Hammer. Hammer. Hammer. God at work.

For years now God has been working at teaching me how radical, impossible and necessary divine-like-compassionate love is.

One powerful lesson has been the revelation that some of the worst that has happened to me has an intention to draw me to pray for the persecutors, the unjust judges, the betrayers and morally numb hypocrites.

I have come to accept the theoretical validity of this and the spiritual value.

Jesus, after all, dying on the cross, looked beyond personal pain. Completely empty of selfishness Jesus focussed on the depravity of the defiant crucifiers and, nailed to wood which Christ created, prayed for their forgiveness. Their hate, moral bankruptcy and misplaced loyalties were gigantic barriers separating them from God. Jesus “looked beyond [their] fault and saw [their] need” (Dottie Rambo, 1967).

loveyourenemiesOver these years I can now pray for those who made themselves my enemies because Paraclete gives me visions of the judgment seat where their eternity will be decided. But flashes of wanting to be vindicated, of their blindness to the pain and suffering they inflicted and of the grave injustices perpetrated against me haunt me, awake and asleep. The bottom line is that I am not perfected in this area. The oppression rises larger than the Christ Who saved me, forgave me, calls me.

jesus-love-your-enemies-lg“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor, and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you this: Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you. In this way you show that you are children of your Father in heaven. He makes his sun rise on people whether they are good or evil. He lets rain fall on them whether they are just or unjust. If you love those who love you, do you deserve a reward? Even the tax collectors do that! Are you doing anything remarkable if you welcome only your friends? Everyone does that!” (Matthew 5:43-47 God’s Word©).

I don’t want to do merely what “everyone” does. God’s love is more.

“I can guarantee that unless you live a life that has God’s approval and do it more faithfully than the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20 God’s Word©).

As Captain Jean-Luc Picard would say, “Make it so.”