DAILY HOPE WITH RICK WARREN 16TH SEPTEMBER 2020.
Daily Hope Devotional by Pastor Rick Warren for today is here to give you the encouragement to live the life God has called you to. Please read, pray and share this devotional with someone today.
RICK WARREN DAILY DEVOTIONAL
Topic of Daily Hope by Rick Warren 16th September 2020 “God Says Respond to Unfairness with Love”
TODAY’S SCRIPTURE: Matthew 5:43-44 NIV
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
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RICK WARREN DAILY DEVOTIONAL FOR TODAY 16TH SEPTEMBER 2020.
Unfairness is part of the human condition. You can’t live on this earth for long without feeling like someone has treated you unfairly. Maybe it’s a parent who put you through a miserable childhood. Maybe it’s an employer who treats you more harshly than they treat your coworkers. Maybe you feel like you were handled unfairly by the legal process.
You can choose to respond to the people who hurt you by hurting them. That’s the easiest choice to make, no doubt about it.
But God gives us another option in his Word: “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 5:43-44 NIV).
When people hurt you, they expect you to retaliate. They expect you to seek revenge. But God wants you to do the exact opposite. He wants you to respond in love.
If you respond to mistreatment with love, you’ll keep the other person from controlling you. You can’t control when another person treats you unfairly. You can control whether you get bitter in the process. You can control your response to injustice.
Just because you respond to an offender lovingly doesn’t mean you continue to allow injustice. On the contrary, we must lovingly seek justice. We must work for justice in the world without retaliating. The Bible commands us to “be fair-minded and just. Do what is right!” (Jeremiah 22:3 NLT).
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a great example of this. He fought against injustice without violence. He overcame evil through the power of love. He followed the example of Jesus, who chose to forgive his persecutors even as they were killing him.
That’s our calling as followers of Jesus. Unfairness and injustice may be part of the human condition, but we must not feed into it. Instead, God calls us to respond in love.
This devotional is written by Pastor Rick Warren. Rick Warren is an innovative pastor, renowned author, and global influencer. The various ministries Pastor Rick has created are a multi-faceted expression of his heart to bring the whole Gospel to the whole world. Read more
