Let's go ahead and open our Bibles to Luke chapter 6, Luke
chapter 6. As you know, you guys have been
going through the Sermon on the Plain and which of course is in
Luke's gospel account, shortened version of the Sermon on the
Mount, which are obviously two different messages.
But we're going to read this morning verses 32 through 36,
chapter 6, verses 32 through 36. So follow along in your Bible as
I read. It goes like this.
But if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?
For even sinners love those who love them.
And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is
that to you? For even sinners do the same.
And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive back,
what credit is that to you? For even sinners lend to sinners
to receive as much back. But love your enemies, do good
and lend, hoping for nothing in return, and your reward will be
great, and you will be sons of the Most High, For he is kind to
the unthankful and evil. Therefore be merciful, just as
your Father who is, excuse me, just as your Father also is
merciful. I'm gonna have you stop there.
Let's pray, Father, as we dig into these verses and just talk
about what this is all about here this morning.
We pray as always for your Holy Spirit to bring direction and
wisdom. We believe, Lord, that your
heart is to feed us from the Word.
And so we ask you to do that today.
Nourish our hearts, minister, grace, guide and direct us in
wisdom and truth. We ask it, Lord, in the
authority that is ours through the name of Jesus.
Amen. Amen.
As Tucker was saying, I I
pastored Calvary Chapel, Ontario for actually it was just shy of
35 years, but Sue and I are now living in Meridian ever since I
turned the fellowship over to my assistant pastor and we're
loving it here. We've got, we've had two kids
living in the Meridian area for years.
And so I knew that I wanted to come, come and live here and
it's just been great. We're within walking distance
from an Olive Garden. Wonderful.
Anyway, we were driving, we were driving from Eagle to Meridian
yesterday and we happened to pass a church that had a sign
that said this. It said Jesus says love one
another. And I and I, I thought about
that as we were driving by and I was thinking, you know, what a
simplistic message that is for, for that.
And you know, it's, it's not like it's untrue, but there's,
there's so much more that needs to be said.
You know, that's one of the problems, you know, with putting
a little quip or something on a electronic sign or whatever.
Jesus said so much more about loving.
And and if we're just going to hear him say things like, you
know, love one another, our natural tendency as he brings
out in this passage that we're looking at here.
And Luke, our natural tendency is to love those who love us or,
or at least who, who we find easy to love.
And so left to our own devices, we're really not going to get
the essence of of the command that Jesus has given us related
to loving other people, because in the passage we looked at her,
he says, no, I don't. I don't want you just to love
people that are, are are easy to love.
I want you to love people that are impossible to love.
I want you to even love your enemies, you know, and people
that that that do this and that and the other thing.
In fact, you know, Pastor Tucker went through and some earlier
verses here just a couple of weeks ago and he he covered
verses 27 and 28. Let me put him up on the screen
just to remind you of what we covered back then.
This is Jesus again speaking, saying, but I say to you who
here love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless
those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
And this is what I meant when I said Jesus said more than just
love each other. It gets much deeper.
It's it's much harder, much harder than than than that.
You know, you'll notice Jesus used some really, really hard
words. He used, He used words like
hate, you know, he used words like curse those who curse you.
And then he even used the word abuse.
Those are all three trigger words today in our, our, our
culture. Now here's the deal.
The passage that I showed you just a moment ago on the screen
of what Tucker talked about here a couple weeks ago, we read it
from the ESV and I did it on on purpose because of the ESV.
Although the new King James and the ESV are very close
translations, I felt like the wording on the ESV was a little
harder hitting when instead of instead of abuse or those that
abuse you, the new King James says those who spitefully use
you. There's nothing wrong with that
translation. It's just that it's not the way
I would talk. You know, I, I don't go around
saying, oh, he's spitefully used me or something like that.
I would say he abused me or he was abusive.
You know, that's a word that I would use.
So I wanted to use the word that that kind of connected with you
or, or even caused some emotions to rise up in you just a little
bit. Because the word abuse, by the
way, makes emotions rise up in people.
I don't know if you've noticed that you, you start talking
about abuse or being abusive and people get angry.
I mean, it just, it, it, it's, it's a, it's a, it's a huge
trigger, particularly in our, our culture today.
And, and, and, and, and obviously there's good reason
for that. Abuse is horrific and, and no
one should, should ever have to go through it.
But what's interesting here is that you'll notice that, that,
that Jesus doesn't say love your enemies unless they abused you,
in which case you're off the hook.
