Now He moves on to another area, but one which He had touched on earlier – a perversion of the law which taught – “Love neighbour, and hate your enemy.” That was a lie of the Pharisees – which first adds to the truth of God and then takes away from it. It has ever been the technique of Satan to stay as close to God’s Word as possible. In this way he can more easily deceive those who aren’t thinking or who haven’t been listening.
Is hating your enemy to be found the commandments of God or in His law? Not trusting my mind or memory, I turned to a common reference book which many of us have. “Treasury of Scripture Knowledge” is like a big reference Bible, with emphasis on the references. And the references given are broken up for the various clauses which make up that verse. In reference to the Pharisees’ “and hate thine enemy” the TSK lists only five Old Testament scriptures. Listen to them and ask yourself if they give you permission to hate your enemy.
Exodus 17:14-16 – “And the LORD said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. And Moses built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovahnissi: For he said, Because the LORD hath sworn that the LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.”
Deuteronomy 23:6 – in regard to the Ammonites and Moabites, “Thou shalt not seek their peace nor their prosperity all thy days for ever.”
Deuteronomy 25:17 and 19 – “Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way, when ye were come forth out of Egypt….therefore it shall be … that thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it.”
In Psalm 41 David says, “Mine enemies speak evil of me, All that hate me whisper together against me: against me do they devise my hurt. Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me. But thou, O LORD, be merciful unto me, and raise me up, that I may requite them.” The word “requite” speaks of administering justice – “repaying them.” Does justice and retribution necessitate “hatred?”
The last reference that the Treasury gives is from our scripture of last Wednesday – Psalm 139 – “Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men. For they speak against thee wickedly, and thine enemies take thy name in vain. Do not I hate them, O LORD, that hate thee? and am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee? I hate them with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies. Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” Unless I am mistaken, these people are David’s enemies only because they are God’s enemies, and the hatred which he professes to have is not the usual human variety but “perfect” hatred.
The only other scripture that I can think of which relates to our Lord’s quotation comes from Leviticus 19. “Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.” Since God specifically referred to a neighbor, does that mean that we can hate the man who is not our neighbor? Later in the same chapter we find words which stabbed right into the heart of the wicked Pharisee. “And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.”
The Pharisee’s alteration of God’s law was totally unjustified – as alterations always are. The Old Testament abounds with commands which regulate the conduct that we are supposed to have toward strangers, and even toward those who consider themselves to be our enemies. If you meet your enemy’s ox or ass going astray – return it. If you see enemy’s ass lying under burden too heavy for it to carry, lend a hand. Proverbs says if your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. So if you saw your worst enemy drop his wallet, you are ordered by the Lord to return it. In fact it is not unscriptural even to add a little to it.
The place where the Jews might have gotten this idea of hatred may come from their wars. But the Canaanites were not to be hated per se; on the other hand their religions definitely were. So nauseating were their abominations, that the land vomited them out. If Israel followed the customs of the Canaanites, they too could expect to be expelled. But those wars between Israel and Canaan had nothing do with personal hatred, or even national bigotry. They were a divine attack on soul-damning Satanic religion.
The Bible teaches that evil men should be both loved and rejected at same time.
What we tend to forget is that our standard in all of the points of this sermon, is the Lord Himself. The guidelines are – God’s love and His wrath upon the sins of His enemies. The right kind of love ardently desires that our wicked neighbors will repent and become as lambs in the flock of the Lord. But as to their sins, we must hate, fear and avoid them like a raging fire.
As we are taught elsewhere, there is a perfect love and a perfect hatred of people of this world. I’m not sure that anything but hatred for God’s enemies can be considered as perfect hatred. Does the Lord justify our hatred because of some harm that they have done toward us? Perfect hatred must be free from all spite and vengeance. When the Pharisees advocated “hate thine enemy,” they had no scriptural justification for their declaration.
Here’s a rather silly illustration for your consideration. In the middle of the night, you are awakened by the horrible screeching of a pair of stray – and probably rabid – cats just outside your window. Neither cat is yours; they are strays – feral – and you’ve had trouble with both of them before. But one has descended from a breed which you generally like – whatever that is. The other cat is definitely a mongrel – filthy, mangy, tattered and over-aggressive. For which cat in this fight are you going to support and root, now that they have disturbed your sleep? Neither of course. You’re going to drive them from your yard if at all possible. Here is the point, you are one of those cats and your enemy is the other. God is under no obligation to choose or to bless either of you – you are both decrepit strays. But that is not the way that Pharisees looked that this, and it’s not common to us either. We usually think of ourselves as good guys and the friends of God. We have every right to hate and attack that other stray, feral, rabid cat.
