Matthew 5:43-48: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
I saw this quote on Facebook: “I went by the house I grew up in the other day. I asked if I could come in and look around. They said ‘no’ and slammed the door in my face… My parents can be so rude.”
Sarah-Grace then shared this quote with me from Lemony Snicket: “Anyone who thinks the pen is mightier than the sword has not been stabbed with both.”[1]
When I was reading a bedtime story to Heather a couple of years ago she asked, "Daddy... Donald Duck, is that Disney or the president?" I thought that was a good question. It is nice that my 6 year old is politically aware enough to comment on international politics.
Our Scripture today says, ‘Love your enemies’. This has been an interesting week. There are some interesting people doing some interesting things in the United States. There is Paul Ryan, whose name you may or may not know: he was one of the most powerful politicians in the United States. He is a libertarian Republican and his political philosophy is seemingly not far from Ayn Rand’s ‘rational selfishness’, as it is called, and social Darwinism. There is also Steve Bannon, whose name you equally may or may not know: he was on their National Security Council and close to President Trump. And then, of course, there is US President Donald Trump (not to be confused with Donald Duck) who with the support and/or prompting of these people and others –he couldn’t do anything on his own; he is after all a political neophyte – he, very early in his tenure, brought some interesting legislation into play in the United States.
Love your enemies: Immediately after the previous US election the American government banned more than 280 million people from entering the United States. They have barred people from 7 predominantly Islamic countries from coming to the US for help. This,of course, went back and forth through the courts as the ruling classes were trying to decide how to go about doing this.
Love your enemies: This banning, apparently, is not entirely distinct from legislation that was drafted during the previous administration. Banning historically has certainly been practiced by both Democrats and Republicans. The US government earlier banned Iraqi children in their time of need. The practice has bi-partisan support. This means that Americans from both of their ruling parties have supported bans on millions of people - some of whom have gone through some of the most horrific things you can ever imagine. They have been barred from looking to the United States for refuge.
Love your enemies: Donald Trump ordered the beginning of his wall early in his presidency as well; apparently his recent Democrat opponent, the experienced, educated, and equally elite Hillary Clinton while officially opposing a ‘wall’ herself had proposed instead the building of a ‘fence’ to keep others out.
Love your enemies: The US is still torturing illegally detained people as they have been for most of this century and before; and did you know that President Obama assassinated even more people by drone attacks than the Presidents before him?
Love your enemies: Did you know that in the time prior to the Trump presidency and since 9/11, the US has invaded or otherwise militarily intervened in about 16 foreign countries, killing thousands upon thousands upon thousands of men, women, and children? But Jesus says, 'Love your enemies'.
Love your enemies. Closer to home here in Canada: in Quebec City, someone, allegedly Alexandre Bissonnette, did walk into a mosque and open fire killing six people and injuring many more.
Love your enemies. In our neighbourhood here there was yet another fatal shooting.
Love your enemies. Our world is full of hate. Love your enemies. Our news -CBC, the Star, the Globe and Mail, CCN, Fox News- is full of hate. Love your enemies. Facebook, Twitter, social media is full of hate. Love your enemies. Classrooms and coffee shops are full of hate. But Jesus says,
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5:43-48)
Think of all the horrible things that are being done by all of the horrible mechanisms of culture, society, people in our world today. Think of ‘free speech’ and all the people who are spewing all the venomous hatred from behind that veil. Think of all the people who are casting out the vulnerable and attacking the marginalized in our world today. Think about those who are right in our midst making life difficult for others. Think about all the evil being done. Think of the people doing the evil. Think of the people who hate you and who hate others like you; think of the people who hate this group or that group and think of the people who hate the marginalized; think of all those hateful people, the ones you know personally and the ones you don’t – and love them.[2]
Jesus says, “pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.” Why should we pray for those who persecute us? ...So that we indeed may be children of our Father in heaven. God still loves us when we do jerky things to each other. He doesn’t give up on us; he’s still our father and as His children, we shouldn’t give up on one another either. We love each other, as our text here says, so that we indeed may be children of our Father in heaven.[3] Love is one of the things that actually defines a Christian.[4] As the song and the Scripture (John 13:35) says, ‘They will know we are Christians by our love.’
Those people who are doing those bad things, Jesus tells us what God thinks of them and how He treats them in relation to those who do the best of the best to people, “He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (v.45).[5] He doesn’t want any of us to perish. He wants all of us to turn from our evil ways and experience the joy of love instead. For God so loves the whole world that He sent His only begotten Son (John 3:16) – God doesn’t just love this part of the world or that part of the world – God sent His only begotten Son to live and die, raise from the dead, and someday come back again, not just for some of the world but for the whole world. Jesus loves all the little children of the world.