Now, again, he's talking about the kind of abuse that comes our
way because we're believers, OK? And that's the context that
we're we're dealing with here. And, and, and incidentally, we
should never be surprised when we, when abuse comes our way or
cursing or hatred. We should never be surprised
when those things come our way because I mean, as believers,
just because we're believers, because Jesus bent over
backwards to warn us and to tell us that this is the way life is
going to be for us. In fact, he said, listen, if
they, if people end up hating you, just just remember they
hated me first, right? So he, he, and that was just one
statement that Jesus made over the course of his public
ministry that was used to prepare you and me for, for the
understanding that we're going to be living in a culture.
And as we walk with the Lord and as we do our best to live for
Jesus, it's going to create problems in the world.
The world is going to look at you and say I don't like you and
the and, and, and some of them might be able to point to a
reason why they don't like you, but some of them won't.
It's just there's something about you, You know, even Paul
the apostle told us, you know, that we are the we are the
fragrance of Christ. You know, to those who are
perishing, it doesn't smell very good.
You don't smell very good Now to those who are born again, You,
you, you come into a room and they're like, oh, you're my
brother, you're my sister. You know, they love you, but the
world does not love you. And, and, and try as you may,
you're not going to get them to love you because you belong to
Jesus. Good grief.
They crucified the Lord of life and he was perfect.
What do you think they're going to do to you and me?
You know, So what what these passages tell us about is that
is that this is this is what we can expect and how are we going
to respond, you know, to these sorts of things.
You know, when I started in the ministry 40 plus years ago, I
have to tell you that Christians weren't really looked down upon
like they are today. In fact, I think that even we
were even esteemed to a degree. I don't know if you guys are
into old classic movies. I used to love We've got 4 grown
kids and and I used to play these old classic movies for my
kids. You know, I'd say, hey movie
night, you know, I'd start a movie and they'd real.
The thing first comes on and they realize it's in black and
white. They're like oh dad, it's black
and white. I guess it's OK, just just watch
this. You know, those were the days
when the clergy or Christians, you know, were highly esteemed,
you know. Well, those days are gone.
I mean, Hollywood has been abusing Christians for a long
time for, for, you know, decades.
And, and, and the world that we live in is becoming increasingly
hostile to the things that we stand for.
And when you express any sort of disagreement with the things
they stand for, look out. I mean, today all you have to do
is just disagree with the ideologies held by the world and
they're going to attack you like a junkyard dog.
You know, the and, and just as viciously.
And, and that that is, that is hard.
But like I said before, I'm not surprised.
And we should never be surprised when the world decides that they
don't like us very much because once again, Jesus told us that's
the way it was going to be. Do you want to know what saddens
me though? What saddens me is when I see
Christians attacking back at the world and I, and I do once in a
while, I watch YouTube videos and stuff like that.
And, and, and I, and whether they know it or not, when
Christians attack back, they're stirring up negative attitudes
in US. And I get affected by it.
I don't know about you, but I get affected by it.
It, it, it, it becomes irritate, irritating.
And then it develops into anger. And I find myself getting angry
at the world because of the dumb things they do and say, you
know? And so we as believers, we kind
of naturally begin to take on this adversarial attitude toward
the world. And it's kind of US versus them.
You know, it's like, man, I'm glad we're in church today so we
can be around people we like, you know, because you go out in
the world and there's a lot of people that are just make it
really, really hard to like them.
And you work with some of those people who some of those people
are even in your own, your family.
And it's hard to like them. You know, you're supposed to
love them, you know, but it's hard to like them because of the
things they say and, and, and the things they do and the
things they believe in. You know, it's, it's, it's not
hard to dislike the world. I mean, it's as simple as that.
And, and it's especially hard when you see the world
unraveling, when you see society unraveling, when you see the,
you know, I, I've, I've watched in, in, in my lifetime, I've
watched the family just fly apart.
And you guys know, you know, that the fat, the family is the
basis of, it's the glue of our society and, and families.
You know, I mean, we've seen this thing deteriorating over
over time for quite a while. And it's hard to watch and to
and, and, and then Jesus comes along and says, I want you to
love these people. Lord, you don't know what you're
asking. You know, there's a, a
particular prophecy that the Apostle Paul spoke wrote.
We don't usually think of the Apostle Paul as a prophet and he
wouldn't have referred to himself that way either, but he
did. He did wax prophetic at times,
particularly when he wrote his 2nd letter to Timothy and when
he talked about what life was going to be like in these last
days, which I believe we're in. And I mean technically we've
been in the last days ever since they really the inauguration of
the church. But I, I believe we're in the
last days of the last days. And one of the reasons I believe
that is because of what Paul wrote to Timothy.
