Love in the Kingdom
Kingdom Living

Transcript

All right. Good morning, church. Once again, happy Mother's Day. We're glad to be here with you as we continue our series entitled, “Kingdom Living.” We've been going verse by verse through the three chapters in Matthew, Matthew 5, 6, and 7, which has been called “The Sermon on the Mount.”

In this sermon, which many have called “The greatest sermon ever preached by the greatest preacher who ever lived,” King Jesus lays out His description of what it looks like to be followers of the King and to live counter culturally to the world, to live in a way that it shows the world what it looks like to live as kingdom citizens. Now, we're in chapter five, verses 38 through 48, in a message I've entitled, “Love in the Kingdom.” King Jesus addresses what it looks like to love the way God loves and to show the world God's kind of love. Now, I wonder, have you ever been wronged so deeply that your first instinct was to strike back, was to hurt back? They hurt you.

I want to hurt them back. Maybe it was a harsh word. Maybe you felt betrayed. Maybe they just made you feel miserable and you wanted to make them feel miserable, too.This is the way the world teaches us, to stand our ground, to take a stand, defend our rights, to get even, or maybe even get better than even.

This is the world's way, but in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus offers a different way, a kingdom way, if you will. He offers a way of love. Jesus calls His followers to love. Instead of following the law of retaliation. He says, ‘I want you to follow the law of love.’

Kingdom love. It doesn't play by the world's rules. It doesn't retaliate. It refuses to take revenge. It reaches across enemy lines.

It reflects the heart of God. It's this new kind of love, the kind of love we see demonstrated in Jesus, because in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus tells us about this kind of love and He calls us to a kind of love that shows the true righteousness of being members of God's family. It's a love that's different from the way the religious leaders of His day were teaching. It's also very different from the world.

As kingdom citizens, we're called to love the way Christ loves. As we encounter the text today, we'll encounter the word, “love,” four times in the text. Every time, it's the Greek word, “Agape.” Those of you that have been students together with us as we study God's word, there are several Greek words for love.

One of them is “agape;” it means “God's unconditional love.” There are other Greek words for love, like “phileo.” “Phileo” is “conditional love;”

it's “brotherly love.” The city of Philadelphia is named from that Greek root word, “phileo.” It means, ‘I love you because you're my brother.’ ‘I love you because you're my sister.’ “Eros” is another Greek word;

it's “sensual love.” It's where we get the word, “erotic.” But, the Greek word “agape” is otherworldly. It's God's kind of love. It's not, ‘I love you because of;’ it’s ‘I love you in spite of.’ I love you because God's love has been poured out in me.

This is the kind of love, this greater love that Jesus calls us to. As we look at the text, I think we'll see three ways that we can answer the call of Jesus to this greater lifestyle of love. Let's look at the text. Matthew 5:38-48 (ESV) 38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’

39 But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. 40 And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. 41 And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. 42 Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you.

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?

47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.This is God's word. Amen.

1. Responds with grace, not retaliation.

This greater love responds with grace, not retaliation. It responds with grace, not retaliation. Jesus continues this formula that He's been following in the Sermon on the Mount.

This is the 5th of 6 antitheses that Jesus declared, where He contrasts what the Pharisees and the scribes have been teaching about the law of Moses and what they really mean from God's perspective. So we know, as we look back when Jesus started these six comparisons, He said, “You've heard it said, you shall not commit murder. But I say, if you're angry and demean your brother or sister, you've committed murder in your heart. You've heard it said, you shall not commit adultery. But I say, if you look at a woman with lust in your heart, you've committed adultery.

You've heard it said, you can give a divorce for any reason, But I say, if you give divorce without cause, that you've committed adultery. Now, you've heard it said that as long as you don't use God's name, you can make an oath. But I say, let your yes be yes and your no be no, because everything belongs to God anyway.”
Those are the first four. Now He's got number five and number six.

Here he goes,38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ Then the other one is, 43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’
Now, we've heard this first one all of our lives.

The Latins called this the “Lex Talionis,” the law of retaliation. Many use it and say, “Well, this ‘eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth’ is kind of harsh.” Well actually, it was to prevent a more harsh response of revenge killings. So, what people would do individually would be, If you poke my eye out, I'm going to poke both of yours out and it would escalate.

Well, if you did that, then I'm going to do this and it would get worse and worse. So actually, this law of eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, was not to be applied individually by individuals, but it was an instruction to judges, so that when they gave a punishment for a crime, the punishment would match the crime. You can find this in the book of Deuteronomy 19:18-21 (ESV) 18 “The judges shall inquire diligently, and if the witness is a false witness and has accused his brother falsely, 19 then you shall do to him as he had meant to do to his brother.

