Blessing Our Enemies

Chapter 7 in The Power of Spoken Blessings is called "Blessing Our Enemies." This one is going to be hard for many of us to swallow. So, I think it best to begin this post with prayer and the Word.

Holy Father,
In our weakness, You are made strong. We confess to You that this principle is impossible for us to live out in our own strength or wisdom. We simply are unable. And beyond our inability is our lack of desire. In ourselves, we don't want to return good for evil, to bless those who curse and abuse us. We feel justified in defending ourselves. It is easy to allow our anger to control our actions in those moments. Father, please help us to trust You. We know in our hearts that Your ways are higher than our ways. We know it. Please help us to obey You in this. Please open our hearts to this teaching. Please help us feel the abundance of Your Grace washing over us. Grace that is sufficient to accomplish Your purposes, even when we can't see to take the next step. You know the only way we can walk in freedom is to obey You in this. It looks and feels like madness. The evil one knows all this, too. He wants us to focus on our rights. And the very intensity with which he tempts us to retaliate should tell us how very, very important it is to obey You in this. Through Your Grace, we tell You that we desire to learn to bless our enemies. We desire that You be glorified in ALL our thoughts, words, actions. Please hold our hearts very close as we venture into these troubling waters. Thank You, Lord, for Your perfect Love. 
In the Name that is sweetest to Your ears,
Amen

Matthew 5:43-45
"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, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous."

Romans 12:14
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.

Romans 12: 19-21
Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," says the Lord.  On the contrary:

If your enemy is hungry,

feed him;

if he is thirsty, give him

something to drink.

In doing this, you will heap 

burning coals on his head.

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Jesus teaches us through His example. On the cross, He said,

"Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."  Luke 23:34

I Peter 2:23

When they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate; when He suffered, He made no threats. Instead, He entrusted Himself to Him who judges justly. 

I Peter 3:9

Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult, but with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing. 

I Corinthians 4:12b-13a

When we are cursed, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; when we are slandered, we answer kindly.

What does this mean for us? How far are we supposed to take this? Can He really mean it?

My first impulse when I am verbally attacked is to retaliate. Or at least to defend myself. But, according to these verses, I am supposed to bless my attacker. Return good for evil. But what about a situation of continual verbal abuse, like a parent with a child. That child is supposed to bless the person who continually tears them down, chews them up and spits them out? How can a loving God ask that? It's completely upside down.

The choice a person makes to abuse, with words or actions, another is always rooted in the lies of the evil one. Living in a fallen world, we will never completely escape abuse. That is the nature of our condition. The choice before us is how do we respond when it happens? What do we do about it? 

In His most loving Mercy, He is asking us to do the only thing that won't bear evil fruit in our hearts. For us to respond to cursing, persecution, or abuse with anything except a blessing will plant seeds of bitterness in our hearts. He knows how we are made. He sees that we are but dust. If we respond to evil with evil, then the fruit borne in our hearts will be evil. It will be destructive. There is no other option. It will cause us to either hate ourselves or hate others. Period. 

By telling us to bless those who curse or persecute or abuse us, He is showing us His deepest Love. He is revealing the Truth of not only our situation, but our nature. 

Galatians 6:7 says:

Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.

We cannot escape the fruit of what we sow. The only freedom to be found in a situation where we have been wronged is to return good for evil, blessings for curses. It is not that He is asking the impossible. He is asking the only thing possible, the only thing that will bring Life out of death. He is throwing us a lifeline for our souls. 

At this point, I am going to share a story from the book The Power of Spoken Blessings, by Bill Gothard. It is a lengthy excerpt, but it is so powerful I just don't think it best to condense it.  Please prayerfully read it:


A teenager in Canada explained an eleven-year battle with depression stemming from an incident at age seven of sexual abuse by a babysitter. It was a struggle that couldn't be overcome by psychiatric counseling: "It helped to share my feelings," the teenager wrote, "but as time passed, the memory and pain would come back in a deeper way. There was never any true freedom from the bitterness and guilt that I had toward this girl and myself."

A breakthrough finally came through talking with a godly counselor who looked to the Scriptures:  "He shared with me from his life how he had experienced bitterness toward certain people he had worked with and how God brought freedom to his life through blessing his enemies."

"He then shared with me the passage of Matthew 18:23-35, where we find the story of the two servants who owed a debt. He showed me how I was like the servant who had been forgiven a great debt, and I had then turned toward my fellow servant and refused forgiveness of her lesser debt. Through my unforgiveness, I had been delivered to the tormentors of depression and bitterness. He shared with me . . . that the key to finding freedom could be found in blessing her." (emphasis added)

"As I began to think things over, a war was raging within me. I could not bring myself to bless this girl, especially after what she had done to me. But the more I looked at the passage, the more I knew in my heart that I needed to bless her."

"We then knelt in prayer, but my heart was so heavy I wasn't able to speak. This man prayed, asking the Lord to rebuke Satan, his principalities, and his powers over my life. I was then able to speak from my heart."

"As I began to ask the Lord to bless her, the load of guilt I had been carrying started to lift off my shoulders . . . Once I finished praying, I was free . . ."

"Over a year later, I have had a few times where the memories of the assault have returned. However, in those moments. I have once again prayed and asked the Lord to bless her, and instantly the pain and hurt have gone."

"I praise the Lord for the deliverance in my life that has come through the power of a spoken blessing."          (The Power of Spoken Blessings, pp. 74, 75)

There will be people who curse us, abuse us, revile us. That is the nature of our fallen world. How will we respond?


We cannot avoid being wronged. What do we do about it?


We only have two choices in the face of evil: to bless or to curse. 


We cannot change the choices of others to do evil. But we can walk in freedom and joy in the face of evil. If we choose to react, retaliate, or revile in return, we are choosing to take a part of that evil into ourselves. Period. And it will not lie there dormant. It will grow more evil in our souls. 


Our only choice is the upside down one. We must bless those who curse us. We must bless those who abuse us. We must bless those who revile us. Therein is our Life. That is when we look like Jesus.

Who do you need to bless? Who do I need to bless? 


His Grace IS SUFFICIENT for the road He asks us to walk. He came to set us free. And in Him we are free indeed!

If the person who wronged you is no longer living, bless the Lord for His Purposes in that situation. Bless Him for allowing you to suffer so that you might partake in the sufferings of Christ. Bless the Lord for teaching you to walk by faith, not by sight. Freedom is still available to you. To me. 

What will we choose?


The choice is ours to make.  And we will bear the fruit of our choice.



Previous posts in this series:
1. Spoken Blessings 
2. Spoken Blessings, Part II
3. But How Do We Actually Speak Blessings? 
4. Unexpected Benefit
5. Chapter 6: Blessing Our Children 
6. A Light Bulb Flips On