“But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matt 5:44)
Expanded Passage: Matthew 5:43-44
They killed him. They killed her husband. Should she not avenge him? Should she not at least wash her hands of them, never to look upon their wretched faces? Perhaps most would think so, but Elizabeth Elliot thought differently. In what seems incredibly backward or upside-down, she boldly and faithfully obeyed Jesus’ command to love. She returned as a missionary to serve the same people that killed her husband.
In Jesus’ sermon, to love one’s enemy and pray for a persecutor was also an upside-down idea for everyone who heard it. The Greeks and Romans perceived love primarily as a selfish act—what could be gained from the other. Love, then, could only be between two mutually-giving parties. Some Jews interpreted texts like Psalm 119:21–22 as grounds to hate “god-haters” (essentially, all Gentiles, in their minds). Contrarily, Jesus establishes the proper extent of love: it reaches even enemies who actively persecute us. According to the early church’s Christian manual, The Didache, in the church’s early days, the disciples encouraged fasting for persecutors as an appropriate application of Jesus’ command!
This command is not radical—it is the minimum requirement. Jesus later suggests that anything less is no better than the tax collectors and pagans, the very enemies and persecutors for whom he calls us to pray. Jesus’ command is proactive. We start with love. We do not merely react lovingly to an enemy if one shows up.
Identify an enemy and choose an act of love to do for them.
Noah Cromer is, first, God’s child; second, a husband and father. He gladly serves at Southern Wesleyan University in residence life and as an adjunct professor.
© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.
