10. “Pray for My Enemies? Surely You’re Joking!”
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“Pray for My Enemies? Surely You’re Joking!”
Praying for one’s enemies is no joke—it’s exactly what Jesus instructed His disciples to do and what He said applies to us today. “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matt. 5:43–45). In another passage, Luke recorded four specific responsibilities: “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you” (Luke 6:27–28). That’s quite an agenda!
Christians shouldn’t deliberately make enemies, but if we follow Jesus Christ, we will certainly have enemies, and often they will be professed “religious people,” the kind of people who crucified Jesus. Some people will hate us, others will hate us and curse us, and a few will hate us, curse us, and deliberately mistreat us. That’s the way the world (“society apart from God”) treated Jesus, and that’s the way we should be expected to be treated the more we become like Him. If you want to be comfortable in this world, then you can’t be conformable to Jesus Christ (Rom. 12:1–2).
In spite of occasional bland tributes to “Jesus the teacher” or “Jesus the lowly carpenter,” the world hates Jesus Christ and the people who try to live like Him (see John 15:18–25). You can talk about “God” in a generic way in a public civic ceremony, but you don’t dare mention the name of Jesus in a manner that suggests that He is Lord—unless you want to be attacked by the politically correct. “They will treat you this way because of my name,” Jesus said (John 15:21), but this kind of treatment can be a pathway to blessing. “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven” (Matt. 5:11–12). It all depends on our faith and love.
If we covet a win/lose solution to a problem—we win, they lose—then matters will only grow worse, and God’s reputation and our testimony may suffer. But if by faith we seek a win/win solution, so that we grow spiritually and our enemies get closer to repentance, then God is glorified. But even if our enemies resist our love and oppose our Lord, we have a guaranteed reward in heaven that will honor Jesus Christ. After all, a hundred years from now, it will make little difference what people think or say about us, but what God does with us will make a great deal of difference.
So, when we pray for our enemies, what should we ask God to do? Should we read their names into David’s imprecatory psalms and beg God to destroy them? How do we love our enemies, do good to them, and honestly pray for them?
For Christian believers, to “love” these people simply means to treat them the way the Lord treats us. God listens to us, so we listen to them. God is kind to us, so we are kind to them. God doesn’t give us what we deserve (that’s mercy), but He does give us what we don’t deserve (that’s grace), and we should follow His example. God forgives us for Jesus’s sake, and we should forgive others for Jesus’s sake. God wills His very best for us, and we should pray for His very best for those who treat us the worst.
But this is something we can’t do in our own natural strength. This kind of Christian living demands a great deal of faith and love, and only the Holy Spirit can provide what we need to have that kind of love (Rom. 5:5).
It’s likely that Stephen’s example and prayer at his martyrdom was a turning point in the life of Saul of Tarsus (Acts 7:54–8:1; 22:10), and this is an encouragement to us whenever people start throwing verbal stones at us—or even real stones. With our eyes on that heavenly promise, we need to pray that God will bless our enemies into the place where the goodness of God will bring them to repentance (Rom. 2:4). We pray them not into judgment but into obedience.
Not only can the Lord turn water into wine, but He can also turn curses into blessings. The evil prophet Balaam tried to curse Israel, but God turned his curses into blessings (Num. 22–24; Neh. 13:2; Deut. 23:5). If we have faith and love, we can pray for those who curse us because we know God can turn the curses into blessings, not only in this life but also in the life to come in glory. At least that was Paul’s inspired conclusion as he pondered the world situation: “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (Rom. 8:18).
The future is your friend when Jesus is your Lord.