Let me put this on the screen for you so we can look at it
together. He says second Timothy 3 verses
one through 4. But understand this, that in the
last days there will come times of difficulty, for people will
be lovers of self. You seen that at all lovers of
money, proud, arrogant, abusive. There's that word disobedient to
their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable,
slanderous, without self-control, literally meaning
they do not possess the ability to control their emotions.
Brutal, not loving, good, treacherous, reckless, swollen
with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.
You know, we, we, we read that passage and we think, well,
that's, that's my neighborhood. I mean, this is my address, you
know, Second Timothy chapter 3. That's where I live.
I see it on the nightly news. I, I, I, you know, we're, we're,
we're living this reality right now.
And, and it's, it's, it's troubling.
I mean, I, I can retreat once in a while and watch episodes of
Andy Griffith, I suppose, and, and, and, and think about what
life used to be like back in the day, But it's not that way now.
This is not that day, and I have to confess that there are times
that I get mad. And when I got mad, it's almost
impossible to hear Jesus say to me, Paul, love your enemies.
Do good to them even when they curse you, even when they hate
you. I want you to do good to them.
And then I, you know, I, I, I, I get reminders in the word of God
that my anger doesn't do a whole lot of good anyway, You know,
there's that verse in James. Let me put it on the screen just
as a reminder. This always comes up, it seems
like when I get angry. Know this, my beloved brothers,
let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to
anger. Why?
For the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of
God. And I have to go.
Yeah, you're right, Lord. You're right.
Now, I know there's such a thing as righteous anger.
Jesus got righteously angry at times.
I don't know if I've ever experienced righteous anger.
You know, I'm. I'm not sure I would.
I don't think I would give myself that kind of credit.
My anger is usually the kind that, you know, I need a good
rebuke over. And then there's the reminder
that Paul gave us in Romans chapter 12 up on the screen.
Do not be conformed to this world because the world is
angry. The world is upset, but he's, he
goes on to say, but be transformed by the renewal of
your mind. And I got to remember that I,
you know, I, I, I, I do, I get angry sometimes, but I got to
remember that it, it's really not a positive thing in my life
and that I need to respond differently from the world.
There needs to be a, a lack of conformity in my life to the
things of the world. And and yet sometimes I find
myself conforming to the world and and that's, you know, a, a,
a bummer. And so, you know, but you know,
one of my brothers, one of my Calvary Chapel brothers, came
out with a message here a couple of years ago and he said this.
And I, I remember when I heard it, it was so profound, I had to
write it down. And so I'm repeating this to
you. What I heard my brother say, he
said this. We must never lose the mission
of the church because of our outrage over the madness in the
world. Because, guys, the the world has
gone mad. I don't know if you've noticed
they've gone mad. It's crazy.
And my response to that can never be such that I lose the
mission, that we lose the mission, and we know what the
mission is. Jesus gave us the mission.
We call it the Great Commission. Let me put it on the screen.
It's for Matthew chapter 28. Therefore go and make disciples
of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of
the Son and of the Holy Spirit. And then he goes on to say this,
teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.
You know, there are several elements to the Great Commission
that are very important that we are, we are bound obligated to,
to, to carry out as, as believers.
But we're not going to be able to do any of those things if our
hearts are overflowing with bitterness toward the world in
anger and frustration. I mean, we're never going to
invite people into, to the, the, the, the, the Kingdom of God
with a clenched fist and clenched teeth, you know, and
that's the, and I'm, I'm preaching to myself here, you
guys, I need this reminder. I want to, I want to invite
people into the Kingdom and I'm not going to.
It's not going to happen if I'm just getting angry all the time
and I'm upset. Because of the cursing and the
hatred and, and, and the abuse that comes our way as you know,
the, the body of Christ, you know the, the, the last thing
that we read in the Great Commission when you saw that
passage on the screen, Jesus said, and I want you also to
teach them to observe all the things that I have commanded
you. Well, guess what?
He commanded us to do that. We're supposed to teach them
love your enemies. And you see, if I'm not, I'm,
I'm struggling sometimes to love believers, let alone I have
hardly gotten around to loving my enemies.
And, and so I'm struggling here. I, I'm, I'm challenged by this
call that Jesus has placed upon my life.
And, and you ought to be as well.
It's a challenging call that he has laid out for us.
And, and, and so if we're, if we're, if we're going to, you
know, respond with annoyance and, and, and anger, you know,
nobody's going to stick around to hear our message.
Hey, let me tell you about the love of Jesus, you jerk, or
something like that. You know, it's just not going to
work. So he gives us in these in, in
in this passage that we're looking at here in Luke chapter
6, some very difficult statements and and sobering
statements. When you look at the end of
verse 35 in your Bible here, it goes on to say that we are to be
kind because he's kind to the unthankful and the evil.
