THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT - PART TWO
SECTION V
SALT OF THE
EARTH – LIGHT OF THE WORLD
“Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour [its flavor and strength], wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.”
“Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set
on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men
light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth
light unto all that are in the house. Let
your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify
your Father which is in heaven.” (Matthew 5:13-16).
We have been called to be both salt and light to the
world. Not that we are sufficient in or
of ourselves to be either, but because God has miraculously placed us in Christ.
We can then reflect His nature Who is
the true Salt of the earth and Light of the world.
Salt is both a flavoring and a preserving agent. Added to other foods, it enhances their
flavor. Used as a preserving agent, it
will keep other food from spoiling. As
Christians, we take on the savor (or flavor) of Christ when we are born again. In our natural state, we humans are tasteless
and bland, but in Christ we take on the aroma and flavor of heaven. “Now
thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh
manifest the savour of His knowledge by us in every place. For
we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and
in them that perish.” (2 Corinthians 2:14, 15).
All of the attributes that Jesus named in the
Beatitudes are the very essence of Christ Himself. These are the things that we must possess in
order to be salt to those who are unsaved.
The world sees the character of Jesus in us because we are poor in spirit,
merciful, pure of heart, meek, etc; and they are reminded of the Savior Who
loved and died for them.
Of this verse, Albert Barnes in his commentary writes, “Salt renders food pleasant and palatable,
and preserves from putrefaction. So Christians, by their lives and
instructions, are to keep the world from entire moral corruption. By bringing
down, by their prayers, the blessing of God, and by their influence and
example, they save the world from universal vice and crime.” (Barnes); Notes on the New Testament.
If salt loses its savor, it no longer has a
purpose. In the Middle East, the people
would take salt and spread it on pathways and walkways. It would literally be trodden under their
feet. Salt used in this way would also
kill any living plant that tried to spring up where it was spread.
Henry Maundrell describes the Valley of Salt in one of
his famous accounts, “Along, on one side
of the valley, toward Gibul, there is a small precipice about two men’s
lengths, occasioned by the continual taking away of the salt; and, in this, you
may see how the veins of it lie. I broke
a piece of it, of which that part that was exposed to the rain, sun, and air,
though it had the sparks and particles of salt, YET IT HAD PERFECTLY LOST ITS
SAVOUR: the inner part, which was connected to the rock, retained its savour,
as I found by proof.” Maundrell, Henry; A Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem at
Easter, A. D. 1697. It is only when we are connected to the Rock, Jesus
Christ, that we are able to retain our saltiness. Without that connection, though we may have
the sparkle of salt, we will lack the flavor, and be of no use to others.
Jesus
also calls us the light of the world. We
know that Jesus is the True Light “which
lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” (John 1:9). “In him
was life; and the life was the light of men.” (John 1:4). Christ was the Word that was in the beginning
with God, and His first utterance was, “Let
there be Light.” And when He spoke
it, it was done! It is this Light - this
Life - that shines on us. We then reflect His light to the world.
Think of a clear night when the moon is full, and it has
risen directly overhead. It is
incredible the amount of light that it sheds upon earth, and, yet, it has no inner
source of light on its own. It is simply
reflecting the light that falls upon it from the sun that is on the other side
of the earth. We on earth can’t see the
sun at that time, but we can look at the moon and get a measure of the light
that comes from it. In the same way, the
world cannot see Christ, for He is no longer in the world as He once was when
He walked in flesh and blood. His
followers are here, however. We are
standing in the Light of the Son of God which is then reflected from our
changed lives. Again, all of the
attributes that Jesus mentioned at the beginning of His Sermon are reflected in
us who abide in the Vine, Jesus Christ. We,
in turn, become salt and light to the world.
SECTION VI
THE LAW
“But the
fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness,
faith, meekness, temperance: against
such there is no law.” (Galatians 5:22, 23).
Jesus could not have completed His ministry on earth without
dealing with the question of the Law and its ultimate purpose and
fulfillment. After establishing the
basic standard of godliness in the Beatitudes, and the need for God’s people to
model that standard to the lost, Jesus turns to the Law. Jesus makes it crystal clear that His purpose
is not to destroy the Law, but rather to establish it, and show us the way that
we can FULFILL it.