Fidel Castro passed away not that long ago: I heard people tell me they hated Castro. I have heard people tell me they hate the Russian President Vladimir Putin. I have heard some people say they hate Trudeau – Justin and/or Pierre. I have heard people tell me they hate Stephen Harper. I have heard people tell me they hate Hillary Clinton and I hear people tell me day in and day out that they hate Donald Trump. I have heard people tell me they hate Muslims. I have heard people tell me they hate Russians, Germans, French, Ukrainians, Arabs, Americans, Albertans, Newfoundlanders, even Torontonians... There is a song by an Edmonton band, the Arrogant Worms, entitled, ‘Ontario Sucks’ Its lyrics, in part, are this:
I hate the Skydome and the CN Tower too
I hate Nathan Phillips Square
The rents too high, the air’s unclean
The beaches are dirty and the people are mean
And the women are big and the men are dumb
And the children are loopy 'cause they live in a slum
The water is polluted and the mayor's a d**k
They dress real bad and they think they're New York
In Toronto , Ontario
"You know, actually I think I hate all of Ontario
"actually, now that I really think about it,
I think I pretty much hate every gosh darn province
and territory in our country!
Except Alberta, yeah I love Alberta"
[says the Edmonton based band]...
And the only really good thing about the province of
'cause Alberta
But Calgary does.
Jesus says, “If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? …And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?” (vv.47-48). They’ll know we are Christians by our love. Jesus loves all the children of the world.
Now, I want to be clear that I am not saying that we should not stand up to what is wrong. We need to definitely stand up to what is wrong. In recent months I have read a lot of Gandhi, Mandela, and Martin Luther King Jr. They all stood up for right over wrong. They all stood up for the weak and oppressed. They all stood up in the face of aggression and they all stood up to their oppressors. This is important. We need to stand up to injustice. We also need, as was acknowledged by each of the aforementioned; we need to avoid the trap of being tricked into hating our opponents.
I watched Star Wars this weekend with my daughters. There is a pivotal moment in that famous movie franchise where Darth Vader is trying to turn Luke from the Light to the Darkness; how does he try to do this? He tries to do this by making him hate. He tells Luke that only his hatred can destroy his enemy: this is a lie of Darth Vader and this is also a lie of our enemy, the Enemy, the devil. In the real world, hate cannot defeat evil; hate can only become evil. Hate is what turns a good person, bad; it is love, Jesus’ love, which redeems us.
Martin Luther King Jr said, “Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.” “Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.” “I have decided to stick to love...Hate is too great a burden to bear.”[6]
‘Do you know what the stupidest expression in the world is?’ - a firefighter once asked me - ‘fight fire with fire;’ ‘you don’t fight fire with fire; that just causes a bigger fire!’ It is the same with hate. Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that. If I get drawn into hating someone because they hate something else than I have just caused love to shrink and hate to grow. If on the other hand we love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, then we may be called children of our Father in heaven. If we love everyone, more than just those who love us, then indeed we may even be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. Therefore let us resolve to love one another and let us wish each other well - even those who may wish us ill.
[1] Lemony Snicket, When Did You See Her Last? (Little, Brown and Company: 2013)
[2] Douglas R.A. Hare, Matthew (Interpretation: Louisville, Kentucky: John Know Press, 1993), 58: There is record of the early church doing just this: praying for and loving those who are presecuting them.
[3] Cf. Daniel Hetherington, SJ, The Gospel of Matthew (Sacra Pagina: Collegeville: Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 2007) 272,89: It is important to note the the OT never says ‘hate your enemies’; this is probably a condemnation upon the way people have been living out their lives as ‘children of the Father,’
[4] D.A. Carson, The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Matthew/Exposition of Matthew/II. The Gospel of the Kingdom (3:1-7:29)/B. First Discourse: The Sermon on the Mount (5:1-7:29)/3. The kingdom of heaven: its demands in relation to the OT (5:17-48)/b. Application: the antitheses (5:21-48)/(6) Hatred and love (5:43-47), Book Version: 4.0.2 : There is no command to hate your enemy; however, ‘The Qumran covenanters explicitly commanded love for those within the community ("those whom God has elected") and hatred for the outsider (cf. 1QS 1:4, 10; 2:4-9; 1QM 4:1-2; 15:6; 1QH 5:4), and they doubtless represent other groups with similar positions. This love-hate antithesis may be mitigated by the covenanters' conviction that they alone were the faithful remnant; at least some of the language anticipates divine eschatological language. But not all of it can be dismissed so easily (cf. Davies, Setting, pp. 245ff.).’ Cf. Sacra Pagina, 89:
[5] M. Eugene Boring, Matthew (NIB 8: Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon, 1995),198. Loving one’s neighbour shows that we are oriented towards God.
[6] Martin Luther King Jr, A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr (Ed. James M. Washington (HaperCollins: New York, NY, 1986) and A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.
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