WWUTT 2323 Lend, Expecting Nothing in Return (Luke 6:32-36)

You know, it's easy to love somebody who is going to love you back. Even wicked people know how to do that. But it's a lot harder to love someone who will not love you in return. But in so doing, we imitate our Father in Heaven when we understand the text.

Many of the Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When we understand the text is committed to teaching sound doctrine and rebuking those who contradict it. Visit our website at www .wutt .com.

Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

Loving Your Enemies in the Sermon on the Plain

Thank you, Becky. In our study of the Sermon on the Plain, we're finishing up that section where Jesus is preaching about loving your enemies. So let me come back to Luke 6, verses 32 to 36. Hear the word of the Lord.

If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.

And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners to get back the same amount. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend expecting nothing in return.

And your reward will be great. And you will be sons of the Most High, for He is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. So we have a statement here about the common grace of God.

He is merciful even to those who are ungrateful and evil. And so if God is going to show kindness even to those people who act this way, then how much more is it upon you to show kindness to those who would act this way also?

To love your enemies, which is how we started this section. I say to you who hear, love your enemies. That was in verse 27. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who abuse you.

And we're summarizing those statements with this section, verses 32 to 36 here today. So let me come back up to verse 32. If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? In other words, Jesus is saying here that's easy to do without trying.

Even sinners know how to do that. And that's the next line. For even sinners love those who love them. Now with regard to the use of this word sinners, we as Christians will sometimes define ourselves as sinners, right?

You might say of yourself, I am a sinner in need of grace and God gives me grace every.

Day.

I am still a sinner, but God loves this sinner. I have put my trust in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of my sins. And even though I will still sin, I still trust in him. He is sanctifying me. He is making me more holy.

He is shaping me more in his image, right? These are things that we will say even about ourselves in this salvation that we are growing.

In.

We already have salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. We are saved. We are forgiven our sins and we are God's children by the precious blood of Jesus. We have been adopted into the family of God. So we understand that state we have been, we have been brought into by faith in Jesus Christ.

We've gone from sinner to saint, all things considered. But we will still sin as we desire to attain that perfection. Remember that the apostle Paul said in Philippians, not that I have already attained it, but I seek to make it my own because Christ has made me his own.

So the apostle Paul saying, I'm not even perfect, but I desire perfection because the perfect who is Christ has made me his own. And I desire Christ. So then I desire that perfection. I'm going to strive for it, even though we won't reach it this side of heaven, as said in Philippians also chapter one, verse six, for I am confident of this very thing that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it at the day of Christ.

So we're not reaching perfection until that day. But in the meantime, we strive for it. We desire to attain it, right? So as Christians, we're forgiven our sins, but we still understand that we may sin.

That is out of humility that we will acknowledge that about ourselves. I'm not perfect yet. But in scripture, sinner is never really used to define the saint. There is a noticeable difference. There is a contrast, a dichotomy between sinner and saint.

The saint is never called a sinner and the sinner is never called a saint. So when we read here that even sinners love those who love them, sure, we might be able to relate on that plane of thinking of ourselves as still occasionally stumbling into sin, desiring to reach perfection, but we've not made it there yet.

So we might relate on that plane, but that is not what is intended here. That's not what is meant. Sinner is an unconverted person. A sinner is a person who is not a saint. They are not followers of Jesus.

So this is even set in contrast with those whom Jesus is addressing. Back to verse 27, I say to you who hear. So the ones to whom Jesus is addressing, they're not sinners. The ones who are not listening to God, who would not follow Jesus' teaching, those are the sinners.

And even they who are unregenerate, unconverted, even they love. They love those who love them. Even sinners do this. So what credit is it to you as a saint if you do that? You're doing the same thing sinners do.

There's nothing spectacular about that. There's nothing about your conduct that sets you apart from the way anybody in the world.

Would act.

Everyone knows how to love those who love them. So how as a saint are we different from the rest of those who are in the world? We must love those who will even not give us love in return. They will not love us back.

And Jesus is saying to us, love your enemies, love those who hate you. So we continue on verse 33. If you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same again.

Even those who are unconverted, unregenerate, who are not followers of Jesus, even they know to do good to those who will do good to them. They know that if they do something nice for somebody else, well, then I'm probably going to get something nice in return.

And so the reason why they do good to others is to get something back from it. Even sinners know how to do that. So if you're only treating well those people who treat you well, then how are you any different from anybody else in the world?

