OPEN: During the Korean war a certain military unit had hired a local boy to cook and clean for them. Being a bunch of jokesters, these guys soon took advantage of the boy’s seeming naiveté’.
· They’d smear Vaseline on the stove handles so that when he’d turn the stove on in the morning he’d get grease all over his fingers.
· They’d put little water buckets over the door so he’d get soaked when he opened the door
· They’d even nail his shoes to the floor during the night.
Day after day the young Korean took the brunt of their practical jokes without saying anything. There was no blame, no self-pity, no temper tantrums.
Finally the men felt guilty about what they were doing, so they sat down with the boy and said, “Look, we know these pranks aren’t funny for you, and we’re sorry. We’re never going to take advantage of you again.” It seemed too good to be true to the houseboy.
“No more sticky on stove?” he asked.
“Nope.”
“No more water on door.”
“No.”
“No more nail shoes to floor?”
“Nope, never again.”
“Okay” the boy said with a smile, “no more spit in soup.”
Apply: How many of you can think of someone that you dislike? Someone who has mistreated you or upset you in some way? Someone who you would like to spit in…
Nah. You wouldn’t want to spit in anyone’s soup would you?
But I imagine, there are some people that you’d prefer to ignore, or avoid as often as possible.
Or perhaps you find ways of talking them down when they’re not around. I mean, you wouldn’t necessarily say things that are “untrue” about them (that wouldn’t be Christian)
– but you might say things you know would hurt them
– or damage their reputation
– or lower them in the eyes of those around us
Or, perhaps you might look for ways to conduct yourself around these special “someones” in a way that you know would bother or irritate them.
They’re your enemies. I know we don’t think of them as being enemies. But, as one person sagely observed, our enemies are not necessarily those who hate us as much as they are people that we hate.
And whether we call them “enemies” or refer to them as people that we “don’t like,” we find ourselves doing things like… rejoicing when they suffer, and resenting it when they succeed.
We just don’t like them.
And, if it ever came down to the question of repairing the relationship between the two of us… THEY need to be the ones to make peace… not us.
I. Now, if we were pagans… we could get away with that
Illus: I once knew a man – a church goer – who tried to tell me that when Jesus said we should “love our neighbor as ourselves” that ONLY applied to those who were his Christian brothers and sisters. He didn’t have to love anybody else.
But that’s not true
Jesus has called us (who are Christians) to a different type of conduct- than the world is used to
Jesus said: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you - Matthew 5:44
Jesus said: Bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you – Luke 6:28
ILLUS: But, people OUTSIDE of Jesus Christ have always had difficulty buying into this approach to life. Nikita Khrushchev once remarked “The difference between Christianity and Communism is great. When someone strikes you on the face, you turn the other cheek.
If you strike me on the face, I’ll hit you so hard your head will fall off.”
Now, worldly people aren’t always violent when responding to people they don’t like, …
But they can still have difficulty with Jesus’ approach to dealing with others… for example:
* Confucius (some 500 years before Jesus) said: "Do not unto others what you would not wish done to yourself."
* An apocryphal book called Tobit: "Do not do to anyone what you yourself hate."
* And the famous Rabbi Hillel: "What is hateful to you, do not do to anyone else. This is the whole law; all the rest is only commentary"
APPLY: That SOUNDS alot like the “Golden Rule” doesn’t it?
But, it’s not.
Jesus “DO unto others…” – Luke 6:31
The philosophy of non-Christians is often “DO NOT unto others what you would not wish done to yourself."
That – in a nut shell – is the “normal” way for non-Christians to respond to others around them
Jesus tells us we need to respond “actively” (not passively) to others. And that is especially true of how we should to respond to those we don’t like.
The world – at its best – says: Avoid or ignore or at least “tolerate” your enemies
But, Jesus says: Love your enemies
The world says – when people curse you & say all manner of evil against you – sue them
Jesus says: bless them
In short, Jesus taught us we must DO unto our enemies as we would want them to do unto us.
Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you - Matthew 5:44
Bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you – Luke 6:28
II. Now, in case it hasn’t occurred to you yet… this is far easier to preach than it is to practice
I mean, has it occurred to anybody yet? (wait for response)
Of course it is far easier to preach this message than it is to practice it. And Jesus knows that.
That’s why He gave us a tool to help us accomplish His will in this matter.
Now, look again at the two passages we’ve mentioned before: (they were up on the overhead)
Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you - Matthew 5:44
Bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you – Luke 6:28
Do see something repeated in both those texts? (prayer)
Pray for those who persecute you… Pray for those who mistreat you… Pray for your enemy
That’s the key. That’s the tool God has given us to help us love our enemies. That’s where you and I have to start.
III. But why? Why should I pray for my enemy?
I don’t particularly like them… why should I pray for them?
Well… the easiest answer is: “that’s what Jesus told us to do!”
But, whenever Jesus gives us an instruction like this there is ALWAYS a good reason or two behind it.
So… why? Why should I pray for my enemies?
1st, because, if we don’t master this concept of “praying” for our enemies.
We’ll never be able to love them… bless them… do good for them like God wants us to. The instructions out of Rom. 12 will always be too tough for us to do consistently.
“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse… Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody.
If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the Lord. On the contrary: ‘If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.’
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Romans 12:14-21
If you & I don’t learn to pray for our enemies… it just WILL NOT be physically possible for us
to feed our enemy,
or bless them,
or even be nice to them.
