[0:00] This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfred, Georgia. It is our prayer that you will be blessed by the preaching of God's Word. Now go into your Bible to Romans chapter 12. And today we're going to talk about how you treat people that persecute you in a biblical manner.
[0:14] Treating your persecutors biblically. You've got to remember, this chapter started off in Romans chapter 12 and verse 1. We finished up a whole lot of doctrine. And we've started into a very practical passage of Scripture.
[0:27] We've been talking about things that we're going to do as leaders and things we're going to do as workers in the church. And so at verse 1 it said, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice.
[0:39] Holy and acceptable unto God. And you start telling us, look, you guys are going to live a very different lifestyle than anybody else. Because you are born again, you're saved, you recognize all that God has done to save you.
[0:51] And then he said, you know, if you live for Jesus and if you serve him, you're going to get some people upset. There may be some people that mock Jesus. There may be some people that mock you.
[1:02] Right now in Morocco there is a believer that has been locked away for two and a half years because he witnesses some people. And it was against the law and he's put in jail. And our missionary Aaron who's over there is going with some fellows down to meet their family and see what they can do to help.
[1:18] Some people suffer persecution, though most of us here wouldn't know much about that. But read with me if you would. Romans chapter 12 verse 14. And know this. This also talks about how you get angry with people and you want to get even with them.
[1:31] Although the real context is about being persecuted, I want you to know today that this is how a Christian ought to respond as Jesus works in his life.
[1:42] Romans 12 verse 14. Bless them which persecute you. Bless and curse not. Rejoice with them that do rejoice. Weep with them that weep.
[1:53] Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits. Recompense to no man evil for evil.
[2:04] Don't you give another guy bad because he did you bad. Provide things honest. Be clear, transparent, honest, open in the way you do things. Let people know you're for real. If it be possible as much as lies in you, live peaceably with all men.
[2:20] Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath. For it is written, vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore, if thine enemy hunger, feed him.
[2:33] If he thirsts, give him drink. For in so doing, thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good. Father in heaven, I pray that you'd help us as Christians.
[2:46] That we would live out our faith during the week. That we would know how to treat those that we have differences with. That we would respond in a biblical manner to those that even might make fun of Jesus.
[2:58] And make fun of the things of God. That we would have the right attitude. I pray God that you'd grow us and mature us. And help us to develop a sweet, loving, kind, Christ-like attitude to other people.
[3:09] Even lost people. Even our enemies. And I'll give you praise for all you do. In Jesus' name, amen. Sadly, though this passage is about being persecuted for serving Jesus. Most of us will never know anything about this.
[3:21] This is not really about somebody who mistreats you. And just like happens to everybody at some time or other in their life. But you can apply the principles. You and I are new creatures.
[3:32] We're not supposed to be, act, or anything like everybody else on the planet. So let's go through some things here that you can write down from this passage of scripture. The number one thing is why might Christians be persecuted?
[3:46] Why might Christians be persecuted? If you serve God, you might can expect some mistreatment. Some slurs thrown your way. Some ugly things said about you.
[3:56] Or said about God. Or said about your church. So let me show you some things. Look at verse 12. Chapter 12, verse 14. The Bible says, Bless them which persecute you. Bless and curse not.
[4:07] Now he's not talking about your mother-in-law right there. Can you say amen? When he says bless them and persecute you, he's not talking about your mother-in-law. He's talking to Christians who have given their life on a living sacrifice.
[4:18] And he's talking to those that are serving God. So open your Bible to John chapter 15 and verse 18. John chapter 15 and verse 18. And the Bible says, If the world hates you, you know that it hated me before it hated you.
[4:33] If you were of the world, the world would love his own. But because you're not of the world, I have chosen you out of the world. Therefore the world hates you. Remember the word I said unto you.
[4:46] The servant is not greater than his Lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my sayings, they'll keep yours. But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me.
[5:01] John chapter 16, verse 1. The Bible says, These things have I spoken unto you that you should not be offended. I want you to be warned. You got saved. You followed Christ. You decided to follow him.
[5:11] So you need to be forewarned that you're going to have some people say some ugly things about you, about Jesus as you step out. He said, I said this so you wouldn't get offended. They shall put you out of the synagogue.
