The words that started today’s gospel reading: “Love your enemies” have been called the most difficult commandment Jesus ever gave us. The whole idea is countercultural. The dictionary tells us that an enemy is one seeking to injure, overthrow or confound an opponent, or something that is harmful or deadly. Is Jesus really telling us to love people that want to injure or hurt us? Well, yes he is.
Let’s look at the other keyword in that sentence: love.
In English, we only have one word for love; and the context usually defines what type of love it is. In the Greek language, there are at least 4 words for love. Agape, storge, phileo and eros. Let’s look briefly at each one of them.
Eros is probably the word we're most familiar with. It’s the word for physical love, sexual desire or romantic love, as commonly shared between a husband and wife, or anyone in a romantic relationship.
Storge describes the familial love shared between parents and children, or between siblings. If you think about the love you feel for your family members (or at least most of them) it will help you understand what storge is. Actually, storge isn't used specifically in the New Testament or in the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures but it is the root of many words used in the Bible.
Phileo is the word for a strong friendship or personal love that is not Erotic. Think of people who are close companions or best friends. In this type of love there is mutual respect and a high regard for being in the presence of each other.
Agape Is sacrificial, selfless and unconditional love It is the type of love that desires the greatest good for someone else. When we think about love, we often think of the emotions that we associate with love. Agape love may produce emotions but it's not born out of emotion it is the choice of our will; we love because we want to and choose to so it comes from the will not from the emotions. In our Christian context, it is used for the love that God has for people and the love of people for God. This is the word Jesus used when he told us to love our enemies. Its also in John 3:16 and 1 Corinthians 13.
But, you say, it's still a very hard teaching. Yes, it is. So, let's be practical and ask the question: “How do we love our enemies?”.
This is a question we all have to grapple with for ourselves. It depends on who we are, who our enemy is, and the nature of the injury or harm done. But here are a few thoughts on the matter.
Agape Love is not a feeling; It shows itself not in our words but in our actions. In John’s first epistle (1John 3:18), he wrote “Our love should not be just words and talk it must be true love which shows itself in action”. I’m going to go a step further than this. Love is not really an action that we do. Love is what and who we are in our deepest essence. Each one of us has been created in the image and likeness of God, and God’s true essence is love. We have a well of love deep within us, and our words and actions must flow from this love.
One of the first actions that must flow from the well of love within us is forgiveness. Sometimes. We can forgive and forget. And be reconciled with our enemy. This is made easier if the other is contrite and makes an effort to meet us part way. The enemy becomes someone we can co-exist with, maybe even a friend. But not always.
Forgiveness does not mean ignoring what has been done or putting a false label on an evil act. It means rather that we no longer let the evil act remain as a barrier towards loving the person who has harmed us.
This doesn’t mean that I have to like the person who has hurt me, or taken advantage of me. It doesn’t mean I have to let them manipulate me, or walk all over me. Setting boundaries is a form of self preservation, not a sign that I do not wish the greatest good for them.
There are people, including family members unfortunately, in my life whose behavior is toxic to me. I do not wish them ill; in fact, I hope they live good and happy lives, but just without me. I know that, for my own sanity, I need to stay away from certain people.
Jesus is not telling us we need to invite these people into our homes, or our lives. Jesus is not requiring that we call them on the phone and encourage them every day… or ever, for that matter. Jesus condones healthy boundaries. You can “agape” someone and also put distance between you. Boundaries with people that mistreat us are important… vital, even, for a healthy life. Just think, for example, of a person in an abusive marriage or other relationship.
Jesus does not command us to be friends, or even acquaintances, with the people who hurt, hate, curse, or mistreat us; but, we are commanded to want God’s best for them, to desire blessings for them, and to pray to the Lord God on their behalf. Right after telling us to Love our enemies, Jesus suggests three ways to do this in different circumstances; he said: do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
Really. Jesus! Do you mean that? Yes, we know You meant it. You showed us that when, on the cross, you prayed “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do end quote.
