"You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you..." Matthew 5:43,44
"cause you cannot choose your friends
but you choose your enemies
and what if they were one
one and the same
could you find a way
to love them both the same
to give them your name"
Love is Not Against the Law - Derek Webb
Learn Obedience, Value Everyone
.
Being Irish, me thinks that getting a little hotheaded is natural, but in reality it is just another thing that I've trained for since childhood. Granted, it is rare for anyone to see this part of my nature anymore as I have grown a bit, and thankfully as I usually am driving alone (driving the DC Beltway might even tempt Mother Teresa to flip someone the bird).
Anger that is hidden and which stems from resentment or unforgiveness, is a much worse destroyer of our heart and spirit (and the heart and spirit of others), than the occasional honking of the horn. It is like rocks scattered all over our path of life, some put there by others, yet most put there by ourselves. We keep tripping daily over some of the same stones, or walk around the others that we think are too big to handle. Oprah has countless pop pyschologists on her show promising the best GPS system to avoid these obstacles.
Christ on the other hand, asks us to keep walking straight, to clear the path of all these things that are not of Him. Some of these are lighter to lift than we think (especially if we draw our strength not from our self), and some are but big clumps of dust that blow away as soon as we touch them. Others are so big and well placed, that it might take days, weeks, or even years to move, but in the moving of all of these we find we are toning that one important muscle, the one that allows, with ease, to offer up our right cheek after the left has been slapped.
This is the muscle that allows us to be beaten to a pulp, to be ridiculed and spit on, and to be naked to a nailed to a cross; yet all the time saying "they know not what they do".
God's love in our heart is , me thinks, the great bulldozer to help us clear the straight path we have been asked to walk. . . . and praying for certain Irish hot-headed drivers is a good thing too (O:
Anger that is hidden and which stems from resentment or unforgiveness, is a much worse destroyer of our heart and spirit (and the heart and spirit of others), than the occasional honking of the horn. It is like rocks scattered all over our path of life, some put there by others, yet most put there by ourselves. We keep tripping daily over some of the same stones, or walk around the others that we think are too big to handle. Oprah has countless pop pyschologists on her show promising the best GPS system to avoid these obstacles.
Christ on the other hand, asks us to keep walking straight, to clear the path of all these things that are not of Him. Some of these are lighter to lift than we think (especially if we draw our strength not from our self), and some are but big clumps of dust that blow away as soon as we touch them. Others are so big and well placed, that it might take days, weeks, or even years to move, but in the moving of all of these we find we are toning that one important muscle, the one that allows, with ease, to offer up our right cheek after the left has been slapped.
This is the muscle that allows us to be beaten to a pulp, to be ridiculed and spit on, and to be naked to a nailed to a cross; yet all the time saying "they know not what they do".
God's love in our heart is , me thinks, the great bulldozer to help us clear the straight path we have been asked to walk. . . . and praying for certain Irish hot-headed drivers is a good thing too (O:
"cause you cannot choose your friends
but you choose your enemies
and what if they were one
one and the same
could you find a way
to love them both the same
to give them your name"
Love is Not Against the Law - Derek Webb
Learn Obedience, Value Everyone
.
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