Pastor Tony Schweitzer
Covenant Christian Reformed Church
Winnipeg, Canada
Lev 19:18 “ ‘Do
not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your
neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.
1Pe 1:16 for it
is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”
Lev 19:2 “Speak
to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: ‘Be holy because I, the LORD your God, am holy.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor
and hate your enemy.’
Mt 5:44 But I tell you: Love your enemies
and pray for those who persecute you,
Mt 5:45 that you may be sons of your
Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends
rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.
Mt 5:46 If you love those who love you,
what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that?
Mt 5:47 And if you greet only your
brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?
Mt 5:48 Be
perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Ephesians 5:1 Be
imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children 2 and live a
life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant
offering and sacrifice to God.
43 The command "Love your neighbor" is
found in Lev 19:18; no OT Scripture adds "and hate your enemies,"
though this seems to be the result of popular reasoning. Such reasoning seems
to have said that if God commands love for "neighbor," then hatred
for "enemies" is implicitly conceded and perhaps even authorized.
Pass it Forward
Family of God in Jesus Christ
In 2002 I was privileged to attend the 50th anniversary of two congregations I had served in BC. It was a deeply moving and healing experience, it was also fun. One of the real fun parts was having 30 year olds come up to me with a big smile carrying a baby and holding the hand of a three year old: say “Remember me?” Yeah, right. I’m not good with names and the last time I saw you, you were 10! I had cheated a little. I had dug out my old church directories and reviewed the names and it helped, but…. In the end I could often say. I know which tree you fell out of. You’re a Wikkering or a Siebring and Bill and Trudy are your parents, but I have no idea which of the kids you are. There was this family resemblance. It gave it away.
I had the experience once in the Vancouver airport. I was approached by a woman who asked me, “Do you have a sister named Marja.” I must have looked a little stunned and she said again “You know, Peter and Marja.” I said “Yes” Marja is my sister. “I knew it” she said “You Look just like her.” Turned out she was a member of the church in St Catherine’s Ontario and Peter was her pastor. Family resemblance, it makes you recognizable even in a crowd.
A few years earlier I had visited Peter and Marja when they were still in their first Congregation, Orillia ON. Unable to have children of their own they adopted children, at the time they had only one. A little boy they had adopted when he was about five now about 8 years old at the time. Mark was of African/American descent and very dark skinned. On this Sunny Sunday morning after church I was standing on the parking lot when I heard one of elders say to my brother-in-law, “Peter, Mark looks more like you every day.” Yep, kids pick up your mannerisms, habits, forms of speech and behaviour so they “look” like you even though physically they don’t look like you at all. There was a young adopted son who wanted more than anything else in the world to “Look Like The Father He Loved!”
How about your family resemblance, do you stand out in a crowd? Or do you just blend in? In the passage we read this morning Jesus calls us to stand out! He wants us to be different… to resemble and accurately represent our Father in Heaven. Christ desires that we be full of compassion and love even as God your heavenly father is. He desires that we give ourself, to invest in new life with the same joy as God invested in our lives with abundance and joy.
Jesus calls you his brothers and sisters. God refers to his people as his
bride. By faith you are the
family of God and there is no getting around it.
Members of God’s family may not have physical resemblances that make you stick out afterall you are adopted. But if you are a family member then you are expected to observe the family’s code of conduct and that should make you stand out. In our western culture with its emphasis on individual rights and privileges we have lost much of that emphasis, but not so in Jesus day. Family members could be identified by the way they conducted themselves and that was the way it was expected.
So Paul reminds us to forgive in the same way we have been
forgiven, Jesus says: Love your enemies, just as God your heavenly father,
loved you his enemy. Just as
children look up to their parents and want desperately to grow up like them, so
they imitate their parents, so God desires we be like little children who love our
heavenly father and desire to be like him. So like him: we are to love our enemies and pray for
those who persecute us.
But how do we learn to love our enemies and forgive those
who persecute us?
Let’s face it. We can’t!
When we have been wronged, we have the right for justice, for vengeance! It is our right. We have it coming. And our sinful self demands it! But you know what? When you demand your rights, you loose your freedom. When you stand on your rights, you loose the freedom of choice. You no longer have the freedom to forgive. You no longer have the possibility of a future relationship.
