Luke 6: 27-38
God our Father, You redeem us and make us Your children in Christ. Look upon
us, give us true freedom and bring us to the inheritance You promised. We ask
this through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You and
the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Jesus said to his disciples: "To you who hear I say, love
your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray
for those who mistreat you. To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer
the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not
withhold even your tunic. Give to everyone who asks of you, and from the one
who takes what is yours do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have
them do to you. For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?
Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good
to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do the same. If you lend money
to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even
sinners lend to sinners and get back the same amount. But rather, love your
enemies and do good to them, and lend expecting nothing back; then your reward
will be great, and you will be children of the Most High,
for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as
also your Father is merciful. "Stop judging and you will not be judged.
Stop condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be
forgiven. Give and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together,
shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure
with which you measure will in return be measured out to you."
In today’s Gospel we have the second part of the “discourse on
the plain.” In the first part (Lk 6: 20-26), Jesus addresses
Himself to the disciples (Lk 6: 20). In the second part (Lk 6: 27-49), He addresses Himself “to you who listen to Me,”
that is, the great crowds of poor and sick people, who had
come from all parts (Lk 6: 17-19).
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Luke 6: 27-30:
Love your enemies! The words that Jesus addresses to these people are demanding
and difficult: to love your enemies, not to curse them, to present the other
cheek to anyone who slaps you on one cheek, and do not protest or complain when
somebody takes what is yours. Taken literally, these commands seem to favor the
rich who rob, but not even Jesus observes them literally. When the soldier
struck Him
on the face, He did not offer the other cheek but rather reacted firmly: “If
there is some offense in what I said,
point it out, but if
not why do you strike Me?” (Jn 18: 22-23). Then, how are these words to be understood? The
following verses help us to understand what Jesus wants to teach us.
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Luke 6: 31-36:
The Golden Rule! to imitate God. Two sayings of Jesus help us to understand
what He wants to teach. The first saying is
the so-called Golden
Rule: “Treat
others as you would like people to treat you!” (Lk 6: 31). The second saying is “Be merciful as your Father in
Heaven is merciful!” (Lk 6: 36). These two
directives indicate that Jesus does not want simply to change the situation,
because nothing would change. He
wants to change the system. The novelty which He wants to construct comes from
the new experience of God the Father, full of tenderness who accepts all! The
words of threat against the rich cannot be the occasion of revenge on the part of the poor! Jesus
demands the contrary attitude: “Love your enemies!” Love cannot depend on what I receive from others. True love
should want the good of others, independently of what he or she does for me.
Love should be creative, because that is how God’s love is
for us: “Be merciful, as your Heavenly
Father is merciful!” Matthew says the same thing with other words: “Be perfect
as your Father in Heaven is perfect” (Mt 5: 48). Never will anyone be able to say, “Today I have been perfect as the Father in Heaven is perfect! I have been
merciful as the
Father in Heaven is merciful.” We will always
be below the measure which Jesus has placed before us.
In Luke’s Gospel, the Golden Rule
says, “Treat others as you would like
people to treat you!”
(Lk 6: 31). Matthew, in his Gospel, gives a different formulation: “Treat
others as you would like others to treat you.” And he adds, “That is the Law
and the Prophets” (Mt 7, 12). Practically,
all religions in the whole world have the same Golden Rule with a diverse
formulation. This is a sign that a universal intuition or desire is expressed
which comes from God and is part of our being in the image of God.
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Luke 6: 37-38: “Do not judge and you will not
be judged; do not condemn and you will not be
condemned; forgive and you will be forgiven; give and there will be gifts for
you; a full measure, pressed down, shaken together, and overflowing, will be
poured into your lap; because the standard you use will be the standard used
for you.”
These are four counsels: two in a negative form, do not judge and do not condemn; and two in positive form: to forgive and to give an
abundant measure. When
He says, “there will be gifts for you,” Jesus refers to the treatment which God wants to bestow on us. But when our way of treating
others is mean, God cannot use with us the abundant and overflowing measure
that He would want to use.
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Celebrate the
visit of God. The Discourse on the Plains or the Sermon on the Mount, from the
beginning, leads the listeners to make a choice, to opt, in favor of the poor.
In the Old Testament, several times, God placed before people this same choice,
blessing or
curse. People were given the freedom to choose: “Today I call heaven and earth to witness against you: I am offering you
life or death, blessing or curse. Choose life, then, so that you and your
descendants may live” (Deut 30: 19). It is not God who condemns, but the people themselves
according to the choice that they make between life and death, good or evil.
These moments of choosing are moments of the visit of God to His people (Gen
21: 1; 50: 24-25); Ex 3: 16; 32: 34; Jr 20: 10; Ps 65: 10; Ps 80: 15; Ps 106:
4). Luke is the only Evangelist who uses this image of the visit of God (Lk 1:
68, 78; 7: 16; 19: 44; Acts 15:1 6). For Luke it is the visit of God which
places the choice
between blessing or curse before people: “Blessed are you who are poor” and
“Alas for you, the rich!” But people do not recognize the visit of God (Lk 19: 44).
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Do we look at life and at
people with the same viewpoint as Jesus?
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What
does it mean today “be merciful as your Heavenly Father is merciful”?
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Am I
as literal as
Jesus in love
and mercy, or do I
rationalize it away
and compartmentalize it so it doesn’t apply to situations in my life?