Luke 6:27-36 Sermon for May 31, 2026

Good morning!

What a blessing it is to stand up here and bring forth God’s Word.

You know, I was doing my devotional yesterday, and the verse I was really wrestling with was Matthew 5:19 and it says this: “Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commands and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”

These are the words of Jesus. And when I spent quite a bit of time with this one verse, it became increasingly weightier as I meditated on it. I went to look at what the reformers taught on this verse and the conclusion is that, though this doesn’t refer to someone’s salvation (the next verse deals with that), it does refer to pastors and those who teach the Word of God. And the consensus is this: you add, subtract, twist, soften, or do any kind of weirdness to the Word of God, you, sir, have no place in the church teaching or preaching, said one reformer.

That’s what Jesus is getting at. Man, to sit with that all week leading up to today was both fearful and a massive blessing. To understand that, as a pastor, my job is to faithfully uphold the teaching and preaching od God’s Word as it is. In Titus, it says, “Holding to the faithful message as taught, so that he will be able to encourage with sound teaching and to refute those who contradict it.”

I say all of this because, here at Kingdom Bound Church, the Word of God is supreme. And I’ve said it before that I come before this pulpit with fear and trembling. And I recognize that the Word of God is sufficient and it is the means by which men and women and drawn to peace with God. I say all of this because, as we venture through the Gospel of Luke (we’ve been in it since December 7th and will be in it for the next two years or so), let’s approach it with a level of reverence, conviction, and expectation and not with flippancy or casualness. This is God’s Word for you! Amen.

With that said, we are in Luke 6:27-36 and I’ll be reading the passage in full before bringing us through it. As I mentioned in other weeks, I am reading from the CSB translation. You are free to use other translations, but I wanted you to know in case you wanted to follow along with a little bit more ease.

Luke 6:27-36

“But I say to you who listen: Love your enemies, do what is good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If anyone hits you on the cheek, offer the other also. And if anyone takes away your coat, don’t hold back your shirt either. Give to everyone who asks you, and from someone who takes your things, don’t ask for them back. Just as you want others to do for you, do the same for them. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. If you do what is good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you. Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do what is good, lend, expecting nothing in return. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High. For he is gracious to the ungrateful and evil. Be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful.

This is the Word of the Lord.

So, before I really bring us through this passage with a handful of takeaways, let me give you a main takeaway for you to put in the back of your pocket. It’s this:

“Because God has shown radical, undeserved mercy to us in Christ, His people must reflect His character by loving even their enemies with supernatural, gospel-shaped mercy.”

That’s the main idea; that’s the big point I want you to take away today. Write that down. Meditate on it. Now, let’s break this down a little more.

The first thing is this: what Jesus is demanding of us here isn’t possible to do in the flesh. You can’t will yourself to do such a thing. Perhaps you can produce this kind of love temporarily, but even that in and of itself, misses the mark.

Why? Well, because you’re trying to love in the flesh and this comes with an inward bent selfishness to it. You aren’t loving those who are difficult to love because of Christ; you’re “loving” them because you want something in return.

Let me ask you this: you ever have to work with someone that’s just so darn difficult? They’re annoying. They’re a pest. They’re miserable. And they get on your last nerves.

And then one day, you decide you’ll muster up all the strength to walk into work and be the bigger person. You’ll do all that you can to be cordial, kind, and compassionate.

Well, how long did that last for you? An hour? Maybe two? And then all of a sudden you’ve found yourself cursing them in the deep crevices of your soul.

Why did this happen? Well, because you didn’t love them as Christ loved you. You tolerated them so that you could have a peaceful shift. You quickly realize how difficult it is to love them.

Why Christ speaks of throughout Scripture is that this love is only possible when you’ve been redeemed. It isn’t possible any other way. You must be born again. You must be regenerate.

Someone once asked me, “Well, if that’s true, why isn’t there a lot of love in my church?” I told them, “Because you simply have a gathering of unregenerate people.” I see this all the time.