ILLUS: Have you ever heard of people who preach the violent destruction of abortion clinics?
Have you ever heard of people who’ve angrily picketed funerals of people who’ve died of AIDS
Do you suppose they ever PRAYED FOR the people they were angry with?
Do you think they ever prayed for the abortion Doctors, and the homosexual activists?
I don’t think so!
Why? Because it’s hard to hate somebody and be nasty towards somebody you are praying FOR
Notice Jesus didn’t say, “Pray ABOUT your enemies…”
If I pray ABOUT my enemies, I’ll probably end up complaining about them…. Or worse, I’ll pray for God to destroy them.
But Jesus said “Pray FOR your enemies…”
It’s very hard to pray FOR people who you dislike… very hard
BUT IT’S EVEN HARDER to pray FOR someone you don’t like…and then turn around and spit in their soup.
You see – when you do this kind of prayer to God - when you pray FOR your enemies - it changes your heart. It frees you up from the bondage of your anger. And it frees you to serve God in a way that really honors Him
ILLUS: According to the National and International Religion Report back in May of 1995, after the tragic bombing that took place in Oklahoma City, callers swamped Oklahoma City radio talk shows. Those callers who insisted that the perpetrators be shot on sight were followed by others who pleaded for prayers for the bombers’ salvation.
The desire to forgive rather than seek revenge (expressed by so many people in this Bible-Belt city) impressed reporters.
In fact, an atheist told a local preacher he had never experienced such love.
Now, you tell me – was God glorified by how these Christians responded to this tragedy? Yes He was.
And at the heart of the response of those Godly believers, was the fact that they believed so much in praying FOR their enemies that they even called for others in their community to do the same. And that impressed people that often aren’t impressed by God.
That’s what gave God the glory!
(pause…)
IV. Do you remember the prayer that Jesus made while He was on the cross?
Any body know what He said? (“Father forgive them, for they know not what they do?”)
Forgive who? Who was Jesus praying for? (His enemies)
Why would He pray that kind of prayer?
Because, the reason He was up on the cross, was to die for His enemies
Romans 5:10 tells us “…when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son…!”
You see, when Jesus died for you… YOU were His enemy. And when Jesus died for you… He also died for YOUR enemies as well!
Jesus’ love for His enemies, resulted in the possibility for YOU to be saved
And when we show this same kind of love for our enemies it can result in their salvation.
So, you see, there is no greater honor you can pay Jesus than to copy the same love (for your enemies)… that He had for His enemies.
*** PRAYER TIME FOR OUR ENEMIES (I gave them suggestions and time to pray for their enemies for about 5 or 6 minutes. I introduced them to God in prayer and then left them silent time to pray).
CLOSE: When we pray for our enemies, that kind of prayer has to power to change US
But it also has the POTENTIAL of changing our enemies. It frees us up to actually show love to our enemies in ways that Romans 12 and other passages of Scripture tell us we should.
ILLUS: Several years ago, a woman wrote about a miraculous lesson her family experienced. During one of their family Bible readings as New Christians, they ran across the verse, "If your enemy is hungry, feed him" (Romans 12:20).
Their sons, 7 and 10 at the time, were especially puzzled. “Why should you feed your enemy?” they wondered. My husband and I wondered too, but the only answer John could think of to give the boys was, "We’re supposed to because God says so." It never occurred to us that we would soon learn why.
Day after day John Jr. came home from school complaining about a classmate who sat behind him in 5th grade. "Bob keeps jabbing me when Miss Smith isn’t looking. One of these days, when we’re out on the play ground, I’m going to jab him back.
I was ready to go down to the school and jab Bob myself. Obviously the boy was a brat. Besides, why wasn’t Miss Smith doing a better job with her kids? I’d better give her an oral jab, too, at the same time!"
I was till fuming over this injustice to John Jr. when his 7 year old brother spoke up: "Maybe he should feed his enemy." The 3 of us were startled.
None of us was sure about this "enemy" business. It didn’t seem that an enemy would be in the 5th grade. An enemy was someone who was way off... well, somewhere.
We all looked at my husband John. Since he was the head of the family, it seemed only right that he should come up with the solution. But the only answer he could offer was the same one he had give before: "I guess we should because God said so."
"Well," I asked John Jr., "do you know what Bob likes to eat? If you’re going to feed him, you may as well get something he likes." "Jelly beans," he almost shouted, "Bob just loves jelly beans." So the family prayed about John Jr.’s enemy and about the Jelly beans.
Then, they went out and bought a bag of jelly beans for him to take to school the next day, and decided that the next time Bob jabbed John Jr., John was simply to turn around and deposit the bag on his "enemy’s" desk. We would see whether or not this enemy feeding worked.
The next afternoon, the boys rushed home from the school bus and John Jr. called ahead, "It worked, Mom! It worked." I wanted the details: "What did Bob do? What did he say?"
"He was so surprised he didn’t say anything - he just took the jelly beans. But he didn’t jab me the rest of the day!" In time, John Jr. and Bob became the best of friends - all because of a little bag of Jelly Beans.
Both of our sons subsequently because missionaries on foreign fields. Their way of showing friendship with any "enemies" of the faith was to invite the inhabitants of those countries into their own homes to share food with them around their own tables.
It seems "enemies" are always hungry. Maybe that’s why God said to feed them.