Even they know how to do that. Now you might notice here that as we're going through these questions that Jesus is asking, we're going through that same list that he had presented before back in verses 27 and 28.

If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? That's love your enemies, love those who are not going to love you in return. If you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you?

That goes to do good to those who hate you. And now we have in verse 34, if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? And that goes back to when one takes away your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either.

So Jesus is going back through that list, helping his disciples to see that what you are naturally inclined to do is to love those who love you back. What should you be doing as somebody who is otherworldly, not of this world, of a different kingdom?

What does Christ expect of those who live in his kingdom? How are they to love? They are to love even their enemies. They are to even lend and give, expecting nothing in return. Love your enemies, do good, expecting nothing in return.

There are times when I have been driving along and I pass by somebody holding a sign that will say, give me food. I have no money. I need gas. I have no job. I'll take whatever you can give me, whatever it is that's on their sign.

And in passing by them, or maybe I'll be up to a stoplight and they'll kind of be standing there in the median or on the sidewalk or something like that. I'll roll down my window and I will have money in my truck.

Probably shouldn't be admitting that. But anyway, I've got money in my truck really for just such an occasion. And I'll wave them over and they'll come over and I'll hand them a 20 or something to that.

Effect.

And they'll say, God bless you. I say, God bless you too. I mean, we're right there in traffic. So it's not like I can take the time to share the gospel with them. More often than not though, they'll say, God bless you.

That's what they say whenever I hand them money. And on the occasion that I do this, usually my children are in the car with me. Now I'm not doing it to give praise or to get praise rather from my children.

In fact, I can't even remember any time my kid said, dad, that was great of you to do.

That.

I don't even notice that. I do it so they can see it. So that they know to practice this, to give money to somebody who can't possibly give me anything in return. I'm even sitting in my car. They're out there on the sidewalk.

What are they going to be able to do for me? We don't know each other's names. Light's going to turn green and I'm going to keep on going. But I've handed something to somebody else expecting nothing in return so that my children will see that practice and they will understand the importance of that as well.

And we'll talk about it later. Those things have come up around the devotions at the table or something to that effect. So I'll want to do those things so that they can see it. I've done it when I'm by myself as well, but I do want them to see it so that it becomes a witness and a testimony to them to do kindness to others who can't give them anything in.

Return.

Now, a common thing that you'll hear said in the world, in fact, you'll hear it said in churches a lot as well, is that you shouldn't give folks begging like that money because what are they going to do with it?

They're just going to go and blow it on drugs or something like that. So what would be better is to give that person food. Sometimes I've given that person food, but understand the frailty of that argument.

Like you're saying, don't hand them money because what are they going to do with it? They're just going to go and blow it on drugs.

All right.

Well, if you give them food, what are they going to do with that? They're going to eat it, but the money they make, they won't spend on food. They'll just go spend it on drugs. So I mean, however way you come at that, you're still going to be equipping them to some degree to be able to use money to buy drugs.

If that's the logic, that's what I'm saying. Your logic for why you wouldn't give a homeless person money is because, well, they're just going to go and buy drugs with it anyway. But if you give them food, then you're saving them the money they're going to get from some body else to go and buy drugs with it anyway.

All I'm saying is that that reasoning doesn't work. One way or the other, helping them in any way would somehow be, you could make it out to be an excuse that they're going to go and buy drugs. That's not a reason to not help somebody.

You're claiming to know their heart and you don't really know it. Now I would say we still got to be wise with the way that we're going to help somebody else. I think that that's important also. But we shouldn't have this attitude of trying to make excuses of why I wouldn't help somebody.

Okay, fine. You don't want to give that person money, but what are you going to do to try to help somebody that is in need? How are you going to demonstrate giving to somebody expecting nothing in return?

Where do you do that? Do you only do that in the church? Well, again, that goes back to what Jesus is saying here. Do you only give to those that are going to give you something back? They're going to love you back.

You would expect, even if you give to somebody in your church who's not going to give money back to you, they're still going to get love. You're going to get love from them, right? They're not your enemy.

They're your brother or sister in the Lord in the church. This is whom we are supposed to help. As said in Galatians chapter six, as we have opportunity, let us do kindness to everyone, especially to those who are of the household of faith.

We should be showing that kindness and that love first to our brothers and sisters in the Lord, even before we go outside the church to help others. That goes, again, that goes back to these questions that Jesus is asking.

Why are you only going to show love to somebody who loves you back? Even sinners know how to do that. What are you going to do to show kindness and compassion to somebody who can't give anything to you in return?