And So what he's basically telling you and me is he wants
us to go do the same that that he wants us to be like him.
He says, you know God, God is saying to you and me, I'm I'm
kind even to evil people. I want you to go do that too.
That's hard. And then verse 36, if you look
with verse 36 again, it says, therefore be merciful, just as
your Father also is merciful. Now, I probably don't have to
remind you that the definition of mercy is not getting what you
do deserve, right? We deserve judgment.
I deserve judgment, but we don't get judgment, we get eternal
life. Why?
Because we're good people? No.
Because we've done things right? No, because he's merciful,
right? So Jesus says, therefore I want
you to be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful, so be
merciful like he's merciful. In other words, show to those
people who hate you, curse you, and despise you because you're a
Christian, show them mercy. Why?
Because God showed you mercy. Wow, that's, that's hard stuff.
You know, there's a companion passage to this section that
we're looking at here in Luke. And of course it's in Matthew's
Gospel and the Sermon on the Mount.
And just as a by way of reminder, I want to, I want to
show it to you on the screen so we can look at it together.
It's in Matthew chapter 5. And it goes like this.
You've heard that it was said you should love your neighbor
and hate your enemy. That was a common phrase.
But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who
persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in
heaven. For He makes his Son rise on the
evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the
unjust. For feel if you love those who
love you, what reward do you have?
Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you
doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the
same? And then check this out.
You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is
perfect. Try that one on for size.
You thought it was hard enough when Jesus said to you and me to
be merciful because our Father is merciful.
Now he UPS the ante a little bit more and he says you therefore
must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.
And I got to say something if if reading that verse doesn't give
you the shakes, I don't think you read it right.
It ought to give you the shakes because Jesus is saying things
to you and me that are impossible in the flesh.
In other words, when I say in the flesh, I mean they're
impossible for you and me to accomplish in and of ourselves.
You know, I've always felt like some of verses in the Bible
should come with a warning sticker.
You know, like when you buy something and it says be sure
and turn off the power before you put this thing, you know,
plug this thing in or something like that.
But the warning sticker that ought to go along with certain
passages of, of the Bible is warning.
Don't do this in the flesh or don't try to do this in the
flesh. And, and if you read things like
love your enemies and then you go out and you try to love
people that hate your guts and you try to do it in the power of
the flesh, I got news for you. You're going to fail and you're
going to fail colossally. I mean, it's going to be a big
failure. Some of you know what I mean?
You've been there. And that's really kind of the
whole point. When Jesus, when Jesus spoke
both the Sermon on the plane and the Sermon on the Mount, he was
speaking to believers. Guys, this these are not
messages you give to an unbeliever.
You don't go around telling unbelievers love your enemies.
You just don't do that. But you know why they don't?
They don't have the goods. They don't have the capability.
They are when I talk about, you know, they I'm when I'm
unbelievers are what Paul refers to in the Bible.
In his epistles, particularly First Corinthians chapter 2, he
talks about unbelievers as the natural man.
OK, that's a term that Paul uses, and he uses it to describe
people who do not have the Holy Spirit living within them.
In other words, their perspective, their ability,
their power is all comes from the natural.
Their their wisdom, their understanding, it all comes from
the natural. OK, they don't have any
supernatural element or spiritual element at all to
discern or to walk in the power of God it they just don't
possess it. OK, you do as AI mean.
I mean, I'm assuming here that everybody in this room is a born
again believer. And what that means obviously is
that you've come to Jesus by faith and you've accepted what
he did on the cross for your sins.
You've embraced him and you've received the gift of the Holy
Spirit. Wonderful.
You're a Christian. But there's so much more to
understand because now He has empowered you.
He's literally given you the power to read through passages
like this and do them. It is now in your power because
of who lives within you, right, to fulfill these things.
You couldn't do that before you were a believer.
You would you you'd look at passages where you know Jesus
says you're, you must be perfect as your heavenly Father's
perfect. I mean, as an unbeliever, I
wouldn't even even know how to even understand or begin to
comprehend a statement like that.
I would just would have gone. That's the dumbest thing I've
ever heard in my life. But as a believer who is now
empowered, endued with power through the Holy Spirit, I can
look at verses like that and I can say, Lord, I know, I, I know
that that's not my power. That's not in Paul, but it is in
you. And now you are in me.
And so I can now walk in that power.
Boy, if that doesn't leave you with your mouth hanging open, I
mean, nothing will. But we forget about this all the
time. All the time.
We forget about the power of the Holy Spirit.
