tonight we turn in the bible to romans chapter 12 romans chapter 12 and we are concluding romans chapter 12 and so tonight we'll read verses 9 through 21 um the text is begins at verse 14 so we're considering verses 14 through 21 we'll back up and begin at verse 9 so this is romans 12 beginning at verse 9. Let's give our attention tonight to God's Word. in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. Now our text. Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice. Weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all if possible as far as it depends on you live peaceably with all beloved never avenge yourselves but leave it to the wrath of god for it is written vengeance is mine i will repay says the lord to the contrary if your enemy is hungry feed him if he is thirsty give him something to drink. For by so doing, you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. May the Lord bless tonight the hearing of his word. As we continue tonight our study in the great book of Romans and learning what the Christian life should be, what it looks like, we're finding that living the Christian life is not nearly as easy as we thought it would be. It's actually quite challenging, isn't it? Nor are we finding that these are just little light suggestions for living. That's not what these are. When Jesus dealt with the Pharisees, this is exactly what he had to unmask. He had to unmask their very superficial reading of the law, their very externalization of the law. It was a superficial approach that only looked to the letter and never got to the spirit of the commandment, never got to the heart of it. And Jesus threw the books at them. All of it could be summarized with Paul's word. Do you want to be under the law? If this is where you want to find your righteousness, are you hearing the law? Are you listening to the law? Do you know what God really requires? Do you know how far reaching the commandments of the Lord are? Do you know how deeply they penetrate? Do you know how far they reach? And God demands perfection. Be perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect. You see, I'm reminded of the beauty then of what Romans has done so far, spending 11 long chapters unpacking the riches of grace and that we have been set free and that we're no longer under the law in that kind of way and that we are no longer under it for condemnation. But what has been said to us, we are now in the Lord Jesus Christ. We have been set free. We are new creatures. We're slaves of righteousness. And now the goal of the christian life is that we establish the law in our lives paul said that in romans at the end of romans 2 do we then throw out the law since we're making the case that it's by faith alone no we establish it this becomes our rule this becomes our way of thanking this becomes the way that we live you have to understand that tonight why do i rehearse that again because what is now commanded of you is absolutely impossible. It is absolutely impossible without the help of the Spirit. And for the Christian who is still dealing with the ongoing presence of sin, there should be a recognition out of the gates that apart from the grace of the Lord, apart from God's sanctifying help who works within us to will and to do for His pleasure, this commandment, what we're looking at tonight, is beyond us. Listen to Calvin on Romans 12. These commands are so difficult and totally opposed to the natural man. Only God can overcome and help us. Arduous is this, I admit, and wholly opposed to the nature of man. There's nothing too arduous to be overcome by the power of God, which shall never be wanting to us, provided we neglect not to seek for it. And although you can hardly find one who has made such advances, think of this morning, in the law of the Lord that he fulfills this precept, yet no one can claim to be a child of God or glory in the name of a Christian who has not in part attained this mind and who does not daily resist the opposite disposition. That's helpful. That's really helpful. What is the heart of what I'm talking about tonight? What is this command that is so difficult for us? It's the command of our Lord to love even our enemies. That is a command, isn't it? Love your enemies. And tonight's passage in Romans 12 is telling us how to do that. So I submit that it is a difficult command, but when honored by the power of the Lord, there is nothing that makes us look more like our Savior. There's nothing that we do that shows more, is more Christ-like than loving our enemies. and that is the life that he is working since Romans 8 has told us that he is conforming us to the life of his son, then that means part of that conformity is that we would look a lot like him in loving enemies. You remember in verse 9 that the apostle called us here to let our love be without hypocrisy. It was a remarkable statement up front dealing with love. That is the description of love that is driving this section. He defines it for us. He helps us to understand love. He's calling us to a sincerity in our love. Let love be without hypocrisy. Let it be without masks. Remember we looked at last time these actors in the ancient world wore life-size masks and Paul was thinking about that take down the masks don't wear masks with with your love let it be sincere sincere let it be real with regard to your neighbor and how do you do that well you hate what is evil and you cling to what is good it's very similar to the ninth commandment tonight isn't it and if we took the approach of hating all evil what have you done with regard to your neighbor. You've just killed gossip. You've just killed slander. You've just killed vengeance. You've just killed angerness in the heart. You have gone after bitterness and wrath and clamor and self-seeking, all these things. Instead, you put outside those things and you are clinging to what is good. You love with a sincere concern for the other person. Your love covers a multitude of offenses. That's love. That's the thrust of verse 9. Now, I made a distinction. I still struggle a little bit with the distinction because the text here seems to be loosely connected in many ways. It just seems to be throwing at us a lot of imperatives on how we are to love but i still believe overall there's a there's a whole connection here and a division here that is important you could make the division in verses 10 through 13 of the love that is on the inside and the love that is on the outside in what follows in verses 14 to the end of the chapter it's clear in verses 10 through 13 he is looking at love on the inside he's looking at love for your brethren. He says it there. It was beautiful. Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love. That is on the inside. That's a special love. That's the love that we get to enjoy. That's the love that the world does not know. It can't know that. Not in this kind of way. This is a redeemed love. So there's something special in love for one another that happens in the body of Christ. What does that look like? Well, Christians have the ability to let things go, don't they? That's the definition of forgiveness. They let it go. They forgive. Christians are sincere. They're learning how to trust one another on the inside. There's a simplicity of love on the inside. They were criticized in the early church for their love feasts as weird. Well, they got together in simplicity and they cared for one another and they fed one another and they broke bread together. Probably referring to the supper when they talked about the love feasts. They were characterized this way on the outside. There was a special kind of love that the world did not understand. They didn't grasp it. They didn't know it and it's important tonight because now we're being challenged with love for those on the outside it's important to make that distinction because if the question here is asked if we're being called to love even our enemies if that's what the thrust of tonight if that's what the heart of tonight is all about what is different between these two kinds of love is it that i'm turning on a different kind of love when I go out on the outside? Is there a different kind of love that's exercised here? In some respects, yes. There's a brotherly love that can't be matched on the outside. But it's not that we so much turn on and off different kinds of love. It's that all true love has the single great characteristic that it is self-denying. It's self-denying. And it's going to have a lot of similarities to how it's shown on the inside and on the outside. It's not always that the difference in love is going to be witnessed in the action itself. The challenge tonight is this. How do we love those who don't love us? That's a new challenge added here. That's the challenge the apostles thinking of. Love for those who love us is reciprocated. Jesus said that. We reciprocate. There's bond. Love for those who love us. Notice verse 9, love with brotherly affection. Brotherly. It's a shared love. It's a joyful love. It's a special love. That's a kind of taste of heaven, if you will, when we love the way that we should. But that kind of love is not experienced, it's not received from those who don't like us. And that's when we're really challenged. And this is where Jesus challenged in the Sermon on the Mount that love should not just be for those who love us. And notice then that this kind of breaks down inside and outside too, because it's not always that those on the inside love us. But sincere love loves the brethren the way it should. It's tested in its sincerity when we love those who don't love us. When we love those who may go as far as persecuting us. And that's Jesus in Matthew chapter 5. I say to you, love your enemies. Bless those who curse you. Do good to those who hate you. And pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you that you may be sons of your father in heaven what romans 12 is addressing certainly addressing is a love than on the inside and on the outside but it's probably more helpful to characterize it tonight as a love for those who love us and a love for those who hate us and that might help us to think through what Paul's saying here. The kind of love when we love those who hate us often gets nothing in return or it gets anger in return. We'll look at that. It enrages all the more and our Lord is instructing us how to deal with that phenomenon. The Lord is helping us here through His servant because Paul is taking off of a lot of teaching here from the lord himself on how to love those who hate us and so where does he begin in verse 14 lo and behold he begins with the attitude and attitude is a good word here isn't it attitude bless those who persecute you bless and do not curse the blessing here speaks of acting kindly and graciously benefiting those who are in hostile pursuit of you or who are hostile to you in whatever manner it may come. The word for persecution is used. So he's calling you to an attitude and a lifestyle towards those who are pursuing hostility. That's the emphasis here. Now, this is where we're challenged. Jesus never spoke of this as a mere possibility. I've always been moved by that. He never gave this as this might happen. He spoke of this as an absolute matter of fact because of your identity. Think of John 15. If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. if you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you. A servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they also will keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name. What a way to pitch Christianity, by the way. You're going to be hated, and you can expect it, but you have to understand the cause. What is the cause? Jesus told us in Matthew chapter 5, blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven why does somebody get hated for righteousness for righteousness sake and if jesus said in john 13 that the greatest mark by which people will know that you are his disciples and are identified with him is your love for one another there's a good way you're going to be persecuted for righteousness sake love for one another will have that effect why because the world doesn't understand this the principle that the world operates on is that of darkness it doesn't understand the values and the things that are a christian is set apart to who is redeemed by by the holy spirit and set apart by christ redeemed by christ and given life by the spirit and when the world sees christians fighting and disputing