From the time that Moses went up on Mt. Sinai and received
the Ten Commandments from the hand of God, mankind had struggled to keep God’s
holy demands as depicted in the Law. Israel’s
history is a sad reminder of the utter futility of mankind’s power to live up
to God’s standard of righteousness. Repeatedly,
God would confirm His covenant which He made with His people on Mt. Sinai (and which
they swore to uphold). Repeatedly they
would break His commandments and dishonor His name. The problem was not with the Law for “…the law is holy, and the commandment holy,
and just, and good” (Romans 7:12), but the problem was with Man for Paul
says, “…we know that the law is
spiritual: but I am carnal, sold
under sin.” (Romans 7:14).
Mankind’s problems with the Law began at the very dawn
of creation when the first man and woman, Adam and Eve, chose the Knowledge of
Good and Evil over the Tree of Life.
Before that decision, the first couple lived in innocence, blessedness,
and fellowship with God their Maker.
They knew no sin, for there was no law to break. Their hearts were pure because of their
relationship with God. They daily walked
in the Light of God’s love. In due
course, God warned them about eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and
Evil. They were given the freedom to eat
of every tree that grew in the Garden of Eden (and I’m certain that they had a
vast selection), but there was just this one tree… The stakes couldn’t have been higher: death
for just one bite! They were curious,
and they were enticed. The trouble with
free will is that it isn’t free at all.
When boundaries are set and rules are made, the flesh becomes a target
for Satan’s lies. Sin then lies at the
door and waits to pounce. Consider
little babies. You tell them “No, don’t
touch!” They then become fixated on
handling that one thing. The room may be
full of other toys and distractions, but they want only the one thing that they
aren’t allowed to have. This is the sin
nature that is in us because of Adam and Eve.
We are born with it. The first
couple soon learned that the wages that sin requires of us is always death. When their enemy tempted them, they
capitulated. Even with only one law to
keep, they couldn’t resist breaking it!
Immediately after their disobedient action, they fell
under condemnation and hid themselves from the presence of the LORD. In addition, they began a slow descent toward
death because they no longer had access to the Tree of Life. Not only did their days on earth become
numbered, but the part of them that knew close communion and fellowship with
God also experienced death. God had
said, “…in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.”
(Genesis 2:17). Though their bodies
lived a long time after their transgression, something even more important died the moment that they
ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil! It was the spiritual Life within.
Adam and Eve were the first ancestors of the human race,
and so their sin affected every generation after them. “…by one man [Adam] sin
entered into the world, and death by sin; and
so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” (Romans
5:12). Just as children inherit certain
features and characteristics from their parents, so Adam’s descendants
inherited sin and death. We’re told that
death reigned over every man and woman from Adam until Moses and right up to
today. There were men during this time
that trusted in God and walked by faith (Enoch, Job, Noah, Abraham, and Joseph,
to name a few), yet the world overall plunged deeper and deeper into sin,
idolatry, and perversion.
So, God in His immeasurable wisdom and desire to redeem
man from sin, provided man with laws by which he might live, but only as a
stop-gap for what He ultimately purposed.
Paul tells us why the Law was added: “It was added because of transgressions,
till the seed should come to Whom the promise was made [that would be
Jesus].” (Galatians 3:19). Outside of Christ, the only things that can try to control man’s carnal tendencies
are deterrents and consequences. At the
same time, Paul tells us that the Law was given so that the trespass might abound
(Romans 5:20), and then he clarifies this argument by asking the question, “Did that which is good, then, become death
to me [referring to the Law]? By no means! But in order that sin might be recognized as
sin, it produced death in me through what was good [the Law], so
that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.”
(Romans 7:13 NIV). God was guiding mankind toward the ultimate realization
that they needed a Savior if they were ever to be saved. In the meantime, they were “…kept [held captive] under the law, shut up [imprisoned] unto the faith which should afterwards be
revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster [guardian; tutor]
to
bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.” (Galatians 3:23, 24).”
Faith was the thing that God wanted us to come to in
the end. It is the one thing that we
can’t do without if we want to please Him (Hebrews 11:6). It is the key element that causes us to
overcome the world, the flesh, and the devil (1 John 5:4, 5; 1 Peter 5:8,
9). The truth that Jesus is the Christ –
the Savior, the Anointed One, the Messiah, and the Son of the living God - is
the Rock upon which His Church is built. It is our faith in that truth that gives us
access to all the treasures of grace that are in Christ. Paul writes, “…after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For
ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.”
(Galatians 3:25, 26).
Scripture tells us that Abraham believed God, and it
was accounted to him for righteousness.