Even love or kindness or any kind of affection, appreciation at all, beyond saying thank you. Even if they don't say thank you, are you still going to give to that person out of the loving kindness of your heart, in the loving kindness of the heart of God, which has been shown to you?

So love your enemies and do good, Jesus says. And lend expecting nothing in return and your reward will be great and you will be sons of the most high for he is kind to the ungrateful and to the evil.

So really what's being said here is that our trust is in something beyond this world. I'm not clinging too tightly to the stuff of this world. I have such a loose grip on those things that God has blessed me with that I'm willing to let it go to somebody else, even if I don't get anything back from it, even if they don't give me a thank you for it.

Because ultimately, who am I out to please? I'm out to please God. And though that person may be ungrateful, my heavenly father sees what I've done. And I know that my father in heaven loves me and I am a son of the most high.

And my reward in heaven will be great. There's nothing wrong with that, by the way. There's nothing wrong with doing kindness to somebody else, expecting a great reward in heaven. That's fine. That is not selfish.

It's not selfishly motivated at all. It is actually trusting God, and that's what we're supposed to do. Hebrews 11 .6 says, without faith, it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

This is part of our faith in God, of knowing that he is a loving God. He is a benevolent God. He gives good gifts to his children. To say to yourself, I'm going to do kindness to somebody else expecting nothing in return.

I'm not even going to expect anything from God. Do you realize that's actually a selfish statement? You might think that you're being the most selfless person in the world. I'm not even expecting anything from God, but it's actually selfish because you're boasting in your own humility, which is not humble, and you're denying something that is glorious about the character of God, that he loves his children and will give good gifts to us.

Praise God. Let that be to the praise of his glory and his grace, not to you and because of anything that you have done, but because he is loving and kind to his children. It is perfectly fine to do good to others, not expecting anything in return on this earth, but expecting that our heavenly father is going to reward us greatly.

That's faith. That's believing in what you cannot see, what you won't even receive this side of heaven, but you know God will give it to you in the next. Your reward will be great. You are trusting in the words that Jesus said here, and you will be sons of the most high.

That's what I want. That's the most of what I want. I don't want somebody else to give me recognition. I don't need the praise of man. I'm recognized by my father. I am loved by him. And that's the most that I could ask for.

What could man give me that's better than that? And as it goes on to say, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. He was kind to you when you were ungrateful and you were evil. Jesus came to save sinners, right?

First Timothy 1 .15, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. That's you. Christ came to save the wicked. That's you. God is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. That's you. And his kindness was demonstrated in giving his son, Jesus Christ, to die on the cross for your sins.

So that you would come to faith in Jesus and not perish under the judgment of God that you deserve because of your rebellion against him. And now in Christ Jesus, you've become something else. You were ungrateful.

Now you give praise to God. You were evil. But now you've been made into a saint. And you are being sanctified by the Holy Spirit of God that dwells within you. This is what God has done for you, oh evil person.

And so how much more is it upon you to be kind to others even when they don't give you anything in return? God is kind to the ungrateful and to the evil. The common grace of God that is upon each and every person.

But you know that kindness more specifically, more specially than anybody else who is not a follower of Jesus. Because you have come from death to life by faith in Jesus Christ. And so Jesus concludes this section anyway in verse 36 by saying, Be merciful even as your father is merciful.

As we read in Lamentations 3, His mercies are new every morning. Great is his faithfulness. My friends, this is God's disposition toward us every day. Because he is good to his children. And so let us show good to others.

That maybe by our kind deeds we have an opportunity to share the gospel with that person. And they may come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved from hell. And have eternal life with God in glory.

Which is the testimony of you and me. Heavenly Father, we thank you for what we've read here. And I pray that it does soften our hearts and humble us to recognize the importance of showing love to others who they even will not show love back to us.

But you have loved us. And you show a common grace to people who will not love you back. And so shouldn't we as imitators of our Heavenly Father be merciful even as our Father is merciful. Thank you for giving your Son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins.

May we be grateful for that every day of our lives. And continue to show the kindness of Christ to others. So that they too may hear the gospel and live. It's in Jesus name that we pray. Amen.

Closing Announcements and Schedule

You've been listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday Gabe will be going through a New Testament study. Then on Thursday we look at an Old Testament book.

On Friday we take questions from the listeners and viewers. Tomorrow we'll pick up on an Old Testament study, When We Understand the Text.