it recognizes that but when the world sees this it doesn't understand that why did the pharisees hate jesus what ultimately did they absolutely hate about jesus interesting that he would associate them with the world, by the way. What did they hate about him? It wasn't arrogance. What was it? There was something about him that they absolutely hated. You know what it was? It was this. When people came into contact with Jesus, he stripped them of their own false righteousness. He stripped them. They were uncomfortable about Him. He made them nervous. His light, His purity, His righteousness, His joy that was all over Him. His love for disciples that was put on display. His love even for sinners they absolutely hated. And it had an effect on them that just exposed their darkness. What do people do with somebody like that? This guy, he's a drunkard. He sits with the drunkards. He sits with the tax collectors and the sinners. That's this kind of guy. Notice that the very thing that they were criticizing was this kind of approach to people. What do people say to us all the time? To put it in very practical terms, high school students know this. When you stand for something, what is the first thing that they say to you? you think you're better than us we get that as a church you think you're better than us who says that they need to come hear the lot sermon if they think that we don't think we're better than anyone but that's the charge isn't it why because of righteousness it's because of these things that are operating and you'll notice then the connection here why i went through that is for you to see the connection in verses 10 through 13 now to 14 in verses 10 through 13 it's all about that kind of righteousness expressed among the brethren and love for the brethren and what's the next thing he launches into after that hatred of the world the more we are christ-like the more we're hated so that means the other is true the inverse if the less christ-like we are the more lukewarm we are the more we're loved by the world and so as we're being sanctified guess what more hatred comes you want to test for sanctification look at lot we said let this morning not much sanctification there and what happened there he was accepted by the world more sanctification equals more hatred from the world that's a good litmus test for christianity for sanctification if you're just an all-around guy that everyone likes and that never stands much for anything and it's peace at all costs and you're never speaking out against anything that is not a biblical model of christianity so hatred now what are we to do bless them bless them the lord calls us to the most difficult thing that when there's active hostility against us don't take the attitude of disgust don't take the attitude of bitterness don't avoid them don't run from them be gracious and benefit them somehow graciously benefit them bless them and you say how in the world do you do that now remember what i said up front of the sermon christian living is not easy is it this is tough lavish kindness on them take an active role in blessing them can you imagine if every time we were offended we didn't fly off the handle and didn't refuse and stay away and gossip and slander and get angry. And what is the first reaction when we're offended? Departure. I go the opposite way. It's not what the Lord just said. You actively bless them. On vacation, I was listening to Dr. Laura, always an interesting person to listen to. And she had a teenager call in and she described, this teenager actually was a he, described that his father had run off with another woman and abandoned the family. It was awful. And mom was on the other end pushing her son to call in and Dr. Laura picked up on that. But it was really interesting the way she said to deal with the father. You know what she said? He's dead to you. He is a dead dog. Leave him alone. Interesting statement. You agree? Can you imagine if the Lord and all of your running responded like that? You're a dead dog to me. You don't have to accept wrong action, right? Maybe. I'll get back to that. We're never given the right to refuse love. You're never given that right. You say, how in the world do I do that? Hardest thing to do, I'm going to be honest, this is where the text stumped me a bit. I've always read verse 15 as being active in the body of Christ, and I don't think you should ever assume that that's not in the body of Christ. But it's bracketed by this on one end and then on enemies on the other of the Lord repaying. So verse 14 begins with, bless those who persecute you. And the text ends with our enemies. It's bracketed by these kinds of people. And then you come to verse 15. Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Don't be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be conceited. Now, I know I'm supposed to be like that to my brethren. I know I'm supposed to weep with those who weep, and I'm going to rejoice with those who rejoice, and that should be a love that happens in the body of Christ. But if it's bracketed this way, is it possible that Paul just said step into their lives and in their joyful moments view it as an opportunity? And in their moments when they're hit because they're going to be hit, you've got a golden opportunity. That's the mind of Christ who became a servant, who became a slave, who Paul said in Philippians, let that mind be in you, which was in Christ Jesus, who became a slave. He was hated for dining with the bad tax collectors and sinners. And so notice that the apostle says in verse 18, repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. Why is he saying that? Well, because our Lord said that you should bless those who curse you and do good to those who hate you. Why? Because the Father in heaven does what? He makes his Son to rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and the unjust. Isn't that an amazing connection? he knew that the Jews thought the Jewish neighbor was only the Jew. And the Gentiles, these were the enemies of the faith. Can you imagine this message in that culture? I tell you, love them. Bless them. Do good to them. Pray for those who spitefully use you, that you may be sons. Because God does this, He sends His sun and rain on