The Daily Word
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But I want to move on to another ‘do not’. In the Old Testament, the general rule within the Mosaic Law was ‘an eye for an eye’, in other words ensure you get proper payment for a wrong done to you. Yes, this could be described as justice, but essentially it is raw justice. But in Romans 12, Paul reiterates the teaching that Jesus had introduced which tempered justice with mercy. If God did not temper His justice on our sinful nature with His mercy shown when He allowed His Son to take that just punishment in our place, then we would have no hope of eternal life. So Paul improves on the Old Testament model by these words, “Do not repay evil with evil”.
Our natural tendency, if someone offends us or does us a bad turn, is to react either verbally or physically and seek to get our own back. Seeing that we are not under Law but under grace, where is the scriptural basis for this reaction? Essentially we are giving way to the devil! And that is a strong word and I use it carefully. But we have the supreme example of Jesus Himself who bore the contradiction of sinners against Him even to the death on the cross. And He could have at the least rebuked them justly and even obliterated them as they were effectively committing blasphemy and He would have committed no sin.
Even if we think of exacting revenge on someone, then we are in a sinful situation. We certainly cannot accomplish this on our own and we need to pray quickly and urgently to stop our natural human instincts taking over.
I realise that this is heavy teaching and we are all guilty of contravening this exhortation but this is an essential part of further words from Romans 12 that I want to look at.
Article written by Brian Preston, Elder @SFGH Church
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