Good morning,
Praise the Lord for the new day. We have several crocuses patches in full bloom around the parsonage and church. It has been so warm that the bees are back in full strength. It is going to be balmy and brilliant today. Thank you Jesus. The Lord blessed us with a wonderful Wednesday gathering for fellowship, study, and prayer. We looked again at Mathew 5.
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy'. But I tell you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” This directive from our Lord goes against every natural tendency. In the natural man, we are not supposed to love our enemies, but to destroy them. Furthermore, our love is called to go above that, and we not only love those who love us, but to love those who hate us. Jesus said, "if you only love those who love you how are you any different from anybody else?"
This love for our enemies means we are going to have to look at people differently. As Christians we are called to put on the mind of Christ, so we are called to see people as Jesus would see them. One thing Jesus always did was to look past what a person was and look at who that person could be. As one preacher has said, "so many are enslaved by sin and they are trapped in their sin, and instead of condemning them for being there, we need to offer them a way out. We need to show them grace, love, and compassion just as Christ has shown it to us.
Romans 12:19-21, “Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written, 'It is mine to avenge; I will repay,' says the Lord. On the contrary, "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” People are going to be won to the Lord not through name calling and brow beating, but by showing forth the love and compassion that we have ourselves received.
When I first came to the States in 1974, I read about Charles Manson. Many of you might remember the name of Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme. In 1976 her name exploded onto every front page in America. She had pushed her way through a crowd and had tried to kill the President of the United States. She was only 17 years old. Investigators later found that she was a proud follower of Charles Manson, the crazed killer who worked his evil through his small, dedicated band of fanatical “disciples.”
After the event news magazines began to dig into the background of this young woman. Their reports found that Squeaky had felt like a misfit in her town, so she wandered across the country until she reached California. There Manson met her and promised to take care of her. She went with him and was willing to kill and die for him. Reporters wanted to know why, “Why would you give your life to a man like Manson?” She explained that she had made a choice early in her teenage years that, “Whoever loves me first can have my life.”
Those who were once enemies of the cross are now followers of the One who gave His life for them. Hurts from the past can stay in our minds forever if, instead of letting the wound gradually heal, leaving a slight scar, resentment keeps picking at the scab. It is if we keep putting a video back in to watch it again and again. We keep a record of the wrong, and we keep underscoring it in the ledger.
We all can say that we do not feel like forgiving, but forgiveness has little to do with feeling. It is, rather, a matter of obedience to the Lord’s command. Harry Emerson Fosdick once said that when he was a boy he overheard a conversation between his dad and mother at the breakfast table. He heard his dad say, “Tell Harry he can mow the grass today if he feels like it.” As his father left, he heard him call back, “And tell Harry he’d better feel like it.” Forgiveness is something like that.
Some time ago I read about Paul Stevens, a man who lived in Evansville, Indiana. He endured perhaps one of the most horrific events that we could ever experience, as his daughter was stabbed to death by a neighbor. Paul Stevens spent nearly a decade being tortured by the memory of his daughter’s killer. To make things worse, his daughter’s killer was released after only seven years behind bars. The memories proved so hard to bear that Stevens moved his family from Evansville to a new home near Dawson Springs, Kentucky. Stevens’s hatred for this man remained almost unbearable. He said that, “At that time the only thing I wanted was to see that man dead”
In 1978, nine years after the murder, Stevens tried something radical. At a Christian retreat, he finally grasped that his hatred could not restore his daughter, so he vowed to overcome the tragedy and devote his time to working with violent criminals. Since that time, Stevens has spent two days each week working as a counselor and lay minister at a maximum security prison and he has come to call some of the 29 prisoners on death row his friends. Many of those prisoners have said that they could never have been led to Christ except by this man, who had such compassionate understanding and such unconditional love.
Now, If Stevens could forgive the murder of his daughter, if Joseph could forgive his brothers for selling him as a slave into Egypt, and if Corrie ten Boom could forgive a Nazi prison guard who tortured her and murdered her family, then we , with Christ's power, have the capacity to forgive those who have offended us. That is love.
Jesus said, “Greater love has no man than this that He would lay down His life for His friends.” “God demonstrates His love for us in this way, that while we were yet still sinners, Christ died for the ungodly.”
As sinners, we owed a debt we could not possibly pay, and He paid a debt He did not owe. Jesus died a vicarious death on our behalf. His death was not an accident, nor was it a spur of the moment decision. Jesus said, “No one takes my life from Me but I willingly lay it down.” That’s the love that God has for you and for me. It was not the nails that held Jesus to the cross; it was His amazing love for us that held Him there.
In Jesus our Saviour,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eA5u9nwpMs
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