Love Your Enemies: It Is the Way of Jesus

Matthew 5:43-48

Main Idea: Loving our enemies is proof that God is our Father and that we are like him, and it is a necessary part of our pursuit to be perfect like him.

1. Loving Our Enemies Shows Others that God Is Our Father (5:43-44).
   1. Love them (5:44).
   2. Pray for them (5:44).
2. Loving Others without Discrimination Is to Act like God Our Father (5:45).
   1. God gives sunlight to all.
   2. God gives rain to all.
3. Loving Others without Discrimination Sets Us apart from Those Who Do Not Know God as Father (5:46-47).
   1. Illustration of the tax collector (5:46)
   2. Illustration of the pagan (5:47)
4. Loving Our Enemies Conforms Us to the Likeness of God Our Father (5:48).
   1. The goal
   2. The pattern

The command to love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you (5:44), responses that are wholly different from those in the world. The attitude of the world is well expressed by W. H. Auden in a portion of his poem “September 1, 1939” (Another Time, 112). The title references the opening date of World War II. Paying back evil for evil is natural. Everyone knows this, and it is the way we have learned to respond since we were little children.

Grant Osborne is helpful in laying a foundation for our study of these six verses. He writes,

Love for neighbor was the epitome of Old Testament ethics (see Matt 22:39-40), but Jesus deepens that ethic in a startling way. We are to love our neighbors even when they are hostile and do evil acts against us. Love for enemies, moreover, is not restricted to feelings of benevolence but is meant to be shown in acts of kindness. The model for this difficult activity is nothing less than God himself, our Father. Like obedient children, we must emulate our Father and act toward evil people as he does. If God can be merciful to wicked as well as good people, so must we. (Matthew, 214)

We will walk through our text making four overarching observations on one of the most difficult commands in all of the Bible to obey. Honesty here is at a premium. To truly love my enemy and persecutor is not human. It is divine. Martin Luther King Jr. was on to something when he said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that” (Strength, 47).

Loving Our Enemies Shows Others that God Is Our Father

Matthew 5:43-44

Once again Jesus uses the phrase “You have heard that it was said.” What he is about to say has been passed down by the scribes of old (vv. 21, 33). This is their take on the inspired text. The passage cited is Leviticus 19:18: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Interestingly, the scribes and Pharisees omit the phrase “as yourself.” Charles Quarles points out, “This subtle revision transformed a command about “and hate your enemy.” You will search in vain to find these words anywhere in the Old Testament. The scribes made an interpretive step and drew a faulty conclusion. To love your neighbor, they argue, has the natural corollary of hating your enemy. What could be more logical? On the contrary, what could be more unlike God? Spurgeon is right:

In this case a command of Scripture had a human antithesis fitted on to it by depraved minds; and this human addition was mischievous. . . . This is a sad crime against the Word of the Lord. (Exposition, 30–31)

To counter their error Jesus provided a startling twofold corrective.

Love Them (5:44)

Jesus “hates the parasitical growth of ‘hate thine enemy’” (Spurgeon, Exposition, 31). Once more he counters the faulty hermeneutic of the scribes and Pharisees with the phrase, “But I tell you.” The real shocker comes next. “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” “Love” is a verb, an action word. It is also a present imperative, a word of command calling for a continuous action. We are not to love our neighbors periodically or every once in a while. We are to love them constantly and consistently. We are to give ourselves up and give ourselves away for the good of those who oppose, hate, and even persecute us. We are to respond with a 1 Corinthians 13 kind of love. Jesus, in essence, transforms our enemies into neighbors, something the Word of God always intended. Perhaps no story in the Bible illustrates this better than the story of the good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37. The Samaritan did not hate and ignore the need of the beaten Jewish man. He loved him and demonstrated that love by serving him. No wonder we rightly see the good Samaritan as a type and picture of our Lord Jesus loving us!

