First Week of Lent – Matthew 5:43-48
Jesus uses extremely strong language in today’s Gospel. He is talking with his disciples and he hits them right where they live. He instructs his disciples that they are to love their enemies. Jesus is being completely countercultural. The culture that Jesus lived in was extremely violent. They nailed criminals to the cross and imposed many other cruel punishments. True, in our culture we also punish criminals with the death penalty, life in prison, etc. However, we strive to do it in a somewhat humane way – such as it is.
Not only did Jesus tell his disciples that they should pray for the individuals who persecute them — be that physically or emotionally. Jesus goes on to say that it is easy to love the individuals who love them. Jesus then challenges his disciples to love everyone. We are not to be selective about who we love. If we don’t love each and every person, we are not much better than the criminals!
It is fairly easy to love most people. However, even the individuals we love, get on our nerves at times. Nor do we always agree. Yet if we care about them, we desire to stay in relationship with them. So we strive to work out the problems and difficulties. We want to stay in relationship.
Today Jesus is telling us that we are to love everyone — not just the people who love us. The reality is that we won’t like everyone every day of the week. Nor will others like us on some days. However, this condition doesn’t mean that this destroys our love and care for the other. The love that Jesus is speaking about has the ability to supercede the daily irritations, disagreements, petty arguments, etc. Love enables us to focus much better.
Yet, we still have the ability to love others: ALL others, even the people we may not like. Today Jesus reminds us that each and every person is lovable---even the one who gets on our very last nerve. However, we do have a choice: to love like Jesus or to allow our emotions to control us! What will we choose today?
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