It is different to not be a "nation" but rather a
"people." We don't have a Land
of our own, so we don't have the kind of enemies that the writer speaks of
here. His desire is for the Lord to
destroy their enemies and in doing so, to reveal His glory and His might. It is a stretch to say that the Lord has used
the nation to reveal His holiness to the nations, the prophets would beg to
differ. Is this a prayer that we can
understand or is it dependent on being a nation? We are given an ethical teaching by both
Jesus and Paul that would have us love and pray for our enemies. Does that mean that in no case we should pray
for military victory? In World War II I would
personally have made a case for prayer against the success of the Axis powers
or at least the leaders of those nations but the destruction of the nations is
a different matter.
I wonder who Peter had in mind when he asked Jesus the question
about how many times he had to forgive his brother? Jesus' response points back to our own need
for forgiveness in answer to the question.
We have been shown much grace and granted extraordinary forgiveness and
we are to be shaped by that experience. When
we have been forgiven of so much, we should be those who extend grace to
others. We learn to be a forgiving
people by being forgiven. Jesus took our
sins on Himself, submitting to pain and suffering inflicted not because of His sin
but ours. We are to take up our own
cross and follow Him by forgiving others their sins against us. From that cross He prayed for forgiveness for
those who put Him there, mocked and taunted Him. Then, He gave us His Spirit to enable us to
do the same.
Unfortunately, I regularly see those who desire the gifts
who do not practice love with brothers and sisters. Paul says that the more excellent way is the
way of love and love of a specific kind.
It is a love that sets self last, that doesn't seek to justify itself,
that can't bear to hurt another by the exercise of the gifts, that understands
what it means to allow our freedom to be circumscribed by another not by force
but because we love them. The kind of
love Paul commends here is the kind of love we should have within marriage but
extends it outward to all our relationships within the body of Christ. Most of the church arguments I see and hear
about involve a desire to justify self in some way or another, we practice very
little forebearance, take remarkable offense, and walk away rather than
reconcile. Love requires more of us than
we realize.
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