PRAY IT! Mountain5

Payback, retaliation, and revenge, oh my!  As we continue on in our Mountain5 sermon series, we look at this week's passage found in Matthew 5:38-42.  Here again, Jesus is calling his followers to be different... waaaaay different! 

Common sense dictates that if society operated on this eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth system, we would all eventually be running around eyeless and toothless.  (Not so good for the ophthalmologists and dentists of this world...!)  That's dumb, and a ridiculous sight to imagine, but frankly, per Jesus, so is retaliation.  It's a vicious cycle that just keeps on perpetuating more ick.  It is not how Jesus chose to respond when faced with mockery, physical abuse, and ultimately crucifixion.  As his followers, it is not how we are to respond, either.

How are we to respond, and pray, in light of this passage?  I'm going to skip ahead to next week.  The answer is made clear in Matthew 5:44 "But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you".

Our response is love.  Our response is prayer. 

That is what our response should be.

But... (insert your own but here!)

There's really not room for our objection in this passage.  With the help of Jesus, who modeled unbelievable grace and mercy for us, we are to respond with love and prayer, rather than with retaliation and revenge.  No buts.

In Acts 1:14, (after Jesus' crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension) we read about how the disciples were gathered together, praying.  "All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers." 

Mary had just lost her son (yes, bigger picture, we gained a Savior, but still, she lost her son) yet even Mary was there, with the disciples, praying. 

Wow.

If Mary can do it, so can we.

If Jesus can do it, while on the cross, so can we.

It's easiest to think of the people that hurt us and wrong us as our enemy.  As evil.  As deserving of whatever it is that is coming to them.  Yet what if we chose to first and foremost see everyone as a child of God, whether they knew that is who they were or not?  Do we really want to seek revenge on a hurting child of God?  On God's creation?  It is easier to pray for those who have hurt us rather than respond with retaliation when we view them with God's eyes rather than our own. 

We shouldn't be surprised that hurting people hurt people.  God can grow in us a compassion that can lead us to respond with a heart like Jesus - where we earnestly pray for them.  Revenge will just leave them with a few less teeth..and looking to take out a few more teeth from whomever along the way. But prayer and the power of God can bring them to a point of transformation that stops the cycle of ick and starts more love and more prayer. 

Dear Jesus,
Please help us respond like you when we get hurt and desire retaliation.  Please help our response be graceful - and to be one of love and prayer.  Please help grow our compassion so that we see everyone as a child of God (some lost, some found).  Please draw everyone closer to you and continue to transform us all.  We need you. 
Amen.

Remember to keep praying as together we Seek God for the City - 2015!  Today we are praying for university students, for Puerto Rico (ah, the land of Pastor Todd's birth!), Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, and for God to renew our hearts to obey Him. 

Pastor Celia