Matthew 5:38-48
Loving my enemies
Manuscript
Well I know I keep getting up here week after week as we go through Matthew and just about every sermon I say the same thing, which is: “Today’s sermon is really difficult.” And today is no exception. Today’s sermon is really difficult. We’ve been looking at really difficult sermons lately haven’t we? For example, Jesus has told us it’s not good enough just not to murder someone. We also mustn’t be angry at them. Jesus has told us that it’s not good enough just not to commit the act of adultery. We also mustn’t even think about it, flirt with someone, or entice someone to lust after us. Jesus has told us it’s not good enough to divorce or husbands or wives for any thing, except in the case of sexual immorality. Jesus has told us it’s not good enough to only tell the truth and keep our promises when we are under oath, but we must do it all the time. And all those things are really difficult. But I think today’s sermon probably takes the cake in difficultness.
Today we look at turning the other cheek and loving your enemies as we look at Matthew 5:38-48. So let’s jump in and have a look at them. Remember that throughout the Sermon on the Mount so far, that Jesus has been quoting parts of the Old Testament, as well as sometimes also quoting religious tradition that had sprung up alongside the Old Testament teaching. And in today’s passage He does that too. He starts with
Matthew 538 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’
This comes from a few places in the Old Testament. One of them is:
Lev 2419 If anyone injures his neighbor, as he has done it shall be done to him, 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; whatever injury he has given a person shall be given to him.
Now so that we can understand the rest of our passage we need to understand what this Old Testament Law was designed to do. It was designed to limit retaliation. Now back then people were much the same as they are today. So, let me ask you an honest question, “what do you want to do when someone does something wrong by you?” There’s no need to answer out loud – although if someone is brave enough to you are welcome! But for all us, think back in your minds to the last time you were wronged, and your reaction to that. Now I’ll be honest and brave and I will admit that some of things I would like to do in retaliation to those who have hurt me have not been very Christian. Without going into details, things involving guns, slow forms of torture and other things that I have considered appropriate at the time have crossed my mind. When we are wronged our natural instinct is that we want to get back. And we normally want to get back worse than we got, so we can teach them a lesson! And in some cultures that escalation of vengeance can lead to blood fueds that last generations. And whole books have been written about those blood fueds and the damage they cause, such as Romeo and Juliet and the Godfather series about the Sicilian mafia. And they aren’t always that far from the truth.
So the Old Testament laws were designed to firstly seek justice for wrongs, but also to limit retaliation. If someone knocked out your eye, well you could knock out their eye but that was all. You couldn’t go and knock out both eyes for instance. And so it’s important for us to realise that the Old Testament laws were there to limit and regulate retaliation, revenge and vengeance. And that sounds quite fair enough. We have a form of that in our society too. When someone wrongs us, we seek recompense and that seems fair. And so Jesus’ followers up on the mountain probably weren’t that surprised that Jesus should quote such a fair law from the Old Testament. But then Jesus goes on to fulfil that Law – bring it to its completion when He says:
Matthew 5 39a But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil.
Ah… come again? If I was a listener up there on the mountain top that’s what I’d be saying. And if I wasn’t so used to what Jesus says here, I’d be saying the same thing now. And perhaps we’ve gotten so used to the Sermon on the Mount and the whole turning the other cheek thing that we’ve missed the shock value of what Jesus is saying. Do not resist the one who is evil, or as some versions say, Do not resist an evil person. Do we really get what Jesus is saying here? Yep, He says, the Old Testament says, eye for an eye, tooth for tooth. Retaliation is okay provided it is limited and measured. That’s what the Old Testament is saying, but I say to you - don’t retaliate at all! Does that make sense? Then Jesus gives us three examples of not just not retaliating, but of actually going along with the person who is trying to hurt us. Let’s look at them: The first one is the famous:
Matthew 5:39b But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.
Now this is most likely not referring to a physical fight but to an insult. Why? Because most people are right handed and if you want to slap someone to really hurt them, you’ll slap them like this with your strong hand, which will hit them on the left cheek not the right. If you want to slap someone on the right cheek you’ve gotta be a left-handed person, or give them a backhand. But – that backhand slap on the cheek – people did that on the right cheek back then, and a backhand slap on the right cheek was the slap of insult when you insulted someone. And so by offering the other cheek it means that if someone insults you - well, let them. Offer the left one too – let them keep insulting you. Wow, that’s hard. Jesus goes on.
Matthew 540 And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well.
