Late one summer evening in Broken Bow,
Nebraska, a weary truck driver pulled his rig into an all-night truck stop. The
waitress had just served him when three tough looking, leather jacketed
motorcyclists, of the Hell’s Angels type, decided to give him a hard time. Not
only did they verbally abuse him, one grabbed the hamburger off his plate,
another took a handful of his French fries, and the third picked up his coffee
and began to drink it. How would you respond? Well, this trucker did not respond as one might expect.
Instead, he calmly rose, picked up his check, walked to the front of the room,
put the check and his money on the cash register, and went out the door. The
waitress followed him to put the money in the register and stood watching out
the door as the big truck drove away into the night. When she returned, one of the bikers said to her, "Well, he’s not much of
a man, is he?" She replied, "I don’t know about that, but he sure
ain’t much of a truck driver. He just ran over three motorcycles on his way out
of the parking lot." This comes
real close to the issue Jesus was addressing in Matthew chapter five. His
listeners had been taught to take their truck and demolish the property of
anyone who offended them. However, they
were charged to behave differently. Instead of taking an “eye for an eye” and a “tooth
for a tooth” they were told not to resist the evil done to them, but to turn
the other cheek when being smitten. Further, they were to “Love their enemies
and to bless those who curse them.”
These were and are tough orders to follow. Everything about our humanity cries out for
revenge. Yet, Jesus said we were to operate in love. These were not mere philosophical
words spewing from the Master’s lips. As
those listening would find out later, they were principles He chose to live by.
Only love could allow a man beaten beyond recognition to look upon his perpetrators
and cry out, “Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” We
should ask God for the same depth of love. With the strength of that virtue, we
will find ourselves easily fulfilling our obligation by not taking “An eye for
an eye.”
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