Thoughts for 2022: How Will We Treat Those Who Persecute Us?

Thoughts for 2022: How Will We Treat Those Who Persecute Us?
Monday, January 10, 2022 by Dr. James W. Walraven

Romans 12:14: “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse” (NAU).

It is hard for us to bless those who persecute and hate us, isn’t it? Our reaction is to respond in kind: to love those who love us and to hate those who hate us. We even, at times, struggle with loving other believers who may strongly disagree with us on any given issue. Yet, as Jesus said in John 13:35, others will know we are disciples of Jesus by our love for fellow believers. But that isn’t where things end. We are to bless those who persecute us, something we do not naturally do.

We don’t see Jesus railing against those who nailed him to the cross, do we? Rather, we see him praying to the Father that the Father would forgive them, for they didn’t know what they were doing. As Romans 5:8 makes clear, God demonstrated his love for us in that while we were sinners Christ died for us.

Our response might be along the lines of, “Jesus was God, we aren’t.” So we might be tempted to give ourselves a pass on that bless your enemies stuff. Yet the Bible provides us with some outstanding examples, David’s relation to king Saul being one of them.

As we’ve seen in some recent posts, king Saul was persecuting David, seeking to destroy him. What was David’s response? Did he seek to kill Saul in return? No! In 1 Samuel 24, David has the chance to kill Saul in a cave. Saul had entered the cave, but unknown to him, David and his men are hiding there. Some urge David to do it, but David responds that he won’t stretch out his hand against Saul because Saul was the Lord’s anointed. David has another opportunity to kill Saul, as recorded in 1 Samuel 26, but he again refuses. In essence, in both cases he “blesses” Saul, the persecutor, by sparing him.

After Saul is slain in battle, 1 Samuel 31, David doesn’t gloat. Rather, he mourns for Saul, 2 Samuel 1:11–12, and composes a lament that speaks of Saul’s and Jonathan’s accomplishments, 2 Samuel 1:17–27.

How unlike so much of what we see going on in the world around us, even sadly at times within the church.

We need to remember who we belong to: Jesus Christ. We are to be different from what we see taking place in the world. We are to serve as living examples of the difference that Christ makes in people’s lives. Imagine what would happen if we were to start to bless those who disagree with us about taking, or not taking, the Covid vaccine. Think of what might take place within the church if we set aside disagreements over non-essentials and focused instead on blessing others. Think what the result could be if we started blessing those who seek to persecute us.

For 2022, how will we treat those who persecute us? Will our response demonstrate to them that we truly belong to Christ? Will they see any difference between our response from the world’s? Or, will we look like any non-Christian? For 2022, let us seek to renew and deepen our relationship with Jesus Christ, to walk in obedience to him.

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