While love can and often does bring healing, sometimes it will simply give us the strength to face the threats of our enemy without fear and without threat in return. "We must in strength and humility meet hate with love" ~ Martin Luther King, Jr
Connecting to Love: Day 18 ~ Loving our enemies
Image source: internet - unknown author
History unfortunately leaves some people oppressed and some people oppressors. One of the great fallacies of our modern life is the assumption that we have the right to live in peace and security.This is an age of hate, terrorism..., certainly we are a terrified generation.
Human beings also have a virtue representing human kindness, compassion, and affection - the unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another.
"Enemies" mean that are people who are repeatedly going against your desires: they may not call themselves enemies, you may not call them enemies, but they resist your will, they are contrary and antagonistic.
Loving your enemy means practical acts of helpfulness in the ordinary things of life. If you love your enemies, then you will not partake in revenge against them which only increases hatred and more violence.
Loving your enemies means that we should be kind to them even though they treat us like dirt. We don't seek revenge, but leave the person and situation in God's hands to do with as he wills.
How do you go about loving your enemies?
According Martin Luther King, Jr (Sermon -Loving Your Enemies) "First, we must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. It is impossible even to begin the act of loving one's enemies without the prior acceptance of the necessity, over and over again, of forgiving those who inflict evil and injury upon us."
In order to love your enemies, you must begin by analyzing yourself. Seems strange to you that you love your enemies by beginning with a look at self.
Some people will not like you, not because of something you have done to them, but they just won’t like you; some people aren’t going to like the way you walk; some people aren’t going to like the way you talk; some people aren’t going to like you because you can do your job better than they can do theirs; some people aren’t going to like you because other people like you, and because you’re popular, some people aren’t going to like you because your hair is a little shorter than theirs or your hair is a little longer than theirs; some people aren’t going to like you because your skin is a little brighter than theirs; and others aren’t going to like you because your skin is a little darker than theirs.
So that some people aren’t going to like you, not because of something that you’ve done to them, but because of various jealous reactions and other reactions that are so prevalent in human nature.
But after looking at these things and admitting these things, we must face the fact that an individual might dislike us because of something that we’ve done deep down in the past, some personality attribute that we possess, something that we’ve done deep down in the past and we’ve forgotten about it; but it was that something that aroused the hate response within the individual. That is why you must begin with yourself. There might be something within you that arouses the tragic hate response in the other individual.
We begin to love our enemies and love those persons that hate us whether in collective life or individual life by looking at ourselves.
Prayer for your enemies is one of the deepest forms of love, because it means that you have to really want that something good happen to them. You might do nice things for your enemy without any genuine desire that things go well with them. It may be for their conversion. It may be for their repentance. It may be that they would be awakened to the enmity in their hearts.
There will come a time, in many instances, when the person who hates you most, the person who has gossiped about you most, the person who has spread false rumors about you most, there will come a time when you will have an opportunity to defeat that person. It might be in terms of a recommendation for a job; it might be in terms of helping that person to make some move in life - that is the meaning of Love.
Make like Martin Luther King, Jr. "I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear."
In the final analysis, love is not merely an emotional something, Love is creative, understanding goodwill for all human beings. According Franklin P. Jones "Love doesn't make the world go around. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile."
So, we must discover the power of love, the redemptive power of love, and when we discover that we will be able to make of this old world a new world.
We will be able to make men better. Love is the only way.
Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you... let us join together in a great fellowship of love...
DAILY QUOTE:
“Whenever you are confronted with an opponent, conquer him with love.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
ACTION:
Ask yourself: my behavior benefit all beings?
Identify and appreciate the various ways love reveals itself to you across your life.
Redefine the things you think, say, and do in your daily interactions with all human beings.
Give you the strong determination, in your life and in all of your attitudes, to work the force of love, Loving without conditions, judgments, or disappointment.
Make a Prayer for your enemies with one or more good intention.
Write in a daily journal the affirmations:
"I Love all human beings without conditions and judgments"
"I love my enemies"
"I love my enemies"
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