Saturday September 20, 2014

Read: Romans 12:14-21, Romans 5:6-8

Think of some of the great heroes and villains of literature and fiction. Like Peter Pan and Captain Hook. Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty. Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. Many of us can remember the stories of how these great enemies have faced each other in many battles and confrontations. The hero is always fighting for justice, rescuing the innocent and battling evil. The villain is always trying to accomplish some kind of scheme for their own evil ends.

Imagine for a moment if Peter Pan dared sacrifice himself to rescue and save Captain Hook from the crocodile? Imagine if Sherlock willingly died to save Moriarty from death. Imagine if Luke Skywalker took a lightsaber blow to save Darth Vader. This reversal seems almost inconceivable. Such a story would shock and maybe even offend us.

God did this for us. In the incredible cosmic narrative of the creator and His creation we are not the heroes, we are the villains. We are God’s enemies who would come up with our own sinful schemes in order to satisfy our own rebellious desires. God Himself, the Hero of the story willingly sacrificed His Son so that we, His enemies, could be saved and could be reconciled with Him. What a shocking twist! We can be so thankful that God does not operate like Peter Pan or Sherlock Holmes or Luke Skywalker. Instead He shows us incredible grace and mercy.

It is this incredible grace that God shows to us that motivates the way that we treat our enemies. Rather than fight against them we show the grace. Rather than harm them or destroy them we seek to bless them and build them up. Instead of cursing them we are to bless them. That is Paul’s point in Romans 12. We are bless those who persecute us. We are to love those who would seek to hurt us. We are to seek to live at peace with everyone as much as it is up to us. Instead of taking revenge we are to allow room for God’s grace and mercy and ultimately allow Him to be the one who carries out perfect and final judgment.

Bear in mind the time in which Paul was writing. The people that the Roman believers are to love are not the kinds of people we tend to think of. They aren’t people who have just annoyed or antagonised the believers. They are the kinds of people who have hunted down believers, tortured them and killed them for their faith. They are the kind of people who would crucify a believer without a second thought. They are the kinds of people who take great joy in inflicting pain on God’s people.

They are like the Islamic State in Iraq persecuting Christians. They are like the atheistic governments of China or North Korea who are hunting down and killing believers. They are like the rebels in Africa who are killing Christians and destroying churches. These are the kinds of enemies that Paul is talking about.

What a radical command it is that we would love and bless these people! Let’s pray that God would cultivate this kind of love in our hearts and spend time today praying for our enemies all around the world.

Prayer:

Use the Bible passage from today and the reading notes to write down your prayer points before you pray.

Adoration:

Confession:

Thanks:

Supplication:

¥ Pray for the enemies of the Gospel around the world. Pray that their plans against God’s Kingdom would be thwarted and that their hearts would be softened towards the Gospel. Pray that they might come to faith in Christ.

¥ Pray for the gathering of God’s people at your church tomorrow. Pray that the word would be faithfully preached and people would be encouraged.

 Word Moment:

Passages like this really come to life when we understand the context of the ancient world. Take some time to do some research about the kind of persecution that believers faced in this time. The book of Acts or Foxe’s Book of Matyrs are great places to start.

 Discussion Questions For Families and Groups

1. Who are our enemies?

2. How could we seek to bless them instead of fighting against them? What could you do as a group to put this into practice?

3. What is a godly response to situations like the current situation in Iraq? How does blessing our enemies interact with protecting and defending the innocent?

 Discipleship Moment For Girls

Intro: Some of the best stories are ones that have a good guy and a bad guy.

Share:  Who are your favourite good guys? What makes them cool? Who are the bad guys they fight against?
Read: Romans 5:10 Imagine how crazy it would be if your favourite good guy got hurt so he could help the bad guy. Even when we were the bad guys who had sinned against God He sent Jesus to come and die so we could be His friends. How does it make you feel to know that Jesus died to make us God’s friends? Why do you think God would do that?
Pray Together: Thank God that He died so that we could be His friends. Pray that He would help us love others too.

 Discipleship Moment For Boys

Intro: Some of the best stories are ones that have a good guy and a bad guy.

Share:  Who are your favourite good guys? What makes them cool? Who are the bad guys they fight against?
Read: Romans 5:10 Imagine how crazy it would be if your favourite good guy got hurt so he could help the bad guy. Even when we were the bad guys who had sinned against God He sent Jesus to come and die so we could be His friends. How does it make you feel to know that Jesus died to make us God’s friends? Why do you think God would do that?
Pray Together: Thank God that He died so that we could be His friends. Pray that He would help us love others too.