So you shall purge the evil from your midst. 20 And the rest shall hear and fear, and shall never again commit any such evil among you. 21 Your eye shall not pity. It shall be life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.” So, this was an instruction not to the individual on how to respond, but to the judges on how to respond to those cases that were brought to them so that they would judge fairly and the crime would fit the punishment.

Jesus is saying, ‘I say to you, that was never meant for you to apply as an individual. And here's what he says in contrast. You've heard it said eye for an eye. You've heard it said tooth for tooth. But I say, do not resist the one who is evil.

That's a hard word. That's hard. That's a difficult word, isn't it? Here's what He's saying, that the law of love for kingdom people is to give up retaliation, to not return evil for evil, but to return good for evil.

This is a tough one. It's already tough to resist. He says, don't resist. Now, other places in the scripture says to resist the evil one, speaking of Satan, resist him. But here, a person that does evil towards you, don't oppose them, don't resist them, don't retaliate.

That's hard. It gets harder. If He left it right there, I could have probably thought, Okay, that's a good word. I'll try to follow that. Lord, give me the grace to follow that.

But then, He gives four examples. It makes it even harder. It's so countercultural. It's so different from the way we humanly respond to hurt. He gives four examples.

Here's the first one. The first example he gives is that if someone should slap you on the right cheek, turn to him the other. Also, this idea of the right cheek is the place of authority. Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father. The right side is the side of authority.

If someone literally backhands you on the right cheek in ancient days and even in modern days, that's a public affront, inviting a fight. Jesus says to offer them the other. There's a certain courage that goes with that.

I'm not going to hit you back. Do you want to take your best shot? Go ahead, take another shot. Go ahead and work that out.

I remember a pastor that used to work with us years ago, named Jamie. He and his family moved to Iraq in 2003 as missionaries from our church. They were working there, reaching Muslims.I remember him telling me that young Muslim men were so angry that before he could share the gospel with them, he visualized it like this,

that as he approached them, he had to let them “hit” him a couple of times before he could get his arms around him and hug them. This was a picture of how he visualized, rather than fighting back verbally. It was kind of an imagery he said that God gave him: it’s hard for them to hit me if I'm hugging them. They might hit me a couple times on the way in.

But if I get in there and show them love, they can't really get a good shot at me now because I've got them in God's embrace. That came to my mind thinking about this passage. If they hit you on the right cheek, go ahead and give them the left. Don't retaliate. Don't return evil for evil.

That was the first example. Man, that one's hard and can I confess to you, I haven't always done well at that one. God's still working on me. In fact, when my sons were going to school and if one of them came home saying they were being bullied, I didn't tell them what Jesus said.

Do you know what I told them? “Stand up for yourself. Hit him back!” “But dad, but I might get kicked out of school.” I said, “That's all right. I'll pick you up.”

I don't know if I told them the right thing. It doesn't seem like I did here, but it's just the way I was brought up by my father and my grandfather. Jesus says something so radical here. It's hard.

Don't return evil for evil. Return good for evil. Turn the other cheek. Don't retaliate. It doesn’t say you can't talk to them.

It doesn't say that you can say, ‘Take your best shot. I'm not going to hit you back, bro. I don't know what you're so angry about.’ That takes more courage, I think, than hitting back to try to address the heart issue. Maybe I'll do better as a grandfather.

We'll see. Here's the second example. He's not finished. He says to not return violence for violence.

He says in verse 40, “And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well.” This is one of the things, if you read the Old Testament, that when someone would borrow money from someone else, they would give them their tunic as collateral. You couldn't get your tunic back, because people were poor in those days. They might just have one suit of clothes and one really good cloak. In fact, if you were poor, the Levitical law said if someone is poor and you're taking their tunic as collateral, you have to give it back to them at bedtime so they can stay warm at night, and then they can return it to you in the morning.

But Jesus says, ‘If somebody sues you, throw in extra. Throw in your outer cloak as well.’

Violence and finances, don't retaliate. That's His second example. His third example is in verse 41, “And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.” That's where we get the phrase today that we still use, “Go the extra mile.”

