Love Your Enemies

     In this passage, Jesus addresses  what comes naturally to us—loving those who love us—and then calls us beyond it: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Jesus does not deny the reality of enemies; He transforms how His followers are to respond to them - prayer. 

     Prayer is the doorway into this kind of love. We cannot manufacture love for those we label as enemies, but we can bring them before God. Through prayer, our view of others, hostility and anger is exposed, and our hearts are reshaped as God’s own love begins to move through us. Loving our enemies is not something we can do in our own strength, but happens through this constant participation in the Father’s , generous love, that He first revealed to us—a love that reveals who God is and who we are becoming as His children - a love we can show to others - even out enemies.