Love your enemies?
Saturday, February 28, 2026
You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.”
Matthew 5: 43-44
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave a remarkable sermon on this verse in 1957. “Probably no admonition of Jesus has been more difficult to follow than the command to ‘love your enemies’,” Dr. King begins. It would be impossible to summarize this awe-inspiring sermon, so I will link the full text at bottom. As a quick ‘outline’, here are his words:
“Let us be practical and ask the question: How do we love our enemies?
First, we must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love… Forgiveness [means] that the evil act no longer remains as a barrier to the relationship…
Second, we must recognize that the evil deed of the enemy-neighbor, the thing that hurts, never quite expresses all that he is. An element of goodness may be found even in our worst enemy.
Third, we must not seek to defeat or humiliate the enemy but to win his friendship and understanding…”
There’s so much more in this sermon. Please print it off and read it sometime. Dr. King talks about how hate scars the soul; love heals it. He shares examples from both the Bible and American history. He contends that “Love is the most durable power in the world.” And the sermon includes my single favorite line from Dr. King’s life:
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Full Text: Dr. King’s Loving Your Enemies