[5:23] This was their community. They were going to lose their community. Yea, the time comes that whosoever kills you will think he does God service. People will put you to death and say, Man, I'm doing this for God.
[5:34] And these things will they do unto you because they have not known the Father nor me. So let me give you some reasons that you might get persecuted that are from the Bible.
[5:46] The world hates us because we don't belong to them. Not being a part of the world makes us different. Now let me explain to you what's the world again. We've gone over that. We're not talking about human race. We're not talking about the creation.
[5:57] We're talking about a system that says, I don't believe God. I might believe in a God but not the God of the creation. I don't believe that God can only be found through Jesus Christ.
[6:10] So the world is a system under Satan's leadership that hates Jesus. They build all sorts of religions. Satan and the world builds all sorts of religion.
[6:20] They build all sorts of ways for people to get to God. But the main focus of the world is to say no to Jesus. They're all happy that you coexist. They're all happy that you believe in any religion as long as you don't believe in Jesus.
[6:36] And so they want to fit us in their mold. They want to persecute us in our belief so we'll get in line and be forced into the mold to live like them. The world hates us because we were chosen out of the world.
[6:50] There is a difference between us. We see it and understand that and so do they. When you say you belong to God, they hear, well I don't then, huh? They do not like that, obviously.
[7:01] Do you realize that when you say I'm born again, I'm going to go to heaven when I die, I believe in Jesus Christ, I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. When you say that, you say it as a positive statement, but it comes across to them like, oh, so I don't, huh?
[7:14] And so they don't like us. They say, well I believe like this. And you say, well you know the truth of the matter is the Bible says you can only go to heaven through Jesus Christ. Jesus said I'm the way, the truth, and the life, and no man comes to the Father but by me.
[7:26] So you think my religion is not enough, right? Well, yep, that's, yep, you summed it up pretty good. They're not going to like that. And it will bring about some persecution. The world hates us because we're identified with Jesus Christ.
[7:40] We are his. We follow him. We stand for him and his causes. It affects every part of our lives. So making the world, the anti-God thought pattern, very uncomfortable and even angry.
[7:52] So persecution should come toward us for our faith, for living out who we are in Christ. And the world will spur us on. They will react against us and that should spur us on to do things for the right reason.
[8:05] You may face persecution. Now you know that's not as true in the South. In this part of the country, it's culturally accepted to be a Christian, but not a radical one. Not one that comes to church all the time.
[8:17] Not one that reads their Bible all the time. Not one that tries to live out this thing. Not one that tries to talk about their faith. That's what makes you a tad timid about giving out a business card. That's what makes you a tad timid about inviting somebody.
[8:29] If we were having an event, if I had jugglers coming, you'd probably be glad to invite them. But when we think about it, man, you talk about Jesus too much. You mention him in the wrong places. It kind of ruffles feathers, upsets people, makes people uncomfortable.
[8:42] So the Apostle Paul, the Holy Spirit, tells Paul, I want you to tell the Christians how they react when people mistreat them. So now we're not talking about here that you punched your boss and you got persecuted.
[8:54] We're not talking about you picked somebody's pocket and you got persecuted. We're not talking about how your mom-in-law doesn't like you and you're getting persecuted. We're talking about standing for Jesus and standing for right and standing for truth. We're talking about maybe your boss coming to you and saying, I want you to do something.
[9:08] And you in your heart say, I just don't think I can do that. That really doesn't seem right. That's not what the Bible teaches and I don't plan on doing it. So go with me if you would. Chapter 12, verse 14. Chapter 12, verse 14.
[9:19] Again, Romans 12, 14. Bless them which persecute you. Bless and curse not. Here comes our attitude. Rejoice with them that rejoice and weep with them that weep.
[9:32] We do the opposite of what they expect. We do the opposite of what any normal person would do. We're born again believers.
[9:43] We've trusted Jesus Christ. We have a completely different attitude. In Matthew chapter 5 and verse 43, Jesus said, You have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
[9:55] He said, but I say to you, love your enemy. Love your enemy and bless them that curse you. Do good to them that hate you. And pray for them that despitefully use you.
[10:07] And then he said, and if you don't do that, you're just acting like they do. If you act like other people, if you act just like them, you're not acting like a child of God. You're not acting like one of his children.
