“And now, dear lady, I am not writing you a new command but one we have had from the beginning.  I ask that we love one another.  And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands.  As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love.”

2 John 5-6

Loving hard people can be hard.  Loving people who don’t reciprocate the same kind of love can be challenging, yet we are still called to love each other and love our neighbors.  I’d say that this is probably one of the harder commands that Jesus gave to us.  We are in a world full of distrust, dissension, selfish desires, people living for themselves and in a society that says “do you” rather than “less of you”.  Each time we respond in love is another opportunity to be like Jesus and that’s the goal, isn’t it?  To be more like Jesus.  Being more like Jesus takes intentionality, self-control, thoughtfulness and less of the world.  

John, the apostle tells us that we are to “love one another, for love comes from God.  Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.  Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.  This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.”  1 John 4:7-9  God loves us so much that he found a way for us to be saved.  God loves us so much that he sent his only son to die for us, to show us what love really looks like;  sacrificial, unconditional, even when we don’t deserve it.  “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins (not his sins, but OUR sins, our wrong doing, our bad behavior, our faithlessness).  Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”  1 John 4:10-12 God loved and still loves us so much, even when we don’t trust, when we hurt, fight, complain, think worldly, when we sin- yet He sent His only son for us.  God gave us love, even when we deserved the opposite.  God gave us love in our disobedience, yet he still loved us.  John then tells us “we also ought to love one another”.  Even that person that doesn’t treat you well and talks behind your back?  Love them.  Even that person who continually pushes your buttons and has to have the last word?  Love them.  Even that person who is the complete opposite than you?  Love them.  We are called to love one another, not every other person, but one another.  That means that difficult and hard person.  That means the person that you’ve tried to love and continually pushes you away.  We are called to love one another because “God lives in us and his love is made complete in us” 1 John 4:12.  

Complete, finished.  Jesus died on the cross for us, because he loves us.  Complete, finished, he bore our sin, even when we didn’t deserve it, even when we were hard to love, yet he loved.  Is your reason for not being able to love that hard person greater than Jesus’ ability to love us even when we don’t deserve it?  We know that the Holy Spirit is in us, so we have the ability to show greater love, we can show and respond lovingly, even when they don’t deserve it.  We can turn the other cheek because we are not like the world, we are made new and have a piece of Jesus’ love inside of us, that we can display.  

Jesus had every single reason to be mean to and disregard Judas.  Jesus had every reason to deny Judas, treat him unkindly, ignore him, talk badly of him.  Jesus knew that Judas was going to betray him, yet he still showed love and offered him a seat at the table.  Jesus put on love, even when he had a reason to put on hate.  I’d argue that Jesus’ reason to hate Judas is greater than your reason to not love that hard person.  So how can we love that person that is so hard?  Seek the Lord in all that we do.  Pray for strength in loving that person and trust in God’s way over the worlds.  The world will tell you to hate that person, make your point and deny them, but God tells you to love them anyway.  “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.  But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you”.  Matthew 5:43 “If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life.”  1 John 5:16  Pray for your hard person.  Pray for those who persecute you.  Pray that God will give them life.  Pray, that’s your weapon, not your tongue.  Yes, it would be easier to just say the mean thing back, have the last word, hurt that person in the moment with your quick tongue, but it’ll only leave you feeling good for a moment.  You’re not weak because of silence, you’re weak because of giving into that quick tongue.  Don’t stoop to the world’s standards, rise up to God’s instructions.  We don’t need to have the last word, Jesus finished it for us.  Remind yourself that each empty word “you had to say” will be accounted for.  “But I tell you that people will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken.”  Matthew 12: 36  

It’s not fair though, why do I get to let that person get away with saying whatever they want?  Because Christ is in you.  “But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear.” Matthew 13: 16 You have a greater reason to love and be an example of Christ’s love.  Yes, they may not deserve it, but neither do we.  We are just like Judas at the table, dipping our bread in the same bowl as Jesus, knowing we are betraying Jesus by doing the exact opposite as he commanded us, to love each other, love your enemy.  It’s not a suggestion, it’s a command.  That person is hard, I get it, but each time you put down your pride is an opportunity to pick up the cross.  “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up the cross and follow me.  For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.”  Matthew 16:24-25  By choosing Jesus, we are choosing love and not hate.  By choosing Jesus, we are choosing to love that hard person, even when it’s hard.