my friends. Everyone is so focused on their life, or the lives of those they chose to be a part of, but my life is taken for granted. I feel this has been a constant way of my life. So, although these are friends who claim to love me, their disregard for my feelings make them an enemy to my life.

I've spent most of my life taking care of others, with no one to take care of me. Most of the time I'm ok with this, but at other times it gets overwhelming. I then withdraw until I realize I don't want to be alone and unused anymore. So I resume my role as helper, without addressing anything. I don't know if this is what it means to love our enemy. Loving our enemy doesn't make them any less of an enemy. By ignoring what's been done, we diminish our love for them. We say "I will forget about what you've done so I can love you" instead of "despite what you've done I will love you." The verses in Matthew prior to these talk about turning the other cheek.

There is an inherent problem with the phrase "forgive and forget." While we must forgive before we can love, and forgiveness means we don't hold things against others, to forget allows us to become vulnerable to the same thing happening, to us becoming part of a horrible cycle. Remembering allows us to put up necessary boundaries. We are not called to keep everyone close. Even Jesus had a few close friends among his many followers. It is necessary to know what role people play in our lives so we can love them for who they are, not resent them for not being who we created them in our mind to be.

"We must listen with our ears and our hearts or we will not get past the judgement of our eyes." - Malcolm Gladwell

In Matthew 5:21-22, Jesus tells us that when we are angry we are subject to judgement, and when we call each other names we are at risk of being subject to the fire of hell. Not all anger is sinful, but when we take our anger and place it in contempt of others, we insult God's creation and thus insult God Himself.

Raca = you idiot
You fool = you moron

Entertaining rage and bitterness allows it to take hold of your life. It overruns us and does not leave room for joy and love. For many people, it can completely demolish their lives. it can be difficult to turn around from such a state, and impossible to do without God.

Lashing out toward others places us on a fast track of isolation, which is our hell. God will always stand on the side of love. But what causes us to insult others? Fear. Pride. Pain. Things only He can take away. As humans, we fail and hurt others. But if we repent, we can be saved.

James talks about the power of the tongue. The tongue has the power to kill. Too often we hear of people who hurt themselves, and sometimes even kill themselves, because of bullies. I joke that my superpower is to make people feel the way I want them to. But it is true, not just of me but of everyone. In my last entry, I wrote about the Eccelsia sermon on words. Cory Monteith's death was a result of lack of good words. Whatever happened in his life, it was never enough. It is my desire that with everyone I encounter I let them know they are enough.

God is perfect, yet He finds it in Himself to forgive. And to love. So why do we think we are better than God, that we are too good to forgive and to love as He does?