Luke 6:27-36
27 “But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
28 bless those who curse you, and pray for those who mistreat you.
29 If anyone hits you on one cheek, let him hit the other one too; if someone takes your coat, let him have your shirt as well.
30 Give to everyone who asks you for something, and when someone takes what is yours, do not ask for it back.
31 Do for others just what you want them to do for you.
32 “If you love only the people who love you, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners love those who love them!
33 And if you do good only to those who do good to you, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners do that!
34 And if you lend only to those from whom you hope to get it back, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount!
35-36 “I tell you, love your enemies. Help and give without expecting a return. You’ll never—I promise—regret it. Live out this God-created identity the way our God lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we’re at our worst. Our God is kind; you be kind.
Reflection
It’s almost Christmas, a time of year when we tell a lot of stories about love. It is the dominant theme at the end of the movie when the couple finally gets together after several crises conspire to keep them apart, it is when the family comes together in the shadow of a lit Christmas tree with all family traumas, issues and conflicts forgiven and resolved. It is wonderful and I just keep waiting for real life to resemble the movies but I guess real life is what happens after the camera stops rolling. I may be a little bit cynical.
After all there are different types of love; philos: brotherly/sisterly love, eros: sexual and romantic love, storge: which is a family kind of love, and agape: the kind of love that is associated with God. Agape is the love that Jesus is talking about here.
It is the kind of love that he constantly offers to those around him: the disciples, his followers, the tax collectors who climb trees, women who touch the hem of his robe, lepers by the side of the road, anybody and everybody. It is the kind of love that helped develop Liberation Theology which in modern times began as a movement that recognized God’s preferential option for the poor, the dispossessed, the oppressed, and the outcast in Latin America . Liberation theology has deepened over the years and evolved to encompass the plights of people of colour in Africa and in the United States, the Indigenous peoples around the world including the U.S. and Canada, Today it still provides words of hope for those who are forgotten and lost in the society around them.
Our scripture today is not the traditional love God and love your neighbour as yourself. It is way beyond that: I think this is a passage most Christians want to avoid. Well, you can see why. It is Jesus at his most radical. People probably left the crowd that day shaking their heads and saying: “Jesus had gone too far this time!”
I mean you can do a lot of things but love your enemies is not usually one of them.
Love your enemies
Bless those who hate you
If someone takes something from you give them more.
We would say today that this is a scenario for losers. And yet here is Jesus telling us that this is exactly what love looks like.
So what I want is for love to look like a lit-up Christmas tree, a turkey dinner, a smiling and if possible an appreciative family and in some sense and for some people that is exactly what Christmas does look like.
But it is also more: it is the pain of losing a loved one to COVID, it is the hurt of divorce visited on a couple at Christmas dinner and now a chair that was filled last year is empty and one partner grieves because the children are with the other parent and they are alone, it is the frustration and hurt and humiliation of the smiling family who would not accept you (or your partner) if they knew you were gay (LGBTQ) or who don’t really accept your partner because they are of a particular race or religion or political persuasion.
It’s not so easy to love those who are different from ourselves, who are outside our circles, who dislike or hate us - and Jesus knew that. He knew that what he was preaching was hard stuff; for those listening to him then and for those of us reading his words today. But it didn’t stop him!
This kind of love is so important. When Jesus said “Love your enemy” I know he may have meant that literally. I mean, look around you, there are people we don’t like for whatever reason, and it's relatively easy to start pointing fingers but I think I can see that Jesus may have meant something more. Or at least I can see that it may also apply to ourselves. We all have things that we fear, things that are the enemy within us, things that we don’t like about ourselves and which we would like to shove away in a deep dark closet never to see the light of day.
It’s that line in our scripture today: “Live out this God-created identity the way our God lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we’re at our worst.” (the Message translation) Even when we are at our worst! God loves us with that agape love; a love that overcomes fear, a love that overcomes difference, a love that overcomes our worst. God loves us, all that we are and all that we could be! God also loves our neighbours and God loves our enemies.
Jesus is not calling us to do the impossible. Jesus is calling us to be the best we can be. If we can look at others with the same eyes that we look at ourselves, if we can treat others and ourselves the way we would truly like to be treated, then I think a more compassionate world could be called into existence. Jesus’ hope was that his preaching would change the world - one person at a time, one heart at a time, one loving interaction at a time.
The candle we lit this 4th Sunday of Advent, the candle of Love, is a beacon lighting the way to the place where hope, peace, joy and love come together in the birth of a baby, in a stable, under a star.
