Please describe one of your physical enemies. What is it about them that makes them your enemy? How long will they be your enemy?
Are you their enemy, too? What is it about you that makes you, their enemy? How long will you be their enemy?
“For Christ himself has brought peace to us. He united Jews and Gentiles into one people when, in his own body on the cross, he broke down the wall of hostility that separated us. 15 He did this by ending the system of law with its commandments and regulations. He made peace between Jews and Gentiles by creating in himself one new people from the two groups. 16 Together as one body, Christ reconciled both groups to God by means of his death on the cross, and our hostility toward each other was put to death” (Eph. 2:14-16 NLT).
“For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. 20 So we are Christ’s ambassadors: God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, ‘Come back to God!’ 21 For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ” (2 Cor. 5:19-21).
Here’s the toughest question: “Do we follow Christ’s example and love every one, or take matters into our own hands, and pay them back?
How did Joseph truly forgive his brothers and others for their treatment of him: sold as a slave to foreigners by his ten brothers; falsely accused of rape by a foreign leader’s wife; forgotten by two released prisoners, who were asked to speak up, on his behalf, of his innocence? Then, when Joseph came into power as second in command in Egypt, having the authority to punish these people for their ‘crimes,’ he forgave and forgot their misdeeds (Gen. 37:1-45:15).
If we say, “I have no enemies,” but still hold a hidden distaste for them, or secretly see them as ‘social trash,’ or refuse to associate with them based on skin color, homosexuality, age, wealth, criminal background, or heavy issues that we haven’t taken enough time to figure out yet, how can Jesus bring his appeal to our world through us, as ‘reconcilers?’
Maybe we’re just not ready to follow Christ to this extent! Carrying the cross of non-discrimination (unconditional love) is just too hard!