Of course, the Lord Jesus contradicted their addition: “But I say to you, Love your enemies.”
This is not an isolated theme in the teaching of Christ. For example, in Luke 10, the Lord was confronted by one the Jewish lawyers – likely a Pharisee. He came tempting Christ with the question, “How may I inherit eternal life.” The Lord asked him what the law declared, knowing full well what the man believed about that law. He replied, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself.” But – to those Pharisees there were differences between a neighbor, a friend and an enemy. And the man asked, “And who is my neighbor?” To that, the Lord replied with one of His more famous parables.
The “Good Samaritan” tells us that our neighbor may be a different race, rank and even a different religion. In fact our neighbour may even hate us and wish to do us great harm. But what makes him a “neighbour” is that he is fellow human being, and he has needs just like us. Our duty is to love him and to do him good – if we can. This kind of love is not sentimentality, but helpfulness. It is practical, humble, and sacrificial service. While he may seek our harm, we seek the opposite for him.
There is a story about a young hardworking slave who earned the respect of owner through his Christian life. One day he was with his master in town and saw on the auction block another old black man, obviously sick and ready die. He pleaded with his master to buy the old sick man, and he did, spending very little money in the process. The young slave then took old man home and nursed him back to health. Weeks later, their owner asked if old man was his father. No! Brother? Friend? “No, that man is my enemy. He sold me into slavery, but Jesus taught me that I should love him.” Of course, the best illustration is that of Jesus and us – we who were his enemies.
Simple words can also express our love; words to them, and to Lord for them. “Bless them that curse you.” If they try to call down disaster and catastrophe on you, pray that Heaven’s blessing might be on them. This may be the highest example of self-control in human inventory. Chrysostom made a famous sermon outline about these things. We must not initiate evil actions towards evil people. We must not take revenge when they hurt us. We should suffer their wrongs quietly. We should surrender to him even more than he demands. We should not hate him just because he hates us. We should do our best to do him good. And finally we should pray for God’s best upon him.
Someone once said, “It is impossible to pray positively for someone without first loving him.” And the more we pray, the more our love will grow. So we should not wait until the enemy earns our respect before we pray. Even as the soldiers were driving in the spikes through the hands of our Lord, He prayed for them. If the torture of the crucifixion couldn’t silence the Lord’s prayer, should the slights and words cast against us silence ours?
If we learn to pray for our enemies, doesn’t it prove that we are children of our Heavenly Father? Someone once said, “When God comes with His scale to judge us, we won’t be measured against others, but against the Lord Himself.” God, the Father, pours out his sunshine on the evil as well as good. In other words: divine love isn’t discriminating, for if it was then no one would ever be saved. God’s common grace, like sunshine and rain, is given to the world in general. And God’s saving grace is still given only to God’s enemies.
If we love those who love us, what do we really have? We have exactly the same kind of love and righteousness that the Pharisees display among themselves. We have the same hearts that the unsaved publicans have. But it is not good enough that we resemble the best of the non-Christians. We are supposed to outstrip them, even making them ashamed of themselves as they look at us in our God-given righteousness. We are to be peculiar, extraordinary and unusual, even in our love. We are to love others when we have nothing to gain from it. Just like God.
In fact, our love is to be “perfect,” even as our Father which is in heaven is perfect. Does this mean sinlessness? I suppose that sometimes the word “perfect” might mean that sort of thing in God, but not here and in us. The Beatitudes and most of the rest of this Sermon on the Mount speak of growth – growing in grace. Hungering and thirsting after righteous is the perpetual desire of real Christian. The perfection of which Christ speaks of here, is complete, well-balanced, godly love. We are to be perfectly balanced in our love, loving even our enemies with the merciful love of God.
Now, do remember our lesson from last week – non-retaliation?
Some people have restraint enough, and they learn how to turn other cheek. It is different, however, to love the slapper. Some people live under the principle, “If you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. And if you try to scratch out my eyes, I will scratch out yours.” Better people live under principle, “You may hurt me, but I’ll not hurt you back.” The best people say, “Hurt me and I’ll love and pray for you.”
Jesus asks us, “What do ye more than others?”