Luke 6:27-38
You Won’t Live This Life Vindicated
If Jesus was attempting to build enlist an army and start a revolt,
He certainly did it all wrong. Jesus had just called His disciples
and was giving His first speech. It really was not the best speech
to motivate a "Let’s-rally-and-revolt" event. Instead, it set a very
realistic picture of what it was going to be like to be a Christian—
especially a Christian shepherd—in a hostile world.
In the last weeks, we have been studying a section of Scripture where
Jesus prayed, picked out twelve disciples, and then preached to them.
Jesus was growing His sheep into Shepherds by preparing them for what
lay ahead—and it was not going to be cookies and cream.
\\#Luke 6:17-26\\ - Jesus preached that they should not expect a
comfortable life. They were going to be poor, hungry, sad, hated,
isolated, and evil spoken of. By reading all of this text, it becomes
obvious that God intends that His people be less than comfortable.
Even more, Jesus pronounced woe upon those who have all good in this
life.
I am not sure that I expressed well what that means to those of us
who quite frankly have never experienced such things.
It does not necessarily mean that we are bad Christians. We are
living in an abnormal time because for 200 plus years, our country
has been extremely blessed due to some decisions our forefathers
made. That’s good for us as we have been experiencing part of their
reward.
Yet, we also want some rewards when we get to heaven, do we not? And
to be plain, most of us have not endured anything for Jesus. For us,
I believe we may have to work harder to get our rewards to the other
side.
\\#Luke 6:27-36\\ - Jesus went on to teach these new leaders that
they need not expect to live this life vindicated. I grew up in an
era where the TV shows always ended with the good guys coming out on
top. For Christians—especically for the Christian shepherds—that
may not be the case.
I. \\#27\\ Jesus’ Command
Luke 6:27 But I say unto you which hear, Love
your enemies….
A. The big command is to love your enemies.
1. Jesus will repeat that command again in \\#35\\.
2. He will also illustrate what He meant and explain why He
commanded it.
3. Notice before we start discussing it, that Jesus knew not
everyone would "hear" or "listen" to this command.
a. Every person has to decide how far they will go in t
this life to obey Christ.
b. Some will not even obey Him enough to be saved.
c. Others will be saved but only carry their walk with
Him so far.
d. Obviously, what Jesus was about to teach is going to
be difficult for Jesus was acknowledging that some
simply will not listen to Him concerning it.
B. Notice the illustrations. Jesus gave seven of them to help us
understand it.
1. We do good to those that hate us.
2. \\#28\\ We pronounce good (bless) to those that would say
bad things (curse) us.
3. We are to pray that God would save and help those who
despitefully use us.
4. \\#29\\ WHEN someone hits us, we are not to resist but
to turn the other cheek to them.
(a) Notice the Scripture does not put an "if" at the
beginning of his verse. It is assumed you will be
struck for Jesus Christ. For most of Christian
history, that would has been the case.
(b) To "turn the other cheek" is just a metaphor to say,
"Don’t resist them."
5. When they take your "cloke" (an extra wind or rain
poncho), give them your coat as well.
6. \\#30\\ Give to EVERYONE who asks of you and do not ask
for your possession to be returned.
7. \\#31\\ Generally, treat everyone like you would like to
be treated.
(a) The passage does not read, "Expect" to be treated
like you would want to be treated."
(b) The thought is even after all of this terrible things
have been done to you, continue to treat people like
you would want for them to treat you.
C. Without doubt, this is a lose, lose, lose scenario.
1. Christ was telling those men to expect…
(a) …to lose their possessions to evil people—so you lose
your possession.
(b) …to be beat be evil people—so you lose your right to
defend yourself.
(c) …and then to have to love those people better than
you might love your own family—so you lose your
right to vindicate yourself.
2. No matter how you look at this, these men are going to
lose and if Jesus intends this command for all of us, we
are all going to lose.
3. Before most anyone is going to obey this command, they are
going to want some explanation—not that God has to give
it. In this case, I believe Jesus did.
II. \\#32-35\\ Jesus’ Explanation
A. Before looking at Jesus’ explanation, let’s consider what some
people think.
1. As I mentioned last week, some read this message and think
it was intended for the millennial, but they fail to read
the book of Acts or Christian history. This is how the
Christians lived!
(a) We know what happened to Jesus for we have been
studying that for the last few weeks.
(b) What about Stephen?
Acts 7:54 When they heard these things, they
were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him
with their teeth.
