For Our Enemies

Do you love God's mercy? Or do you just love God's mercy toward you? Good morning. My name is Dan. And I am glad that you're here opening God's Word with us this morning, whether it's from this campus or one of the other campuses. There was a man back in the first half of the 20th century who had experienced the grace and mercy of God. And because he experienced that mercy in such a powerful way, he said, "I want to give my life "to going out to some other place in the world "where they have never heard of the mercy of God "through Jesus Christ before, "where they have never heard the Gospel, "where they have never even heard the name of Jesus. "I wanna go out, "and I want to tell them about the mercy of God "that is found in our Savior, Jesus Christ." And so he and his wife took up their young daughter. They sold off most of their stuff. They left their homes, left their families, left their stuff behind, and they went out to live among, or try to reach an unreached people group, a people group who were cut off from the outside society, a people group who had been resistant to anyone coming in for any reason. And they spent months trying to offer gifts to show that they were coming in peace. And they spent time making contact, just slowly trying to work their way in. And just when they thought that they had their way in. one day they show up, they flew their plane onto the nearby river, and they go out onto the beach to meet with the locals that they normally met with. And they were met by a couple of men. And that man and his four friends who were with him were speared to death that day on the beach by the people that they were trying to reach with the mercy of God. That man's name was Jim Elliot. You might've heard of him before. This happened back in the 1950s. And the story actually made the cover of Time Magazine at the time. And the story actually sparked a missionary movement where there were several people, many, many people who said, "You know what? "That man gave his life to share the Gospel. "And I think I wanna do the same." They weren't looking to go and die necessarily, but they wanted the Gospel to go out. And it sparked a missionary movement that lasted for almost two decades afterwards. But the part of the story that didn't often get reported back then was that the widow of Jim Elliot began to pray. And she began to pray for the very people who killed her husband; who killed her husband and took him from her and took her daughter's father from her, and took the lives of her other friends who were killed on the beach that day. And she began to pray for these people. And after a little time, she took up her daughter once again, had a few other women who went with her, and they actually moved in among this tribe. And they brought medicine and they saved the lives of their children and their husbands and their wives by bringing in medicine for them. But even more than that, they shared the mercy of God that we find in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She was a woman who truly loved the mercy of God. She didn't just love the mercy of God toward her. She truly loved the mercy of God that she would take it to those who should have been her enemies by all worldly standards, right? And she took the mercy of God found in the Gospel to this people group. So, I'll ask it again. Do you love God's mercy? Or do you just love God's mercy toward you? It's a question that's at the heart of the matter that we're looking at today. Over the past couple weeks, we started this sermon series that we're calling "Built on Prayer." And what we're doing is we're going through the book of Acts a little bit, and we're looking at the prayers of the church in the Book of Acts. And what we're seeing is that when the church prays, the Word of God goes out and the number of believers increase. When the church prays, that's when the Word goes out and the church is built up. We have a lot of ways that we think we can build up the church, through our resources and through our strategies and through our smarts and our wit and our talents and our abilities or whatever. And all of those things are good, and we use those for the good of the church and for the glory of God; but those things are not what build the church. Prayer is what builds the church. The people of God going before the Almighty God, the Sovereign God, the One who saves, that's what builds the church. And today what we're talking about is that the church is built on prayer for our enemies. The church is built on prayer for our enemies. As sinful people, it's often our natural desire to want to retaliate against our enemies, or to retaliate against those who do things to try to harm us in any way, whatever that might look like. Or we try to push down those who try to push us down. We look to do those kinds of things. Yet as believers, we follow a Savior who came to His enemies and laid down His life for them. Romans 5 tells us that we were all once enemies of God, and yet Jesus laid down His life for us. And He's a Savior who, with His dying breath, prayed for those who were killing Him in that moment. They were killing Him, and He was praying for them. And He's a Savior who gives mercy to the worst of sinners. And we're willing to accept that mercy a lot of times. But are we willing to see that mercy go out to all people all over the world, even maybe our enemies? I know that there's a lot going on in the world right now, as has been mentioned this morning. I want you to know that as we think about wars and we think about those kinds of things, it's not exactly what we're talking about today. We're not talking about how governments should respond to governments. That's not at the heart of the matter today. At the heart of the matter is, how should you as a believer respond to those who are seeking, or have sought, to harm you in some kind of way? Last week, Pastor Jerry took us through Acts 6, or at least the beginning of it, and we were introduced to a man named Stephen. And we begin to see the beginning of his story. Stephen was one of the seven