[10:18] We're doing the opposite. Bless and curse not. Don't get ugly. Don't be mean. Bless. Bless. We're to love our enemies. Love is an action, not an emotion.
[10:29] We're to do what love does. You know, somebody says something wrong. Somebody attacks Jesus. Somebody attacks our church. Somebody says something ugly. And you say, well, we're supposed to love them. And you say, I just don't feel it.
[10:40] You're not supposed to feel it. You're supposed to do it. Love's not what you feel. Love's what you do. Can you say amen right there? By the way, that's how it works in your marriage too. You know, you say, I just don't feel as in love this week.
[10:51] Who cares how you feel? Love your wife. Say amen. Love your wife. You love her. You love her like Christ told you to. You love her like the Bible says to. It's not a matter. Well, I feel it this week.
[11:02] Boy, this week I woke up just really romantic. I mean, this is my romantic week of the year. I'm feeling so in love. That's never the biblical idea. And when lost people mistreat us, or they mistreat Jesus, or they arrest a guy in Morocco, we're to love them.
[11:18] We are to bless them. The Bible says bless them. You know, that means ask God to do something good to them. And to give them what they need, we're not to ask God to curse them. Most of us say, I'll ask God to bless them.
[11:29] Oh, God in heaven. Kill him. Make his camels all die. Put the fleas of a million camels under his armpits. Yes, God, I'm praying for them. That's how we want to pray. But that's not what he said.
[11:40] He said, bless them. We're to find ways to do good to those that hate us. We're to pray for them. And when we do that, we're acting like our Father. We're living out who we are.
[11:51] We're living out who... Do you know? Do you know you changed families? Do you know you changed families? Are you ready for this? There's only two races of people on the planet.
[12:02] Those are the Father God in heaven who were saved and born again through Jesus Christ. And those who have not been saved and born again, that's the other family. Satan's family, God's family. God's race and the other race.
[12:13] That's it. There's only two. There's only really two nationalities in the world. Those who know God and love God and those who don't. And the ones who love Him, love Him through Jesus Christ. We're different.
[12:24] You say, nobody acts like that. Good. We're not nobodies. We're somebody in Jesus. Amen. I'm going to be different, talk different, act different. I want to carry on different because I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice.
[12:40] You say, it'd take a sacrifice to be good if somebody had been mean to me. Good. That's what he asked you to do at the beginning of the chapter. Say amen. He said, I beseech you by the mercies of God. Have you seen how good God's been to you?
[12:51] Then love them who just mistreat us. Then look at verse 15. Romans chapter 12, verse 15. We're to feel as they feel as much as we can. Rejoice with them when they do rejoice.
[13:03] Weep with them when they weep. Within that weep. We want to be happy when they get a promotion. We want to hurt when they hurt. This will all be impossible without God doing something in our heart.
[13:15] He will have to love through us because it goes against human nature. It requires us to be a servant. I'll be honest with you. I've spent almost my entire life being a preacher.
[13:25] I got the first church I worked in. Betty and I got married in August by October. I was working on a church staff. So I really didn't know much about what the world was like.
[13:36] What it was like to work out there with lost people. And one, I think it was David or Joy was going to be born. And my dad called and he knew I didn't have any insurance. And he said, the place I work will hire you for two weeks.
[13:48] But there will be 14, 16 hour days if you want to work. But they pay really good. And in two weeks you're going to pay for the whole delivery of the baby. I said, I'll take the job. I went there.
[13:58] I had no idea where you lived. I had no idea what your job was like. Man, I'm down there. You know, here I go in. Come break time. You know, I get out my little snack like everybody else does.
[14:09] And I bow my head and say a word of prayer. Boy, they didn't like that. You know, they didn't like that. They were cussing and they were laughing at me. And they said, oh, here comes the reverend. Here comes the preacher, man. And they made fun of me.
[14:20] They cussed. I never heard so many cuss words in all my life. For two weeks. I told Daddy after I got through it. I said, I got a whole new respect for the people that go to the church I preach in. And here's what he said to you.
[14:30] He said, I know it's different for you. But you weep with him. You know, the truth is that there were people making fun of me. They were making fun of me for my marriage. They were making fun of me. Because I didn't have other girls.
