Love the Haters

God absolutely delights in using His Word to chisel away at our hardness. It amazes me that whenever I am facing a perceived trial that the words of scripture seem to leap more boldly from pages.

I have recently been put into a position where I will be dealing with some abrasive people.    You don’t need me to tell you that some people are characterized by rudeness and even hostility.  We all encounter them from time to time.  To be around miserable and nasty personalities is not something I ever asked for, but it’s where I am right now.   The condescending treatment, the harsh attitudes, the abusive speech… who needs that kind of stress?!  Wouldn’t it be great to just coast through my days without having to encounter people like this?

So then there’s God’s impeccable timing:  in my reading and meditating time just a few days ago, I came to the section in Matthew 5:43-48… a familiar passage in the Sermon on the Mount:  

“I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

 "If you love those who love you, what reward do you have?  Do not even the tax collectors do the same?”

“If you greet only your brothers what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?”  

Jesus’s commands in this passage tore through my heart like a tornado in trailer court. Now it’s not like I’ve ever been persecuted to the point of having my eyes gouged out or my fingers cut off.  I have never been in fear for my life by hostile people.   But loving someone who is nasty is just not something that lands at the top of my Christian to-do list.  This group of verses, at least from my perspective, is some of the hardest of the Lord’s expectations of us.  Jesus says to love them. "Seriously?! You want me to actually ‘love’ them?"  And not some passive sort of ‘like’ or ‘tolerance’.   This love He’s talking about is a self-sacrificing, warm, caring love and concern directed toward the one that I would consider my enemy.  And it’s not a suggestion or recommendation. This is a command from Jesus Himself. A strong imperative! That is sooooo totally antithetical to every fleshly cell in my body.  With every ounce of strength in my being, I want to do the opposite.  "Can’t I just defend my honor and be snarky and sarcastic?  I have dignity, you know! Nobody is going to treat me like that!”  

But instead, in this greatest sermon ever preached, Jesus says I am to love my enemies the way God loves them.  He extends His kindness to everyone by giving sunshine and rain to the righteous and to the evil at the same time. Why? Because He loves them.  

It is the way of Jesus that His followers would be distinct… and it is our love for our enemies that makes us distinct.  Who does such a thing?  While everyone else may respond harshly to abrasiveness, true believers will be the ones who respond with love.  And not only that, but we will be the ones wearing out the knees in our favorite jeans, on the floor in serious prayer.  

As I thought through these verses in a new and fresh way, the twisted metal of my hard-heartedness toward those who need Christ lie piled up in a heap as I asked God for strength to make me a brighter light in the darkness.  May the Lord forgive my negligence in praying for these people and give me a renewed vigor to beseech Him on their behalf.   As committed believers and as a church, may these soul-and-spirit-piercing passages awaken us all from our slumber to be in fervent prayer for those in need of salvation.   Prayer changes us.  When the content of our prayers relates to how we respond to the haters, God will implant within us a capacity to love those who are difficult to love.  Genuine love has a way of building a strong platform from where we will be heard.   From an earthly standpoint, effectively sharing the gospel depends on this (speaking the truth in love).  Nobody ever said that loving difficult people was going to be easy… but God has given us His Spirit… and His Spirit gives us the strength to do hard things.

May God grant you many blessings,

Mark

Overview of Acts, chapters 1-17

We will be going back to Acts, but just to keep the story fresh on our minds: 

The Book of Acts, so far:

In Acts 1:8 Jesus promised His disciples would receive POWER and be His WITNESSES. The Holy Spirit came to indwell all believers, and they began witnessing! The church grew as many came to believe in Christ. Religious leaders were constantly trying to stop the “Jesus talk”, culminating in the execution of Stephen. This scattered the church, but did not stop the religious leaders from pursuing, especially a man named Saul - who met Jesus while on the way to arrest Christians. Then God opened the door for Peter to bring the Gospel to the Gentiles, changing the course of history. Even the king’s (Herod’s) attack on the church couldn’t stop the power of God. That’s Acts 1-12.

