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Hey, give me your lunch money
Thanks,
Oh that stupid bully stole my lunch money again shucks
I can't believe it
That stupid Crissy stole my boyfriend again
what is she doing
Am I her test pilot for all the hot guys or something She makes me so mad
I worked myself to death for that company
and for what
for that stupid boss of mine to deny me a raise again
Bullies giving you problems? friends stealing your love life?
Bosses keeping you from getting ahead?
Do you feel like you want revenge?
yes
yes
then pick up that phone and call Burning Coals
Gift shop
Burning Coals
that sounds great
Oh, it's not what you think
based upon the biblical principle of overcoming evil with good
Burning Coals will respond to that evil
person
by sending a personalized thoughtful
gift get picked out just for them
what good does that do for me?
just watch
Bob, I was sure you would hit me in the face when I Denied your raise
Or at least
Slash my tires
But instead
I get this lovely plant, I'm touched
Please accept my apology
For being mean
Please accept a fifty percent rates
That's amazing, it sure is
Why wast your time
On hateful vengeance
When a thoughtful offering of good is all
you needs to overcome the evil of others
and Burning Coals guarantees
that their gifts will be as effective as
well
Heaping burning coals on your enemies head
Just like King Solomon promised
(Burning Coals gift shop)
Hi, my name is Cory I'd like to place an order please (who for?)
for my boss he was a scumbag
(what wrong with him?) well he hasn't given me a raised five years (and what address are we sending this to?)
well I live at 20 bell Hill lane for billing purposes
he works in
Seattle
(ok we will sent something right over) thank you (have a good day)
Can I borrow a phone mister?
Oh my goodness this is so nice, I'm sorry Tara
For stealing Josh and Eric and Alex and
Johathan and Zack
And Anthony
Wow, this is from you? It sure is. Man, I have been a real jerk to you.
Let me buy you some candy
Wow, Thanks Burning Coals
Wow, thanks Burning Coals
Wow, thanks Burning Coals
frank's recalls
Our pleasure
next time someone makes you mad
Call Burning Coals where we say don't get mad
Get sweet
we do live in a at dog-eat-dog world and that has made us
strong willed
and very selfish
Jesus wants to challenge that
in our scripture passage this morning
he says you have heard
the law say
that the punishment
must match the injury
an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth
That's
pretty much what I was taught and
well I think I've said that to my kids a couple of times you know
the punishment has to match the crime
Jesus is really quoting Exodus chapter twenty one
but if there is any further injury then you shall appoint
as a penalty a life for a life
Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth
hand for hand, foot for a foot
burn for a burn, wound for a wound
bruise
for a bruise
the punishment is suppose to match the crime in fact I think most of us
when were hurt what we want to do is punish them they equally pluss
a little bit more
we want to get even pluss
Don't we?
Jesus' challenge to us is about our rights
he's calling us to
set aside our rights and he identifies
four rights that all of us have
number one is the right of our dignity
that we have a right to live without insult
and Jesus
points that out he says well
if somebody
slaps you on the right cheek then offer him your other cheek
what is he thinking
if I get slapped on the right cheek I'm either punching him out or if he is bigger
Than me I'm running
I'm not standing around and offering up my other cheek
Jesus says that what we should do when our dignity he has been
insulted
is not insult
the person back
we don't bad mouth them we don't gossip about them we don't slander
we don't try to get even
the second right we have is the right to comfort
we want
things that
That pleases us don't we?
those things that make our lives easier and
Jesus says well, a person may ask you for your shirt
I'm telling you if they ask for your shirt the give them your sweater also
wow
Give them everything off my back
Yes that is what Jesus is saying
we want what
pleases us
Jesus says no instead of
of keeping everything that pleases you know what you need to do is you need to
Serve other people
Serve other people
take your comforts
and serve them
then there is our privacy
we deserve our privacy that's a right that we have
our privacy
really states that we get to have what we prefer
in our life
and to this Jesus says well
if this soldier command you to walk one mile
which you had an obligation to do
carried a pack of the
All the gear of a Roman soldier Jesus says you're obligated to do that for one
mile but I tell you do it for two, two?
