Keeping Your Enemies Close

Jesu Juva

Romans 12:9-21                                                                 

August 30, 2020

Proper 17A                                  

 Dear saints of our Savior~ 

          I keep my friends close, but my enemies even closer.  I don’t know who first coined that phrase about friends and enemies.  But on the surface, it seems like a pretty good strategy—especially where enemies are concerned.  Keeping enemies close means you can keep an eye on them. It helps you anticipate their next move.  And it might enable you to launch a preemptive first-strike if necessary.  Keeping your enemies close is good advice.         

          Today’s reading from Romans 12 contains even more good reasons to keep your enemies close.  In fact, it’s a reminder that, while it’s good to have friends, it’s even better for the Christian to have enemies.  For Jesus never said, “Blessed is the man who is loved by his wife, cherished by his children, and admired by all.”  But Jesus did say, “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me” (Matt. 5:11).  The fact is that enemies can be even more of a blessing than friends and family. And, if that’s true, then blessed are you, for your life has its fair share of enemies—and if not now, then soon.

          Romans chapter 12 isn’t only about enemies.  This section of Romans has to do with living out your Christian faith.  In last week’s reading from earlier in the same chapter, we were told to offer our bodies as “living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God.”  Today we get some straight talk on just how holy, sacrificial living is done. 

          And it’s done very simply.  Here as Paul expresses how we Christians are to live our lives, motivated by the mercies of God, it’s refreshingly sweet and simple.  He writes:  Let love be genuine.  Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.  Love one another with brotherly affection.  Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.  Contribute to the needs of the saints.  Show hospitality.  Overcome evil with good.  Short, sweet, and simple.  It’s all easier said than done, to be sure.  But there’s really no mystery—no great surprise in any of that.

          What is surprising here—what really goes against our every instinct—is what Paul writes concerning our enemies.  Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.  Repay no one evil for evil.  Never avenge yourselves.  Paul even quotes an old Proverb about enemies: If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.  For by doing so you will heap burning coals on his head.

          It’s good for you to have enemies because enemies provide you with the perfect opportunity to live out your Christian faith.  Your enemies provide the perfect opportunity for you to walk the walk and talk the talk—to be doers of the Word.  Thanks to your enemies, you can provide food and drink to those who wish that you would starve.  You can provide clothing for those who would like nothing better than to strip you of your possessions and your good reputation.  You can defend those who attack you.  Thanks to your enemies, you get plenty of practice at refraining from revenge and overcoming evil with good.  Thank God for enemies.  For without enemies, when would you ever have the chance to fulfill the law of Christian love?  This is why Christians keep their friends close, but their enemies even closer.  With enemies like these, who needs friends?

          There’s one other good reason for you to keep your enemies close:  they are a constant reminder of how much we admire ourselves.  It’s true.  We all think quite highly of ourselves—especially compared to our enemies.  We’re proud of our progress in virtuous living.  We’re amazed at how thoroughly we’ve cleaned up our act—confident that we’ve pretty well mastered the art of Christian living.  I thank thee, God, that I’m not like everybody else—abortionists and arsonists, rebels and rioters.

          When you catch yourself thinking along those lines, then do this:  Think about your enemies.  Take note of your thoughts and feelings toward that person who has wronged you—that person who has cursed you, twisted your words, lied about you, stolen from you, cheated you, cheated on you, treated you like excrement.  How do you feel about that person?  What you think and feel about your enemies tells the whole truth and nothing but the truth about just how far you’ve missed the mark—how uncharitable, how unchristian, how unloving and unforgiving we really are.  And without bona-fide, grade A enemies, we’d never know that terrible truth about ourselves.  It’s good to have enemies, for they are painful reminders of the sin and death that dwells deep within us.

          For you and me there’s to be no revenge, no retaliation, no retribution.  Repentance is what we need.  We need to repent of how much we love ourselves and for how much we hate our enemies.  You are never more alone than when you are alone with your sin.  But you never have a bigger cheering section than when you repent.  For if the angels of God rejoice over one sinner who repents, then surely the angels are rejoicing all around you—and you owe it all to your enemies!

          Well, not quite.  For behind every enemy you face and behind every cross you bear stands Jesus, the Son of the living God.  He knows about enemies.  And He knows about crosses.  In fact, as the nails went into His hands and feet, He prayed for His enemies:  “Father, forgive them.”  And we are, by nature, God’s enemies.  “We have met the enemy, and he is us.”  But in Jesus Christ God shows us what it really means to love your enemies.  Enemies like us never had it so good.  God’s love in Jesus is the kind of love that feeds you when you’re hungry, gives you who are thirsty a drink, clothes you when you’ve got nothing, and keeps right on doing it even while we kick, and scream and fuss like immature little children.  But children—well, that’s what we are.  Children of God, holy and dearly loved, died-for, forgiven and redeemed—all with a resurrection promise.  That is what we are—we who know the love of Jesus.

          If you want to know what God is really like, look at Jesus.  Look at how Jesus lived while He was here on earth—what He said and did for those thirty-three years while living here in the enemy camp.  That shows us who God really is.  For Jesus was not overcome by evil; Jesus overcame evil with good.

          Jesus is the friend of sinners, but He was the enemy of so-called saints—Sadducees and Pharisees and teachers of the law who fought tooth and nail to bring Him down.  But Jesus shouldered it all, joyfully and willingly, so that He might have you as His own.  Jesus, who overcame evil with good, was overcome by evil men.  On Good Friday we see our Savior in the hands of angry sinners—spider-like men who wrapped Jesus in a web of their lies, nailed Him to the cross, and drained His blood.

          But that blood once drained from the corpse on the cross now fills the chalice.  And the resurrected Jesus—the living Christ—now offers you the blessings and benefits of His body and His blood in the Lord’s Supper.  “This is my body, given for you.  This cup is the New Testament in my blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.”  Here at this altar sinners get to eat and drink with the Friend of sinners.  In this holy meal Jesus overcomes all the evil in you with all the good He is.  And all that good—He gives away to you as a gift.  And when that happens, angels rejoice, and we are reminded again of the simple truth that God is love. 

          In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.