Reflections on Romans Chapter 12 – Part 11

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse…Never pay back evil for evil…Romans 12.

But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt from him either…but love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. Jesus Christ in Luke Chapter 6.

I don’t think we qualify any Biblical teaching to the extent that we qualify the teaching on loving and blessing our enemies. Even to the point of saying, “Well, so and so is not an enemy, we just differ politically, or in economic philosophy, or in terms of Biblical doctrine.” It seems we think that if we can establish that the opposition is not really an enemy that we can treat them however we please.

The other qualification is that, “Well, I’m not really attacking the person, I’m attacking his ideas, I’m attacking what he believes.” We think that relieves us of taking the teaching of Christ about loving and blessing our enemies seriously.

Perhaps if our rhetorical engagement with our opposition were clothed with blessing and love our protestations of qualification would carry a measure of truth. That is, “Show me your love and blessing toward your opposition and then I’ll listen to your rhetoric; then I’ll ponder what you have to say.”

We think and act as if neither Christ nor Paul lived in such circumstances as do we; as if they didn’t know political, or economic, or military, or religious opposition. We are fools – and I put myself at the front of the class. Those of our generation who are not fools – well, we tend to look at them as quaint curiosities at best, as embarrassments at worst.  

We pat ourselves on the back when we don’t retaliate. Yes, we are not to return evil for evil, that is the passive part of the commandment – loving and blessing are the active elements of our mandate.

This is such a core element of the nature of Christ, and yet I have seldom heard a word about it in church and seldom seen it played out in life.

We give lip service to not wrestling against flesh and blood when we use the same tactics as the opposition. Better yet, we engage in debates over elements that are transitory, that often have little or nothing to do with the souls of men. Could it be that displaying the nature of God to our generation is more important than winning earth-bound battles?