In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, Amen.
I stand before God in confession and I say my sins in the presence of another. It is hard, it is challenging, but it demonstrates that I have, at least in part, contrition. I stand before God and he pours out his mercy upon me: I am healed and freed from the sin which held me captive. God has renewed in me the new Life which I have received in baptism. I walk out a changed man. And then someone hurts me, looks at me the wrong way or offends me and I am full of anger.
“As you wish that men would do to you,” says the Lord, “do so to them.” For indeed we could also say, “As you wish that God would do to you, do so to your neighbour.” For in the scariest words in Scripture, perhaps because we are familiar with them we may well overlook their full meaning, the Lord commands us to pray,
And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
— Matthew 6:12
“As much as I am willing to forgive others,” the Lord is telling us, “to the same measure the Lord will forgive me.” And so Christ commands us to love to a higher degree,
But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return.
And this is not merely food for thought, this is not merely challenging, this is impossible. And yet the Lord has given us the promise,
The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.
— Luke 18:27
We are called to live by the standards of the Kingdom and not by those of this Age. We are called to love without requiring anything from the other. And our loving of others is a demonstration of our love for God. The beloved disciple puts this in stark terms.
If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?
And this commandment we have from him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.
— First John 4:20–21
Let us, therefore, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, learn to love others as God has loved us through his Church where we bring our meagre offerings before the Lord and he returns to us an abundance of Life, where we receive from the Lord many gifts for us to distribute to the world, “and [our] reward will be great, and [we] will be sons of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish. [Let us] be merciful, even as [our] Father is merciful.”
That we may offer true honour, glory and worship to our God and Saviour Jesus Christ, by whose power we may do unto others as we would have them do unto us, together with his unoriginate Father and the All-holy, Good and Life-giving Spirit, Amen.
Brethren, it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has commissioned us; he has put his seal upon us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. But I call God to witness against me – it was to spare you that I refrained from coming to Corinth. Not that we lord it over your faith; we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith. For I made up my mind not to make you another painful visit. For if I cause you pain, who is there to make me glad but the one whom I have pained? And I wrote as I did, so that when I came I might not suffer pain from those who should have made me rejoice, for I felt sure of all of you, that my joy would be the joy of you all. For I wrote you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you.
— Second Corinthians 1:21–24, 2:1–4
The Lord said, “As you wish that men would do to you, do so to them. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For 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? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”
— Luke 6:31–36