[14:40] Because I wasn't going out there. They were just having fun. Just making fun of the preacher, man. So I don't really want to bless them. I want to pray for them. But I want God to break their legs.
[14:51] I am praying that all their tires go flat on the way home. Say amen. God in heaven, bless them. Bless them with flat tires. Bless them with a black nose. Where they get punched in blood everywhere.
[15:03] Bless them with a black. You know God. Bless them. That was my prayer. Here's what the Bible said. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's a living sacrifice. A living sacrifice. No matter how they treat you. You be happy with them.
[15:13] You feel with them. You hurt with them. Third thing. Verse 16. Look at verse 16. How are we to treat others? Look at verse 16. Romans 12, 16. Be of the same mind.
[15:25] One toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits. Recompense to no man. Evil for evil.
[15:36] Provide things honest in the sight of all men. If it be possible, as much as is in you, live peaceably with all men. Hey, get the same mind towards everyone.
[15:49] Get a humble mind. Have the right attitude. Don't think you're better than other people. Don't think you're smarter than other people. Don't pay people back with the way they pay you. Be transparent and clear and honest.
[16:00] And as much as you can, live humbly and comfortably with other people. The main application of this passage is about those that are persecuting us or mistreating us.
[16:11] These verses are sandwiched in the middle of the thought of persecution. It started out, bless them that persecute you, and it's going to end up with how we're to treat those that persecute us. So the passage has to be taken about being persecuted.
[16:24] But we're not only to love them and bless them and do good and pray for those that persecute us, but also we're to do that among ourselves.
[16:34] We're to do that among ourselves. Go back to verse 16. Go back to verse 16. Romans 12, 16. Be of the same mind one toward another. Now, you know, I'm supposed to be nice to the guy at work that cusses all the time and mocks God and mocks me and makes fun of me because I've been married to the same woman all these years, mocks me because I don't do the things he does.
[16:55] I'm supposed to be nice to him. But, you know, when you come to church, you're supposed to have that same attitude. They're not, these aren't even your enemies. You're supposed to walk in here and say, man, I've got a sweet spirit towards every brother in the church.
[17:08] We do little things that divide us. We come to expect our brothers and sisters in Christ to treat us right and we get offended if they don't. But we're not to do that.
[17:21] You know, we come to church and it's almost like, it's almost like, all right, I'm used to living and standing for Jesus at work. But when I came, they didn't shake my hand. The pastor didn't shake my hand.
[17:32] And that person sat in my seat. You know, I traveled and preached quite a bit. And I was, Betty and I were traveling one time. We were in a church and I always walk around. I look, man, you look for the little pillow. You look for the little footstool.
[17:44] You look for the Bible. You look for anything that says, this belongs to somebody. And so we were sitting there and this lady came up and she stood right there in the pew and she goes, I said, am I in your seat?
[17:57] She said, yep, for the last 30 years. Excuse me, ma'am. And I got up. I'm about to, I'm about wanting to stand in it. We get offended at church. Say amen. We get offended.
[18:08] More Christians get their feelings hurt. Here's a Romans chapter 12. Don't get offended. Treat your brothers and sisters in Christ like you want to be treated. The idea is to be friendly, easy to get along with.
[18:19] Don't consider yourself better than others. Don't practice elitism or superiority with anyone. Associate with people who are not as important as you are. Be humble. Be honest and above board.
[18:31] Let them see you doing right. I'll leave this point, but you know, it's very easy for us to look and say, that guy looks poorer than I do. He looks like he comes from a less well-off home and I don't want to sit close to him.
[18:43] And this guy looks like he's not, he doesn't, he's not out of my culture and he's not like me and so I'm going to stay away from him. We can get those attitudes. That's never to take place among us.
[18:54] You say, well, it's hard for me to be nice to people. I was raised in the South, man, and I've got some attitudes. Hey, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice.
[19:06] A living sacrifice. And by which your reasonable service to love Jesus and let it show in the way you treat people that come to church. Hey, man, I ought to do it at work. I certainly ought to do it at church.
