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Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse\u2026Don\u2019t pay back evil with evil. Be careful to do what everyone thinks is right. If possible, live in peace with everyone. Do that as much as you can. My dear friends, don\u2019t try to get even. Leave room for God to show his anger. It is written, \u201cI am the God who judges people. I will pay them back,\u201d says the Lord. Do just the opposite. Scripture says, \u201cIf your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. By doing those things, you will pile up burning coals on their heads.\u201d Don\u2019t let evil overcome you. Overcome evil by doing good (Romans 12:14, 17-21).

What do we do in the face of evil? This is the question that ends Romans 12. The question is not about evil out there somewhere. Paul is writing to the church about love. The full question is, \u201cHow do we love our enemies when they do evil to us\u201d? This was not meant for human governments, but rather for individual Christians when people intentionally hurt us. Here is the answer: \u201cDon\u2019t let evil overcome you. Overcome evil by doing good.\u201d

There is a recognition that evil is very insidious. It begins small, and if the trickle is not stopped, it will become a flood that fills us up. In the end, it will overcome us. Evil works that way. It grows. It begins with a thought, a flash of anger and builds until it bursts out of us.

Evil will grow and poison everything it touches. It is said that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, perpetrators of the Columbine High School massacre, were motivated by revenge. They felt mistreated, rejected, and abused, and this was a way of taking revenge and getting back\u2014evil responding to evil, hate responding to hate. It was reported that they shouted as they entered into the building, "This is for all the people who made fun of us all these years," and then they laughed and opened fire. Those two allowed hate to take root in their hearts, and it grew until the fruit of it erupted in violence.

This idea lies at the heart of the epic fantasies The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. Both of these stories also contain the Biblical antidote: love. How do we counter evil? By overcoming it with good.

Remember that we are talking about sincere love. This is the agape of God towards us. We don\u2019t deserve God\u2019s love, yet he gives it to us. God comes to us in the blood of Jesus and forgives all the evil we have done. He over comes the evil we commit with his goodness.

To overcome evil with good is God\u2019s master plan of salvation. His purpose is to reclaim His creation from the control of evil, transform it, and bring it back under the control of His righteousness. In other words, He will overcome the world\u2019s evil with His good. In following the command of Christ to \u201cbless and not curse\u201d (Matt. 5:44; Luke 6:28) and by returning good for evil, we do as God does, and we become active participants in His great plan for the world.

We need to understand this. We also need to believe that this is true. Only if we believe this will be get Paul\u2019s invitation to \u201cleave room for God to show his anger.\u201d Some have suggested that we ought to let God get revenge for us because \u201cHe can hurt \u2019em a whole lot worse than we can!\u201d However, the wrath of God is never retaliatory or spiteful; it is always redemptive. God pursues the sinner, cuts off his escape, confronts her with the consequences of sin, chastises him, and makes her sin miserable.

Why? To bring to repentance. To give grace. To redeem our enemy as He has redeemed us. When we take our own revenge, we stand between God and His beloved. Furthermore, we take the Creator\u2019s place on the seat of judgment in the life of another creature.

Jesus experienced all the hatred and injustice and violence that the leaders of this world could pour out on him. He was victim of the mindless hate and the violence of the crowd and the Roman soldiers who had nothing against him personally but who used him as an excuse to vent the hatred in their hearts.

But Jesus did not take on and return their hate, and He did not let it change Him from His course of revealing the Father's love, His love even for God's enemies. Love is stronger than hate because hate enslaves, and the decision to love brings freedom. He forgave His enemies.

Christ, when he died by submitting himself to the hatred of his accusers, offered us a solution to the hatred and injustice of the world. Without him, it is eye for an eye and tooth for tooth. But now there is a new way. The way of love. This does not mean that justice has been abolished. But it means that we are relieved of the burden of justice. We can leave that to God. And we can love our enemies because God loves us.

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