So this it talking about the case where someone takes you to court, but not just who actually takes you to court, it says here “if anyone would sue you,” or as some translations make more explicit, “if anyone wants to sue you.” That is if they want to sue you to take your tunic. Now we don’t usually wear tunics these days, but back then it was an essential piece of clothing. We normally don’t sue people for articles of clothing either. But remember back then they didn’t have China to get their clothes from, so clothes were a lot more expensive than they are today. And it was common to sue someone for their tunic. But your tunic wasn’t the most valuable piece of clothing you had - your cloak was more important – and most likely, more expensive. So Jesus is basically saying: if someone wants your tunic – well don’t just give him your tunic, give him your cloak as well. If someone is wanting to sue you for your Holden, well give him your BMW. I don’t know about you but to me, well, to be honest, I find this pretty hard to accept! Well Jesus gives us a third example
Matthew 541 And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.
Now what Jesus is referring to here is when the Roman army conscripted people, just ordinary people who happened to be around. The army would ask them – well command them - to help carry their stuff. And Jesus says, well if they do that, don’t resist, do it, and don’t just carry it one mile but two. Now when we think of the Army
we think of the Australian Army, which we really respect and look up to. And to be quite honest, if an Australian Army troop carrier broke down outside your house, you’d probably be only too happy to lend them a hand and get them on their way. But this wasn’t the Australian Army and it wasn’t the Jewish Army. It was the Roman Army, which was an army of occupation. It would be the equivalent as if the Japanese had won World War 2, and they told you to to carry their stuff a mile. Well, Jesus says, take it two miles. Or to make it a bit more modern than WW2, what if Al Qaeda had won the War on Terror and now occupied Australia, and they demanded you carried some of their stuff a couple of ks down the road? What would your attitude to that be? I think I know what mine would be. But what should it be? Jesus said:
Matthew 541 And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.
He’s talking about helping your enemy, and we’ll get more on to helping our enemies shortly. So Jesus has given us three examples of when someone insults us, wants to take advantage of us and take our stuff, wants us to do carry stuff, work for them, that we shouldn’t retaliate, and go the extra mile. And then Jesus finishes off with
Matthew 5 42 Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you.
That’s pretty hard isn’t it? I remember when we lived in Central Asia we were constantly challenged with that one, because people were always knocking on the door, poor people, asking for help. Well, Augustin noted that our text says “give to the one who begs from you,” but it doesn’t say, “give everything to him that asks.” That is, we ought to give, but not necessarily what they ask for. And that’s what we often tried to do in Central Asia, and what we do here too, help with food, advice, but not necessarily money. We need to be wise with people who ask for help, and give help that will actually help them. And in fact, in 1 Timothy 5 Paul gives instructions for helping widows and lays down some pretty strict rules for when to help them and how. And so when we help others we must do it wisely, but help them we must.
Now all this is pretty tough, and do you know what makes it tough? It’s because we are so attached to our possessions, to our stuff, to our pride, our reputation, to our time. We don’t want to turn the other cheek when we are insulted, because it is demages our pride, our reputation. We don’t want to give our cloak when someone demands our tunic, because we don’t want to lose our possessions, our stuff. We don’t want to go the extra mile, because my time is precious to me.
But throughout the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is introducing us to a new ethic, new values, those of the Kingdom of Heaven. When we die or Jesus returns, we will live in a different world to this one, a world where the values and ethics are very different to those of today. And Jesus doesn’t want us to wait until them to start living by these values, but to start now. In the beatitudes, Jesus told us
Matthew 511 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
We are blessed when we are insulted on account of Jesus’ name. Turn the other cheek, your reputation doesn’t matter, only God’s does.
Matthew 53 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Money, wealth, possessions, they aren’t the real deal. Yep, sure, we need money to survive. We need to be responsible with our money and possessions, but they shouldn’t be what we live for, as it says in
1 Timothy 66 Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, 7 for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. 8 But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.
We shouldn’t be amassing more than we need. Money counts for nothing in the Kingdom of Heaven, and we can’t take it with us. What’s more important is that we use what we have to help those who need it, and that we are salt and light in this world and our focus is on telling others about His kingdom. What a radical ethic of Jesus! It’s almost as if if Jesus is telling us that we need to love our enemies, telling us to love those who insult us, take stuff from us and use up our time getting us to work for free for their own ends. It’s almost as if Jesus is telling us to love our enemies… well actually… if we continue on, that’s exactly what He tells us to do. Let’s have a look:
Matthew 543 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’
Here’s another saying Jesus quotes that people in His day had heard, but only half of this saying that people have heard is from the Old Testament.
Leviticus 1918 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.
So the Jews knew that they were supposed to love their neighbours, and for us as Christians that means we ought to love other Christians. But note Leviticus 19.18 says nothing about hating your enemies. But because it only says to love your neighbour – and not your enemy - they took that to mean you could hate your enemy. In fact, they took it to mean that you should hate your enemy. But Jesus gives us another “I say to you” as He fulfils this law. He says:
Matthew 544 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.
