Dangerous Places
What if all your life you were taught a certain way to do something, and then one day someone came along and told you that you weren’t supposed to be doing it that way? What would be our reaction?
Golf Club
All my life I have been told the proper way to hold and swing a golf club.
Hold the golf club upside-down.
I’ve heard it said, and I myself have said many times “God turns things upside-down, he mixes things up and he does things backwards.” What’s really funny about that is how backward that statement is. God doesn’t turn things upside-down, we do, he just puts them right-side up. God doesn’t mix things up, we do, he puts them back like they belong. God doesn’t do things backwards, we do, he just shows us how we should be doing things right.
In our text today we will find yet another one of these passages that undermines our way of thinking, and turns things upside-down, or rather right-side up. Now when I say the name Ananias, who do most of us think of? Most of us when we hear that name immediately think of Ananias and Sapphira, we conjure up images of two people who thought only of themselves, but this morning I want to look at another Ananias, someone who God called to a very dangerous place. But, before we can go there I need to give you a little background information on a “young man named Saul”.
Saul was a Pharisee, and a good one, he had perfect lineage, he had zeal, he had passion, he was a Roman citizen, he was very well educated, there was only one real problem with Saul, and it was the fact that he persecuted the Christians relentlessly. He personally supervised the stoning of Stephen, and he was in charge of going from synagogue to synagogue asking for names of the Christians that the people knew, so he could hunt them down. This was not really the guy that you wanted to have show up at your Bible study, much less your church on Sunday morning.
One day Saul was going to Damascus to hunt down more Christians, when he was blinded by a great light, and a voice came from the sky and Saul was asked why he was persecuting Jesus. Not the church mind you, but Jesus. Saul was told to go into the town and a man would come to lay hands on him, so his sight would be restored.
Acts 9:10-15 Read verses.
Could you imagine what Ananias must have been thinking?! God had just told him to go and lay hands on the very man who would have taken him out and had him stoned to death. God wanted Ananias to lay hands on the enemy, and what’s more is that God said he was going to use the enemy! How outrageous is that? Everything we know and everything we have ever been taught tells us to avoid the enemy, and to hate the enemy, and if the opportunity arises to kill the enemy. But here comes God again turning things upside-down, mixing things up, and doing things backwards.
It’s interesting to me how easily we use the word enemy, how easy we apply this label to people. Maybe we don’t use the exact word, but our attitudes are the same toward them. If we saw them laying in a ditch bleeding would we help? If we saw them hurting emotionally would we give them comfort? If we saw them starving would we give them something to eat? And, even if we did any of these things would we then get a pious attitude that “Look, I help that miserable so-and-so even though he hates me, I am truly righteous.”
Luke 6:27-35
"But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. 29 If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. 30 Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. 31 Do to others as you would have them do to you. 32 "If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. 33 If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. 34 If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. 35 But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.
In Matthew this same teaching is echoed.
Matthew 5:43-47
"You have heard that it was said, ’You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy’44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. 46 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 and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?
So here we are just cruising along on our Christian journey, and all the sudden like Emeril, BAM! We are told to hold the golf club upside-down. What is this madness?! Love my enemies, how crazy is this?
Isn’t it interesting though that when Jesus says to love your neighbor, there are all sorts of questions about who our neighbor is, but when he says love your enemies…we all know exactly who he’s talking about. Isn’t it interesting that we are more willing to love our neighbors, than we are our enemies? Isn’t it interesting that our we are more willing to give to those who will repay us somehow, through attendance at church or by some other means? Isn’t it interesting that our same attitudes are ranked right there with the tax collectors and the Gentiles? And, by the way that’s not a good thing.
A holy man was engaged in his morning prayer under a tree whose roots stretched out over the riverbank. During his meditation he noticed that the river was rising, and a scorpion caught in the roots was about to drown. He crawled out on the roots and reached down to free the scorpion, but every time he did so, the scorpion struck back at him. An observer came along and said to the holy man, "Don’t you know that’s a scorpion, and it’s in the nature of a scorpion to want to sting?" To which the holy man replied, ’That may well be, but it is my nature to save, and must I change my nature because the scorpion does not change its nature?"
It’s interesting that Ananias was called to rescue a scorpion, isn’t it interesting that we are all to often we are more than willing to let the scorpion drown?
Abraham Lincoln was once being criticized for his attitude towards his enemies. “Why do you try to make friends with them? You should try to destroy them.” Lincoln answered, “Am I not destroying my enemies, when I make them my friends?”
Which is better? To kill your enemy, or to make your enemy your friend? To let your enemy starve or to feed your enemy? To let your enemy hurt or to comfort your enemy? To hate your enemy or to love your enemy?
In Romans we find that
Romans 5:10
For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life.
We are called to dangerous places, maybe not internationally, but definitely locally. We are called to go where no body wants to go. Why because we were once there as well. Someone once loved us, someone once reached out to us. And, if we have never been outside the family of God and been brought in then who better to tell those who know nothing about the love of God then those who have known nothing but.
Maybe, just maybe God’s ways are right, and if they are then what does that tell us about our ways?
Maybe, just maybe the church isn’t so different than the world around us, and maybe just maybe that’s why people don’t see Jesus in the church.
Maybe we resemble the world more than we resemble Christ.
Maybe the world is looking for love, and they don’t see the church as a place to find it.
Maybe we should start holding the club in a new way.
