There are some teachings of Christ that sound good to us and we would set out to complete our Savior´s wishes, but somehow we never quite get the hang of it. In Matthew 5:43-48 Jesus calls us to love not only our brothers, but those who seek to injure us in some way. While this may sound like a quality that we wish we could have, perhaps in reality we have a little difficulty pulling it off.
Jesus mentions here that if we love and treat kindly those we love, it doesn´t score us much points in the spiritual life. What He asks us to shoot for is an attitude far more mature and quite contrary to our human nature. When someone offends us or hurts us our tendency is to guard ourselves from that threat. But Jesus is asking us to do just the opposite.
Somewhere in the wisdom of God, He can see the benefit and it reflects more of His character, to love and open ourselves up to the very people who do not want to feel the same way towards us. This is what God is like. He has opened His heart to a race of people who have throughout the generations, turned to any other thing than to Him.
We have always preferred to be wrapped up in ourselves and our selfish little lives and our sinful ways. If we turn to God it is merely done in certain times and up to the limits that we each set for ourselves. The rest of the day or the week we reserve to run after all the things we would like for ourselves and our own pleasure.
But the Lord does say that there has always been and will always be some who see that this is a quality of God and one which we should seek to make a part of our own nature as well. Some will want to have this strange quality of loving and spreading out our hearts to those who do not have our well-being in mind.
Great, you may say. We know we should have it. But it goes against our nature. How can we get a grip on it or learn to cultivate that inside ourselves. Well, unfortunately it is not something within our power to do. If you are a strong-willed person you may be able to have some success in this area. There are many self-help books written and psychologist ready to give counseling on methods to progress. But no matter how far you are able to control parts of your nature, the moment something really bad happens to you, you may find that the illusion of success was only brain deep.
So what we need is more than psychology or good techniques to overcome this nature ourselves. We need a transformation of nature. That nature that was born inside of us needs to somehow die and a new nature formed inside of us at the core. This is what the Bible describes as the process and this is what Jesus preached and offered us.
The process is clear. There must be a turning. We have to sacrifice who and what we were before when we were under the control of that first nature. To do that we need to realize that it was nothing like the nature of God and we must each work through the thought of whether or not you and I even have the need to go that far.
Many people will say that they want to follow Jesus, but they are not willing to bow down and say, ¨Okay, what I want for myself may not be what God wants of me.´ `Lord, please make whatever changes in my heart that You see fit.¨ We each need to know that to choose the Lord, we have to stop choosing ourselves. No longer do we chase our own dreams, that was the appealing call of the world we knew before. The call we hear now is to look beyond this world and up into the heavenly realms. That is where Jesus sits today and He beckons us to seek Him there. We have felt that calling deep within and our hearts respond with, ¨Yes Lord, I will look away and let my heart run to You.¨
Then, somewhere in this magical process, when we are looking so fully at Him, searching our hearts, the scriptures, looking everywhere to hear His voice encouraging us forward, then somehow, our nature begins this wonderful change.
We cease to be concerned with ourselves as we are enveloped in attaining Him. In turn, in this moment our nature is already taking on a new form. The very nature of Jesus begins to grow deep inside. This happens deeper that methods of serious thinking or programmed processes of reacting to our environment. The more we look at Jesus, the more His nature shines in our hearts and souls.
Now if this is extremely pleasing to think of, and it is, the best part of it though, is that it points to and directs glory unto God. God does everything and He deserves the credit. It was Him who called, He was the reason, the path towards correction, and receives in the end, the pleasure and the honor. It is beautiful and good. What a wonderful Lord we have!
So when you come to ponder just how you will adjust your nature to the callings of Jesus Christ, do not get discouraged. It is impossible for you to do, but nothing is impossible for the One whom you would do it for. Once you decide that you owe Him the effort it will take you to turn from your ways, He provides the solutions. The work gets done inside of us in direct proportion to our dependence upon Him.
Make God that important to you today, that you will not settle for anything less. Let nothing in your life be so important as to take your eyes and heart off of Him. You will be amazed at the nature that grows inside of you as you travel from that self-centered person, to a Jesus-centered person.
Then you will be like the apostles who sang in the prison cells, or like Stephen who prayed for the angry mob as they heaved the stones to kill him. Your heart will go out to those who are trying to harm or slander you because it is no longer your heart. It is the great heart of Jesus, which is the only thing filling your sight and your attention.
Love on my friends,
In Christ.
Amen
Scott W
Searching For Christ 
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