We forget the extent of that power.
When I, when I talk to Christians and they're, they're,
they're talking to me about some, you know, besetting sin in
their life or something like that, Pastor Paul, I just,
there's, I can't get. And all they all they are
focusing on is their weakness and and they need to they need
to build their faith by getting into the word and understand
what kind of power now lives inside of you as a believer.
It is absolutely astounding. Let me, I want to, I want to
share with you the apostle Paul actually describes the power of
the Holy Spirit living within you.
And in fact, he even prayed for the believers in the Ephesian
church that they might that their that the eyes of their
heart might be open to understand it.
And this is one of the most beautiful prayers in the Bible.
And I believe that it's a prayer that all believers can lay hold
of in terms of of what Paul's desire was concerning our need
to come to terms with the this power that now is resident
within you and me. It's from Ephesians chapter 1.
And we're going to put it on the screen so you can see it
together. All right.
He he says, first of all, I do not cease to give thanks for
you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our
Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit
of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him having the
eyes of your hearts enlightened. Here's why, that you may know
what is first of all the hope to which He has called you.
What are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the
Saints? And check this out.
And what is the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us
who believe according to the working of His great might, that
He worked in Christ when He raised him from the dead and
seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above
all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every
name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to
come. Guys, do you realize what Paul
said here concerning this power? That he was praying for you and
me to be open to, to begin to understand, let alone lay hold
of? He's he's basically saying that
the very same power that now lives in you through the Holy
Spirit is the power that raised Jesus from the dead and seated
him at the right hand of the glory of God.
Same power. Can I just say something?
If we really, truly understood the depth of what Paul said in
this passage, I wouldn't be able.
You guys wouldn't be able to stay in your seats.
You'd be up on your feet like you were at a football game and
your team just won the game with a last minute something or other
and you'd be cheering and going bananas.
If we really understood this power that is resident in us, he
says, Paul says. But I'm praying for you guys
that you might have your hearts opened to the fullness of what
God has done for you. First of all, the hope to what
you've been called, but then also this, this power, this
power. Power to do what?
Be merciful even as your heavenly Father is merciful.
Power to forgive even as Jesus showed you that perfect example,
hanging on a cross, looking down upon the people who crucified
him and saying Father, forgive them.
They know not what they do. That ability is now living in
you because He is living in you. And whatever inability you have
noticed in yourself to forgive others or to be merciful or to
be kind when they are being particularly awful to you,
That's just all you. But the power to live and love
that supernatural ability to go beyond who you are and be like
he is, is now living within you and just waiting.
Just waiting. I had somebody come up to me
after first service and ask the question, So why aren't we
seeing this more in our lives? Isn't that a great question?
I, I thought that was really good.
Why, why, why am I not seeing this power to forgive this power
to, to, to love even my, my enemies.
And, and I said, well, you know, there's a, there's a
corresponding reality that goes along with anything that the
spirit wants to do in our life. And that is to resist the power
of what I want to do. And that's the flesh.
You see, dying to the flesh is this is another message, by the
way, which I'm not going to launch into it.
It really is. It's a it's a whole different
message. But but whenever we talk about
walk in the spirit, walk in the spirit, there's always that
correspond. There's the other side of that
coin and that is resist the flesh, because my flesh wants
to, to punch people, right? Somebody gets in my face, I want
to punch them. That's, that's Paul, that's me.
So you see, why am I not seeing this power to forgive?
Because I've been giving in for so long to, to the power of
Paul, to, to, to walk in the flesh, to be angry, you know,
But we have to learn to resist so that we might yield to the
power of the Holy Spirit. You know, it's really
interesting. The power of the Holy Spirit is
such that he's, he is such a gentleman.
I've learned this over the years of walking with the Lord.
He is such a gentleman. Sometimes I wish he wasn't so
much. I mean, I need to be smacked
upside the head more often than the not.
But he yields to me sometimes. And that's the crazy thing about
the Holy Spirit. He will sometimes yield to me
when I am supposed to be yielding to him.
And so in other words, when somebody treats me badly, he'll
let me. He'll let me treat them badly
back, and then he'll convict me. And I feel like a worm.
You know how that goes. And then I have to go to the
person later and say, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that.
And so my prayer then becomes, Lord, I want to release you more
in my life. I want to resist me so that I
might be able to yield more to you.
You told me to love my enemies. I'm not there yet, but you've
given me the power that I can't deny.
It's all there, right? It's all there.
I don't have to. I don't have to cry out to God.
Please help me love my enemies. It's there, it's done.
The Spirit lives in US. I just need to learn to yield to
Him and resist the me. Amen.
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