who were chosen to serve tables. You'll remember from last week. And in our passage today, we're gonna see how Stephen's story ends. I'll give you a spoiler here. It ends with a prayer on his lips. In his dying moments, he ends it with a prayer for those who are killing him. So today, we're gonna be looking at Acts 7, and we're gonna be starting in verse 54. Let me give you a little context of the story and then we'll read the story and then we'll give some implications of the story afterwards. Between what Jerry was looking at last week and what we're looking at today, Stephen started doing these signs and wonders and preaching the Gospel. And it made him some enemies. There were those who hated Jesus, and they hated the name of Jesus. And they started saying, "You know what? "This guy is speaking blasphemy. "He's speaking blasphemy against Moses. "He's speaking blasphemy against God. "He's speaking against the temple. "He's speaking against the Law. "This is all blasphemy." But what Stephen was doing was not blasphemy. What he was actually doing was showing from the Old Testament that all along it was God's plan to not continue with the Law being all there was in this building of the temple. But He was sending someone who was going to fulfill the Law, someone who was going to fulfill the purpose of the temple, the embodiment of God here on earth; and that this person was going to save. He was going to save His people from their sins. And Stephen says, "And you killed Him." What a way to make enemies, right? I mean, that'll probably do it. You're speaking to a bunch of religious people and saying, "You killed the One who is over your religion," and it makes him some enemies. So where we pick up, Stephen has just finished giving a speech in defense not of himself, but in defense of the Gospel. And this speech, I find interesting, is actually the longest speech in the Book of Acts. It's not the sermon at Pentecost when the Holy Spirit first comes in. It's not from one of the apostles. It's not from Peter who walked with Jesus. It's not from Paul who goes on later to write much of the New Testament. It's from a man who is chosen to serve tables. That's the longest sermon in the Book of Acts. And Stephen gives it here. And at the end, he denounces his fellow Jews who refuse to believe in Jesus, especially the Jewish leaders who were present. And he calls them stiff-necked people. And he says, "You always resist the Holy Spirit." Now, in our culture, talking about the temple and talking about the Law and talking about Moses, it's probably not gonna make you many enemies. Right? In our culture, a lot of people are just not gonna care. It's not gonna make you enemies. However, speaking about Jesus might make you some enemies, and speaking truth might make you some enemies. And in particular, telling people that they are sinners in need of Jesus might make you some enemies. Now, maybe you wouldn't call them enemies. Maybe that's too strong of a word for you. But maybe you have a friend or a family member who talks badly about you because of your faith. Maybe you have people who hate you, or at least it feels like they hate you because of your faith. You probably won't get stoned or killed or anything like that. I understand that. Well, we might not be in those shoes. In fact, somebody told me this morning, they were like, "I bet it's hard to talk about, "relate to someone getting stoned "if you've never been stoned before, right?" I said, "Well, I'm gonna leave that one right on the table. "We all have a past, okay? "But for the mercy of God, we're here this morning." It's a joke that you'll get later about being stoned. There it is. You might not get stoned. You might not get killed for your faith. You may not be physically harmed in any way, though you may. You may. But you may have people who turn against you. You may have people who try to harm you by your reputation. You may have people who may try to do all sorts of things to you, turn their back on you or try to harm you in some other way. It might not even be someone you know. And we all know that there's many people who are enemies of the cross, and they're very open about it. They're very open about being enemies of Jesus. And they're out there. Or maybe just maybe someone has done harm to you in some other kind of way for some other reason. How do we respond when people have wronged us? How do we respond to our enemies? Well, we're gonna see what Stephen does. He's offended them already. And by proclaiming Jesus, he's taken Jesus' side. And because he's taken Jesus' side, they now stand against him. They've turned against him. So, let's take a look at Acts 7:54-58. It says, "When the members of the Sanhedrin heard this, "they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. "But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, "looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, "and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. "'Look,' he said, 'I see heaven open "'and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.' "At this they covered their ears, "yelling at the top of their voices, "they all rushed at him, "dragged him out of the city "and began to stone him. "Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats "at the feet of a young man named Saul. "While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, "'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.' "Then he fell on his knees and he cried out, "'Lord, do not hold this sin against them.' "And when he had said this, he fell asleep." That part down there is not part of our passage this morning. I don't know what that is. But I don't know how to get rid of it either. And so, Stephen is full of the Holy Spirit. He's full of the Holy Spirit, he's speaking truth. And those who he said resist the Holy Spirit, they get angry. They get even more mad at him. The more he speaks, the more they can't stand to listen. And the more he speaks, the more they want to shut him up. And they become real mature about it. They plug their ears and they start yelling at the top of their