The familiar words from Psalm 22 must have still been ringing in the ears of the mourners at the Cross.
Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
2 O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer,
and by night, but I find no rest.
The lament must have weighed as heavy on their hearts as Romansrolled the stone to seal a new tomb where Jesus’ body lay wrapped in blood-stained linens of embalmment.
6 But I am a worm and not a man,
scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
7 All who see me mock me;
they make mouths at me; they wag their heads;
8 “He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him;
let him rescue him, for he delights in him!”
How they must have wept bitterly for our Lord from beyond the Tomb on this Holy Sabbath of the Passover.
Jesus is dead! Crucified on a Cross. His broken body cursed by God.
The word of the Lord came to me, saying, 2 “Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem, Thus says the Lord,
“I remember the devotion of your youth,
your love as a bride,
how you followed me in the wilderness,
in a land not sown.
3 Israel was holy to the Lord,
the first fruits of his harvest…
“Dearly beloved,” begins our covenant witness for marriage.
“Dear Lord Jesus,” we praise Christ when first we bow to Him.
9 “Therefore I still contend with you,
declares the Lord,
and with your children’s children I will contend…
Know and see that it is evil and bitter
for you to forsake the Lord your God;
the fear of me is not in you,
declares the Lord God of hosts.
20 “For long ago I broke your yoke
and burst your bonds;
but you said, ‘I will not serve.’
Yes, on every high hill
and under every green tree
you bowed down like a whore…
DIVORCE, by ‘christian’ husbands?
DIVORCE, by ‘christian’ wives?
You have long ago forsaken your love for the Lord your God. Your whoredom is against Christ Jesus, your returning Bridegroom!
Our “Lord,” Christ Jesus warns: “Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce … but from the beginning it was not so. – Matthew 19:8
Ephesians 5:22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord…
25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church… that she might be holy and without blemish.
31 “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”
32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
How dare we (christians) even speak of the sexual sin of the world, when we have not returned to the purity Christ Jesus expects of His betrothed so soiled in sexual sin!
Jeremiah 2:
22 Though you wash yourself with lye
and use much soap,
the stain of your guilt is still before me,
declares the Lord God…
29 “Why do you contend with me?
You have all transgressed against me,
declares the Lord.
30 In vain have I struck your children;
they took no correction…
Do our christian children witness the love and forgiveness of Christ even less than their divorced christian parents?
Do our christian children sell their flesh and souls to the same sexual desires we would hide from the world?
Sometimes we just don’t get it. We only want to see the nice things Jesus did. We only want to hear the nice things Jesus had say and even now speaks through Scripture and the Spirit.
In case you missed the beginning of this series, we are following the early days of Jesus’ public ministry. We have looked at His early calling of the people to repentance and followed Jesus to his rejection (and near murder) by the people of Nazareth.
Doctor Luke records in chapters 5 and 6 a list of some of Jesus’ early miracles. (How we use these all-too-frequently to attract the multitudes to our church buildings! The bigger the blessings for the multitudes, the bigger the building we need.)
I related an often used part of a favorite teaching of Jesus in an Advent preparation series on The Beatitudes. Oh how we love to point out the miracles of His feeding the 5000 and the feeding the 4000; while we forget that Jesus’ message is to REPENT! Turn back to God, our Father. He sends us the bread from Heaven. Jesus is the Bread of Heaven. His Word is what we MUST digest.
“Blessed are you… Happy are you: This we want to hear.
Jesus has been preaching repentance. He has performed many miracles. He has shown compassion for many individuals and even compassion for the hungry crowds.
People will follow Jesus anywhere, IF only He will keep performing miracles for them. (You remember, his own neighbors and friends in Nazareth were angry enough at Jesus to want to throw Jesus off the cliff to His death.) Why? We want to be entertained. We want blessings and not curses. We want proof. (Forget faith!) He would NOT perform for the multitudes of for even his hometown neighbors and family.
Jesus of Nazareth – Tyre to the N. – Israel, Judea map
Jesus Ministers to a Great Multitude
17 And he came down with them and stood on a level place, with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, 18 who came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases. And those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. 19 And all the crowd sought to touch him, for power came out from him and healed them all.
