“Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. If it is possible as much as depends on you live peaceably with all men.”
–Romans 12:17-18

It is important to do what is right in the sight of all men. And it is important to live peaceably with all men. But sometimes that is not possible. There are those in your life (maybe even now) where it wouldn’t be wise to do what is right in their sight. There are those in your life (maybe even now) where it is not possible to live peaceably with them, and you wouldn’t be a wise steward of your time to continue to try.

Paul knew that these circumstances would hopefully be rare, but the encouragement is true. There is an exhortation to do as much as depends on you to live peaceably with all people. But there is also a release, for there comes a time where you have to admit that you have done as much as depends on you and it is just not possible—for whatever reason—to live peaceably with that person.

That doesn’t mean that you are released to be mean, or that you retaliate or reciprocate hate. It just means that we are not going to be able to live at peace with all people. It’s a reality of life. Some people are always going to be angry or negative or toxic or vengeful or rude. But that doesn’t mean that you have to be. 

Remember, this section of scripture instructs us on how to be a good friend to those who treat us poorly. We are to walk wisely and live kindly. We must not retaliate or reciprocate. We leave that up to the Lord (see Romans 12:19). We just get to love like Jesus loves and simply serve.

Though Romans 12:9-21 is only thirteen verses, it contains approximately thirty practical ways that we can practice being the kind of friend that Jesus has been to us. 

At the heart of this passage is Jesus. It’s only through His demonstration of love to us that we are able to learn how to love others, even when we feel we have every right and reason to hate. We love because He first loved us (1 John 4:19).

With the love of Christ, we can bless our enemies and love those who treat us poorly. In this second portion of Romans 12, the Apostle Paul encourages us to love our enemies with the courage available to us in Christ and reminds us of our purpose to lead our enemies to Jesus.

Watch our study of Romans 12:15-21 and learn how we can overcome evil with good through the love of Jesus.

​If we want to impact the people in the culture around us, it will not be accomplished by shouting louder, reciprocating ridicule, or overcoming evil with more evil. 

It will happen by loving others the way that Jesus would love them.

How do we love others the way Jesus loves them? We consider Him. We think constantly of Him. If we are going to be persecuted for being followers of Jesus, it would be appropriate for us to continue to be followers of Jesus in our response to persecution. How will cursing those who persecute us differentiate ourselves as followers of Jesus from those who do not follow Jesus? It will not. How will hatred draw anyone to Jesus? It does not.

So we consider Jesus, “who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself so that we will not grow weary so that we will not lose heart.” (Hebrews 12:3) We think constantly of Him enduring all that sinful men could say against him so that we will not lose our purpose or our courage to love our enemies.

This doesn’t mean that we turn into doormats. We do not need to compromise our convictions in order to be a good friend to the world. Remember—being a good friend to the world, not of the world, means that we are genuine and honest, while at the same time kind always ready to give an answer for the hope that we have with gentleness and respect.

It takes a seriously secure person to love an enemy in this way—to pray for your persecutors while they are persecuting you. To bless when it’s so much easier to curse. It takes receiving the love of Jesus to show the love of Jesus. 

Romans 12:14 says, “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.” This past Sunday, we spent our time in God’s word studying this one verse—and what a verse it is!

The command to bless our persecutors is counterintuitive, and yet this is how Christianity has made the most genuine impact in the world. The practice of loving when you feel like you have every right and reason to retaliate can only be accomplished with the same love that Jesus has for us and demonstrated to us.

But the ability to bless instead of curse does not come naturally. It takes time to develop and learn at the feet of Jesus as we pay attention to how He loves us so that we can live and love this way for others.

Watch our study of Romans 12:14 and learn what it looks like to be a good friend to those to treat you like an enemy.

Romans 12:9-13 is loaded with applications for how we are to be the kind of friend to others that Jesus is to us. Because Jesus is genuine, honest, and loyal to us, we ought to be the same to others. 

Jesus is genuine. What you see is what you get. He never sends sideways messages. We never have to read between the lines and wonder what He really meant. 

Jesus is honest. He is the real deal. He never shrinks back from telling us the truth, even if it’s a tough truth to tell. 

Jesus is loyal. He lets us know that He isn’t going anywhere and we can depend on Him sticking around. He knows everything about us—and at the same time assures us that He will never leave us or forsake us. 

Oh, what a friend we have in Jesus! And because we experience His friendship, we want to be this kind of friend to those around us.

Being a good friend who is genuine doesn’t mean that you always agree with or that you always affirm others actions or behaviors. It means you tell your friend the truth while also communicating loyalty and commitment, letting them know that you’re not going to leave or shun them.

This doesn’t come easily. It takes diligence. It takes intention. It takes practice. It takes the Holy Spirit in us to love others the way Jesus loves us. Because, if we’re honest, people are mean and self-centered. People don’t often reciprocate or even appreciate this kind of genuine, honest, loyal friendship. People are flawed and hurt—and hurt people hurt people.

People like this need friends like Jesus: genuine, honest, and loyal. So be to others what Jesus is to you—a good friend!

​Romans 12:9-21 contains approximately 30 exhortations and applications—practical ways we can practice being the kind of friend to others that Jesus has been to us. 

This past Sunday, we looked at just 5 verses of that portion of the text and contemplated the depth of love that Christ’s expresses in His friendship with us. He has demonstrated His love for us by laying down His life for us—and we are encouraged to do the same for our brothers and sisters.

Watch our study of Romans 12:9-13 as we learned what a good friend we have in Jesus, then considered how we can be that kind of a friend to those around us.

When we see and receive God’s mercy, we can’t help but respond. And as we read in Romans 12, our appropriate response in light of His mercy is to offer Him our everything by loving Him with our heart, soul, and mind.

When we do this, we start to mature. As we renew our minds by His word, we see ourselves soberly and honestly as His servants. And as His servants, He is sending us to serve and love our neighbors—to give the people we find around us the gifts that God has given us to give to them. 

When we realize that the gifts that God has given us are not really for us but have been given to us to bless and serve others, we begin to grow in our maturity in Christ. He didn’t give us these gifts so that we can draw attention to ourselves or to soothe some personal insecurity that we might have. He didn’t give us these gifts so that we could develop exaggerated ideas of our own importance.

God gives us these gifts to give away. When we all give away the gifts that we have been given, it builds others up so that the body of Christ is healthy, growing, full of love, and maturing. 

When we cooperate with God’s work that He began in us, He leads us toward true maturity. As this begins and continues, something happens within us—we begin to become a bit uncomfortable with always receiving the good things God gives us. 

As we worship Him and are blessed by Him, our hearts continue to fill up until we find ourselves responding to God’s love by loving those around us with the very love that He has given us. 

This is all part of His plan to mature and strengthen us, and it’s what we considered as we continued our study in Romans 12:3-8. Watch our study from Sunday as we studied what it means to love those around us with the gifts that God has given us. 

“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.”
– Romans 12:1

Continually offering our everything to God is our reasonable, rational, and logical response to His mercy. This is one of the reasons why simple Bible study is so important—so that we can see God’s mercies and respond accordingly. It’s the way that the Apostle Paul communicated in his letters—doctrine then application.

But remember, we need to be at the altar, continually in view of God’s mercies because the world is continually distracting us to look away and forget God’s mercies. The world, with it’s philosophy, is competing for our attention and devotion by providing a multitude of distractions so that God’s mercies are no longer in view. And when God’s mercies fade from our view, we forget them and neglect to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice. 

When that happens, it just means we need a little more time learning who He is, all that He has given us, and all that He has done for us. This response is what worship looks like—a willing, living sacrifice offered in response to just how good Jesus has been to us. It’s this continual process of receiving and responding that is renewing our minds and helping us to know and to do the next right thing.

​Many letters written by the Apostle Paul follow a similar trajectory. He opens with doctrine (explaining who we are in Jesus) and ends with application (defining how we are to live in light of our identity in Jesus).

In most letters, you can almost draw a line in the middle at the transition from doctrine to application. Paul follows a similar pattern in Romans, but apparently he had a little more doctrine than application in Romans. The transition from doctrine to application isn’t exactly in the middle—but that doesn’t make the application any less intense.

This past Sunday, we considered just the first two verses of Romans 12 as we transitioned from doctrine to application in the letter to the Romans. Watch our study as we ask two questions of the Lord: Who are you? What do You want me to do?