For reflection:
- Who are our enemies? Who are our neighbors? Are they the same or different people?
- The struggle to extend love to those we label “enemy” is real. What do you think is behind that inclination to withhold? Fear? Pride? Something else?
- How does receiving and knowing Jesus‘s love for us enable us to love our enemies?
- Have you seen any real life examples of love extinguishing hate in your life?
- Why do things that are “good” when they are only rejected or ignored or mocked?
- Explain what it might look like to love your enemies. Name some specific choices or behaviors. Name some things that are out-of-bounds.
- How do we love people when they do destructive things to us? To others?How do you keep your own person safe and intact when you love people who seek your harm?
- At what point do we stop offering the love that Jesus tells us to offer?
Digging Deeper:
- The “godliest expression of love is one that makes the in-group bigger.” In searching your heart, what person or group have you been keeping God’s love, that is flowing through you, from? What can you commit to do to help make God’s in-group bigger starting today?
- What does it look like when we love for the reward? What leads us to think that doing the things of Jesus are for a reward?
- How does this love contrast with Psalm 139, “do I not hate those who hate You?” What I mean is why would God put that there and then have this passage about loving enemies here?
- What is the significance behind Jesus making the distinction between what “you have heard…said” as opposed to “what is written” in the law? (Lev. 19:18)
- When we pray for those that persecute us, what should we pray? Will your heart find joy in the redemption of your enemies that allows them to share heaven with you?
- There is much debate about defining our “neighbors” and the original Hebrew rēaʿ (רֵעַ) can indicate a range from ‘companion’ to ‘simply other’. How has the growth of your faith helped you to define which meaning you have taken for your neighbor?
- What steps can we take to ensure our definition of neighbor doesn’t stop at the end of the block or the church doors?
- Jesus compares our inclination to transactional love to the Publicans seeking just earthly rewards and beseeches us to go beyond that. In what way or to whom can we demonstrate this love that exceeds the transactional?
- The word “perfect” (telios, Matthew 5:48) directly translates to mean complete or mature. How does the idea of our love maturing to be like that of God help us to understand the love Jesus refers just prior (Matthew 5:45) to this statement?
- Jesus said “so that you may be children of your father”. How does that statement square with the idea that being a follower of Jesus is an act of grace and a work of faith? How do we balance these ideas?