[Here is the nice part we all love:]
The Beatitudes
20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said:
“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.
“Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.
22 “Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! 23 Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.
Amen! Yes, we need this Jesus.
(Lord bring us a miracle and bring us your reward. Prove you Power to us and we will follow You.)
Ah, but you with ears to hear, hear what Jesus says next:
Jesus Pronounces Woes
24 “But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.
25 “Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry.
“Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.
26 “Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.
So you want to be rich, do you? You want Jesus to bless your house with plenty and laughter and good reputation for you and your family… Are you sure? Do you really want it all NOW?
Dear brothers and sisters of His church, of the multitudes of christians;
Hear what you do not recall (and I will shorten it for our short memories; but read it all, if you will:)
Love Your Enemies
27 “But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
Have you been abused? Sexually? Physically? Verbally? Financially? Emotionally?
Do some hate you? (Certainly a fellow believer or sister who claims Christ ought not?)
LOVE THEM.
Though they are your enemies, love them. That is what Christ Jesus commands. (Are you still with us, christian of the crowds and multitudes?)
What is this ‘love’ to which Jesus (IF He IS our Lord) calls us?
Welcome them (perhaps into your homes, but certainly into your life. (How else will they see Christ in you?)
Entertain them. No, not like TV or a sport or your cell phone; just do not ignore your enemies as if they are not real people created by God, perhaps for a later winning into His Kingdom.
Be fond of them. Admit it; you know people who are enemies of Christ Jesus whom you admire and like. Are they not also deserving as you of His love as shown through you?
Love them dearly. Yes, your enemy; that the love of Christ Jesus may shine into the darkness of their life.
Not only, “love them,” do good to them.
Sure, we all remember the story of the good Samaritan; but Jesus’ point was not so much that a hated man did good for a man, but that men (and women) who claim to be “good” do not often do the good act of mercy, as had the Samaritan unbeliever. Therefore Jesus continues in Luke 6:32
32 “If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.
33 And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same… 35 But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.
36 Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.
Jesus’ personal love is also personal love for the unbeliever and for the unsaved, as you and I were once unsaved and an enemy of God (though our profession may have been false and our faith rebellious).
REPENT! Show mercy, as our Heavenly Father has shown us mercy.
and LOVE, as Christ Jesus has loved us.
For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. – Romans 5:10 KJV
No, repentance is not such a bad message for each of us; therefore, be reconciled to your brother in Christ. Be reconciled to your sister in Christ. Be reconciled even to your enemy! Love them.
And just two additional things (from Luke 6:27) added next in v. 28:
Abuse (of all kinds and of varying degrees) is a terrible thing, an offense between two human beings, both created by God. The word often translated ‘abused’ by this and other versions of the Bible in the KJV reads: “them which spitefully use (you).” It is a better translation (unencumbered by the world’s spin on the meaning). Listen to the meaning from Jesus’ words:
Outline of Biblical Usage
to insult
to treat abusively, use despitefully
to revile
in a forensic sense, to accuse falsely
to threaten
ALL of these are abuses of the enemy; and the enemy is Satan. Do you use these spitefully in retaliation against those who spitefully use you? Do you respond to your enemies (or even a brother or sister in Christ) in a spiteful way?
Stop it! Jesus commands us: LOVE them. DO good to them. BLESS them. (and here is the hard one for us:) PRAY for them.
–
Oh how I pray for enemies who have spitefully used me. One of them may be you… or your loved one.
–
I pray that they will repent.
I pray that they might confess their sin and turn back to God (that’s what repent means, you know; turn back).
I pray that they might be that lost sheep.
I pray that they might be that one you never believed would REPENT and hear the word of Jesus over the hatred and ways of the world and the sin of who we also once were before He also saved us.
Oh, dear one, REPENT of your sin. I pray for you.
Pray also for me.
Forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
Are our enemies not our worst offenders?
Forgive us, for the many times we, too have been an enemy of our Lord, Christ Jesus who teaches us:
