Wednesday, September 30, 2020

PT-2 "Perversion by Addition" (Matt. 5:43)

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/30/2020 9:57 AM

 

My Worship Time                                                              Focus:  PT-2 “Perversion by Addition”

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                      Reference:  Matthew 5:43

 

            Message of the verse:  43 "You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’”

 

            We begin to look at the last part of the perversion by addition which is the last part of verse 43 “and hate your enemy.”  In our last SD we lastly looked at what is called the imprecatory Psalms that were written by David.  However such words did not represent David’s personal vendetta but they represented his concern for God’s holiness and also His justice that it would be executed on those who despised the Lord’s glorious name and to those who were persecuting His people.  You see that before Christ was born the blood line that He would come through had to remain intact so that He would be born at the exact time that God desired for Him to be born.  Now as we go back to look at Psalm 69 again we want to look at verse nine today as it is the basis for David’s imprecations “For zeal for Your house has consumed me, And the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on me.”  We can see from this verse that David is angered about what had been done against God, and in John 2:17 we read these very words that came from the lips of our Lord Jesus Christ at the beginning of His ministry.  He will then cleanse the Temple at the end of His ministry too.

 

            Let us now look at the superscription at the beginning of Psalm 3 and then look at verse seven of that verse:  «A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son.”  “Arise, O LORD; save me, O my God! For You have smitten all my enemies on the cheek; You have shattered the teeth of the wicked.”  We can see that this Psalm was written by David after the demise of his son Absalom as he tried to usurp his father’s kingdom.  David loved his son dearly, and mourned a long time after his death, but he knew Absalom was ungodly and the enemy of God’s people and of His anointed king.

 

            We can see a similar experience from John in the book of Revelation “I took the little book out of the angel’s hand and ate it, and in my mouth it was sweet as honey; and when I had eaten it, my stomach was made bitter” (Rev. 10:10).  The book contained what was going to happen as millions of people would die, but John knew that these people, for the most part were against God.

 

            John MacArthur writes “It is one thing to defend the honor and glory of God by seeking the defeat of His detracting enemies, but quite another to hate people personally as our own enemies.  Our attitude toward even the worst pagans or heretics is to love them and pray that they will turn to God and be saved.  But we also pray that, if they do not turn to Him, God will judge them and remove them in order to prepare the way for His Son Jesus Christ as the rightful ruler of this world.”

 

            When we look at the scribes and the Pharisees we can see that they had no such balance.  They had no love for justice, but only for vengeance.  They certainly had no love for their enemies but only for themselves.  We can see words from David in Psalm 139:22-24 that are needed to be looked at now:  “22 I hate them with the utmost hatred; They have become my enemies. 23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me and know my anxious thoughts; 24 And see if there be any hurtful way in me, And lead me in the everlasting way.”

 

            MacArthur concludes “The scribes and Pharisees, by contrast, knew nothing either of righteousness indignation or righteous love.  Their only indignation was that of personal hatred, and their only love was that of self-esteem.”

 

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  We have a lady in our church who stands in front of an abortion clinic every Wednesday, rain, snow, cold or hot she stands there to minister to ladies who about to kill their baby.  At first there was hatred for the women who were about to kill an innocent person, but then she, through the ministry of the Holy Spirit began to have love for them.  There now has been lives changed because of her love for her enemies and I praise the Lord for that.

 

My Steps of Faith for Today:  To love the person but hate their sin.

 

9/30/2020 10:27 AM

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