Skip to main content

{sermon on the mount}

 {sermon on the mount} 

HOW TO REALLY LOVE YOUR ENEMIES_ 

Matthew 5:38-48 

 
The real test of love does not come in how we relate to the kind and loveable... but in how we relate to the cruel and dispicable. 

 

[Group discussion starter] A friend keeps borrowing things from you but either fails to return them or returns them damaged. Do you (a) make the friend pay for anything lost or damaged, (b) refuse to loan anything else to your friend or (c) continue to loan anything he or she asks for? Explain. 

 

This passage brings us to the highest point of the Sermon on the Mount. 
Jesus’ words here are both most admired and most resented. 
He calls us to show our attitude of total love to an “evil person” (v39) and our “enemies” (v44). Nowhere is the challenge of this sermon greater. Nowhere is the distinctiveness of the Christian counterculture more obvious. Nowhere is our need of the power of the Holy Spirit (whose first fruit is love) more compelling... 

 

[Read Matthew 5:38-48] 

 

What do you find most difficult about Jesus’ instructions in these verses? 
 

 
Jesus’ quote of “Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth” comes from Exodus 21:24 
How would this original instruction to Israel’s Judges help clarify the meaning of justice? 

 

How would it also limit the extent of revenge? 
 

 
 
The Pharisees extended this original principle from the law courts (where it belonged) to personal relationships (where it didn’t belong). 
What consequences might have resulted? 
 

 
[Activity] Look again at verses 39-42, how would you contrast our natural responses in such situations with the responses that Jesus expects of us? 
 

 

 

 
What is accomplished by ‘turning the other cheek’ or ‘going the second mile’? 
 

 
In what situations might Jesus’ commands apply today? 
 

 
In verses 44-45, according to Jesus, how are we to treat our enemies and why? 
 

 
In what ways is Jesus’ command extraordinary (v46-48)? 
 

 
Does all of this mean that Christians are to be ‘doormats’ for the world to walk on? 
Explain. 
 

 
How was Jesus himself an example of the principles “Do not resist an evil person” and “Love your enemies”? 
 

 
How might you better reflect the character of God when you are mistreated?  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

{SEVEN CHURCHES} #3

  {SEVEN LETTERS}    The Attractiveness of Suffering_   Revelation 2:8-11     In the year AD 177 persecution broke out against the Christians living in what is today the French city of Lyon. Christianity had raised the suspicions and hatred of the Roman  bureaucrats who governed the city. The vicious persecution that raged, touched Christians at every level of society. After the persecuti on subsided, church father Irenaeus, arranged for a letter to be written to Christians in other parts of the Roman Empire describing the faithfulness of the  martyrs...   We  can’t  even begin to put into words, much less describe in detail, the  magnitude  of the persecution here: how the pagans raged so terribly against the saints, and how the ble ssed martyrs endured so patiently... To begin with, they nobly endured all the abuse the whole mob collectively piled on: screaming  at them, punching them, dragging them through the stre...
Post a Comment
Read more

{SEVEN CHURCHES} #1

  The Lord Who Speaks_   Revelation 1:9-20   We  don’t  tend to get many letters these days. We get emails, text messages,  WhatsApp  and other electronic messages, but rarely  a handwritten, pen-and-paper letter.    I tend to save any good ones I get... notes from when Leah was little. Letters that encourage or bless me.   I’ll keep them in my  bedside  drawer or  tucked  into books on our shelves. Then I get to read them again and feel loved and blessed by their words. ..     [Discussion starter]    Tell the group about a significant letter you have received and why it meant so much to you.     Revelation 2-3 records seven letters written by Jesus to seven churches.   It must have been a thrill for an early church congregation to receive a letter from the apostles Paul, Peter, or James... but here were letters from Jesus himself . And we all get to read everyone else’s ma...
Post a Comment
Read more

David #12

  [DAVID] Generous giving_   1 Chronicles 29     Giving has become a sore spot for many Christians. Every day we are bombarded with appeals for money – from TV and radio evangelists, from missionaries, from parachurch organisations , from charities and from our own churches. Sometim es we might feel like shouting, “Enough is enough!” How can we adopt godly attitudes toward giving so that we don’t live with a closed fist but an open hand and a generous heart?     [Group discussion starter] How do you tend to respond when people ask you for money? Explain.     David had a refreshing attitude toward giving. In this chapter he illustrates what it means to give joyously and generously to the Lord...     [Read 1 Chronicles 29]     What does this chapter reveal about David’s perspective on giving?       In verses 1-5, how does David provide an excellent example of what it means to give generously to God?    ...
Post a Comment
Read more