The Bible tells us what marks a true Christian. It’s the fruit of the Spirit. It’s a love that can only come from the perspective that you’ve been loved by Christ, therefore you love others in a Spirit-empowered obedient way. You no longer love to get something in return. You love because of what Jesus has done for you.

If you have such bitterness in your heart, such resentment in your heart, such anger in your heart, such hatred in your heart, such a dislike in your heart, such uncompassion in your heart, you need to ask yourself, “Am I of Christ, then?”

Ezekiel 36:26 says, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”

That’s the secret it. And only God can do this. You need to plead on your knees for the mercy of Jesus in your life. And when He saves you, go and do likewise; that is, love others. Show compassion. Show grace. Show kindness. But without compromising the truths of the Gospel ever.

The second thing is this: The Christian’s love reflects the character of God; not human fairness. Well, you might say: “They don’t deserve my love, compassion, and mercy.”

To that, I say, “Neither do you.”

Not one of us in this room this morning ever deserved the mercy of God on our souls. Not one. Not one of us warranted salvation.

Listen, it’s important to grasp this: When you die, you will face judgment. And there are two options you can do. You can either represent yourself, which is foolish. Why? Because you are a wretched sinner and there is no such thing as good deeds outweighing the bad. That’s bad theology. To represent yourself is to automatically receive a guilty verdict on your soul.

The other option is to have Jesus represent you. In doing so, when the Father looks upon you on Judgement Day, He sees the righteousness of Jesus on you. And we can’t buy, earn, or bargain this righteousness. It’s freely given to us when we confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that He is the Son of God, died, resurrected from the dead, and will come back to make all things new.

So, the point is this: not one of us deserved or deserves the mercy and love of Jesus. It’s unmerited grace. And because of this, you cannot declare who in your life deserves your love and mercy and compassion. Doesn’t work that way.

We have got to stop manipulating the love of God on our lives. We have got to stop saying, “God loves me the way I am.” No. Really? I love me. I like that, right? That kind of theology is of the Devil. With that, just throw out the Bible then, which is by the way, what we are seeing left and right when we declare God’s love over us and we just do, think, and talk however we please.

It isn’t about that. We are declared righteous and at peace with God when the Father sees the righteousness of Jesus on us. And when the righteousness of Jesus is on us, we live in pursuit of who Jesus is, what Jesus has commanded of us, and what the Word of God says.

Alright, so, in light of that, the third thing to takeaway from this passage is that this passage exposes the bankruptcy of human ‘goodness.’ Here’s what I mean: just being a mere, cultural ‘good’ person isn’t enough.

Where do we get this from? We get it from the part of this passage where it says even sinners do such and such. What Jesus is commanding us here is something much more deep and profound.

There is no one good. Even the ‘good’ neighbors you have who are not believers, the Bible says, “There is certainly no one righteous on the earth who does good and never sins.” Eccl. 7:20.

And then, for those who would so want to boast in their so-called good deeds, the Bible says in Isaiah 64:6, “All of us have become like something unclean, and all our righteous acts are like a polluted garment; all of us wither like a leaf, and our iniquities carry us away like the wind.”

Wow! That’s a hard word right there, and what Jesus is getting at is that He is commanding us to do something and to be a people that can only be produced by the Holy Spirit. And when we grasp that, our Kingdom-minded lives become something incredibly counter-cultural.

The Christian life is not shaped by reciprocity but by Christlike generosity.

My friends, as I begin to wrap up here, mercy is the mark of a Christian, one who has experienced the mercy of Christ in and on them. Mercy isn’t optional. We need to be people rooted in the love of God. We need to be people who remember what Christ has done for us. We need to be people who are known for what we are for and not what we are against. We need to be people who demonstrate a radical love that springs from the character of God.

My friends, let us not see the ungodly world do this better than the Church. Let us understand that only the Holy Spirit can produce the kind of love in us that Christ demands of us. You cannot muster up this love. You look upon your enemies as those whom Christ went to the cross for, and you pray for their salvation, and you demonstrate a radical love that shakes them.

Impossible? Yes! But with Christ, all things are possible. Let us stand and worship King Jesus.