Pray for Them (5:44)

Jesus extends our response a step further. Not only should we love our enemies; we should also pray for them. The word “pray” is also a present imperative, a word of command that calls for habitual action. Praying for one’s enemies puts them before the throne of God, our Father. It commits their welfare to the one who knows all things and sees all things. This is especially necessary when it comes to praying for those “who persecute you” (cf. 5:11-12). If I am opposed and “persecuted” (also a present-tense verb) for following Christ, then how do I respond? I love them anyway. If I am mistreated, perhaps even harmed by my enemies, how do I respond? I pray for them. The parallel account in Luke 6:27-28 drives this home: “But I say to you who listen: Love your enemies, do what is good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” Romans 12:14 provides an added reinforcement: “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse” (see also Rom 12:20-21).

It has been well said that Jesus’s life is the best commentary on his words. Never is that truer than when it comes to loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you. As he hung on the cross and was persecuted and mocked by the sinners he came to save, our Lord loved and prayed for his enemies, saying, “Father, forgive them, because they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). Stephen did the same thing for his enemies in Acts 7:59-60 as they stoned him to death. Citizens of this world will find all of this foolish and nonsensical. Citizens of the kingdom of King Jesus, however, find it the normal and supernatural thing to do. After all, we are simply following in our Father’s footsteps. We are simply following the example of Jesus.

Loving Others without Discrimination Is to Act like God Our Father

Matthew 5:45

Loving your enemies does not make you a child of God. Loving your enemies shows you are a child of God. As John Piper puts it,

Now someone might take [“so that you may be children of your Father in heaven”] to mean that you must first become a person who loves his enemies before you can be a child of God. But it may also mean: love your enemies and so prove yourself to be what you are—a child of God. That is, show you are a child of God by acting the way your Father acts. If you are his, then his character is in you, and you will be inclined to do what he does. God loves his enemies—the evil and the unrighteous—in sending rain and sunshine on them instead of instant judgment. (“But I Say to You, Part 1”)

When we love our enemies, we reflect God. As his image bearers, we show what he is like when we put his character on display. We show that we are his children. We can see a daily example of God’s love for his enemies when we realize that God does not send instant judgment “on the evil.” He sends his blessings. Two examples are given.

God Gives Sunlight to All

The examples of sun and rain are aspects of both natural revelation and common grace. God reveals himself as loving and benevolent to all of humanity, a humanity that bears his image. He is indiscriminate in his love as he causes the sun to rise day after day on both evil people and good people. He blesses those who hate him (“the evil”) and those who love him (“the good”). And note, it is “his sun.” All of creation is his. The sun, stars, and planets belong to their Creator to do his bidding. Part of their assignment is to bless humanity, both good and evil!

God Gives Rain to All

The people of God knew he sent the rain. It was a regular reminder of his grace, his kindness, and their absolute dependence on God to provide what they needed to live. The “evil” and “good” are now described with the parallel terms “righteous” and “unrighteous” (some translations have “just” and “unjust”). Our Father loves and cares for them all, each and every one. They all get the light of the sun and the nourishment of rain. When we love our enemies, those who have now been redefined as our neighbors, we are acting like our heavenly Father. Sinclair Ferguson provides helpful clarity and perspective on all this:

Can we really love those who have been hostile to us? Not as long as we live by the principles of the kingdoms of this world, which at best encourage us to ignore our enemies, and at worst to retaliate against them. Only the Kingdom of God can provide sufficiently strong motives to help us love our enemies: your Father shows love to his enemies every day in giving the sun and the rain to the righteous and the ungodly alike. He has every right to retaliate against sinners for the dishonor they have done to his creation. Instead, he shows mercy and patience. We are to do the same. Like Father, like son! (Sermon, 103)

Loving Others without Discrimination Sets Us apart from Those Who Do Not Know God as Father

Matthew 5:46-47

Citizens of the kingdom of God live distinctively different lives as they display the character of their heavenly Father and as they live as salt in an impure world and light in a darkened world. To love only those who love you in return is nothing more than “self-serving pragmatism” (Quarles, Sermon, 166). Even lost pagans do that. Virtually everyone does it. We must not lower our standards and be like everyone else. You are a new creation in Christ (2 Cor 5:17). You now live in a new kind of way. You now love in a new kind of way. Jesus once again puts two examples before us for our careful consideration. After all, “If you love those who love you, what reward will you have?” Eschatological judgment will not be a happy place for such persons.