[19:17] Fourth thing I want you to notice. We're not to seek vengeance. Look, if you would, at verse 19. Romans chapter 12 and verse 19. Dearly beloved, all you Christians, I love you.
[19:29] Don't get vengeance. Avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath. For it's written, vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.
[19:40] Therefore, if thine enemy hunger, feed him. And if he thirst, give him a drink. For in so doing, thou shalt heat coals of fire on his head. We are not to avenge ourselves, not to retaliate, not to get satisfaction, not to punish in return for our mistreatment.
[19:59] I think everybody in this room has been hurt. Some of you may have been abused as a child by somebody. Some of you had a pastor that was just meaner than the devil until you mistreated you and hurt you.
[20:11] You've got an attitude. Some of you had a cousin or an uncle or somebody at work and you've been hurt. And the first thing in our minds is, I want to get even.
[20:24] I want to get even. Our daughter was raped in Peru. She came to the house and rang the doorbell furiously. And I was mad.
[20:34] I was up studying. Nobody was in the house but me and the doorbell. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. I always told them, ring the bell and I will come. Don't go ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. So I got down and I opened the door. I said, stop it!
[20:46] And she's crying. And her dress has been ripped and her face is marked. And she goes, I've been raped, Dad. Well, I'll just be honest with you. Two things happened.
[20:56] Number one, I started running across the road at full speed. You ever seen a bull elephant running? A 300 pound guy? I was running straight. There's a little bit of a taxi driver. He's Peruvian. He's a little bit short. And I'm running across and I've got my fist up and I'm going to kill it and Joy's screaming, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!
[21:11] He helped me! He brought me home! He didn't do it! I went upstairs and I said, what happened? She told me and I drove my fist through the door. Had to pay to fix that door. That was the dumbest thing in the world, you know? Took her to the hospital and she's getting examed and she looks at me and says, Daddy, don't hate Peruvians.
[21:26] Three guys raped me, not the country. You know what I was thinking that whole time? God in heaven, I have some rich friends in America. I'm going to pray for bombers. Stealth bombers. I hope they come down here and kill every one of them.
[21:38] Honestly, my thought was I want them all to go to hell. You ever been there? You get hurt enough, you want to get even, you want to pay back? Here's what he said. Don't avenge yourselves.
[21:49] Don't pay back. Look at Leviticus chapter 19 and verse 18. That's Old Testament as well as New Testament. It says, Don't avenge yourself. Thou shalt not avenge. Now look at this.
[21:59] Nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people. Underline, don't bear grudges. Boy, that'll kill a Baptist church. If you told Baptist people, if you've got a grudge, don't come to church, we wouldn't have an attendance.
[22:14] Amen? So I say, come on, bring your grudge. Maybe I can help you. But hey, we're not supposed to seek vengeance. We're not even supposed to hold grudges. In the hills of Tennessee, when I was a boy, you would often drive by a place they called Devil's Alley.
[22:29] And it would happen in lots of different places. You'd see a fence line on this side of the row, and another fence line here, and weeds and junk growing right there in the middle. And I can remember saying to my daddy, Daddy, that's not really the way we fence.
[22:40] Why do they have the fence, two different fences? And he said, well, that's called Devil's Alley. And I said, well, what's that mean? He said, those two farmers can't figure out where the line goes, so they both put one up, and that land belongs to nobody, just the devil, because they're fighting.
[22:53] Must have been Baptist. Say amen. Must have been Baptist. And here's what he's saying. Don't hold grudges. Don't be like that. God gives us an example for the correct response in the book of Proverbs.
[23:04] In Proverbs 24, 29, he says, say not I will do so to him as he had done to me. Don't you say I'm going to do to him what he did to me. And I will render every man according to his work.
[23:14] Don't say that. That's not our attitude. A lost man might say that. We don't. We're to be filled with love, not hate. In Proverbs 10, verse 12, it says, hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all sins.
[23:29] And so you can live a life, and you can let this vengeance, and this grudge, and this bad act, it's hurting your marriage. It's hurting your marriage. You are still remembering what she did or he did.
[23:41] 150 years ago, and it's affecting you. You're mad at your daddy, and your daddy's long dead. Stop it. Hatred stirs up strife, causes a big stink, and love says, let's just move on.
