1 Epiphany 7A Trinity Hamburg 2.19.17 Our Enemies are Our Friends

 +There's a great children's book called Let's Be Enemies. The story is all about James and John, two boys who had been friends but because John found James to be a bit too bossy, are now enemies.
You can’t be enemies, in the true sense of the word, without first being friends.
“Enemy” is derived from the Latin inimicus, “In,” meaning “Not” and “amicus” meaning friend. An enemy is someone who is, decidedly NOT A FRIEND.
Now I know we toss the term enemy around when referencing less personal relationships---Isis is our enemy, but when considering the true meaning of the word---enemy as in notafriend---we get closer to what scholars believe Jesus meant in this part of Matthew's gospel.
In Let’s Be Enemies, John, the narrator, is ticked off at his former friend and current “notafriend,” his enemy, James.He spends most of the story talking about retaliation-- what he isn’t going to let James do now that they’re enemies-and what John is going to do to James---revenge.
John engages in what Jesus is telling us to avoid---retaliation and revenge in response to being betrayed, violated, cheated or in some way disgraced.
In the days of Jesus, this code of conduct, as outlined in the Book of Leviticus, was the law of the land.
In The Message a contemporary English translation of today’s Gospel, the last verse, “Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect” is translated to read: "In a word, what I'm saying is, Grow up. You're kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you."
John in Let’s Be Enemies is acting like a child. Which is appropriate since he IS a child, but to us, Jesus is saying---“enough with revenge and retaliation—an eye for an eye will just make the whole world blind (Ghandi) Love is the way forward. It’s the only way forward.”  
Now, Jesus isn’t telling us that we should be some type of doormat for abusive behavior. Nor is He telling us that we must passively accept the misfortunes of life. Today’s Gospel is telling us that when we’re treated badly, when our feelings are hurt, when our trust is broken and when our faith in another is betrayed, we shouldn’t “beat them at their own game” or give them a taste of their own medicine.” That’s the behavior of the playground, of children, of immaturity. The behavior of the grown up, the behavior of one mature in the faith of God is to respond to betrayal, lies, and hurt feelings with Love. To realize that the one who is behaving badly is the one who’s hurting, the one who’s lost, the one who’s stuck on the playground of retaliation and revenge. We are to the best of our ability, treat “our enemies,” like God treats us, with love and patience, in generosity and graciousness.
[Now hear me loud and clear, I’m not saying that we should stay in dangerous situations. People in situations of physical, sexual, economic or emotional abuse need to first treat themselves with love, and get into a safe place surrounded by trusted people. God does not want us to be martyrs.] But, outside of these abusive situations it’s pretty clear: we are to love our enemies.
I get it…this isn’t easy. Who wants to love the very person/people that has hurt or infuriated us? But, as we all know, being followers—authentic followers---of Jesus Christ isn’t always easy.
But it is pretty simple. All Jesus asks us to do is to be like him and he---even when he was hanging on the cross---had one clear and consistent position when it came to other people: he loved them. He didn’t always like them, he didn’t always agree with them, he didn’t always enjoy them. But he loved them. Doing this isn’t easy, but it is necessary, because it’s the foundational principle of our faith.
In Let’s Be Enemies, James and John learn that not being friends is a lot harder than being friends, so they make up:
After walking away from each other for a time, John approaches James and says:
“Hey James?”
What?”
“Let’s roller skate.”
“OK. Have a pretzel, John.”
“Thank you, James.”
There’s a lesson here----as children of God we have a responsibility to rise above pettiness, to rise above reacting out of anger, to rise above retaliation. We are Children of a God who will give us all the love we need, who will soothe our wounds with a love which is beyond all understanding. And, just like the child who finds solace when wrapped in the arms of a loving parent, we too find solace in the loving arms of our God, who will—who does-- make everything better. So better that, once the sting of our anger, our hurt and our betrayal is washed away by that Love, we can, like John, turn to the James’ in our life and say, “want to go roller skating, want a pretzel” Because, through the grace of our loving God, I am able to forgive you, you are able to forgive me and together we can move on.
So Let’s be Enemies, Let’s Be Friends, remembering that we are the children of a God who gives us the grace to turn the other cheek, to love the unlovable and to leave the playground of revenge and retaliation behind.
Amen.