I don't even want to do it one mile
you mean I'm obligated to do that I'm supposed to be willing to do two miles
instead of what we
what we prefer, what Jesus is calling us to do is to exceed expectations of
others
not meet expectations exceed expectations of others
and then finally there's the right of our possessions we've earned them
Haven't we?
and our possessions are
really the things that
give us a sense of comfort
symbols of our hard work
and Jesus says no I'm going to tell you this
you should share the things that are your possessions in fact you should let
people borrow them if they want to borrow them, you mean the guy that doesn't
return it for a month
without gas
didn't clean it
What's Jesus thinking
I don't
Want to lend those things to someone else
Jesus is calling us to setting our rights
To dignity
to comfort
to privacy
and possessions aside
and he's calling us to pick up
what I think it's the most difficult thing in the world to do he wants us to
love and pray for our enemies
Oh, I want to do something to them but it's not love them and pray for them
Jesus says but I say do you
love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you
now it's interesting that Jesus is not saying that you have to love their ways
you don't have to love the fact that they've hurt you that they'd injured you
that they've slander and gossiped you
he's not saying you have the love that but you have to love the person
Yes they too are created in the image of God
and Jesus is calling is to be peacemakers
with others
and the only way to really be at peace with someone who's hurt you is to love
them
it is our divine
way of living
Jesus says
loving your enemies praying for those who persecute you
Then we're living in the divine way look At verse forty-five as
children of the father in heaven we're children of the father in heaven
and what God wants us to do is bring a little heaven and
have it be a part of earth and part of that
loving your enemy
Jesus says this
but you are to be perfect even as your father in heaven is perfect
and not think challenges us more than
loving someone who has hurt us
none of us get to adulthood without out a few bumps
bruises
Challenges, difficulties
injustices
we come to adulthood with some great hurts
and oftentimes that hurt has literally been someone that has
come after us
hunted us down so to speak
I liken those circumstances in life and I've had a couple of them like this
to a little bit like being in a washing machine
during the last
circumstance like that people would ask me will hire you do and I said I'm still
on the wash cycle
you know what to expect but you still don't like it
then finally we got to the spin cycle
People would say how you doing well I think I'm In the spin cycle now and boy is that
disorienting
but the great thing about moving from the wash cycle to the spin cycle
is you know eventully now it's going to stop
and when it stopd you're just happy that it's over
the other thing that's true
if we
gather up some perspective is after we're washed
and after the spin cycle you know we're a little cleaner than we were
than when we started
how do we love our enemies how do we do that when somebody's really hurt us
to the core
Well, number one
we have to acknowledge
the angered
and the hate
we have to acknowledge that hurt
and that hatred
we do hate them
we do want
bad things to happened to them we want a heap burning coals and a few
other things on their head
we don't just want what happened to us to happen to them we want what happened
to us plus
to happen to them
it's amazing how we have a tendency to not
acknowledge
the hate
and the hurt
we have a tendency to want to kind of push that down is that why are supposed to do
as Christians
are we supposed to ignoring
our hurt and our hate? no
ignoring it does
no one good
in fact
if we could try to push down that hurt and that hate I can guarantee you it's going
up pop up someplace else
one psychologist put it this way if you don't acknowledge your
difficult hurt emotions it will begin to erode your soul
and it will
it's a little bit like having a splinter in your hands
if you don't acknowledge the splatter what happens it continues to hurt
it gets infected it ends up worse than it would have been
in terms of pain
in terms of effort
that if we would have just
went through the pain an effort to dig in and out when we first got it
that's where our
difficult emotions are
And once we acknowledge that
that hurt and that hatred
then we're ready to move beyond
that hurt and hatred
move beyond that mistake
Move beyond what that person said and here's how we do that
we moved beyond it because none of us are perfect
you've heard me
mentioned this before but hurt people hurt
and when we can acknowledge that hurt we begin to entertain in our minds wow
if they hurt us that way who's hurt them
how hurt have they been in their life
To act this way towards me
and knowing that hurt people hurt people
knowing that none of us are perfect listen to what Jesus says
this is the woman caught in adultery
Jesus brings her before all the Pharisees that want to stone her
and he says if they have you is without sin
let him be the first to throw a stone on her
why can he say that because he knows everybody
has sinned
everybody falls short of
God's glorious ideals
everybody at least steps on somebody else's toes once in awhile in life
and true that may not match the hurt
that has been a heap on you but
knowing we're not perfect
realizing that for someone to hurt us in this particular
way
they must have been very hurt in their life
that enables us to get beyond the hurt, doesn't it?
