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HOW SHOULD WE GREET OUR ENEMIES?

Matt 5:43 "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'
44 "But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,
45 "that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
46 "For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
47 "And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so?
48 "Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.

notice that in not even one of these scriptures does He say to AGREE with them. He says to love them, in other words, pray for them, for their understanding... and help them if they need help (their donkey is sick... they need food or drink... help them if you can) and so on and so forth... HE DOES NOT SAY TO HANG OUT WITH THEM... BE BEST BUDS (American slang for friends)... or anything like that... He does not even say TRUST them... not at all... a BIG difference in loving and trusting... you can love without trust, and you can even trust without love... He says in verse 45 that God is even good at times to those who are evil... ("makes the sun rise on" them... in other words they have good air to breath, food to eat, shelter, and clothes just like we do)... and "rains on the just and the unjust"... bad things also happen to good people... and God is in control of ALL of that. BUT He is NOT telling us to go shopping with, eat supper with, go bowling with, or in any way hang out with these evil people, indicating that we agree with their evil ways... just love them and greet them (say "hello" to them) with a smile, showing the love of God. For one thing... God is a sovereign God... if He wants to save their soul (and He does, it's not His will that ANY should perish)... then who are we to shun them and in the process turn them away from God... what good would that do?? Also there is another scripture that I believe agrees well these here in 2 John...

RO 12:20 Therefore "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; If he is thirsty, give him a drink; For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head." 21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

also found here...

Proverbs 25:21 If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; And if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; 22 For so you will heap coals of fire on his head, And the Lord will reward you.

Here He is NOT telling us to become best friends with them... but to do good to them... in "heaping coals of fire on his head"... we are causing the convicting power of the Holy Ghost to have access to convict them... thus could very well be instrumental in bringing about their salvation... then we will no longer be enemies.

example: Lynn Davenport and I have worked together in online ministry for over 10 years now... and in the old "Hands of God" community we had a man to come in who called himself "Rudy"... he confessed to me at one point that he called himself that because he intended to come in and be rude to us "Christians"... (I put that in quotations because that was attitude at the time)... he wanted to show us how stupid and rediculous we were... he got pretty rude at times... some people wanted to get rude back... I wouldn't allow that, I told them that he just didn't understand and let us show him the love of God and help him to understand... as long as there was no name calling or cursing or vulgarity or anything... I wouldn't let him do that, but I explained that to him in a loving and kind and gentle way (if had persisted and refuse to listen I would have had to ban him... but he stopped doing that)... but he would really do all he could to prove us wrong and such as that... but we were very patient and kind to him....
one night he called me into a chat... and he asked me "what is this 'salvation' thing?" I explained it to him... he asked "how do you go about getting it?" I explained that to him... he was quiet for several minutes... I didn't know what to expect... and then the next thing he said was "I did it!" I said "did what?" he said "I just got saved, and now I know what ya'll have been talking about, I know it real"...
Then he told me all about why he came into the community and how he had a really hard time understanding why we didn't treat him as bad as he treated us, it confused him, it worried him, he couldn't get it out of his mine (that was the coals of fire on his head)... Today the man is a preacher, preaching God's uncompromised word!
If we had just turned our backs on him and shunned him, what good would we have done?... if we had just agreed with him and let him think he was right, would good would we have done?... thus the scripture above in action.


NOW...



2 John 1:1 THE ELDER, To the elect lady and her children, whom I love in truth, and not only I, but also all those who have known the truth,
2 because of the truth which abides in us and will be with us forever:
3 Grace, mercy, and peace will be with you from God the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love.
4 I rejoiced greatly that I have found some of your children walking in truth, as we received commandment from the Father.
5 And now I plead with you, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment to you, but that which we have had from the beginning: that we love one another.
6 This is love, that we walk according to His commandments. This is the commandment, that as you have heard from the beginning, you should walk in it.
7 For many deceivers have gone out into the world who do not confess Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist.
8 Look to yourselves, that we do not lose those things we worked for, but that we may receive a full reward.
9 Whoever transgresses and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ does not have God. He who abides in the doctrine of Christ has both the Father and the Son.
10 If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive him into your house nor greet him;
11 for he who greets him shares in his evil deeds.

the word "greet" definition in the strongs concordance...

Bid: 3004 levgw Lego (leg'-o);
Word Origin: Greek, Verb
a root word

1. to say, to speak
a. affirm over, maintain
b. to teach
c. to exhort, advise, to command, direct
d. to point out with words, intend, mean, mean to say
e. to call by name, to call, name
f. to speak out, speak of, mention

now notice that this one word can have different meanings...

in Matthew he is talking about definition e. to call by name... greet them with their name (in other words be friendly... has nothing to do with teaching, trusting, advising... or anything other than a friendly "hello")

in 2 John he is talking about c. to exhort, advise, to command, direct.... more so the exhortation part of it... don't encourage him in his evil ways... don't AGREE with him... if we encourage their evil ways then we are as guilty as he is.