Let’s reflect for a few minutes on some words from a sermon by – in my opinion – the greatest preacher who has ever lived. The most Spirit-anointed, bold, and compassionate pastor of all time. The greatest preacher and most wonderful pastor of all time, in his sermon on the mount, said this:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.
You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you: Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons 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. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
– Matthew 5:38-48
Here are these wonderful, beautiful, deeply challenging words from the Lord Jesus. Of course, there are people who try to claim that the Lord Jesus contradicts the Old Testament Law, when he says ‘you have heard that it was said … but I tell you’. But all of this is God’s word. All of it was given by the holy, loving, just, merciful God. The God who does not change. When God’s Law told people ‘an eye for an eye’, he wasn’t saying ‘get revenge however you can’. No, he was saying, ‘Don’t escalate the feud.’ Justice is important. If someone takes something from you, there should be a consequence to that. But it isn’t two eyes for an eye, and a life for a tooth. It’s an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Justice is to be done, by those who are responsible for it.
And in terms of love, the Old Testament does tell us to love our neighbour, just as the New Testament does. But its laws don’t tell us to hate our enemy. That was being said in Jesus’ day, ‘love your neighbour, and hate your enemy’. But it was a total distortion of the law. In fact, the Law of God had always taught God’s people to love their enemy. Whenever I get to Exodus 23, just a few chapters after the giving of the Ten Commandments, I’m amazed by these words:
“If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, be sure to take it back to him. If you see the donkey of someone who hates you fallen down under its load, do not leave it there; be sure you help him with it.”
-Exodus 23:4-5
Even way back in Exodus, soon after being released from the steel grip of Pharaoh, that great enemy of God’s people, the Lord is instructing his people to do good to those who hate them.
So, the Son of God does not contradict the moral commands that God has given his people. But he does intensify them. See, especially in verses 38 and 39 of Matthew 5 the emphasis isn’t on the consequences that should fall on the person who treats his neighbour badly. Rather, the Lord Jesus places all the emphasis on how the child of God is to respond when someone treats them badly or unfairly. In giving his laser focus to what our response should be when someone harms us, he says: “Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.”
And as the Son of God, he has perfect authority to do so. As the One through whom all things were made – including you and me – he has authority to tell all people – including you and me – how to live. To turn the other cheek. Rather than seeking to shame the one who has brought shame on you, instead, you should allow them to shame you further. To keep on doing good to someone who is so unthankful, so inconsiderate of what we are doing for them. To keep on showing kindness to someone who throws that kindness back in our face.
Is this unfair of Jesus, to call us to this? Not at all. Not only does he have the authority to tell us how to live. But he himself has come and lived among us in this way, more perfectly than any other person.
Later on in Matthew’s gospel we read this:
“Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers round him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand and knelt in front of him and mocked him. “Hail, king of the Jews!” they said. They spat on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again. After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him.”
-Matthew 27:27-31
The Lord Jesus, the Son of God, even at the moment he instructed his followers how they should respond to those who shamed them: surely he knew that he would be struck and mocked by soldiers a few years later. He knew that he would be mistreated by those soldiers, far more than being ordered to carry a pack for a mile, as we read about in verse 41. He knew how his creations would treat him, without recognising that he truly is the King of the Jews, and the King of the entire universe. Not recognising that the One they had mockingly dressed in a scarlet robe was the One who is Ruler over all. The One who would redeem his enslaved subjects at the cost of his own scarlet blood. Not recognising as they beat him again and again on the head with the royal staff, that the power it represents truly belonged to this pathetic-seeming prisoner. Not recognising that this One with the crown of thorns pressed into his skull really was the One who would rise again and wear the crown of sovereignty. That one day they themselves would bow the knee before him, whether in delight or in defeat.
And it is through this supreme act of being shamed, of turning the other cheek, that life has flowed out to the world. The Lord Jesus went all the way to the cross, not because we had spoken kindly enough to him, or had worked out a way to earn his favour. But because of his grace. His freely given love. His almost-absurd generosity to those who live in his world, without any reference to him.
And the Lord can work through our loving acts, to point people to our Saviour, who so wonderfully turns the other cheek, to welcome them into his family.
This is hard. Just as in Jesus’ day, when people said ‘love your neighbour and hate your enemy’, it’s easy for us to distort the law. To make it easier to live by. But it’s hard for us to live according to the way of Jesus. It’s easy for us to find a reason why our enemy doesn’t deserve our love. It’s easy even to find a reason why even our neighbour doesn’t deserve our sacrificial service. But it’s hard to love others, as our God has loved us.
And so we need the strength of Christ’s Spirit, if we are to consistently do good to those who don’t seem to treat us well, let alone those who actively treat us badly.
Let’s respond in prayer, giving thanks for the greatest cheek-turning of all, that took place two thousand years ago, in order that we God’s justice against sin would be carried out, and that we might receive his mercy. Let’s ask that he would forgive us for the many times that we’ve acted in such unchristlike ways. Have stood on our rights, rather than standing in the way of our Saviour’s grace to us and to others. Let’s ask that the Lord Jesus would help us in these good commands he has given to us. That he would help us by his Spirit, so that we might live more and more in his ways.
Not That Richard Baxter 