lungs, like really mature men. I mean, can you imagine if afterwards you come and you're talking to me, and I don't like what you're saying, so I just say, "La la la, la, la. "I can't hear you." That's what my five-year-old does. It's not what grown adults do. And yet here we are, that's what they're doing, grown men acting like this. And what they're doing is they are giving this outward sign that they are resisting the word of God. They're resisting the word of God. And they get to the point where they drag him out of the city and they begin to stone him. To be clear that means they are killing him. They are killing him. And we get this strange little note that they lay their coats at the feet of a man named Saul. Now, hold on to that. That's gonna be important in just a little bit, but we'll come back around. With his dying breath, Stephen doesn't curse them. And with his dying breath, Stephen doesn't call them names, and he doesn't say what an injustice this is. He doesn't do any of those things. He turns and he prays. Rather than retaliate, he looks up to heaven and he prays. And he prays two prayers. First of all, he prays, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." That's a prayer that says, "In life or in death, "Lord, my soul belongs to You. "I belong to You in life. "I've given my life to You to do as You've called. "I've given everything to be Your witness "whether I live or die. "If I'm alive, I will still give my life to You. "It still belongs to You. "But now, in this moment of death, "I am trusting my soul to You." And I think this is a lesson to us because I think many of us might keep our faith to ourselves because we're worried about making enemies, and we're worried about what the outcome might be. We're worried that we might offend someone. We are worried that people might not like us. It's a sign that you might be finding your hope in something else. It's a sign that you might be finding your hope in comfort. It's a sign that you might be finding your hope in people pleasing or being liked. It's a sign that you might be finding your hope in just living a nice life where you don't offend anyone and no one offends you. But I love the old Heidelberg Catechism that says, "What is your only comfort in life and death? "Answer: that I'm not my own, "but belong, body and soul, in life and in death, "to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ." When Stephen prays, "Lord, receive my spirit," it's a prayer saying, "I belong to You in life and in death. "You are my hope in life and in death." But Stephen prays his second prayer, and it's the prayer that I really want us to focus in on today. It's the prayer that he prays for his enemies. He prays, "Lord, don't hold this sin against them. "Don't hold this sin against them." I don't know about you, but I try to put myself in this moment, and those aren't the words coming off of my lips. I mean, when I'm in my car, when I'm driving on the road and someone honks at me, my first words are not a prayer. Okay. And I'm willing to bet that yours aren't either. It should be, it should be. I'm not saying it shouldn't be, but, in the moment, it's usually not. It's nothing that bad, y'all. Okay. I'm not saying anything that bad, I'm just saying it's not a prayer. And when Stephen prays, "Lord, don't hold this sin against them," he's not saying, "You know what, Lord, "just this one, just forget about it. "I know this one is really bad, "so just forget about this one. "All their other sin, hold it against them, "but just not this one." That's not what Stephen is praying here. That's not what he's saying. The heart of the prayer is, "Lord, don't bring Your final judgment on them now. "Lord, don't cut them off "from hearing the Gospel of mercy and grace. "Don't cut them off from the chance "to experience Your mercy, "the experience that I have had with Your mercy, "don't cut them off from it, Lord. "Don't cut them off. "Let Your Word go out into their hearts." Why would he pray that for them? Why would he pray that for them in that moment? It's because Stephen loved the mercy of God. He didn't just love the mercy of God for him; he loved the mercy of God and he loved the God of mercy, and he wanted to see other people come to know Him. Stephen is pointing his hearers to the cross. I'm sure you know at least one of those people who always has a movie or a show reference on the tip of their tongue. No matter what you say, no matter what you do, I see some spouses looking at one another right now, yeah, you know these people. Something happens and they're like, "This is just like that time in that show, "or it's just like that time in that movie." And they might just say the line. And if you get it, maybe you think it's funny, if not, you just kinda, "Yeah, this is good, I guess." because you have no idea what what they're talking about. But what they're doing is saying, "This is just like that one time. "This is just like that situation in this show." And that's what Stephen is doing here. He is looking to the cross himself, first of all, but he's also pointing his hearers to the cross. And I think that Luke is sure to record the prayer in order to point all believers to the cross when they find themselves in such situations. Stephen wants us to look to the cross. Because the question about praying for our enemies, I don't think it's so much, what should we pray for our enemies? I think the bigger question is: how could I possibly pray for my enemies? How could I possibly bring myself to the point where I could pray for my enemies? Because it's not an easy thing. And I'm not gonna stand up here and act like I can just tell you to do it and it's just gonna come easy to you. People have real hurts. People have done real things to us. And to some of us, maybe it's worse than others. People have harmed us, and so it's not easy to pray for those who've done you wrong. What do we do? We do what Stephen did; we look to the cross. We look to the cross. Even that I'm not saying is an easy step. I'm not saying, "Oh, well just look to the cross. "No big deal, right?" It