“But I say to you who are listening: Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who asks of you, and if anyone takes away what is yours, do not ask for it back again. Do to others as you would have them do to you. —Luke 6:27-31

“It was the Sermon on the Mount, rather than a doctrine of passive resistance, that initially inspired the Negroes of Montgomery to dignified social action. It was Jesus of Nazareth that stirred the Negroes to protest with the creative weapon of love.” —Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Loving

enables me to love my neighbor, and loving my neighbor enables me to love God. (1 John 4:7-8)

Jesus’ goal is nothing less than the full

of your life into the loving nature of God.

The greatest commandment is not to love your neighbor

than yourself, it’s to love your neighbor

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yourself.

When the people in our circles are only like us, we miss out on the

and

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God desires to share with us.

An Orientation to Love

After selecting his twelve apostles, Jesus came down to a crowd of people seeking healing. (Luke 6:17-20)

Then he began to address his

.

“The Sermon on the Plain is an orientation lecture from the rabbi to his disciples on the nature of God’s love that they are expected to exhibit.” —Bishop Tom Berlin

In the sermon, Jesus describes what a life

by God’s love looks like. (Luke 6:27-28)

“Love your

” is the key principle.

He restates the principle: “Do good to those who

you, bless those who

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you, pray for those who

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you.”

Next he

the principle. (Luke 6:29-31)

In giving these instructions, Jesus is not making new

.

“All is changed when we realize that these are illustrations of what a certain kind of person, the kingdom person, will characteristically do in such situations… This is how God does it, and he invites us to join him. —Dallas Willard

The standard he sets seems impossibly

.

“Agape is not a weak, passive love. It is love in action. Agape is love seeking to preserve and create community. It is insistence on community even when one seeks to break it. Agape is a willingness to go to any length to restore community.” —Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “An Experiment in Love” (1958)

Beyond Self-Interest

Jesus’ standard of love goes far beyond

. (Luke 6:32-34)

Doing good for people who

pay you back is good, but it’s not an accomplishment.

Love is not

. (Romans 12:9-10)

We cannot really love someone if we only want to get something

them.

“[Agape] begins by loving others for their sakes. It is an entirely ‘neighbor-regarding concern for others,’ which discovers the neighbor in every man it meets. Therefore, agape makes no distinction between friends and enemy; it is directed toward both.” —Dr. King, “An Experiment in Love”

To love like Jesus, we have to see each other as a “

, not an “

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.”

Jesus’ standard seems impossible. It is, without God’s

and a loving

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.

Becoming the kind of person who loves this way is a

.

As we are “loved into people of love,” we become more and more able to love like

.

Where to Start

We can begin by praying for our enemies and forgoing revenge.

Even if we don’t think we have enemies, we do have people we resent, avoid, look down on, and

.

We can begin to love them by doing

to them.

Instead of retreating to our devices, we can

the people we typically ignore.

Action Steps

Commit to praying

for an enemy or someone you find hard to love.

Take an interest in

you’d typically ignore.

When an inconsiderate driver makes you mad, speak a

over them.

My additional notes: