Epiphany 7A ​(Lev. 19:1-2, 9-18; Ps. 119:33-40; 1 Cor. 3:10-11, 16-23; Mt. 5:38-48)

​“You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.”
“Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
“Do not resist an evildoer.”
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
“Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.”

After hearing all these lessons for today the 7th Sunday after Epiphany, I start to wonder why Joyce asked me to cover for her. Be holy. Be perfect. Do not resist an evildoer. Love your neighbor as yourself. And this isn’t enough. Here comes the hardest commandment of Jesus: Love your enemies. Do these commandments sound realistic to you? Are these achievable or realizable? Oh, I’m so ready to say NO! How about you?

But I’m actually wondering what if this is actually possible. If Jesus or St. Paul knew it’s never possible, why would they bother to say it and hand over this teaching generation after generation? So, this time, I want us to set aside all our desires to say no to all these commandments. Instead, I want us to be hopeful that we can indeed live them out. Of course, not on our own, but with the help of the Holy Spirit who guides and moves our hearts to the divine will.

In order to do what’s been asked of us by Jesus, the first thing we should ask ourselves is “What is love?” Not just love, but love in the Christian sense. In the Christian sense, it is far from being romantic. There’s nothing like “roses are red, violets are blue, sugar is sweet, and so are you” about this. Love in the Christian sense is real, earthy, life giving, forgiving, accepting, enduring, and ever embracing.

We all are very much familiar with the 1st Corinthians chapter 13: “Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.”

And we know this love of God in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. As we look at Jesus, we look at the divine love, what love ought to be. Jesus is the divine love incarnate. Jesus is the human form of God’s love. Jesus is not only the Word becoming flesh, but also love becoming flesh.

So what about Jesus the embodied love of God? What does it do to us? St. Paul in his letters to the Corinthians tells us we are God’s temple. And its foundation is Jesus. He is the foundation of our whole being which we call “God’s temple.”

I want to remind all of us that if we don’t see our foundation in our existence, our being, we can’t possibly love anyone in the Christian sense. Without experiencing this foundation, we know nothing about the divine love. Without experiencing Jesus in us, we know nothing about loving our neighbors as ourselves or loving our enemies.

If we desire to love God, ourselves, our neighbors, and even our enemies, we must experience God’s love towards us first. Deep down in ourselves, in our hearts, we discover God’s love. God’s love speaks to us that we are accepted, forgiven, welcome, and are never abandoned in any situations. God’s love speaks to our hearts that God is eternally present with us. Not even death can separate from us. Whatever or whoever curses us and hurts us, God never curses or hurts us. God blesses us and heals us. Finding this eternal love hidden, yet revealed through Jesus Christ in our hearts is our first task if we want to truly love anything or anyone.

Because we are accepted by God, we can accept ourselves and others. Because we are forgiven by God, we can forgive ourselves and others. The Lord's Prayer says, “Forgive our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” God forgives us. Therefore we can forgive ourselves and those who sin against us. As much as we experience and accept God’s love, we can actually love ourselves.

Someone says, “We accept the love we think we deserve.” I believe there is some truth to this. How much love do we think we deserve? Probably not a lot since we are pretty hard on ourselves. But if we look at Jesus, his death and resurrection, God tells us otherwise. The love God shows us in Jesus is the love we deserve. This is the love God believes we should accept. And this is the Gospel! This is the good news! And this is universal, this is catholic!

As we look deep inside our hearts and discover Christ living in us, we learn to love God and ourselves. We slowly and gradually learn to accept ourselves as God accepts us. We learn to see ourselves created in the image of God. The image of God created in us is no one but Christ. We see Christ in us. We discover God’s image in us through Christ.

Our baptismal covenant asks us, “Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?” Seeking Christ in all persons… Don’t forget that you are also included in that category of “all persons!” Loving ourselves begins when we seek Christ in ourselves and fall in love with him. Then, we are able to see Christ in our neighbors. We are able to see the image of God in them. Maya Angelou famously said, “I don’t trust people who don’t love themselves and tell me ‘I love you.’ There’s an African saying which is: Be careful when a naked person offers you a shirt.”

And this is not an easy task. We have to “SEEK” Christ in all persons. Seeking requires a spiritual discipline of seeking Christ in ourselves first, seeking the image of God in ourselves. As we seek Christ in us, we can seek Christ in others, and serve Christ.

So now here comes the most difficult part: loving our enemies. What should we do with this? Again, there’s nothing romantic about this whole business of loving our enemies in the Christian sense. Very thankfully, Jesus never told us to become BFFs with our enemies! Simply love them, and pray for them. In other words, seek Christ in them. Seek the image of God in them. And how do we seek the image of God, Christ in them especially when they are evildoers?

We don’t resist an evildoer in the same way he persecutes us. Instead of retaliating, turn the other cheek. It does sound foolish, but this is Jesus’ way of reminding us what they have done wrong as well as giving them a chance not to do it again. And its non-violent resistance creates social pressure around evildoers. In this way, we never cease to seek and discover his image in them. Help them discover Christ in them. Help them recover and restore their image of God. So we become the sign of Christ. We become the living symbol of the image of God. We become the living reflection of their humanity. So we protest against their own rejection of the image of God created in them. We resist their refusal to see their restored, reconciled, and healed humanity in them. We fight until they see Christ in themselves. So is this kind of Christian love doable? I believe so!

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.” This love that drives out hate begins from within ourselves, our hearts where we discover and rediscover Christ. 

In this new era of facing a high level of fear, anxiety, hate, and hostility, we are tempted to hate our enemies or those who hurt us emotionally and spiritually. It is easy to not seek th image of God in them, and demonize them. Given that what they’re doing is indeed evil, let’s remember we are Christians. We are called to show their true identity, the image of God, Christ, their humanity in them. As we eat the body of Christ and drink his blood, let us remind ourselves Christ living in us. So we never give up to love them and pray for them. We love them as we never cease to remind them Christ the love becoming flesh is in them just like sun rising on the evil and on the good, raining on the righteous and on the unrighteous. Are we ready to do that? May it be so! Amen.