Love your enemies. Yup, He really said that.

Reading the Gospels has a way of tweaking all my emotions. I love the stories about fish and figs, crops and coins. And who doesn’t like the healings and feedings and miracles? Personally, I get a real charge when Jesus thumps the religious elite. “Take that you two-faced pompous twit!”

But then, there are those passages — you know, the ones that you cannot possibly apply to someone else.

“Love your enemies. Do good to those that hate. Pray for those who persecute you.”

I don’t like it when He says, “you.” 
I really wish He would say, “they” or “everyone but you, David.”
But this one, I cannot escape.

I recently read this passage from the Sermon on the Mount and thought, “Has Jesus met some of the people I work with?” ” Has He met my brother, my neighbor or any of the other characters in my life?”

This is perhaps the hardest of all commands to follow.

Jesus expects us to pray for our attackers, to lift up our critics and to love our enemies – because as Christians we’re supposed to be different, completely transformed and made new by grace.

But, you don’t understand, Lord!

Actually, He does. Throughout the Passion, Jesus Christ prayed for the forgiveness of his enemies “for they know not what they do.”


If Jesus could pray for his murderers as He was saving mankind from its sinful existence and marching towards his death on Golgotha, then what can we do to pray for the foes we face in our daily lives?


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