Sermon Preached February 20, 2011 by Pastor Spaude
Reckless Love! - Matthew 5:38-48
How would you define reckless? I remember a story my dad told me of when he was growing up in Lake Benton Minnesota. Back then before Xboxes and I pods they had to make their own fun. In summer my dad and his three brothers got the idea that they would make a diving suit to dive in Lame Benton. Somehow they constructed a suit with a metal helmet that was waterproof and attached a garden hose to the helmet. The idea was that two people would be in a boat up top and one would walk the bottom of the lake. One of the persons in the boat would man bicycle pump attached to the hose. Reckless would be agreeing to be the one to try the diving suit. An example of reckless from my childhood was having bottle rocket wars with my friends. Reckless was devising a rocket gun that held one of those rockets that you blast into the air to shoot at your friends- all the while the blast of the rocket would come right at you as you held the “rocket gun.” Webster’s Dictionary defines reckless as “lacking caution. In others words you know the danger and risk but go ahead and take the chance anyway.
- What it meant for Jesus
In Matthew 5:38-48 was Jesus is asking of his followers is that they be “reckless” as they
love. In other words he’s saying that you know the risk and the danger but that you should go ahead and do it anyways. Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ 39 But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. 40 And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. 41 If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. 42 Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. 43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”
With those words Jesus asks you and me to practice RECKLESS LOVE. But Jesus isn’t asking anything of us that he first didn’t ask of himself. How did Jesus love his enemies? It starts with you and me. By nature we are enemies of God. The Bible says, “The sinful mind is hostile to God.” The sin flows from our hearts and lives is evil in his sight. And yet, God did not seek vengeance, although he rightly could. Our death is not what he wanted. Instead, he sought a way to show us love, and what he came up with was the cross. The cross shows us the depth of his love for people who did only evil to him. On the cross found a way to make us his children, and not his enemies so that we might show love to all others as well. On the cross He gave us more than his shirt off his back. He gave us his back his hands his feet, his side his body and soul for us. How REACKLESS to go to the cross knowing that some people will never believe in what you did? Some would even mock you as many do today. Jesus knew that when he gave himself up in Gethsemane. He knew the risk and the danger- yet it did it anyways. RECKLESS LOVE. That RECKLESS LOVE made us God’s children. So when Jesus asks you to practice RECKLESS LOVE, he is simply asking you to be a “chip of the block,” to act as your Father God and brother Jesus acted.
- What it means for us
So what does RECKLESS LOVE means for us in our lives? With the words “You have heard
that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for a tooth’ Jesus was telling us to let the punishment fit the crime and let the government take care of punishing the evil person. Let the government be concerned about getting even, not you. You are “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. What Jesus wants you to consider is how you respond to an evil person. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?”
Jesus isn’t looking for mechanical actions here. I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine. No that would be easy love. RECKLESS LOVE doesn’t only love your best friend or that person in church who helps you. RECKLESS LOVE loves the member who doesn’t help you and maybe disagrees with you. RECKLESS LOVE allows itself to be hurt by someone’s words and “turns the other cheek” in other words doesn’t hurt them back. RECKLESS LOVE views being wronged not as a great injustice but just another opportunity to reflect the kind of love Jesus had without wanting revenge. RECKLESS LOVE “gives up my coat and go the extra mile when our children or elderly parents press our patience into service or our elderly parents.
Kids, what happened the last time you were playing and one of your friends pushed you or said something mean to you? Deep down inside what did you want to do? Did you do it? The rest of us, what happened the last time someone took credit for something you did or said? What happened the last time someone insulted you in front of a lot of people? Deep down inside what did you want to do? Did you do it? But RECKLESS LOVE doesn’t say “What about my rights?”
Nor does it try to “just be as loving as it has to be.” It knows that it might be taken advantage of. When I did my circuit pastor visit to Christ Lutheran Church I asked our two called workers Pastor Biedenbender and Eileen Zanto what were their greatest challenges that Satan places before them. Eileen said, “How do you tell who to help? So many people come and many times I find out later that they were lying.” It isn’t easy practicing RECKLESS LOVE.
That doesn’t mean that Jesus is asking you to put your life or the lives of others at risk as if you can’t practice self-defense. That would be breaking the 5th commandment. Nor is he asking you to give all you have away that you can’t provide for yourself or your family. For that would be sinning against the 8th commandment by not protecting life and not be a good Christian steward of your possessions. Nor is he asking you to expose your faith and soul to danger by joining with another’s sinful lifestyle- that would be breaking the 1st commandment.
But he is asking us to knowingly take a risk and put our egos or pride in danger. Think of the situations and people in your lives. How many people aren’t there in your life where you could say, “I don’t want to show love to that person. They don’t show me love.” Before we respond to any situation or any person Jesus wants you to search your heart and find a way to respond that shows Christian love and glorifies God. He wants us to check our egos and pride at the door. You see, Jesus wants your attitude not your actions. Jesus wants your heart not your hands.
Why? Because do that not only is God pleasing but is preserving for your soul. Revenge, anger, “what’s in it for me”, “I don’t have to”, and mere actions--- those are all poisons that Satan sows in the souls of God’s children- poisons that will harms our faith and can eventually kill off our faith. “Be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect.” Why is that principal so difficult for us to hear? Better yet, why is that so difficult for us to live? It’s difficult because the sinful flesh we carry around looks for an excuse to not love perfectly. It loves a good argument with the in-laws. It won’t stand for being overlooked at work. And it certainly will “defend” itself, if someone so much as lays a finger on it.” And to tell you the truth the sinful flesh won’t even mind causing a nice division at church.
But when Jesus says, “Practice RECKLESS LOVE” He reminds us that there is no “But how can you expect me to love that person” in God’s vocabulary. And how thankful we must be for that. God never said “But how can you expect me to love that person” when he looked at you or me. He loved unconditionally. He
- February 20, 2011,