Reflection On Mathew 5: 43-48

Jesus is a very demanding person and we know it. Here He restates the old law with the implication that it wasn't very difficult to observe. After all, to “love your countryman but hate your enemy” is something we would naturally do. Those who originally heard Him preaching this message would probably have been very happy had he stopped with that quotation. They could have all gone home peacefully, feeling very self-righteous. But the Lord didn't stop. He gave a new commandment – one which was much more demanding. In fact, it is so demanding that it seems almost contradictory, “Love your enemies, pray for your persecutors!” How can we love our enemies, those who hate us? Or why should we love them? If we love our enemies, wouldn't that mean that they would cease being our enemies? Hating them, we can understand. But loving them? It’s the Lord’s way of saying, “Don’t have enemies, at least from your point of view.” Love them right out of existence by making them your friends. Now that is certainly a lofty ideal! This is one of the most difficult commandments we have. How we fare with this one will say much about our real commitment to the ways of Jesus.
For the Jews, a neighbor meant only a fellow Jew someone belonging to his own group and never an outsider or a gentile. But for Jesus the world was beyond the Jewish circles, much beyond the vicinities of their group. Jesus shows the wider horizon of God’s love and He wants all God’s children to get beyond the little world of theirs to experience the all – encompassing love of God. We are to follow the example of the Heavenly Father who makes the sunshine and the rainfall on the good and the wicked, the just and the unjust alike. We are to have no discrimination whatsoever in our love towards others. In God’s love we are all one, all inclusive, beyond any boundaries. Allow Jesus to break the petty walls that separate us from others, that force us to keep distance with others that marks us distinct and exclusive.
Questions to ponder:
How are we tending to love?
Do you love neighbor or enemy?
In whom you find more joy by loving them? (Friends or foes)

Do you not find something good or extraordinary in the wicked or unrighteous?

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