The Greek word here for “‘forces you” is actually a Persian word originally that passed into the Greek. It was from where the Persian king would send a messenger or someone and he would empower them to take someone's donkey, horse, chariot or whatever to help them get the message out that they could do that. Roman soldiers, if they were carrying a heavy pack, a heavy load, could grab any Jewish citizen and force them to carry it for one mile, literally. The Greek word there for “mile” is “million.”

It means literally 1,000 paces. So, once they had walked 1,000 paces, that was what the Roman government was called to. So, when Jesus said, “If someone makes you,” they were thinking, That's happened to me where I've had a Roman soldier make me carry his pack for a mile. And you can go to the Middle east and to Greece and to Turkey, and you can still see Roman roads. They had it marked.

They had the mile markers just like I-95. It was very, very orderly. Then, His fourth example that He gives is that if someone begs you, if someone asks something from you, don't refuse it. For example, instead of retaliating, give good. It's a hard word.

It's a challenging word. Don't refuse. Don't turn them away. Christ is our example to follow in this. He's the one who set the example for us.

Peter talks about it in his letter. He says, 1 Peter 2:21-23 (NIV) 21 “To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. 22 “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” 23 When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats.

Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly.” <He did not retaliate. That's our example, the Lord Jesus. the Apostle Paul, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, was probably contemplating the Sermon on the Mount when He wrote this;

He says, in Romans 12:9-21 (ESV), “Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good… Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. …Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible,

so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by doing so you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

That's just the best summary. Instead of retaliating evil for evil, let the love of God, which is yours in Christ Jesus, be your response.

It's a challenging word, but this is “agape” love. It's unconditional. It's not based on a condition that's favorable. It's based on, does the love of God reside in your heart? If it does, that's how you'll respond.

If it doesn't, if you're easily offended, if every little thing hurts your feelings, that means you haven't done what Jesus invites us to do, to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow Me. What I would say to you, if you're a Christ follower and you've made Him king, you'll finally, as you grow in Christ, come to the place where you're unoffendable, because your identity is so wrapped up in what Jesus says about you that when someone does evil to you, you'll just be thinking to yourself, I wonder what's going on in his heart.

I wonder what's going on that evil came out of them towards me. You know, Jesus lives in me. You know, I can take a couple of shots.

Here, let me hug you. Let me see if I can get at the root of your problem.

Paul says it's like putting hot coals on their head. That's so opposite from the world. Have you heard of this lady, Corrie Ten Boom? Corrie Ten Boom is the author of a very popular Christian book, “The Hiding Place.”

Corrie Ten Boom grew up in Germany; her parents were Christians. They were so committed to Christ that when Hitler began to persecute the Jews, they began to hide them in their house. They had built a false wall so that they could hide them in her house, but the SS found out, and when they did, they

put the Jews that they captured there in a concentration camp as did they put Corrie Ten Boom's whole family. Her parents died. The rest of her family died. Only she and her sister, Betsie, survived.

Both of them were in a concentration camp at Ravensbruck. It was there that one of the cruelest guards took a special interest in her and Betsie and made life even more miserable than the concentration camp. Her sister, Betsie, finally starved to death and only Corrie survived out of her whole family. Years later, she wrote the book, and she was traveling around from church to church, talking about her experiences and how Jesus had brought her through this horrible time and how God had given her the power to forgive. Now, at one of these conferences, she was speaking at a church in Munich and a man came to the front afterwards with tears in his eyes. He was an elderly gentleman.

She looked at him and his hands were shaking. Then, she looked up to his face and she recognized him. He was the guard. As he came towards her, she began to feel the hatred that she thought she had released, but seeing him caused it to come to the surface.

As she saw his lips moving, he said, “I have come to the Christ now, and I am so ashamed of what I did. Will you forgive me?” In her heart, she felt her heart harden, and she knew she could never do it. But then, with the spirit in her, she began to pray and she asked, “Lord, show me how to do this.

Help me to forgive him,” because that's what she's been teaching. Even as she prayed, a surge of warmth and peace came over her.Then, she felt herself saying, as if she weren't even saying it herself, ‘I forgive you, brother, with all of my heart.’ That's overcoming evil with good.

This is challenging, isn't it? This word that Jesus gives us today. I began to think about this and I started to think, Well, what about people that the government asked to become soldiers to defend our country? Does that mean they cannot take up arms? What about police officers who are called to protect and defend?

Does that mean we can't have a police force if we're going to live as Christians ? Does that mean we have to abstain and be passivists from all these places? Well, many do conclude that way. I don't and I take my guide from the scripture as well. What I look at to help me to balance this is Romans, chapter 13, for instance.