Ah – come again? Love my enemies? Pray for my persecutors? Ah….. I’m supposed to love that guy who swindled me out of thousands? I’m supposed to pray for that boss who sacked me? I’m supposed to love my ex-husband who left me for a younger woman? I’m supposed to pray for my father who beat me and then left us? I’m supposed to love that guy who ran off with my wife? That’s tough. Do you see how radical these words of Jesus are? But they are so important. But when we do that there is a wonderful promise that Jesus gives us:
Matthew 545a so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.
That is, when we love our enemies, we are the Sons of our Father. Why? Because God also loves His enemies as Jesus reminds us
Matthew 5:45b For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
And as Jesus reminds us, it is pretty easy to love those who love us:
Matthew 546 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?
If we just love those we get on with, our families, our friends, those who we have common interests with, well that’s easy. Even Gentiles – the words means pagans, unbelievers - even they do that. Even tax collectors – rich, corrupt people - they love those who love them. Of course, we should love those who love us, but we should love others as well. We should greet others as well.
On just a small scale, when you come to church, don’t just greet and hang around with those whom you get on with and know well, but go and talk to those you don’t know so well, maybe even those you don’t like. And its great to see so many of you doing that. When you invite people around, well, invite your friends, but don’t just invite them. Invite also those you don’t know so well. Even invite those you have trouble getting on with.
So in summary, what have we talked about today? What we’ve talked about is no walk in the park. And I think most us were already aware of what this passage of Scripture says and how tough it is. Sometimes we ask – does it really mean what it seems to be saying? I mean, we are only human beings – does God expect us to be perfect? Well… verse 48 says:
Matthew 548 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
So, yes He does expect us to be perfect. Sure, we’ll be perfect after Jesus returns and we go to live with Him forever, but what about now? All this loving your enemies stuff, it is tough, and it seems impossible. Turning the other cheek. Going the extra mile. Loving your enemies. It just goes against our whole inbuilt desire for retaliation, for vengeance, for revenge, even for justice.
As to justice, well, other parts of the Bible tell us that we need to leave justice in God’s hands. But also, as for justice, if true justice was meted out by God, would it be only our enemies who would suffer the righteous justice of God? And this is where the rubber hits the road, and thinking about this helps us to forgive and love others and put up with them. Because if true justice was meted out, yep, our enemies, those who do wrong against us would be punished. But - so would we. You see, we were enemies with God. And if you aren’t living with and for Christ, you are still His enemy. Why? Because if we ignore God, don’t follow His rules, the way He says we should live, then that means we are His enemies. But if we come to God through Christ, then He reconciles us to Himself, as it says in
Romans 56 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
We were weak, we were sinners, we were enemies of God, and we – that is those who have turned to God and follow Christ - we have been reconciled to God through the death of Jesus Christ. And if you are here today, and you know you are a sinner and not reconciled to God, well then you can be reconciled to God because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross. To be reconciled to God you need to turn from your life of not following God, and turn to Christ, asking Him to forgive your sins, and then determining to live for God, with His help, as best you can. And for those here who do know the forgiveness of Christ, that ought to help us love our enemies, because no matter what others have done against us, it’s nothing compared to what we’ve done to God. And if God can love and forgive us, then we can love and forgive our enemies, and do as much as we can, on our side, to make them our friends.
And the other thing that Jesus calls us to do when we come to Him, is to make Him and His kingdom the most important thing in our lives. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells of a radical new way to live, where life does not consist of our possessions or reputation. Where the poor in spirit inherit His kingdom. Where those who are reviled and insulted on account of Christ will receive a great reward in Heaven. Where the peacemakers will be called Sons of God. Where the meek shall inherit the earth.
Let me close with a challenge. At the moment, Natalie is preparing a welcome pack for visitors to our church. She found an old welcome pack from a few years ago and David Blackburn, one of our previous pastors, had written this welcome to our visitors:
Welcome to Gympie Baptist Church
In a world where the general rule seems to be “every one for themselves,” it would not be hard to think that no-one really cares about your needs or what happens to you. That is not true either of God or the Gympie Baptist Church. We do care and we are glad to have an opportunity to welcome you.
At the Gympie Baptist Church, it is our earnest desire to share with you what we have found to be true in our own lives—that God’s Love for all people in Jesus Christ is very real! We make no claims to being a perfect church or even a great church, but we do love the Lord and we do care about people.
As I read that I was challenged. Is it true? Am I, as a member of Gympie Baptist Church, loving people that way? Are we as Gympie Baptist Church loving people that way? Of course, we’ll never be able to fulfil this call from Jesus perfectly until the next age, but are we doing our best now, with God’s help, to strive towards the perfection that Jesus calls us to? To be e a loving community of people following Jesus, who know their sins are forgiven, and who are willing to do the same to others? To turn the other cheek, go the extra mile, give to those who ask us for help, and to love our enemies?