them, and they get to enjoy these things. We're showing that we're children when we act that way. When I was a child, my mom used to read me stories, and I don't remember many of them, but I remember one. And it was called The Pineapple Story. And it was a missionary who answered God's call to serve Christ to the natives in Dutch New Guinea. And for a period, he was there for 10 years. The mission field was way out in the bush, and he had a pineapple field to make ends meet and to help people, so to make a living. Well, after three years, because I guess it takes that long for these things to grow and to mature and develop, well, he comes out one day to harvest and pick his pineapples, and they're all gone. The natives had been stealing them, and nothing worked. And so he kept getting angrier and angrier, and he kept trying to have this pineapple field, and the natives would come, and they would steal his pineapples, and he tried to take everything away in anger from the natives. And one night, he prayed and confessed that the whole vineyard, this is what struck me as a kid, the whole vineyard is the Lord's. And so, Lord, I've given this vineyard to you. And the natives noticed that he stopped coming out and getting mad. So they came, what's going on? You know, the missionary replied, well, I've given my pineapple garden away. It isn't my garden anymore. You're not stealing my pineapples, the natives. Well, whose pineapples are we stealing? God's. Well, that made the natives deathly afraid, and they brought the pineapples back. Okay, so that was the story. That's the story that I remember as a kid. I'm not promoting pacifism, or I'm not promoting a disregard of justice. I'm promoting this tonight. Here's what strikes me about the story. It's the mindset. It's the mindset that I believe undergirds what Paul is saying. Why do we love? Because we've been loved. But there's a bigger picture now to my love. What does the love mean now that I'm exercising? Being a Christian, what do we confess? I'm no longer my own. I'm bought. I'm serving the interests of somebody else. I've died. My life is hidden. I'm no longer about rights in the way that I used to be in the world. And I love this because Paul would say elsewhere, it's the love of Christ that compels us. It's the love of Christ that controls us now. That's the controlling factor in life, his love. And that being the case, I have an entirely different perspective on the life of the unbeliever, don't I? He's lost. He's dead. And I have spiritual eyes to see that. And the neighbor who is persecuting me, he's persecuting me because of who I now am. and I have to see that problem for what it is they're without God and without hope in the world and that's where I used to be they don't have a savior and they're fighting for heaven on earth and the reason they're persecuting is because they don't have what you have and they know it and we're pilgrims living by faith and you see now we remember that the apostle is setting before us The goal here is that this kind of love is sharing a missionary concern for the moment of God Himself who has taken His gospel into all of the earth and has preached it to every creature. And Jesus said that, But let your light so shine before men with what kind of goal that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven? You notice how that kind of mentality prevails throughout the New Testament. When Peter would even say to wives who have disobedient husbands, what should they do? remember what he said, that if you have disobedient husbands, that you may try to win them. How so? Without a word, without spitefully shooting the lip. How? By your conduct. When they see your respectful and pure conduct, what's it going to do? Keep something on them. It's going to heap something on him. And that's what he says at the end of this. If your enemy's hungry, what should you do? Feed him. If he's thirsty, give him something to drink. You're heaping coals of fire on his head. That motivates that final call then that in as much as depends upon us, we should maintain peace with everyone. As much as depends on us. And we should never avenge ourselves, verse 19. But leave it to the wrath of God. For it's written, vengeance is mine. I will repay, says the Lord. The summarizing principle then at the end, don't be overcome by evil. It's totally, have you ever seen the rot of madness fill someone? It's a rot that happens in the heart and it overcomes and it slowly destroys the person. A rot of bitterness. Esau had it. A bitterness springing up. don't be overcome by it, but overcome evil with good. That's his calling for us. And remember that when God says, vengeance is mine, you know that means hell, right? We have a whole different perspective in the day of grace, in the day of mercy. So then tonight, what a freedom, isn't it? In Christ, not under condemnation, free to love this way. Look at your neighbor next to you and say, that one's made in God's image and I have a special brotherly affection with him. I'm going to love them the way that I'm called to love. And tomorrow, I'm going to go out into the world and it may be hostile, it may be hard, I may be hit with various things, but God has said, you know what? Bless them. Love them. You will be like your Father in heaven. May Christ fill us with His grace to be able to love the way that He calls us to love. Let's pray. Oh Lord our God, tonight you have set before us a way that is too hard for us in and of ourselves and we confess that. We also confess that Lord we have run from these commands and we haven't even loved our brethren. We've avoided our brethren and you call us here to love our enemies and yet we confess today and we partook today in the supper that declared your unchanging love for us and that has softened our hearts it has overcome us and now we are free and we come to you tonight not only asking for forgiveness and cleansing but help help to love one another here and help to love as you call us to love blessing those who even persecute us. Thank you for instructing us in this way. May your name be glorified in your saints today, tomorrow, in the coming weeks, in the years that you've given us under the sun to live. In Jesus' name we pray these things. Amen.