Starting in Acts 13, we find Paul (the aforementioned “Saul”), Barnabas, and Mark left Antioch and went to Cyprus. We saw how the Holy Spirit was at work, empowering ministry, fighting spiritual battles, and saving souls. In Antioch of Pisidia, Paul delivered the longest recorded sermon we have from him to the Jews in the synagogue. The sermon’s point: history and salvation are all about Jesus, and you have a choice to make.

The missionaries get back in time for an attack on the church – people claiming you had to obey the Old Testament Law in order to be saved (Acts 15)! This was settled at the Jerusalem Council, where the verdict was “Salvation is by grace through faith. Jews: don’t trouble Gentiles with legalism. Gentiles, don’t trouble Jews with your freedom.”

Paul and Barnabas have a falling out over taking Mark on the next mission trip. So Barnabas takes Mark with him to Cyprus, and Paul takes Silas to Syria and Cilicia, when they picked up Timothy and got the vision to go to Macedonia. In Philippi, the crew witnesses to a group of women. One woman, Lydia, receives Christ and invites the missionaries to stay with her. After driving an evil spirit out of a fortune telling slave girl, Paul and Silas are beaten and imprisoned, but God sends an earthquake to release them. The jailer attempts suicide, but is stopped by Paul and lead to Christ. Paul and Silas are asked to leave, and did after they get the magistrates to apologize.

Paul and co. go to Berea and find people eager to receive the Word, examining it daily. But the enemies of the Gospel from Thessalonica chase Paul out – so Paul is escorted all the way to Athens, where he sent a message back for Silas and Timothy to get there ASAP. While in Athens, Paul boldly confronts the idolatry by preaching that the “unknown god” they acknowledged is the God of Israel, Who: created all things, is the source of life, is not far from any of us, commands everyone to repent, and will ultimately judge the world by His appointed Man. 

What we have seen so far in Acts 13-17 - Jesus created an UNSTOPPABLE CHURCH. 

Questions and Answers: Why are small groups considered a biblical way to do ministry?

Harvest Bible Chapel is not a church with small groups, but a church of small groups. And it’s not a fad – we believe that small groups is the way to do ministry – to make disciples.

Jesus did things in small groups. He spent most of His ministry just pouring into 12 people. And of the 12, there were just three in the “inner circle” (Peter, James, John) that seemed to be privy to more training from Jesus.

The early church was a place of small group ministry. Acts 2:46 says And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts...

Going to the temple for larger group worship and breaking bread in homes. That’s what we are going after – larger group worship at the auditorium on Sundays, breaking bread in each others’ homes through the week.

I love small groups. Not just the concept, either. I love the small group I attend. The men have been very faithful to me and to each other. (Shout out to Ben, Mike, and Russ!)

"Small groups" serve a lot of needs. Small groups are where relationships grow. That’s where accountability happens. Primary pastoral care happens in small groups. It is the front line of counseling. It is a launching pad for local outreach. It is where people are known and loved and do life together and laugh and cry and pray and challenge and so much more.

As much as I would like to do it – I don’t have the time to sit down with every single person from church every week and personally minister to them. But this can happen – and so much more effectively – if everyone is committed to being a part of a small group and ministering to each other. 

And that's why we do small groups. 

*This is our last question from this round of Q&A. Thanks to all who participated, and (Lord willing) we will do it again June 25!

Questions and Answers: Why doesn't this church have Sunday school for those people older than little kids?

I am not anti-Sunday School – I used to teach it every week! So why don’t we have it at HBC?

It ties into the mission. We want people to leave church Sunday really holding on to one main thing. We live in a day where information abounds. You have access to information from all over the world with a phone that you keep in your pocket. So we aren’t looking to saturate you or bombard you with information on Sunday. Quite the opposite – we want to zero in on one key truth, understand it, dig deep into it, learn to apply it... and walk out embracing it.

What about the relational aspect of Sunday School? We emphasize Small Groups as the way to connect with others.

This doesn’t mean that on occasion we wouldn’t offer a temporary class (as Dan Thompson has done for college age people before).

I could also discuss staffing, room space, and cost of room rental as other obstacles to Sunday School in our current situation... but I won’t for now.