Jesus says: “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you”. (Lk 6:27-38) And just to be sure he repeats it: “love your enemies and do good to them”. Then he finishes up with “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” From ridiculous to impossible!
Let’s start with the impossible and work back to the ridiculous. En route we should remind ourselves that Jesus doesn’t ask the impossible, quite the opposite, he is very aware of our limitations. And if what he says appears ridiculous then it may be that we have misunderstood, rather than he is off base.
So how could we be merciful as the Father is merciful? How could we be like God in anything? God who is so far above us, beyond us, all powerful, all loving. Jesus clearly said something like this in many contexts. Matthew in his equivalent passage has him say “Be perfect as your father is perfect” (Mt 5:48). So let’s just deal with mercy for now…
If we think of mercy as something we give then the idea that we can give in the same way as God gives does indeed sound impossible. And there is plenty of scripture which speaks of mercy in this way – mercy flowing forth like a river, etc. But let’s also be careful when reading what is clearly poetry. If we step back and try and think like lawyers, then mercy is not something that is given – it is actually a withholding, withholding of justice – something is held back. A judge (or king, or anyone) who is merciful is not imposing the judgement to which s/he is entitled, not asking for the punishment, the restitution, whatever … If we view mercy this way, then it may not be easy to be merciful, all our instincts may scream to apply the judgement to which we are entitled. But it is possible, even in purely human terms. Jesus tells us we should behave this way, we don’t need to impose judgement on those who have wronged us. In fact if we hold back then we will gain something:
“Stop judging and you will not be judged.
Stop condemning and you will not be condemned.
Forgive and you will be forgiven.
Give, and gifts will be given to you”
Now we are in more familiar territory. Grief counsellors, victim support groups, many others will tell us that that those feelings of hurt, of injustice, our need for payback – all those things actually hook us into our hurt and our pain. The process of healing requires us to let go of those feelings. No one suggests this is easy, but we see many examples to show it is possible.
And now we’re talking about feelings, let’s move to the ridiculous. How can we love our enemies? By definition surely, if they are enemies then our relationship is one of hating, not loving. They hate us, that’s what makes them enemies, and we hate them, otherwise they would not be enemies. And there’s the rub, as Shakespeare would say… Jesus is telling us we shouldn’t treat them as enemies, we should do good to them. Here we need to remind ourselves that Jesus isn’t talking about our feelings – he is talking about our actions. In our modern world we have inherited an unhealthy obsession with feelings, a worldview which was invented in the 18th Century – feelings are what make the world go round, they are the basis of identity, validation of our feelings is a central need. Jesus doesn’t talk about feelings – for him love is not a feeling, it is a basis for action; it is the foundation for justice, not for identity.
To link this also to a modern perspective, we do not control our feelings – any anger management class, therapy session, whatever, will tell you not to focus on the feelings but on the actions. We can control our actions, sometimes with difficulty, but what we do is under our control. And by controlling our actions we may find that our feelings follow along. Jesus is not acting as our therapist, but he does understand how people work. Love your enemies isn’t about how we feel about them, it has everything to do with how we act towards them – “do good to them”. That may be hard, we may not feel like we want to do it – but we can do it if we chose to. And Jesus is pointing out that by taking the harder path, not just being nice to those that we get on with, then we do actually gain from that. We can be merciful, even as our Father is merciful, and “gifts will be given to us; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing”. If we can let go of our need for judgement then there is so much more on offer.