Paul talks about it here. He says, Romans 13:1-8 (ESV) “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. …For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.

Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.”

So, here Paul is talking to Christians and saying, don't break the law because God ordained the police officer, the soldier and those that are under God because God is over the government. He says that they don't bear the sword in vain. Some have used this passage, Martin Luther and others, to talk about the right balance on how to achieve this. So, I would say that this also extends to us as fathers and mothers who are called to protect their children and their families. The scripture says that greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

So, I feel that I would be called to lay down my life in protection of my wife, my children, my grandchildren or you. If I were in that situation, that might mean that in that authority position I would behave differently than turning the other cheek. But for me as an individual, Jesus says, if it's just you and them, I want you to seek the way of returning good or evil. Because who knows that that way of love might be the way that changes that person's heart. There might be exceptions where we are called to take up the sword.

You work that out. I don't want to soften Jesus' words to us. I want it to rattle around in there and shake us up. Just as it did Corrie when she encountered that guard who came to her. We are called.

Has someone wronged you recently? A co-worker? A family member? A spouse? Don't repay evil with evil.

Choose grace over retaliation. Extend mercy. This is what Jesus teaches to kingdom citizens. Here's the second way. Here's the second way:

2. Reaches beyond friends to enemies.

This greater love reaches beyond friends to enemies. It reaches beyond friends to enemies. So now we're at verse 43. He says,“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ This is the sixth of six antithesis where Jesus takes on Old Testament laws that have been misapplied by the scribes and the Pharisees and He corrects them so that they are aimed at the heart.

He says that you've heard it said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. You can look through the whole Old Testament, you cannot find that version of the law stated anywhere. Here's what had happened. The law actually said, “Love God with all your heart, all your strength, all your mind, all your soul and love your neighbor as yourself.”

That's what the law said. But the Pharisees, in their Rabbinic reflections on this, looked at it and said, ‘Well, who's your neighbor? Oh, that's other Jews, okay? So if you're not a Jew, we don't have to love you. And I guess logically speaking, if we don't have to love you, that means we can hate you.’

So, they had moved to the point where logic had taken them to the point that if you're a non Israelite, we can hate you. So they came to the point of, love your neighbor, hate your enemies.

That was their logic, working it out. Here's what Jesus says, boy, He turns it upside down. 44 “But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” This is the final one; this is six of six antitheses. ‘With my own authority as the Son of God, as the new Moses,’ if you will.

Moses went up on Mount Sinai and brought down the Ten Commandments. Jesus goes up on the Mount and brings down His sermon, explaining what the law really meant all along. He says, “But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Love your enemies. Pray for them.

Now, if I'm going to pray for an enemy, here's how I might pray, ‘Lord, could You send fire down from heaven, please?’

Do you think that's what He means? I don't think so. Some of the disciples asked Jesus, ‘Hey, remember when Elijah called fire down from heaven? Can we do that?’ Jesus said, ‘No, that's not the way;

that's not the Kingdom way.’ That would have been an easy prayer to pray, ‘Send a lightning bolt, Lord.’ No, I don't think that's what He meant. That's not what He means. “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

Pray for those who are currently persecuting you for your faith, for your belief; they're hurting you. Pray for them. I think it means to pray for their hearts, pray for their salvation, pay for their good, pray that they would be blessed. All of these things. I think He has that in mind.

It's what He's talking about here and it goes on. Look at verse 46.

46 “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” So, He picks out a group that was hated by the Jews. The tax collectors were Jews, too, but they were considered traitors because they were collecting taxes for the Roman Empire. They were often thieves because they would collect more than that was necessary and skim it off the top.

So, they hated them. They said, ‘Well, even tax collectors love the way you love. You love me, I love you. We're in love. That's just reciprocal love.’

That's not what God's talking about. That's not what Jesus is talking about. He said, the kind of love I'm talking about is “agape” love. I love you not because you love me, but in spite of you. I just love you anyway because God's love has been poured out in me.

He says, “...even the tax collectors…” Can anybody in the world love somebody if they love them back?

Of course. It kind of works like this, too. In the world, if you stop loving me, I'm going to stop loving you back. It's conditional love. But “agape” love is unconditional.

It loves and keeps on loving. He says, in verse 47, “And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?” Those are the ones we're supposed to call enemies and we're supposed to hate.

They even know how to love as well as you do. Boy,Jesus, You really know how to hit the heart. You really know how to penetrate our hard hearts. There's a parallel passage in the Gospel of Luke. You might consider it the “reader's digest” version of the Sermon on the Mount.

