Day 12: Praying for the enemy?
Matthew 5: 43 “You have heard the law that says, ‘Love your neighbor’ and hate your enemy. 44 But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you!45 In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. 46 If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even corrupt tax collectors do that much. 47 If you are kind only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that. 48 But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.
Loving our enemies feels impossible in our own strength. When someone hurts us, betrays us, or stands against us, our natural response is self-protection, distance, or even retaliation. However, Jesus doesn’t give us an option, He gives us a command: love them and pray for them. Why? Because this kind of prayer does two powerful things at once.
First, it aligns our hearts with the heart of the Father, who loves even those who reject Him. Second, it breaks the chains of bitterness and resentment in our lives. Prayer for our enemies is not primarily about changing them, though God can certainly do that; it is about changing us. It turns our focus from the wound to the Healer and reminds us that no one is beyond the reach of God’s grace because we once were His enemies too. Remember Romans 5:10?
Romans 5: 10 For since our friendship with God was restored by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be saved through the life of his Son.11 So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God.
When we choose to pray for those who persecute us, we step into the very likeness of Christ, who prayed from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). This is costly obedience, but it is also the pathway to freedom and deeper intimacy with God.
A.W. Tozer drives this truth home with piercing clarity:
“We cannot pray in love and live in hate and still think we are worshipping God.”
Tozer understood that authentic worship and authentic prayer flow from the same source, a heart surrendered to love. If we harbor hatred toward anyone, our prayers become hollow. But when we obey Jesus and lift our enemies before the throne, something holy happens: our worship becomes real, our faith becomes credible, and the love of God is perfected in us.
Prayer Focus
Heavenly Father,
Thank You for loving me when I was still Your enemy. Today I choose obedience over emotion. I bring before You the people who have hurt me, spoken against me, or made life difficult. [Take a moment to name them silently or aloud.] I ask You to bless them, to draw them closer to
Your heart, and to meet every need in their lives.
Lord, soften my heart where it has grown hard. Replace any root of bitterness with Your supernatural love. Teach me to pray in love and not in hate, so that my worship would be genuine and pleasing to You. Make me a child who reflects Your Fatherly heart; giving sunshine and rain even to those who don’t deserve it.