Today’s Devotional
You have heard this command before, and something in you flinched. Love your enemies. The words land in a room where someone specific lives, someone whose face you can see right now, someone who has cost you sleep and trust and peace you earned. Jesus said these words to a crowd of people who had actual enemies: occupiers, tax collectors who skimmed their wages, neighbors who reported them. he said love them, do good to them, bless them, pray for them, and every verb in that list is an action, not a feeling.
That matters more than most people realize. Jesus did not say feel warmth toward the person who broke you. he said do good. he said bless. he said pray. Each word is a thing you do with your hands, your mouth, your minutes. Love here is a practice, the way playing the piano is a practice: you sit down, you begin, you are terrible at it, and you come back tomorrow. The man who said these words did not say them from comfort. he said them on his way to a cross, where he practiced every one of them on the men who nailed him there. Father, forgive them. That was the same love, hitting the same keys, for people who were actively killing him.
I think this is why the command starts with “to you who are listening.” he knew most people would stop hearing after the word enemies. he was looking for the ones who would stay.
Time to reflect
These are worth sitting with slowly, one at a time.
- When you hear “love your enemies,” whose face appears first? What have they cost you?
- Have you been waiting to feel forgiveness before you act on it, and has that waiting kept you frozen?
- What is one small, concrete act of good you could do for someone who has wronged you, even if everything in you resists it?
- Where did you learn that love has to feel natural before it counts?
Prayer Of The Day
Lord, you know the name I am thinking of right now. You know what they did and you know what it cost. I do not feel generous toward this person. I do not feel warm. I feel tired and used and unsure why you ask this of me when the wound is still open. But you asked from a cross, and your hands were bleeding when you said the words. Teach me that love is something I do before it is something I feel. Give me one step I can take today, even a clumsy one, even one that feels forced. I trust that you honor the practice even when the player is terrible. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.
Strengthening Faith
Every one of these is small enough to do today, and each one moves toward the verse, not just around it.
- Read Romans 12:17-21, where Paul expands on the same teaching. Notice which phrase unsettles you most and write it on a piece of paper you keep in your pocket today.
- Pray for the person who came to mind during this devotional. Pray by name, out loud, for thirty seconds. You do not need to mean every word yet. Start anyway.
- Identify one routine unkindness you carry toward someone, even a stranger: the coworker you ignore, the neighbor you avoid eye contact with. Today, reverse it once. Say good morning. Hold the door. Let the reversal be small and real.
- Sit in a chair for two minutes without your phone and ask God to show you one thing about your enemy that he loves. Stay until something comes, even if it surprises you.
- Cook or prepare something extra at your next meal and give it to someone you would not normally feed. The act does not need a speech attached to it.
Today Wisdom
Listening is already a kind of love. The crowd heard “love your enemies” and most of them walked away. You are still here, still holding the sentence, still turning it over. That willingness to stay when the words get heavy is the first note of the practice he described.