[23:56] Let's just move on. Look at another verse if you could. Proverbs 12, 16, we can ignore the insults, or we can act like a fool. A fool's wrath is presently known, but a prudent man covers shame.
[24:10] If you act like a fool, if you get mad, I'm just going to mess you up. We can respond with right words. Proverbs 15, 1 says, a soft answer turns away wrath, but grievous words stir up anger.
[24:23] You know, but most of the time, if you look at me and you say, if you say, you're fat, I'll say you're ugly. And if you say something back, I will say something back. We're going to keep it going. But he said, hey, we don't avenge ourselves.
[24:37] Say amen right there. He said, it's hard, brother. In Peru, this message was the most disliked message I ever preached. They told me at that service, some of the ladies came to me and said, we don't appreciate it one bit.
[24:47] Our husband's been a jerk. It was just really bad, but watch this. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice. Yes, it's a sacrifice to forgive.
[24:58] Yes, it's a sacrifice to lay the grudges down. I can work at promoting love and understanding, or I can cause division. Proverbs 17, 9 says, he that covers a transgression seeks love, but he that repeats a matter separates friends.
[25:14] So here's what he's saying. He said, Christians, you don't need to fight your own fight. You don't need to retaliate. You don't need to punish people back. Man, churches are so full of just vindictive, bitter people, and lost people don't even want to have anything to do with us.
[25:33] We're supposed to be the people where the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts. But we're walking around like, I'm ready to punch somebody. I'm ready to punch somebody. I'm aggravated.
[25:44] That's never attitude. We're to put that down. We are new people in Christ Jesus. Can you say amen? You've got marriage problems going on right now in your marriage, and a lot of your marriage problems are this.
[25:56] I'm still mad. I've got a grudge. I'm not forgetting. I'm going to stir it up, cause a stink, do everything I can, when love would cover it up, and move on. That's what the Bible says.
[26:09] Your parents, your kids, your neighbor, cover it up and move on. We can wait on God to take care of us. In Proverbs chapter 20, verse 22, the wise man said to his son, say not thou, I will recompense evil, but wait on the Lord.
[26:26] Wait on the Lord. This passage of Scripture is going to talk about heaping coals of fire on his head, but this is no secret backdoor way to be mean to people.
[26:38] You know? It's no secret backdoor way to be mean to people. The idea in the Bible is not turn the other cheek and then punch him. The idea in the Bible is I'm going to conquer with love.
[26:50] I'm going to love him in spite of what he does. I'm going to be kind in spite of him. I'm going to respond correctly. Proverbs 24, 17 says, Rejoice not when your enemy falls.
[27:01] Let not your heart be glad when he stumbles, lest the Lord see it, and it displeases him, and he turns away. I'm not supposed to be going, I'm going to be nice to you, so God will kill you. That's not supposed to be my attitude.
[27:13] That's not supposed to be my attitude. I know I've got mercy, and I want others to get mercy. The forgiven, forgive. But our whole society is almost built on a bitterness.
[27:26] We treat our enemies with great kindness. This is not a weapon against them, but rather genuinely loving them and praying that God will save them. 1 Thessalonians 5, 15 says, Follow that which is good, both among yourselves and to all men.
[27:39] I've got to quit. But can you realize, do you have any idea what got a hold of the Apostle Paul and convicted him and got him saved? Do you remember? Stephen was being stoned for being a Christian, and they were laying their coats at the feet of Saul, who would soon be called Paul, who would become the guy who writes a great part of the New Testament.
[28:01] And guess how Stephen reacted? Stephen wasn't shooting birds back at them. Stephen wasn't cursing them. Stephen wasn't praying God would get evil with them. Stephen wasn't throwing any inside cuts.
[28:14] Stephen just said this, Forgive them, Father. And he looked to Jesus, and old Saul couldn't handle it. It seems like from that very moment on, he kept kicking against the pricks that kept hurting him.
[28:29] And he realized, I'm wrong. And he realized, he was doing wrong. Get this. Here's some practical applications.
[28:40] In Exodus 23, in verse 4, he said to them, If you meet your enemy's ox, or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring him back again. So if you happen to be, you happen to be walking down the road, and here comes your enemy's donkey.
