Uncommon: Loving your enemies

Intro

Intro: Go ahead and open your bibles to Matthew 5 we are going to be looking at verse 43-48 tonight and we will jump around a little bit. So if you weren’t here a few weeks ago we unveiled our new theme for the school year that we want to focus on one word “Uncommon”

definition for that means to be rare, above ordinary, exceptional, remarkably unusual.

Our theme verse is 1 Peter 2:9 “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” How many have got that memorized? I challenge you to start working on that.

We also talked about some practical ways to be uncommon for Christ: Bring your bible to school, sit with someone at lunch who may be by themselves, be a light to others, love when its hard. If you do that I would love to hear that and how it went!

Last thing we went over was our acrostic for UNCOMMON

Understand who we are in Christ

Never be ashamed of your testimony.

Confident: Be confident in sharing the gospel with others.

Opportunities: Look for opportunities to serve in church and share the gospel.

Move toward change. We should constantly be looking less and less like the world and stick out amongst the world.

Motivate others towards the gospel.

Operate according to what Gods word says. Don’t say one thing and then act the opposite.

New creation when we come to Christ

Tonight we want to look at a passage that for us to look and be uncommon we need to follow the hard things Jesus commands us to do.

So a little bit of context before we get into our passage chapters 5-7 are known as the Sermon on the mount, Jesus is speaking primarily to his disciples but there are others around as well. In verses 21-48 Jesus gives these “You have heard” statements. Jesus is speaking out against misinterpretations that religious leaders took from the OT and corrects them by going the opposite of what they had been told. The one we want to look at tonight is “Loving your enemy”

If I were to ask you to think of one person that you don’t like, or you can’t stand to be around. I think it would be really easy to think of someone. You probably have their name in your head right now. I’m just gonna go ahead and spoil what we are going to talk about and let you know: God wants us to love them. We will come back to this at the end. Lets read our passage and then we will see three things God does.

I The easy thing to do vs 43

Let me tell you its really easy to love your neighbor (or those who are like you or share the same interest). We just talked about this but in this verse we see three things, correction, truth, and false teaching. Jesus isn’t going against what the OT says, He is going against what people have tuned the word into. This happens all the time as people take Gods word or use Gods name and add to it or mold to make it sound good or fit today’s culture. Writer of Hebrews 13:8-9

8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.9 Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, which have not benefited those devoted to them.

We have to know God and know his word to be able to discern what is true and what is not.

II Jesus command and blessings vs. 44-45

Instead of just loving those around you or your neighbor Jesus say’s love and pray for your enemies and who persecute you. Loving our enemies isn’t the way to earn our salvation, but instead it marks maturity, a true believer, and is totally uncommon to what the world says. When we show love to those that are hard to love people take notice and when they take notice they then might begin to ask questions. This is pointing people to Jesus.

HURT: Some of you might say “Well you don’t know what she did, or he said” Some of you might be dealing with more than just not being able to love someone but it might be anger or feelings that you’ve buried toward someone that is affecting you to really live for Christ. Can I tell you God wants to help you work through that and he understands.

Why can we love our enemies? Turn to

1 John 4:19-21 19 We love because he first loved us. 20 If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot[a] love God whom he has not seen. 21 And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.

Can we make that more personal? Insert your name where it says We or Us

“Justin can love because Christ first loved Justin”

We can love others because Christ loved us first.

But the other thing is that hate and love have a hard time being together so we have to ask for God’s help and if that is something you struggle with lets talk and work through that.

Going back to Matthew look in verse 45 this is a question that a lot of people ask “Why do good things happen to bad people?” I will admit I don’t know if I have the right answer but I think that what we see in verse 45 Jesus says that God allows the sun to rise and rain fall on both believer and unbeliever. Every good thing can be pointed back to Christ in hope that ones who are not saved may come to know Jesus and for believers its something we can look back on and see how his timing is perfect.

For example me getting this job goes way beyond me interviewing. Things worked out so crazy when you talk through it.

-Timing of this job.

-Selling a house in a day and a half.

-No jobs were open for Sara like she wanted and then the company she is working for created a position.

-We bought a house here and it was perfect for what we were looking for and it had sat for awhile and what that was was Gods timing.

I will be the first to admit that God has blessed me way more than I deserve, but when I look back on those blessings I know that God orchestrated them all for his plan.

III Common vs. Uncommon vs 46-48

Jesus ends this short part of his sermon by giving a challenge by comparing common vs. uncommon attitudes with two questions: Q1: What reward should you get if you love those that love you? Even tax collectors do.

Tax collectors were known at the time to take more money than they should. And because of this they were hated by even their own people. But Jesus says even the tax collectors love those that love them.

Q2: You greet only your brothers what more does that do?

As believers we are not called to be average in showing love for the lovable but show significantly greater love for the unlovable. When someone asks about First Baptist East youth what do they say? For a guest are they welcomed, or do they feel like an outsider? Are we just like everyone else or can we be a youth group that when someone is asked about FBE that they say “MAN they really love everyone!”

God doesn’t call us to be common but we are called to a greater call to be UNCOMMON

Lets go back to the beginning when I asked you to think of someone who you have a hard time loving. Will you commit to praying for that person during the week?

I don’t know where everyone is at with this message, maybe God has challenged you with something as a believer. Or maybe you are here tonight and you realize that you have never asked for God’s gift. We have all fallen short of God’s glory and because of that we have been separated from him. But that gift that I just talked about was God sending his son to die on the cross and ultimately defeat death by rising again. There is nothing we can do but say yes to Jesus! If you are here tonight and you have never said yes to Jesus we are about to sing and if that is something you want to do I will be off on the side. Come talk to me! Nothing more I would like to share than how to have a personal relationship with God.