It's like a shorter version. Here's what Jesus is saying in the book of Luke, in this same parallel section, He says in Luke 6:27–28 (ESV), "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 abuse you.

…And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.” That's the golden rule: “Do unto others as you'd have others do unto you.”

That's what Jesus is teaching. So, we see Jesus on the cross, His seven last sayings of Jesus among them, as He looks at those that were mocking Him, those that were crucifying Him, He says, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” This is the Jesus who calls us to turn the other cheek. This is the Jesus who calls us to love our enemies and to pray for them.

That's Him praying on the cross to His Father. This is how Stephen, the first martyr, prayed as He was being stoned for preaching about Jesus. It says that heaven parted and He saw the Lord Jesus at the right hand of the Father and with his dying breath he said, “Father, forgive them, Lord, forgive them. Do not hold this sin against them.”

He prayed just as His Lord had prayed for His enemies. Who would you consider an enemy right now? Holy Spirit, open our minds so that we can think about it. Do you see a face in your mind right now?

Someone that you wouldn't call them an enemy, but you just don't like them.

That's an enemy. Who do you consider an enemy right now? Is it someone who disagrees with your faith? Is it someone who disagrees with you politically?

Is it someone who is a former friend? You were pretty close, but you don't talk anymore. Is it a family member who you haven't talked to in years? Well, if she would say she was sorry because it was her fault.

Pray for them, bless them, love them. This is the radical love of the kingdom. This is the second way we love past friends, even our enemies. Here's the third way:

3. Reflects the perfect character of our Father.

It shows that we are children of God, that we're different from the world. It reflects the perfect character of our Father. We're at verse 48, and you'll probably notice I didn't spend much time on verse 45. Let me take those two together. Because in 45 He says, “so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”

When you love your enemies, Jesus said, it makes you like you are children of God. Why? Because God lets the sun rise on the evil and the good. God lets it rain on the just and the unjust. God is merciful on the good and the evil.

If He weren't, none of us would be able to stand before Him and if He wasn't willing to put His arms around us even when we were enemies so that He could bring us near, change our hearts and make us like Jesus, then where would we be? So, He loves us anyway. Then, we see in verse 48, “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Oh, my goodness.

This is impossible. But yet, let's “unpack” it for a second. The Old Testament doesn't word it quite like that.

The Old Testament says, “You must be holy as the Lord is holy.” Well, that's impossible too, isn't it? The Luke translation, the Luke Gospel says, “You must be merciful as your Father is merciful.” Well, that's impossible too, isn't it? But all things are possible with Christ.

All things are possible with God. “I can do all things through Christ, who gives me strength.” So, that word “perfect;” let me help you with it for a second, because I need help with it, too. The Greek word for perfect is “teleios,” which can also be translated, “complete,” “to the end” or “to the level of maturity or wholeness.”

Here's what God is doing in us. It's what He was doing in Corrie Ten Boom. When that guard came forward, there was still something in her heart that had to be brought to the surface for her to “die” to; for her to surrender.

Every time you get slapped, every time you get offended, He's bringing out that which is in you that needs to be perfected, brought to maturity. So, pray for me, and I'll pray for you. I want to be less like me and more like Jesus. I want to be more like my Father, who has adopted me through the love of Jesus, than like the world. “God's still working on me;”

I'd said that so often that one of you made me a T-shirt that read, “I'm under construction.” I've still got that T-shirt. God's still working on me and He is still working on you.

That gives me hope. He says, “Be perfect, as your Father is perfect.” Now, why would He tell you to do something you can't do? Well, the only way you can do it is through Him. One day we're going to be like Jesus, completely.

That's what He's up to. If He's trusted you with somebody who's persecuting you, someone who's hurt you, someone who's offended you, He's given you an opportunity to respond the way Jesus responds. 1 John 4:7-8 (ESV) 7 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

Every one of those Greek words right there is “agape” love. God is love. It's His chief character trait. When we get the fruit of the spirit in our lives, the chief one, the very first fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self control.

The first one is love. It's the chief mark. God is love. If you want to be like your heavenly Father;

if you want to be like your King Jesus, the mark of love is what we're called to. Some years ago, I was on a mission trip to Uganda, and we'd heard that there were some pastors that were there in a United Nations refugee camp. Our church raised the money and paid for them to come to the pastors conference that I was leading when I got there. Here is a picture of the five pastors.

