SCRIPTURE: Proverbs 24
OBSERVATION/APPLICATION:
Don’t rejoice when your enemies fall; don’t be happy when they stumble. For the Lord will be displeased with you and will turn his anger away from them. [Proverbs 24:17-18]
You have heard the law that says, ‘Love your neighbour’ and hate your enemy. But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. [Matthew 5:43-45]
What Solomon states in the negative – don’t be happy when your enemies suffer – Jesus states in the positive – love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you.
Solomon does not explain like Jesus does why we should treat our enemies like this, but he does sense that it does not fit with how God is – the Lord will be displeased.
As he reflects on life, Solomon senses that God’s grace extends beyond just His own covenant people.
And Jesus makes it plain that God loves them – we are to love our enemies because this makes us like God, i.e. He loves and blesses His enemies.

Sometimes I hear people say that the God of the old testament is a cruel, unloving God, and that they prefer the God that Jesus represents.
But the sense I get from Jesus that we have misunderstood the God of the old testament.
He is not contrasting the Father with the old testament God, but suggesting that the “laws” that people added to God’s Law were contrary to what God was like.
There is no law in the old testament that says ‘Love your neighbour’ and hate your enemy.
Yes, they were to hate sin, they were to execute God’s justice against unrepentant and dangerous sinners, but they were never commanded to hate sinners.
To love them does not mean to accept what they do as good, or to join them in it.
Though the language is not used, the sense of this is that we are to love the sinner but not the sin.
As Solomon describes the life of wisdom and contrasts it with the life of folly, he is not taking pleasure in the suffering of the foolish.
He himself will learn the hard way that the foolish need mercy, not rejection.

Jesus shows us how God’s love works; He loves us even though we are His enemies.
Imitate God, therefore, in everything you do, because you are his dear children. Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God. [Ephesians 5:1-2]
You are no different that the person who hates you, or the person who wronged you – you and they need God’s mercy. My sins may be different from yours; others sins may seem worse than ours.
But we have all failed, we have all hurt others, we have all fallen short of God’s love, we all need God’s mercy. And thankfully He does show us mercy, He does shower us and our enemies with blessing, so that we will all come to our senses and humble ourselves before Him.

Thank God that He doesn’t treat us like we treat others.
And may we learn to love others, even our enemies, like He loves us!

PRAYER:
Lord, easier said than done. But You have not only shown us how to love enemies, You give us Your Spirit to help us. May Your love overflow through me to those I consider “enemies”.