God is challenging me deeply over the last couple of days with this:
Matthew 5:43-47 “You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.
48 “In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.”
Deuteronomy 9
24 You rebelled. Rebelled against the clear orders of God, your God. Refused to trust (God) him. Wouldn’t obey him. You’ve been rebels against God from the first day I knew you.
25-28 Your children will answer, “Because they abandoned the Covenant of the God
of their ancestors that he made with them after he got them out of
Egypt; they went off and worshipped other gods, submitted to gods they’d
never heard of before, gods they had no business dealing with. So God’s anger erupted against that land and all the curses written in this book came down on it. God, furiously angry, pulled them, roots and all, out of their land and dumped them in another country, as you can see.”
29 God,
our God, will take care of the hidden things but the revealed things
are our business. It’s up to us and our children to attend to all the
terms in this Revelation.
