Jesus in His Relationships - Jesus and His Enemies (Daily Devotional)

Shalom and welcome to our series of Living Supernaturally. We are looking into God’s word and a topic of Jesus in His relationships. One of the relationships that we are going to focus on today is how Jesus related to His enemies and how we see that His love is in action. In our own lives, it is easy to love people who love us but what about those who may misunderstand us or those who may mock us, hurt us, or even people who are enemies with us? We often tend to naturally respond in anger or even isolation or withdrawal but Jesus modelled something radically different. He loved even His enemies. On the cross we read what Jesus said. In Luke chapter 23, verse 34, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.’ This is a familiar verse for most of us and we see Jesus was falsely accused, He was mocked, beaten, nailed to the cross for nothing that He did, yet His words were not of anger or of revenge but of forgiveness. He prayed for those who executed Him. He said, ‘Father forgive them.’ This was strength and this is choosing mercy even when He was going through so much of agony. We see that Jesus explains and says, ‘they do not know what they are looking.’ So, we see that Jesus looked deeper than their cruelty, He saw their ignorance and blindness. His love was compassionate enough to really recognize that sin can blind people. When we look at our enemies through this lens, we may just not see the offense but we see the brokenness behind it just like Jesus did. We also see earlier in His ministry, Jesus teaches and says, ‘love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you’, this was His teaching. On the cross, He actually lived what He had taught. His love was just not His words but we see that in His action. What does this mean for us? Loving our enemies doesn’t mean ignoring wrong or even allowing abuse. It means refusing to let hatred take root in our hearts. It means to choose forgiveness over bitterness, to pray over being resentful, to have compassion over revenge. This kind of love is only possible through Christ living in us. So, who in your life is difficult to love? Are you holding on to bitterness or are we willing to forgive like Jesus forgave? Let us do what Jesus did and model His love to those who may persecute us. Let’s pray together, Heavenly Father, we thank you for showing us what it means to love our enemies. Thank you that you have taught us to forgive as you have forgiven us. Remove our heart of anger or bitterness and give us patience, compassion and may our love be in action. We pray that your Spirit would enable us to love like you loved, in Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.

Thank you for tuning in to Living Supernaturally, for more resources to strengthen your spiritual walk, please visit apcwo.org.