That;s why you have to acknowledge that
the hurt first
then you'll know when you're on the other side your beyond that hurt
we want to get beyond that hurt and the only way to get beyond that hurt
is to be willing to forgive them
well I'm not going to forgive them for what they did I'm not going to forgive
them
for what they said
and when we refuse to forgive the only person we're still hurting
is ourselves
Luz Meads
who was one of my professors said forgiveness is to let
the prisoners
the captives
free
realizing
that the prisoner and captive was yourself
now maybe you're different than I am but when I am a hurt I have this tendency
to record that in my brain and then I replayed the tape over and over and
over again
and when I replay that tape you know what happens I feel the same feelings I
did when the hurt began
and I'd ask you this question
why let them hurt you one more minutes
because every time you rehearse that hurt
you re-experience those bad
feelings
they're not feeling bad we're feeling bad
and forgiving someone means a commitment to stop replaying that in our
mind re-feeling those feelings
Jesus calls us to forgive
for we also forgive everyone who sin against us we just pray that the Lord's
prayer
and then Paul says this and forgive whatever grievances
you may have against another
any grievance
We are to forgive as we've been forgiven
in fact we won't realize how our sinfulness has hurt Christ until we get to
heaven
and there will be that moment
where we realized just the impact
of our own sinfulness upon God
if we're honest we get a glimpse of our
Sinfulness and how it impacts those around us
as I mentioned in the past few weeks ago
we must forgive
and we must receive forgiveness
that creates the potential for reconciliation we don't always get
reconciliation
with the people that we forgive but without forgiveness will never have
reconciliation
that's why God wants to reconcile us to him
and he does that by
forgiving us before we
ever acknowledging our shortcoming our sinfulness
the fact that we fall short of his glorious ideal
you know one of the hardest things to do is to
forgive someone who's truly deeply hurt us
as we forgive them we should pray that God would work on them and I know you
pray for people but I'm talking about praying for them in a good way
well that comment is a prayer too, isn't it?
Lord get them!
make them once feel how they made me feel
that's not the prayer that
Jesus is calling us to pray
he's calling
for us to pray that the Holy Spirit would change their heart
that the Holy Spirit would he heal the hurt in them so that they won't
hurt someone else
down the way
therefore I tell you what ever you asked for in prayer
and believe that you have received it
it will be yours
praying for someone else's healing is
that's a bigger thing then asking
for this or for that
it takes a lot to have change of heart to the point
that you're willing to pray that God would change that other person's heart
And life that God somehow will bless them in such a way that they become a
healed and whole person
you know we pray but that's not our prayer
and then finally were to be
a Godly example
that means
we need to not only be willing to forgive them but we need that kind of
stand at the
door
of reconciliation
a willingness says I like to call it to leave the drawbridge down
see someone hurts us and
we lift up the drawbridge of our castle
of our life
and we say that person
you don't ever get in my life again and I know if I do that if I'm fortified
you'll never hurt me again
I'm not saying that you needed stay in abusive
situation
you'll know that you forgiven that other person in your opened to
reconciliation
when you put down the drawbridge
you make the first move
towards reconciliation
they may never come near you again they may not risk going across that bridge
that's not your responsibility your responsibility is to leave the
drawbridge down
to be a Godly example
you thought what I talked about last week was challenging
purity in singleness
and fidelity in marriage
that pales in comparison to loving
your enemies
praying God's blessing on those
who have hurt you
yes Jesus is calling at times
for you to give up your dignity
give up your comfort
give up your privacy
give up your possessions
All to the end
that we might see someone else with us in eternity
we do that
wanting to be the
the conduit through which God releases his healing Holy Spirit in the life of
someone else
when we've been truly hurt
only the Holy Spirit
can heal us
when someone else has been truly hurt who's hurt us only the Holy Spirit can
heal that
that hurt completely
eternally
once again Jesus gives us a lot to live up to
he calls us to a very exceptional life we were never designed to live this life
just on our own human emotion our own human willpower
are own human talent and intellect
because truly loving our enemies and praying for those who persecutor us
it's beyond human logic
it only makes sense
in the shadow
of eternity
let's pray
Lord we've we wish you wouldn't say things like this
because we feel so self justified in our the harboring of our hurts
and Lord for those that have been truly
hurt today I pray that
your Holy Spirit would come upon them
that Lord you would begin a work in them that would
would be evident by a willingness to forgive a willingness to pray
an openness to
getting beyond the hurt Lord you know our make up it's not
that's not natural for us
yet Lord you want to do the supernatural in us all the time
and Lord if you can help us to do this today will know that you truly are
the God of the universe
we will know that your Holy Spirit is
alive and well and moving in our own
Heart, souls and minds
Lord where we resist
giving up our rights Lord enable us to do that
Lord help us to be imitators of you in the hard places of life
That our lives would be a
a living testimony to your word
and so we pray these things Lord in your name. Amen
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