Love Like Jesus—Lectionary Reflection for Epiphany 7C (Luke 6:27-38)

Luke 6:27-38 New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

²⁷ “But I say to you who are listening: Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; ²⁸ bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you. ²⁹ 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. ³⁰ Give to everyone who asks of you, and if anyone takes away what is yours, do not ask for it back again. ³¹ Do to others as you would have them do to you.

³² “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. ³³ If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. ³⁴ If you lend to those from whom you expect to receive payment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. ³⁵ Instead, love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. ³⁶ Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

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                The Vice President recently found himself in a self-made quandary when he appealed to a principle called ordo amoris to defend the new administration’s policies regarding foreign aid and immigration. He seemed to turn the principle of loving one’s neighbors upside down, such that you love your family first and then work outward in concentric circles. He appealed to Augustine and Aquinas in support of his position. Many Catholic theologians, as well as Pope Francis, suggested he misinterpreted these two important figures. I tend to agree with the critics. Augustine does speak about an ordering of loves, but as I read him in his Teaching Christianity: De Doctrina Christiana it’s a lot more complicated than the Veep suggests. Indeed, as Pope Francis pointed out, he forgot about the Parable of the Good Samaritan, which defines the neighbor very broadly (not just the people living next door). I will leave the debate with the Vice President to others, but the reading for the Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany complicates things even further. Here in Luke 6, in the Sermon on the Plain, Jesus speaks not of loving one’s neighbor but one’s enemies.

                The command of Jesus, the way of Jesus is laid out here in bold letters: “Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you.” I’m not sure any of us have truly fulfilled this command. Jesus delivers this challenging word during a sermon known as the Sermon on the Plain, a parallel version of the better-known Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7). We earlier explored the opening verses of this sermon, which offers a series of blessings and words of woe. In those words, we hear about God’s preferential option for the poor. Jesus makes it quite clear that God stands on the side of the poor and hungry while opposing the rich and satiated (Luke 6:17-26). Now, we hear a word about loving our enemies and a call to do good to those who hate us. Surely, Jesus doesn’t mean this literally. Are there no caveats? Unfortunately, Luke doesn’t offer any. Therefore, we are left to figure out what to do with this message.

                At the very least, Jesus’ call for his followers to love their enemies overrules the principle espoused by the Vice President. There can be no limitation to the call to love others. We cannot ignore those outside our immediate circle.  As Joel Green notes, according to this word from Jesus: “Love is expressed in doing good—that is, not by passivity in the face of opposition but in proactivity: doing good, blessing, praying, and offering the second cheek and the shirt along with the coat.” [Green, The Gospel of Luke (NICNT)) (Kindle p. 272).]  

                Love is active, not passive. It seems to start with more spiritual responses.  We can bless those who curse us and pray for those who abuse us. Thoughts and prayers are the easy part. But what about turning the other cheek when someone strikes us? That is more difficult. Now, it is said by some interpreters that turning the other cheek is an act of resistance.  That sounds better than simply being a doormat. Nonviolent acts of resistance, such as those witnessed during the Civil Rights struggle, would seem to fulfill this call. From turning the other cheek to giving one’s coat or shirt, these are responses that may raise questions in the minds of the oppressors. At the same time, we might want to place a few caveats here. This can prove very dangerous to vulnerable persons, especially women who have been counseled to stay with husbands or boyfriends who act violently toward them. In other words, this is not a counsel to put ourselves in places of unnecessary danger.

                In verse 31, Jesus gets to the core message. It is the Golden Rule. Do to others as you would have them do to you. We find something similar in the teachings of most religious traditions. Thus, Rabbi Hillel declared: “That which is despicable to you, do not do to a fellow. That is the whole Torah, the rest is commentary. Go and learn it.” Buddhism teaches: “Treat not others in ways you would find hurtful.” So, this is not something unique to Jesus, but it should be a prime message of the Christian faith.

                In the verses that follow, Jesus develops his message about loving one’s enemies and doing good to others as we would have them do good to us. He asks his audience what credit it would be, as a follower of Jesus, to love those who love us. That’s easy. We would assume that our family loves us, and the same is true for our friends. Even sinners do that. There’s nothing special here. After all, you can be a mafia kingpin and love your family! But what about those outside this circle? This is where it gets more difficult. In fact, Jesus offers some examples that are challenging at best. He speaks of lending in the expectation of getting something back, what credit is that to you? Sinners do the same. So, when it comes to loving one’s enemies, doing good, or lending, one shouldn’t expect anything back in return. In defining love, Jesus overturns the idea of reciprocity. You love because God loves, expecting nothing in return.

                Since Augustine’s teachings on the ordering of love have entered the conversation in recent days, it is worth noting that Augustine did emphasize the commandments to love God and neighbor. He writes: “So if it seems to you that you have understood the divine scriptures, or any part of them, in such a way that by this understanding you do not build up this twin love of God and neighbor, then you have not yet understood them.” [Saint Augustine, Teaching Christianity, Book 1:40, p. 129]. While Tom Oord might offer a somewhat different definition of love than Augustine, I think he would agree with this statement from the primacy of love from Augustine. The question then might center on definitions of love, something Oord has done for us.

                In his book The Nature of Love, Oord provides a very helpful definition of love that can guide our interpretation of this passage. Lifting up the Greek word agape, Oord defines this form of love as  “acting intentionally, in response to God and others, to promote overall well-being in response to that which produces ill-being.” He then offers a more succinct definition, calling this “in spite of love.”  Thus, “just as God loves us in spite of our rebellion, complacency, and sin, so we ought to love others and ourselves in spite of the pain, suffering, and destructions others and we have done.” The goal of this kind of love is “promoting good” [The Nature of Love, p. 56]. I think this definition fits the text nicely and offers an important response to those who would place limits on love. Even Augustine, when defining the ordering of love, simply addressed the question of prioritizing who to help when resources are limited. But I’m not sure that is the case for the United States when it comes to helping people in need wherever they might be found.   

                Jesus does suggest that there will be a reward for those who embrace these teachings. That reward will come from God, in that they will be called “children of the Most High.” After all, God “is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.” Therefore, “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”

                This passage offers us one of the more difficult words from Jesus. Implementation will require great discernment on our part, such that in loving our enemies, we do not allow ourselves to be abused. On the other hand, Jesus’ commendation of mercy to others is an important word. Even as God is merciful, so should we. The question is, what does this involve? Ultimately, following Oord’s definition of love, the goal here is creating a space of well-being rather than ill-being so that one’s enemy becomes one’s friend. That is a good reminder of how we as followers of Jesus should live in this time and place, with the hope that enemies become friends through love. As the old song reminds us: “What the world needs now is love, sweet love!”

Image Attribution: Henrietta. Kindness and Generosity, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=59069 [retrieved February 16, 2025]. Original source: https://flickr.com/photos/wonderlane/4463707407/.