Love Enemies for Reward
Do you avoid someone because of the way they make you feel. Feeling of anger and frustration dominate the atmosphere—at least in your mind—when you are around that person. Perhaps you feel the relationship is of absolute uselessness to both you and that person. The Bible tells us that this relationship is actually a huge benefit to you.
“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. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. ” (Lk 6:35–36)
Today’s reward for loving our enemies can be bleak or nonexistent, but we are not to look for reward today. We are to look towards our heavenly reward that is promised by God in heaven. He has not promised a small reward, He has promised a very great reward.
Selfish selflessness?
The Bible is full of paradoxes: the Godhead is three person in one God; Jesus Christ, when he walked this Earth, was fully man and fully God; every person is fully responsible for his actions, yet God is completely sovereign and in control over everything. Can we can add one more to the list, the selfish pursuit of selflessness?
Perhaps not, Webster’s defines selfishness as, “concerned excessively or exclusively with oneself : seeking or concentrating on one’s own advantage, pleasure, or well-being without regard for others.”1 The key thing to notice about selfishness is that it is “without regard for others”. But this is not what the God is calling us towards. He is calling us to seek reward through the selfless sacrificial love of others—this is reward seeking perfected.
“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. ” (Mt 6:19–21)
Do you seek great reward? Don’t seek it in this life, seek the reward that is in heaven, it is great, it is imperishable, it is not selfish, it is perfect.
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