27 “But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
28 bless those who curse you, and pray for those who mistreat you.
29 If anyone hits you on one cheek, let him hit the other one too; if someone takes your coat, let him have your shirt as well.
30 Give to everyone who asks you for something, and when someone takes what is yours, do not ask for it back.
31 Do for others just what you want them to do for you.
32 “If you love only the people who love you, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners love those who love them!
33 And if you do good only to those who do good to you, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners do that!
34 And if you lend only to those from whom you hope to get it back, why should you receive a blessing? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount!
35-36 “I tell you, love your enemies. Help and give without expecting a return. You’ll never—I promise—regret it. Live out this God-created identity the way our God lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we’re at our worst. Our God is kind; you be kind.
Reflection
It’s almost Christmas, a time of year when we tell a lot of stories about love. It is the dominant theme at the end of the movie when the couple finally gets together after several crises conspire to keep them apart, it is when the family comes together in the shadow of a lit Christmas tree with all family traumas, issues and conflicts forgiven and resolved. It is wonderful and I just keep waiting for real life to resemble the movies but I guess real life is what happens after the camera stops rolling. I may be a little bit cynical.
After all there are different types of love; philos: brotherly/sisterly love, eros: sexual and romantic love, storge: which is a family kind of love, and agape: the kind of love that is associated with God. Agape is the love that Jesus is talking about here.
It is the kind of love that he constantly offers to those around him: the disciples, his followers, the tax collectors who climb trees, women who touch the hem of his robe, lepers by the side of the road, anybody and everybody. It is the kind of love that helped develop Liberation Theology which in modern times began as a movement that recognized God’s preferential option for the poor, the dispossessed, the oppressed, and the outcast in Latin America . Liberation theology has deepened over the years and evolved to encompass the plights of people of colour in Africa and in the United States, the Indigenous peoples around the world including the U.S. and Canada, Today it still provides words of hope for those who are forgotten and lost in the society around them.
Our scripture today is not the traditional love God and love your neighbour as yourself. It is way beyond that: I think this is a passage most Christians want to avoid. Well, you can see why. It is Jesus at his most radical. People probably left the crowd that day shaking their heads and saying: “Jesus had gone too far this time!”
I mean you can do a lot of things but love your enemies is not usually one of them.
Love your enemies
Bless those who hate you
If someone takes something from you give them more.
We would say today that this is a scenario for losers. And yet here is Jesus telling us that this is exactly what love looks like.
So what I want is for love to look like a lit-up Christmas tree, a turkey dinner, a smiling and if possible an appreciative family and in some sense and for some people that is exactly what Christmas does look like.
But it is also more: it is the pain of losing a loved one to COVID, it is the hurt of divorce visited on a couple at Christmas dinner and now a chair that was filled last year is empty and one partner grieves because the children are with the other parent and they are alone, it is the frustration and hurt and humiliation of the smiling family who would not accept you (or your partner) if they knew you were gay (LGBTQ) or who don’t really accept your partner because they are of a particular race or religion or political persuasion.
It’s not so easy to love those who are different from ourselves, who are outside our circles, who dislike or hate us - and Jesus knew that. He knew that what he was preaching was hard stuff; for those listening to him then and for those of us reading his words today. But it didn’t stop him!
This kind of love is so important. When Jesus said “Love your enemy” I know he may have meant that literally. I mean, look around you, there are people we don’t like for whatever reason, and it's relatively easy to start pointing fingers but I think I can see that Jesus may have meant something more. Or at least I can see that it may also apply to ourselves. We all have things that we fear, things that are the enemy within us, things that we don’t like about ourselves and which we would like to shove away in a deep dark closet never to see the light of day.
It’s that line in our scripture today: “Live out this God-created identity the way our God lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we’re at our worst.” (the Message translation) Even when we are at our worst! God loves us with that agape love; a love that overcomes fear, a love that overcomes difference, a love that overcomes our worst. God loves us, all that we are and all that we could be! God also loves our neighbours and God loves our enemies.
Jesus is not calling us to do the impossible. Jesus is calling us to be the best we can be. If we can look at others with the same eyes that we look at ourselves, if we can treat others and ourselves the way we would truly like to be treated, then I think a more compassionate world could be called into existence. Jesus’ hope was that his preaching would change the world - one person at a time, one heart at a time, one loving interaction at a time.
The candle we lit this 4th Sunday of Advent, the candle of Love, is a beacon lighting the way to the place where hope, peace, joy and love come together in the birth of a baby, in a stable, under a star.