Illustration of the Tax Collector (5:46)

Tax collectors were despised and hated in Jesus’s day. They were viewed as traitors to their own people in their service to Rome. Many were virtual thieves because they manipulated tax rates for personal gain. “Licensed robbers” was how the common Hebrew person saw them. A righteous, law-abiding, and faithful Jew believed he had nothing in common with these infamous rogues. Jesus said, “Not so quick!” Even tax collectors have and enjoy friends—other tax collectors, for example! He asks, How are you any different from them if you only love people who love you? No doubt this example would have stunned and angered our Lord’s Jewish audience. However, our Lord is not finished. He will inflame their anger even further with his second illustration.

Illustration of the Pagan (5:47)

Jewish hatred for Gentiles often rivaled their hatred of tax collectors. MacArthur notes, “Gentiles were outside the pale of God’s mercy and concern, fit only for destruction as His enemies and the enemies of those who thought they were His people” (Matthew 1–7, 349). I could just imagine how a Hebrew viewed a “Gentile tax collector”! They were filled with hate upon hate, no doubt.

We see their immense hatred in how they interacted with Gentiles. Greetings in the ancient world usually expressed some kind of blessing. It was similar but more than our greeting, “Good day.” As a result, some Jews would never greet a Gentile, and some Gentiles would never greet a Jew (Quarles, Sermon, 167). They would only greet their friends, those like them. They greeted only those to whom Jesus refers as “your brothers.” Jesus says there is absolutely nothing remarkable about this action. You are more like a lost Gentile than the loving God. Your behavior is “more pagan than divine” (ibid., 188). There is nothing different about you at all. Nothing distinguishes you from the world. There is no evidence you belong to the kingdom of God (v. 3), that you are a child of God (v. 8), or that you have a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees and will get you into heaven (v. 20). How we treat our enemies says a lot about us. It may even indicate where we are headed when we die.

Loving Our Enemies Conforms Us to the Likeness of God Our Father

Matthew 5:48

A number of times in the Bible we are told, “God is . . .” These declarations reveal something about the nature and character of God. For example, we find the following affirmations in Scripture:

• God is holy (Lev 11:44; 19:2; 1 Pet 1:16)
• “God is Spirit” (John 4:24)
• “God is a consuming fire, a jealous God” (Deut 4:24; Heb 12:29)
• “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16)
• God is true (1 John 5:20)

Jesus adds to these marvelous statements another type of “God is . . .” in verse 48. He says, “Your heavenly Father is perfect.” The immediate context is how we love our enemies. Quarles notes, “Love for others, including one’s enemies, is the essence of divine perfection and the key to true righteousness” (Sermon, 169). Let’s take a closer look at exactly what is before us here.

The Goal

God’s expectation is clear even if in our own efforts it is utterly impossible. We must “be perfect.” In the greater context of the Sermon on the Mount, the idea of moral purity and practice is also before us. We are to reflect the character of the God to whose kingdom we now belong. This is where we are headed in our future glorification. Who and what we will be someday in eternity should impact how we love and conduct ourselves today. We are to be what we are becoming! We pursue the ideal with the full confidence and conviction that we will arrive there. First John 3:2-3 puts it perfectly:

Dear friends, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know that when he appears, we will be like him because we will see him as he is. And everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself just as he is pure.

Because we have the hope, a certain hope, that we will be like him, we pursue purity as he is pure. We pursue perfection as he is perfect.