As a result of his faith, God made a promise to Abraham saying, “I will establish My covenant between Me and
thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant,
to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee.” (Genesis 17:7), and, “…in thy seed shall all the nations of the
earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed My voice.” (Genesis 22:18).
The Law, which was given 430 years after could not
negate this promise that was made to Abraham.
In the New Testament, it is unmistakable that God was not referring to
the natural seed of Abraham, but the spiritual seed which was Christ. “Now to
Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as
of one, And to thy seed, which is
Christ.” (Galatians 3:16).
We who have been born again and washed in the blood of
the precious Lamb of God are the seed of Abraham and the Israel of God. “For he is not a Jew, which is one
outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh:
but he is a Jew, which is one
inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of
men, but of God.” (Romans 2:28, 29).
Therefore, all of the promises of the Old Testament that are addressed
to Israel or to the Jews are ours to claim through the Lord Jesus. Both Jews and Gentiles have been called into
one body and one community in Christ. “For through Him [Jesus] we both have access by one Spirit unto the
Father. Now therefore ye are no more
strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the
household of God.” (Ephesians 2:18, 19).
THE LIFE
On Mt. Sinai, the LORD made a simple covenant with Moses
and the Israelites: if they kept the Law, then He would give them Life and
blessing in exchange. He said, “Ye shall therefore keep My statutes, and My
judgments: which if a man do, he
shall live in them: I am the LORD.” (Leviticus 18:5). Andrew A. Bonar is credited with commenting
on the phrase “…he shall live in them…”
when he wrote:
·
“If, as most think, we are to
take, in this place, the words ‘live in them,’ as meaning ‘eternal life to be
got by them,’ the scope of the passage is, that so excellent are God’s laws,
and every special minute detail of these laws, that if a man were to keep these
always and perfectly, the very keeping would be eternal life to him.”
And Albert Barnes has this to say of the same phrase:
·
“…the life which connects him with
Yahweh through his obedience.”
(Barnes,
Albert); Notes on the Whole Bible.
The life that God was referring to was not just our day-to-day
existence, but the Resurrection Life, the Eternal Life, that is found in Jesus
Christ. Scripture says, “In
Him was life; and the life was the light of men.” Jesus said of Himself, “I am the way, the truth, and
the life: no man cometh to the Father, but by Me” (John 14:6). This was the Life that God was promising to
restore to mankind if they would just walk in His ways. This was Christ’s purpose for coming: to
restore all that we had lost in Adam. Adam
lost Life - Christ came to restore it. The
Lord stated this purpose when He said, “I am come that they might have life,
and that they might have it more abundantly.”
(John 10:10). “More abundantly” implies
that what we have in Christ far surpasses what Adam had in the beginning before
his transgression.
Sadly, Israel broke the terms of the covenant by not
keeping God’s laws (see Jeremiah 31:32).
God, therefore, was no longer bound to keep His side of the agreement
either. You see, God knew that there was
no law that could give life. It was we mortals
who were having trouble with that fact.
Paul said, “Is the law then
against the promises of God? God forbid:
for if there had been a law given
which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law.”
(Galatians 3:21). The promise of Life in
the beginning was contained in the presence of the Tree of Life in the Garden
of Eden. If man had refused that other
tree, he would have had access to Eternal Life through that blessed Tree of
Life. Instead, he chose to disobey God’s
warning and was subsequently barred from access to the Tree of Life altogether. As the Tree of Life appears in the beginning
of creation, so also it appears at the end of time in St. John’s Revelation after
Christ has restored all things and gained the final victory. Mankind has been given access to its life-giving
properties for eternity!
The Tree of Life is a type and shadow of the Lord Jesus
Himself. He used a similar analogy when
He talked about being the True Vine. He
said as long as the various branches abide, or remain attached to that Vine,
they will receive life giving nutrients from the Vine, and will, as a result,
bear fruit (John 15). In another place
Jesus told the people, “Verily, verily, I
say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso
eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life; and I will
raise him up at the last day. For My
flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My
blood, dwelleth in Me, and I in him. As
the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth Me,
even he shall live by Me.” (John 6:53-57). If we want to have Eternal Life, we must
partake of Jesus, the True Vine and the Tree of Life. He is the Manna from heaven and the Bread of
Life. We must partake of the redemption
that is in His blood, and feast on the Life that is in His flesh. When these corruptible bodies of ours shall finally
be exchanged for incorruptible bodies, then death will once and for all be
swallowed up in victory and will be the last enemy that shall be destroyed.