You taught us to recognize that whatever a person has done to us this never expresses everything that they are. An element of goodness may be found even in our worst enemy. For there is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we realized this, we can see them in a new light. We can look for the source of their actions; does their hate grow out of fear pride, ignorance, prejudice, or even misunderstanding? They too, are made in God’s image and are not beyond the reach of God’s redemptive love.
Much of what I’ve said so far today, refers to personal enemies; people who hurt us individually by their words and actions towards us. But we also have systemic enemies - Systems that demean ourselves and others – discrimination in all its forms, persecution, poverty, greed, etc.
The Anglican bishop Desmond Tutu suffered at the hands of enemies far more challenging than any of my enemies; he was honored with the Nobel Peace Prize for his opposition to South Africa's brutal apartheid regime. He insists that we must give up our sugary notions of the difficult work of forgiving, if we are ever to learn to love our enemies. Tutu put it this way:
“Forgiving and being reconciled to our enemies or our loved ones is not about pretending that things are other than they are. It is not about patting one another on the back and turning a blind eye to the wrong. True reconciliation exposes the awfulness, the abuse, the hurt, the truth. It could even sometimes make things worse. It is a risky undertaking but in the end it is worthwhile, because in the end only an honest confrontation with reality can bring real healing. Superficial reconciliation can bring only superficial healing.”
Tutu’s words point to forgiveness as a task not to be entered into lightly. But a task that is necessary if we are to begin the healing that must take place in Our world so that that we might be reconciled to one another. Now, we could wait until we are healed before learning to love our enemies, but I believe that Jesus is calling us to a much more radical way of being in the world. For Jesus insists that we love our enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
And so, we pray. We pray not to a grand-puppeteer in the sky, hoping for him to intervene and change our enemies. We pray to the God who dwells among us trusting that the Spirit who lives and breathes in, with and through us, will change us. We pray in the sure and certain hope that we and the world can be transformed and that compassion can be awakened in us. We pray seeking the compassion to love our neighbours. We pray seeking the wisdom to find ways to forgive so that we can be reconciled one to another. This is the work Christ is calling us to do. This is the transformation that the Spirit empowers in us, that we might become God’s compassionate children, capable of loving even our enemies so that, in the world God loves, peace might break out everywhere.
I’m going to close with words from the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, the leader of the human dights movement in the 1970s, who said in his homily on Loving one’s enemies:
When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality.
Probably no admonition of Jesus has been more difficult to follow than the command to “love your enemies.” Some people have sincerely felt that its actual practice is not possible. It is easy, they say, to love those who love you, but how can one love those who openly and insidiously seek to defeat you? . . .
This command of Jesus challenges us with new urgency. Upheaval after upheaval has reminded us that modern humanity is traveling along a road called hate, in a journey that will bring us to destruction. . . . Far from being the pious injunction of a Utopian dreamer, the command to love one’s enemy is an absolute necessity for our survival. Love even for enemies is the key to the solution of the problems of our world. Jesus is not an impractical idealist: he is the practical realist.
I am certain that Jesus understood the difficulty inherent in the act of loving one’s enemy. He never joined the ranks of those who talk glibly about the easiness of the moral life. He realized that every genuine expression of love grows out of a consistent and total surrender to God. So when Jesus said “Love your enemy,” he was not unmindful of its stringent qualities. Yet he meant every word of it. Our responsibility as Christians is to discover the meaning of this command and seek passionately to live it out in our daily lives. . . .
When Jesus bids us to love our enemies, he is speaking of neither eros [romantic love] nor philia [reciprocal love of friends]; he is speaking of agape, understanding and creative, redemptive goodwill for all people. Only by following this way and responding with this type of love are we able to be children of our Father who is in Heaven.
This is a timely reminder to Christians around the world, whether we are dealing with our personal enemies or systemic ones. How would our world be changed if we all seek to embody love as ‘creative, redemptive goodwill’ on behalf of all living things? Amen.
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