They were from the Congo, Kenya and a couple of them from Rwanda. They had escaped war and genocide, even in Rwanda. One of them was Pastor Emmanuel. Pastor Emmanuel, when he was six years old, the Rwandan genocide took place. It was a battle that was between the Hutu and the Tutsi people groups; they were two tribal enemies.

The Hutus had decided they were going to wipe out the minority Tutsis and also the Pygmies that were there that had been removed from the jungles and forced out the Batwa. These two minority groups were so decimated that nearly a million of them were killed in a matter of days. Some reported that bodies were floating down the river in Rwanda with all these. Whenever Pastor Emmanuel was six years old, his entire family was murdered, his grandparents, his aunts and his uncles,

by the neighbors in the same village that they had grown up together. Because of this tribal difference, they were killed by machetes in terrible, ugly ways. His mother, Emmanuel and his sister hid and escaped. As he grew up, Emmanuel told us, “My dream was to grow up and become a soldier so I could have a weapon and I could return to my village and kill them all.” That was his burning vision for life.

So, as he got a little older, he found out he could go to school in Uganda; it would be safer there anyway. His mom and sister had moved away from their home village and they were still in hiding from those areas. He got a scholarship to go to a school in Uganda. Now, little did he realize until he got there, that it was a Christian school.

While he was there, he came to Jesus. As he was studying, he realized that God was calling him to forgive his neighbors that had murdered his family. So, he went back to Rwanda and got in contact with his sister and his mother. He shared the gospel with them and told them what God had put on his heart to forgive. They resisted.

They were angry. But over time, he said, they came to a place where the Holy Spirit changed their hearts. They agreed and came up with a plan. They had never been back to their home village, but they decided to go back to their home village to make a feast, invite all their neighbors and to publicly confess their own sin, because Emmanuel said he was moved by Romans 3:23,

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” to confess their own sin and their own hatred that they had in their hearts, that they wanted to kill them and to forgive them for killing their family. Do you know what? They did it. They went back to that village and they did that very thing and they forgave them.

He says his mother and his daughter still live there now. They moved back home and they're still ministering in that village. This is how he closes. I asked him to write it down. If you want to read my blog online, you can read his entire testimony,

but here's how he closed as he wrote this down for me. He says, We embraced each other and I prayed for them. Since then my Mum has been sharing with our so-called enemies whatever they have and I am going on preaching the Gospel to those who are suffering in sin. I thank the almighty God who sent Jesus Christ to save me. By now I am a child of God, a new creation, no judgement is on me and I believe that Jesus Christ will not leave me. Glory be to Jesus who saved me and He has given me a beautiful wife and a daughter.

My hope is that Jesus Christ, who saved me while I was a terrible sinner, will not fail to save others through his powerful blood.”

That's how he closes his testimony. Jesus' love changed his heart and caused him to be able to love his enemies. Ask yourself, does the love in my heart reflect the love of the Father or do I still have hatred?

Do I still want to get even? Do I still want to harm? Or am I at the place now where God has brought me, where I want to show mercy, I want to show grace, I want to show kindness. I don't want to return evil for evil. I want to return good for evil.

May this word penetrate our hearts, that we would respond with grace, not retaliation. That we would reach beyond friends to enemies, that we would reflect the perfect character and love of our Heavenly Father. This is what Jesus is calling us to today. Let's pray.

Lord Jesus, would You transform our hearts, especially those of us who are thinking of someone that has hurt us, that Lord, You would allow us to think less of ourselves and more of You so that we would be able to love even our enemies. Lord, I first of all just want to pray for those of us that might be here today and we've treated God in such a way that we've been like enemies to Him. We haven't been following Him.

Is that you? You came in today because it was Mother's Day. Someone invited you. But, you've never surrendered your life to King Jesus. You've never given your life to Him.

You can do it right now, through prayer, through expressing your faith. You could pray with me right now. It's not so much the words as it is the attitude of your heart. Would you pray with me? “Dear Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner.

I need a Savior. I believe You died on the cross for me, that You were raised from the grave and that You live today. Come and live in me. Forgive me of my sin.

Adopt me into Your family. I want to be a child of God. I want You as my King, my Lord and my Savior. All the days of my life, I will follow You.”

If you're praying that prayer of faith, believing, He'll save you. Others are here and you're a Christ follower, but this is a difficult Word and you're thinking of someone who hurt you badly. Jesus is saying to follow the law of love, not retaliation.

Lord, help us with that, especially those people that we're thinking of right now. Lord, help us to be reconciled. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.