In the 6th century B.C., God spoke through
His Prophet Jeremiah and announced the coming of a new covenant that He would
make with the house of Israel. He said, “Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that
I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of
Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day
that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which My
covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD: but
this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After
those days, saith the LORD, I will
put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be
their God, and they shall be My people. And
they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother,
saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know Me, from the least of them unto
the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I
will remember their sin no more.” (Jeremiah 31:31-34). Understand that this new covenant included,
not just the Jews, but all the peoples of the earth who would believe according
to God’s original promise to Abraham (see Galatians 6:16; Romans 9:6, 7).
ESTABLISHING
THE LAW
“Do we then
make void the law through faith? God
forbid: yea, we establish the law.” (Romans 3:31).
Against the backdrop of Jewish history, Jesus makes a
bold statement in verses 17 and 18 of Matthew 5 when He says, “Think not that I am come to destroy the
law, or the prophets: I am not come
to destroy, but to FULFILL. For
verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot [the tenth letter
of the Hebrew alphabet, “י”, the smallest of them all] or one tittle [little lines or projections, that distinguish Hebrew
letters from other similar ones] shall in
no wise pass from the law, till all
be fulfilled.”
Over the centuries, certain traditions had been added
to the Law which made the truth of God ineffectual. Jesus rebuked the Jewish leaders of His time
for this very thing, telling them, “Why
do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father
and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death. But ye say, Whosoever shall say to his father
or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; and
honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free [Jesus is referring
to those who treat the care that they give to their aging parents as a favor,
or gift, rather than the responsibility and commandment that it is. They should have viewed it as their reasonable
service toward those who had sacrificed for them their whole lives]. Thus
have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of
you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth, and honoureth Me
with their lips; but their heart is far from Me. But
in vain they do worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.
(Matthew 15:3-9).
In His Sermon, Jesus leaves no doubt that He has come
to establish the Law rather than tear it down.
He makes it clear that the Law is still in effect and always will
be. Furthermore, Jesus proceeds to make
the demands of the Law even more rigid than how the Jews were interpreting them
at the time. The Lord’s purpose was to
raise the standard of righteousness up to the level that God was demanding
rather than water it down to where the Jews had taken it. The Lord said, “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and
shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but
whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the
kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you,
That except your righteousness shall
exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case
enter into the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:19, 20). No wonder the leaders hated our Lord. He did not hesitate to call them out for
their hypocrisy. Our righteousness must exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees of our day if we are to have any hope of
entering into the Kingdom of Heaven.
The good news is that through Christ we can do that very thing.
The 1st through 8th chapters of
Romans take us on a marvelous journey.
It explains God’s overall purpose in dealing with sin, the flesh, and
the Law. In chapter 6, we’re given His
answer to sin and the flesh. Paul says, “Know ye not, that so many of us as were
baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Therefore
we are buried with Him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up
from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in
newness of life. For if we have
been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the
likeness of His resurrection: knowing this, that our old man [our fleshly nature] is
crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that
henceforth we should not serve sin. For
he that is dead is freed from sin.” (Romans 6:3-7). Before we can partake of Christ’s resurrection,
we must first partake of Jesus’ death on the Cross. This is what baptism is all about. It is as though we were crucified with the
Lord and buried with Him in a grave, but then resurrected along with Him. As Paul so eloquently states, “I
am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the
life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, Who
loved me, and gave Himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20).
In Romans 7, Paul explains how God deals with the Law
by likening to a marriage. He teaches
that as long as a woman’s husband is alive, it would be wrong to be joined to
another without cause. If the husband
dies, however, the wife is free to be married to someone else. In Paul’s analogy, the Law is our husband,
but we are no longer bound to it because we are dead in Christ. “Wherefore,
my brethren, ye also are become dead
to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another,
even to Him [Christ] Who is raised
from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.” (Romans 7:4).
As for fulfilling the Law, Paul gives us the solution
in chapter 8: “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own
Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law MIGHT
BE FULFILLED in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the
Spirit.” (Romans 8:3, 4). Walking
with Jesus, in the Spirit, is the only way that we can grow close, and stay
close, to Him. Adam and Eve knew this
blessed relationship in the beginning.