55 But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked
up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of
God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,
56 And said, Behold, I see the heavens opened,
and the Son of man standing on the right hand of
God.
57 Then they cried out with a loud voice, and
stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one
accord,
58 And cast him out of the city, and stoned him:
and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a
young man’s feet, whose name was Saul.
59 And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God,
and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
60 And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud
voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.
And when he had said this, he fell asleep.
(1) Many others were beaten, arrested, imprisoned,
and even killed for Jesus, but this account
gives us more details than most others.
(2) Stephen did not resist or fight back. Like
Jesus, Stephen laid down his life for Christ.
(3) History tells us many, many others did as well.
(4) Christians might flee, but they would not fight.
Joh 18:36 Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of
this world: if my kingdom were of this world,
then would my servants fight, that I should not
be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom
not from hence.
2. I believe I understand what most of us would think for I
think it too, but we cannot rewrite a text to fit what
we think or what we would do.
B. What did Jesus say? I believe Jesus did give some explanation
but He did it by giving us more commands.
1. \\#32\\ Christians have to love better than the lost.
a. "What thank have ye?" - Why would anyone thank or
respect you for that?
(1) To say it slightly different would be to say,
"What is different about that?"
(2) The answer would be nothing.
b. So Jesus was commanding them to love differently.
(1) "But why?" or perhaps a better question, "Love
like who?"
(2) We are not told but I believe you will see that
Jesus was commanding us to love them like God
loves them.
(3) If we do not think that God is hurt by our
hatful actions, I would say, "Think again."
2. \\#33\\ Christians have to do better than the lost.
a. This is the same message only on the physical plane
now instead of the emotional plane.
b. We are to treat others—even those who are abusing us—
much better than they would treat us in the same
situation.
(1) And who should we be emulating when we treat
these people better?
(2) The answer is not given here but we will see that we
are to treat them like God treat them.
3. \\#34\\ Christians are to give better than the lost.
a. We move from the emotional, to the physical, to the
financial plane.
b. We are to lend or to give like God gives to them.
4. Notice verse 36.
Luke 6:36 Be ye therefore merciful, as your
Father also is merciful.
a. In all of these areas, we are being kind, loving,
gracious, and forgiving like God is.
b. In other words, we are to be God’s object lessons to
this world, even to those who would do us harm.
c. God is big on object lessons.
(1) Ezekiel 3 - God made Ezekiel mute so that the
only time he could speak was when he spoke for
the Lord.
(2) Ezekiel 4 - God made Ezekiel lay on his left
side for 390 days then to lay 40 days on his
right side for an object lesson.
(3) Ezekiel 5 - God had Ezekiel shave off ALL of his
hair as an object lesson.
(4) Ezekiel 25 - Ezekiel’s wife died and could would
not let him weep or mourn for her as an object
lesson.
d. Today, God calls upon Christians to be object lessons
to the world by their appearance, their vocabulary,
their attitudes, and their behaviors.
e. Loving people like God loves them and treating people
like God treats them is just one of the ways that we
can both obey God and demonstrate to a lost world
just how much God loves them.
Luke 6:35 But love ye your enemies, and do good,
and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your
reward shall be great, and ye shall be the
children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the
unthankful and to the evil.
III. \\#37-38\\ Jesus’ Expectation - Fulfilling this command is not
going to be easy, but Jesus expected us to do not only the
right actions but to keep the right attitudes.
A. \\#37\\ We are not judge.
1. This passage is pulled out of context today in an attempt
to mute Christians against sin, but look at the context.
a. This was written to the Christians on how to deal with
those who were hurting them.
b. What kind of judgment might we render against those
who are doing these kinds of things to us?
(1) We might judge them worthy of our wrath.
(2) We might judge them unworthy of our message.
2. Jesus was commanding us not to make that kind of call.
B. We are to forgive them.
1. All of this is telling us how we are to treat these evil
people who are hurting us.
2. We are treat them with the same forgiveness that God has
treated us,
3. By the way, that means we are to forgive them whether they
are sorry for what they did or not.
C. \\#38\\ We are to give.
1. We are to give to this lost world as freely as God will
allow us to give.
2. Of course, we are not going to give to them so that they
can hurt themselves but to feed them, to cloth them, to
heal them—we should give.
For that last one, God does promise that gifts will be given back to
us in return; but for everything else, we are to obey with no promise
of any kind of vindication—at least not in this world. It is a
difficult command that Jesus gave to those men and to us, a command
to love like God loves; but it is God’s command.
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