The Pattern

In 1 John 3:2-3 the pattern is Christ. In Matthew 5:48 the pattern is our heavenly Father. There is no difference! The Father and the Son are one (John 10:30). As the Son is like his Father, so too should the disciple be like his or her Savior. This is the pattern Scripture sets before us. Paul understood this truth and extended it in the process of discipleship in 1 Corinthians 11:1 when he writes, “Imitate me, as I also imitate Christ.” Again, the immediate context in our text is how we love our enemies. The greater context is the Sermon on the Mount itself. I love how Spurgeon puts it:

What a mark is set before us by our Perfect King, who, speaking from his mountain-throne, saith, “Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect”! Lord, give what thou dost command; then both the grace and the glory will be thine alone. (Exposition, 32; emphasis original)

Conclusion

Loving our enemies is to treat others the way God the Father, in Christ Jesus, has treated us. As Paul says in Romans 5:8, “But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Paul adds in Romans 5:10, “While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son.” Andy Davis says, when we love our enemies, “we will imitate our heavenly Father and grow towards the perfection that salvation in Christ will eventually complete in us (Matt 5:48)” (loving our enemies to humility and provides ten good reasons to be humble toward our opponents. There is excellent food for thought here as we conclude this study:

1. Because God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble (1 Pet 5:5).
2. Because we are sinners too (1 Cor 4:7).
3. Because God is motivated to fight for those who do not fight for themselves (1 Pet 2:23).
4. Because Paul was willing to trade his salvation to rescue his enemies (Rom 9:1-4).
5. You cannot tell the wheat from the weeds (Matt 13:29).
6. You are not the issue; God’s glory is (1 Cor 10:31).
7. A humble response to attacks will motivate church members to join you (Rom 12:9-21).
8. Your enemies may be right . . . about something (Ps 139:23-24).
9. Humility will adorn the gospel for outsiders to see (Matt 5:16).
10. Suffering well grows you in Christlikeness (Rom 5:3). (Davis, Revitalize, 121–24)

What does it look like practically to be humble toward our opponents? There are many ways we can live out God’s call to be humble. Here are ten:

1. Make it a point to obey Jesus’s command to pray for those who oppose and insult you. Pray for them by name.
2. Bring all criticisms back to God in prayer. Where you are convicted that you have wronged someone, be humble enough to go back to that person and seek forgiveness.
3. Practice good listening skills with people who disagree with you.
4. Ask the Lord in prayer to give you a discerning heart to know when to fight like a lion and when to be humble and yielding.
5. Get prepared for potentially contentious meetings, especially before the whole church (like in church conferences), by praying in great detail about what you’re about to face, putting on the spiritual armor Paul lists in Ephesians 6:10-17, and by reading many Scripture verses on humility.
6. Be especially wary of gossip and slander when gathered with passionate supporters of your efforts. . . . Understand how sinful it is to act as though you could never commit the same sin as others.
7. Ponder the example of the Pharisee and the tax collector in Jesus’s parable of humble prayer (Luke 18:9-14).
8. Understand that some opponents really are children of the devil and will never be reconciled to biblical doctrine. But also know that some of the bitterest enemies right now could become staunch allies later.
9. Be wary of lawsuits. Read Paul’s prohibition passage in 1 Corinthians 6:1-8 and submit to God’s wisdom.
10. As you proceed in the Christian life, be more and more zealous for Christ’s glory than for your good reputation among others. (slightly adapted from Davis, Revitalize, 125–27)

Reflect and Discuss

1. Imagine if Jesus did not call you to love and pray for your enemies. What might this change about the gospel you have now? In light of this, why is loving and praying for your enemies a good thing?
2. This chapter teaches that “love for enemies is not restricted to feelings of benevolence.” Explain in your own words what this means. Why is it important not to limit love to feelings?
3. How does praying for our enemies change your heart toward them? Is there someone you can pray for right now?
4. What should you pray for your enemies?
5. Because sin affects us all, every person is more disposed to loving some people over others. If you honestly assess your heart, who are you more likely to love with regard to gender, race, economic status, political/national affiliation, religious belief, etc.?
6. Do Christians ever treat one another as if they are enemies? Are Christians ever preferential toward one another in their love? How so?
7. How can you both inwardly and outwardly love your enemies?
8. What is the relationship between loving God and loving your enemies? Can you love one and not the other?
9. How does your love for God fuel and empower your love for your enemies?
10. Which of the ten practical tips seems most helpful to you? How can you implement it this week?