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Gospel Reading for June 17, 2025 – Matthew 5: 43-48
POSITIVE
Jesus said to his disciples: “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brothers only, what is unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the same? So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
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Of course, no one can be as perfect as our heavenly Father, but we can strive to be perfect as he is.
Jesus describes being perfect by loving our enemies and praying for those who persecute us. In other words, perfection means going against the flow or not following the usual reactions of people on things that are negative. How many of us will not find it difficult to love our enemies and pray for our persecutors? Most of us would instantly hate them too, and maybe, there will be those of us who will even pray that they be punished. But, this is not God’s ways, because if God were like most of us, we might be receiving punishment left and right. Imagine, if the sun and the rain would be rationed according to what we deserve!
Achieving perfection is to accept the negative and make it POSITIVE. When Adam and Eve sinned and were estranged from God, he did not look at us with disdain and was never repelled by our sin. He continued to love us; to love us perfectly by making his own Son suffer and die for us. As a result, we are no longer estranged from God. We are no longer doomed to everlasting fire. We are now given the chance to live happily ever after with him.
A simple magnet can illustrate this. Negative pole to negative pole will not attract, but negative pole and positive pole will attract. When opposite poles are brought together, their field lines merge and create an attractive force. Let us remember, that negative things will always be part of our lives because of the evil one, but when we treat them positively, it will create a force that will destroy the evil one because the evil one will just be negative and nothing else.
“How lovely on the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who announces peace and brings good news of happiness, who announces salvation, and says to Zion, “Your God reigns!” (Isaiah 52: 7)
