Let’s Choose Love

Who is your enemy?

Maybe it’s the person across the street who seems to judge everything you do. Maybe it’s the person on social media who hates what you stand for. Maybe it’s someone who doesn’t try to care about you. Or maybe you don’t have “enemies,” but you have people who make you feel angry, frustrated, and inferior.

It’s no secret that our world seems divided. There always seems to be tension in the relational, spiritual, and political climate of our world. And sometimes, it seems impossible to put differences aside and treat people who hurt us with kindness and grace.

But Jesus has called us to live differently. Jesus calls us to “love our enemies, and do good to them.” And then, He demonstrated what this looks like by dying for everyone. He gave up His own life on behalf of people who hated Him … and He didn’t expect anything from them in return.

Every person on this planet—past, present, and future—God loves. And He has called each of us to love others like He loves us: sacrificially, humbly, and unconditionally.

Loving our enemies doesn’t mean we should put ourselves in unhealthy or unsafe situations, nor does it mean we should ignore the pain someone has caused us. But it does mean that we daily seek to represent Jesus by showing people respect, empathy, truth, and grace. It means we acknowledge the pain and the injustice we experience while never ceasing to pray that our enemies personally accept Jesus.

It’s Jesus who showed us what unconditional love and forgiveness looked like when He died for us. It’s Jesus who took Paul, a murderer, and turned him into a great evangelist. It’s Jesus who forgave Peter for denying Him, and set him apart to build the global Church. It’s Jesus who loved religious zealots who betrayed Him, and crowds who tried to kill Him.

When Jesus asks us to love our enemies, He isn’t asking us to do anything that He hasn’t already done first.

Jesus is kind to the “ungrateful and the wicked” and that includes us. So let’s represent Jesus well so that others—even our enemies—want to know Him. Because when people know Him, they won’t want to stay as they are … they will want to become more like Jesus.