[28:53] And you're like, that's my enemy's donkey. He's going to lose his donkey. He's going to lose his cow. He's going to lose something of value to him. I'm going to just look the other way. He said, No, no, no, no, no, no. You're mine.
[29:03] I saw what you do. You grab the animal and take him back. He said, You're walking down the road, and your enemy's horse is carrying a large load, and he falls out under the load, and you walk by saying, Ha, ha, ha. Woo-hoo.
[29:14] I don't like you. And your horse fell down, and I'm glad he did. And you just keep going. He said, No, no, no. You get down, and you help him get back up. We are different because we've been born again, and it changes and affects the way we do things.
[29:29] Get you to verse 21, and end the chapter. He says, Overcome evil with good. In Proverbs 25, 21, it says, If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread, and the Lord shall reward you.
[29:44] In verse 22, God's going to reward you. We don't stoop to their level. We're children of our Father. We cannot be known for what we don't do.
[29:57] Christians are like, We don't do that. We don't do that. We don't do that. That's not who we are. You didn't get saved to quit. You got saved to start. You didn't get saved to stop doing this, and stop doing this, and stop doing this.
[30:10] That's legalism. That's moralism. You got saved to live a new life in Jesus Christ. That would be totally weird, man. Because you love the guy spitting on you. In Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 28, He says, The guy that stole, don't steal anymore, but get you a job.
[30:27] You stole before, now don't steal. Get a job so you can get to poor people. You used to steal for yourself, now you get a job so you can get to poor people. He said, Don't let corrupt communication come out of your mouth in chapter 4 and verse 29.
[30:39] He said, Don't let it come out, but instead, Don't just stop saying dirty words. Start saying sweet words. Don't stop saying dirty words. Start saying sweet words. Biblical Christianity is not about what you do not do.
[30:52] Biblical Christianity is not about what you do not do, but rather about what you do. It's not really what you do, but it's who you are in Christ Jesus.
[31:02] It's not the negative, but the positive. We don't just not do wrong, we do right. You're not saved from hell alone, you're saved from hell to Him.
[31:15] All this new behavior is not something we do to be, but rather what we do because of who we are. Last illustration. I could say to you, Well, I don't have affairs outside of my marriage.
[31:29] I don't spend time with other people's wives. I don't commit adultery. That's not good. I mean, that's only half of the formula. If I told you, Well, I don't mess around with anybody else's wife, that's never, you know what the real answer is?
[31:43] Man, I'm in love with my wife, and so I never get around somebody else's wife. The negatives in the Bible are so greatly outweighed with the positives. You can walk in light and not darkness.
[31:56] And so you've got a new life. So who are you angry at? Who are you mad at? Who are you bitter with? What are you carrying a grudge about? Do you recognize who you are and who's living with you?
[32:08] Will you live out who you are in Christ? The word in the last verse is overcome, and that's in an imperative form. It says, Be not overcome. Don't let sin and evil and bad win.
[32:21] But you win, overcome with good. We're new creatures. He started the chapter saying, I beseech you therefore, brethren, I beg you, brothers, I'm telling you, brothers, by the mercies of God, you ought to live a new kind of life.
[32:38] A living sacrifice. Now this is really where the rubber meets the road. You've got to get rid of that grudge. You've got to get that chip off your shoulder.
[32:49] I know they did you wrong, and I know they hurt you, and I know people have done you wrong, and you love to keep it all started, but you've got to stop that. You're going to say, No, Lord, no, Lord, I'm going to cover that up. I'm going to forget that, forgive that, and I'm going to start loving people, and caring, and giving.
[33:04] It's not about what I quit doing, and it's about what I start doing. He said, That's tough. I know. That's why he started off the chapter saying, Living sacrifice. Living sacrifice. Well, if my wife will get right, if my husband will get right, if my dad will say he's sorry, if George would quit doing what he's doing, we'd say, No, no, no, no, no, no.
[33:23] You're the living sacrifice, not them. Father in heaven, I ask you to work in hearts and lives. I pray you change people today for your honor and glory. I pray your name would be glorified, and I'll magnify you for what you do.
[33:36] This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfred, Georgia. For more information, log on to www.visionbaptist.com, where you can find our service times, location, contact information, and more audio and video recordings.