How The Holy Spirit Helps Us Love Our Enemies

1. The Holy Spirit helps us love our enemies by giving us a supernatural compassion for them despite their opposition to us. Jesus said, "Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you." (Luke 6:27,28) Ask the Lord to fill you up with an overpowering sense of His love for your enemies while overlooking their antagonism.

2. The Holy Spirit can give you great courage to stand up to your enemies while learning how to love the sinner while hating their sin. Ask the Lord to give you the objectivity to be able to overcome your subjective feelings of anger, fear and resentment. Trust the Spirit to help you objectively look at your enemies the way Jesus would.

3. The Holy Spirit can give you the ability to speak the truth in love in a calm tone of voice that helps to diffuse volatile situations. Solomon wrote, "A harsh word, stirs up strife, but a soft answer turns away wrath." (Prov. 15:1) Ask the Lord to help you to remain calm, cool and collected in the face of opposition.

4. The Holy Spirit can give you the ability to understand and empathize with your enemies’ problems. Ask the Lord to give you great grace when you are criticized. Trust the Lord to help you to exhibit Christ’s peace in the face of all kinds of pressures, stresses and tensions caused by your opponents.

5. The Holy Spirit can give you a mature mind, will and emotions to deal with enemies in a diplomat way. Ask the Lord to help you keep your wits about you as Paul did before King Agrippa and the taunts of Festus in Acts 25,26. Paul said, "King Agrippa, I consider myself fortunate to stand before you today as I make my defense against all the accusations of the Jews and especially because you are so well acquainted with all the Jewish customs and controversies. Therefore, I beg you to listen to me patiently." (Acts 26:2,3) Only the Spirit is able to give us the words, the peace of mind & the right approach in the times of trouble.

6. The Holy Spirit can give you an appreciation for something worthwhile from your enemies’ accusations. Ask the Lord to help you to learn how to consider your enemies’ accusations as a helpful thing. Trust God to turn some of your opponents into supporters, advocates or friends when they observe your maturity and calm reactions to provocation. Remember, His ways are perfect and all His ways are peaceful.

7. The Holy Spirit can help you pray for your enemies with a genuine concern for their best interests and eternal welfare. Ask the Lord to bless your enemies and pray that they will come to know Christ in a way that they may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. Trust the Lord to help them to come to know the Lord Jesus as their Savior as a result of seeing Christ in your reactions.

8. The Holy Spirit can help you treat your enemies kindly, graciously and with a genuine respect as one whom God has created. Ask the Lord to help you appreciate the fact that Christ would love your enemies in a way that they would be ashamed of themselves for their awful actions.

9. The Holy Spirit can help you put away anger, bitterness or resentment and replace it with kindness and forgiveness, even as Christ has done for us. Ask the Lord to help you prayerfully set aside your feelings of anger, bitterness and resentment and replace those emotions with a Christ like love for all your opponents.

10. The Holy Spirit can help you keep from getting discouraged when your enemies seem to be getting the upper hand. Ask the Lord to help you remain confident that greater is He who is in you than He who is in the world. (I John 4:4) Trust the Lord to help you remember that God is greater than any opponent.

11. The Holy Spirit can help you see the long term results of your patient loving response when others are too short sighted in their belligerent reactions to enemies. Ask the Lord to help you keep the long term view when you are criticized, attacked or tempted to surrender to feelings of carnal vengeance.

12. The Holy Spirit can help you see fault finders as opportunities for you to grow more in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus. Instead, of giving fault finder the delight of getting under your skin, ask the Lord to help you use them as catalyst for growing in grace and in greater knowledge of our Lord Jesus.