Proverbs 20:22 – Do not say, "I
will repay evil"; wait for the LORD, and he will deliver you.
In our passage of confession this
morning we are told to not repay evil with evil but to wait on the
Lord who is our deliverer. Because of our sinfulness and corruption,
our natural instinct when someone has wronged us is to act in kind,
to complete the circle, as it were, and to repay them the evil that
they first paid us.
In the third chapter of 1 Peter, the
Apostle Peter, who initially is addressing husbands and wives but
then expands his exhortation to the entire body, urges them to “live
in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be
compassionate and humble,” and, echoing our passage of confession
from Proverbs, he instructs them, “do not repay evil with evil or
insult with insult, but with blessing, because of this you were
called so that you may inherit a blessing.”
This is not only Godly instruction but
it is wise counsel for people who live at length and for duration
within close proximity of one another. For example, if you have a
family, and you repay a family member's evil with evil, then you are
not only being disobedient before God but you are also setting
yourself up for hard times. You do, after all, live in shared
quarters with that family member. The same can be applied to our
relationships with our neighbors. Unless one of you pulls up roots
and leaves the community you will for all intents and purposes remain
neighbors (geography being the static thing that it is), and if you
repay evil with evil to your neighbors, then you are setting yourself
up to be locked into the determinism of “feuding families”--and
anyone who has read any of the books by Mark Twain which depict such
things knows that this quickly becomes nonsensical.
See, the issue is this. When we repay
evil with evil and think to ourselves, “I'm going to complete the
circle, I'm going to finish this,” what we are actually doing is
perpetuating the presence of evil. Christians, however, are called to
break this cycle. We don't return evil but blessing. Why? Because
that is what God has done towards us. We were evil, we betrayed God.
God, however, gave us Christ. He gave us The Blessing. When family or
neighbors, government or foreign nations, when the world gives you
evil, do the right thing and be a Christian—be shaped by the
activity of God—don't respond with evil, rather, give a blessing
and wait on God's deliverance, wait on God's providential justice.
All of us have failed to do this perfectly, and this reminds us of
our need to confess our sins, so if able, please kneel as we confess
our sins together.
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