Enoch walked with God, and God miraculously took him up to be with
Him. Jesus called His disciples to walk
with Him and follow in His footsteps. If
we walk in the Spirit, we will not fulfill the lust of the flesh, but will,
instead, fulfill the righteousness of the Law by following in the footsteps of
the Master. By faith, we will, little by
little, become transformed into His likeness.
There are those who have misunderstood the intent of
the Gospel message where the Law is concerned.
They teach that the grace of God disannuls and makes void the Law
altogether. They believe that there is
no longer any penalty for sin because God no longer sees our transgressions
since we are in Christ. Paul says, “God forbid!” to such a notion (Romans
3:3:21; 6:1). We find, instead, a
delicate balance in scripture between the Law and grace. We are saved by grace, and not by works, lest
we take credit and think we have something to boast about. Yet, we’re told that faith without works is
dead. Paul declares that “…we are His [Christ’s] workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto
good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians
2:10). By receiving the Lord Jesus, we
have been given power to become sons of God.
The sinless One has become sin for us so that we could become righteous
in Him. The Law is always there as a
plumbline and a schoolmaster for mankind; but it cannot save, and it cannot
give life.
YOU HAVE
HEARD THAT IT WAS SAID…BUT I SAY UNTO YOU
It is important – essential – that we base our theology
not on things that we have heard said about godliness, but on what Jesus has
said. His Word is from the beginning and
it never changes. “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.” (Hebrews
13:8). Starting in Matthew 5:21, Jesus
lists several points of the Law that most Jews were familiar with, but then He
expresses the spirit behind the letter when He said, “…but I say unto you.”
In verse 21, Jesus said, “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not
kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment.” Pretty straightforward, but it didn’t go deep
enough. Jesus wanted His disciples to
understand the root cause that would drive a man or woman to take another’s
life. That root cause is anger. When anger builds up and overflows, it can
result in murder. The secret is dealing
with the heart of man and not only
his actions. Jesus said that “…whosoever is angry with his brother
without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment,” and not only they who
actually take a life. He said, “…whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca [a
senseless, empty headed man; a term of reproach used among the Jews in the time
of Christ], shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say,
Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.” (Verse 22). Jesus went further yet. He said, “Therefore
if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother
hath aught against thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way;
first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.” (Verses
23, 24). It was the Lord’s intention
that everyone understand that in order to fulfill
the Law, one’s heart had to be pure. As Paul wrote, “…the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a
good conscience, and of faith unfeigned.” (1 Timothy 1:5).
Jesus used several examples to illustrate this
point. In verse 27, He teaches that
adultery isn’t just an act of passion and betrayal, but it starts in the heart
when we look on the opposite sex with lust and covetousness. Such passion can build until it leads to
sin. The secret is to remove all things
from one’s life that would fuel lust in the heart. Pornography, movies depicting nudity and
sexual acts, risqué books and magazines, etc., these have no place in the life
of one who professes to be sold out to Christ.
We must yield our members as servants of righteousness and present our
bodies as living sacrifices to the One Who died for us and lives
forevermore. He gives us the strength to
overcome every passion.
At the end of this section, Jesus warns about frivolous
divorce and its negative effects on the souls who are involved. Unbridled passions, whether anger, bitterness
or lust, are often at the core of such break ups. What God has united, only He can part. He must be at the heart of such decisions.
In verse 33, Jesus deals with the habit that the Jews
had of swearing oaths and making vows. If
we make promises to God, we better follow through with what we have vowed. It is better, however, that we become men and
women of our word, known for our honesty and integrity. Let your yes mean yes, and your no, no.
Jesus mentions a popular phrase of the time, “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a
tooth.” (verse 38). This is a
proverb that has stood the test of time.
We still hear it from time to time, even among Christians. It couldn’t be further from the way God has
called us to react to evil, though.
Jesus gave us these guidelines: “…resist
not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the
other also. And if any man will sue thee
at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile,
go with him twain. Give to him that
asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.” (Verse
39-42). Difficult? Yes, but not in Christ. We can do all things through Christ Who
strengthens us. It all depends on who we
want to serve in this life, God or ourselves.
Every time we respond to evil in kind, we are overcome by it and we
spread the growth of violence and evil just that much further. This is why Paul tells us, “Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil
with good.” (Romans 12:21).
Finally, Jesus calls into question the belief that we
should love our neighbors and hate our enemies (verse 43). Instead, He declares, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that
hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; that
ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven.” (Verses 44, 45). Does it seem unreasonable? Not in Christ. He already has done it!
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