When we have been wronged there is no motivation to forgive. Why should I? The argument goes like this: He has injured me! He has hurt me financially. I will never be able to walk again because that stupid idiot got behind the wheel of his car drunk out of ever loving mind and now I am in a wheelchair! Why should I! He should never be allowed to drive again. He should spend a long time in jail. I want my pound of flesh. He should have to suffer what I have to suffer that would be fair! Or: This wasn’t my fault, she did it to me! She did it deliberately! I could accept it if it had been an accident, but it was not it was done on purpose. I can’t forgive! I won’t forgive!
I don’t know about you, but that kind of argument has gone round in my mind on many occasions.
And you know what? If you have thought these kinds of thoughts you’re absolutely right. And you are in your right not to forgive. God has that same right. He could have destroyed the world he created. He had the right on many occasions to destroy his people Israel: to forsake his people, but he chose to love and forgive and in that he opened the possibility for growth and relationship.
The motivation to forgive will come only when we stop and accept the forgiveness that our Heavenly Father grants us.
But even if we are motivated to forgive, we still can’t. It does take the power of the Holy Spirit so I need to live close to him, I need to pray. God needs to change me
We were enemies of God, says Paul. We were not his people, we were strangers and exiles. But before we came to him he came to us and forgave us. Gave us new life, reestablished fellowship with us on the most personal basis possible. Though we never deserved it, God passed grace and life forward.
So what happens when we do love our enemies, forgive those who sin against us and pray for those who persecute us? We by the grace of God create opportunity for growth and renewal. Like our heavenly father we exercise grace. We Pass It Forward! As long as we hate, we demonize the other. When we begin to love we humanize him. When we love, when we forgive, when we pray for…. We pass forward the gift of life, before it is deserved, just as God granted it to us before we ever deserved it.
When we love we create the possibility for new and richer relationships than we have known up till now. Be warned, it may not happen, a new relationship takes response to the gift of grace, but without loving our enemies any new life giving relationship is IMPOSSIBLE.
Forgiving your enemies is possible!
When I was a seminarian, Clara and I served a small church is rural Alberta. That summer one of our members, We’ll call him BURT, was diagnosed with stomach cancer. Twice he had surgery which removed his entire stomach and he was given a very poor prognosis. But he survived. He said that God had given him his life back.
Two years later, their oldest daughter was to graduate from High School. The day before graduation a young man armed with a rifle entered the school and shot and killed, I think it was two people, including their daughter. I don’t know about you, but I cannot imagine the devastation that would bring into my life and the life of my family. Burt and his wife believed they had to forgive this young man and made the decision to do so. So they went to his trial and after he went to jail they visited him regularly for years. And when he applied for early parole he received it because Burt and his wife offered him a job on the farm and a place to stay. A few years later he married one of their daughters.
I know the story because for years Burt and his wife were active with World Missions, promoting World Missions among the churches of Alberta and BC and they spent a number of afternoons in our living room. On occasion we talked about the events in their family and I have asked them how were they able to forgive. Their response? We had no choice. God had granted us a new lease on life when He cured Burt’s cancer, how could we deny this young man a new lease on life? But it took years before we wanted to forgive him. It took years to learn to love him.
But not only do we pass the gift life forward to someone else we pass it on to ourselves as well. Loving our enemy, forgiving those who have hurt us, praying for those who persecute us, makes it possible to thank God for who he has made us to be WITHOUT RESERVATION!
Let me explain: If you can look at yourself in the mirror and thank God for whom you have become at this point of your life and can look forward to whatever else God may have in store for you, then you cannot not continue to harbour hatred in your heart. Why Not? Well, the person you are today has been formed by the many people and events that make up your life. Events and persons God has brought into your life. Yes, even those difficult people, even the people who hurt you. And if you thank God for the person you have become, how can you possibly continue to hate the person whom God used to make you the person you are?
Loving your enemy sets you truly free to thank God for life and live it with rejoicing.!
So here we are today, intent on once again coming around the Table of the Lord. This is where we celebrate being a family. Here we commit ourselves again to living as members of the family, true to vision and values of this Family, God’s family, of which Christ is the head. We call it a sacrament. Jesus calls it the New Covenant. And when we break bread we celebrate this covenant with him. We rejoice that he reached out to us and placed us once again around the family table. Restored, accepted as Sons and Daughters with full rights. Children indeed! Now that is cause for celebration.
Here at the table we can not harbour hatred. Here we are called to forgive our enemies and create new positive family ties instead. That our Joy may be full and our Jesus Christ be glorified in our lives.
So Live generously! Give Generously! Be imitators of Christ so that more and more every day you will resemble your heavenly father and show the family characteristics that sets you apart from the world.
Amen