might not even be your first step. You might have to take other first steps first. What I am saying is that it is the final step that will finally get you to be able to pray for your enemies. We look to the cross. I wanna show you three things to see at the cross that can lead you to a place where you can pray for your enemies. And at the end, I'll give three ways to pray for our enemies. In order to pray for our enemies, first of all, we look to the example of the cross. We look to the example of the cross. There's no doubt that in this situation, Stephen is looking to the example of his Savior on the cross. He's been pointing to Jesus the whole time. There's no reason to think he's pointing anywhere else now. He's been pointing to Him his whole speech, and now he's praying essentially the same prayer that Jesus prayed on the cross. "Father, forgive them, "for they do not know what they are doing." When you are not sure how to respond in a particular situation, it's always a good idea to look and see what Jesus said or did. Right? We are followers of Jesus. And so it would only make sense to look to His example to see how to follow Him. Now, I'm not saying that's always the easy option. In fact, a lot of times following in Jesus' footsteps is not the easy option. But when we see His example, we wanna follow it. We can become overwhelmed by it in such a way that we want to follow it. And as we look to follow the example of Christ, we pray that those who are watching would see our testimony and would see the testimony of how Jesus changes lives, and how Jesus takes people who will trust in Him and conform them into His image to make us more like Him. And we let our lives be a testimony. You remember we talked about just a few minutes ago during the announcements, our mission statement that every man, woman, and child would hear and what? See the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Where do they see it? In you and in me. It's always a good idea to look and see what Jesus said or did. Right? We are followers of Jesus. And so it would only make sense to look to His example to see how to follow Him. Now, I'm not saying that's always the easy option. In fact, a lot of times following in Jesus' footsteps is not the easy option. But when we see His example, we wanna follow it. We can become overwhelmed by it in such a way that we want to follow it. And as we look to follow the example of Christ, we pray that those who are watching would see our testimony and would see the testimony of how Jesus changes lives, and how Jesus takes people who will trust in Him and conform them into His image to make us more like Him. And we let our lives be a testimony. You remember we talked about just a few minutes ago during the announcements, our mission statement that every man, woman, and child would hear and what? See the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Where do they see it? In you and in me. And so we look to the example of the cross. But here's the thing. We can't truly be like Jesus until we do this second one, we look to the overwhelming mercy of the cross. When we look to the cross we should be overwhelmed by the mercy of God. We should be overwhelmed by this mercy that we don't deserve. Because when we look to the cross, what we should see is, first of all, how great our sin is. Our sin is so great that we cannot save ourselves from it. Our sin is so great that we cannot do anything to make up for it. Our sin is so great that God had to send His one and only Son in order to become a man, in order to take our sin on His shoulder, in order to take it to a cross in order to die for it, in order for us to have eternal life. That's how serious our sin is. That's how great our sin is. And when we look to the cross and we see how great our sin is, we should also see how much greater is the mercy of God that it would cover that great sin. We should see the overwhelming mercy of God. And the more we see how undeserving of our salvation we are, the more we should want to see salvation go out to others as well. Take a look at what Titus 3 says. "At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, "deceived and enslaved "by all kinds of passions and pleasures. "We lived in malice and envy, "being hated and hating one another. "But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, "He saved us, "not because of righteous things we had done, "but because of His mercy." Friend, I want you to know that your salvation, it does not come because you were good enough. And your salvation has not come because you were smart enough, you were smart enough to believe the right thing. That's not how you salvation comes. And your salvation does not come because you are somehow religiously talented enough. That's not the way it works. Your salvation does not come because you are an American. Your salvation does not come because of your political affiliation. Your salvation does not come because of a particular family you came from. You do not possess anything within yourself that has earned your salvation. We do not have anything that God looks at us and is like, "Man, I just gotta have that one "'cause look at what he's got." That's not how our salvation comes to us. Our salvation comes because of the overwhelming, never-ending, unstoppable mercy of God. And that is the only way that our salvation has come. And it's not just for you. And it could be easy to forget that. It's not just for you. It could be easy to accept it and say, "I am so thankful that I received the mercy of God," and then just leave it at that. God's mercy is not just for you. And as we come to the reality that God has saved undeserving sinners like ourselves, the more we should want to see this overwhelming mercy of God go out to others as well, even people that in our minds we might think are the worst of sinners. Our reaction to people might be to just write them off. When people do things to us, our reaction might be to just write them off. But we should pray with Stephen, "Lord, don't cut them off. "Lord, show them Your mercy. "Lord, send Your Spirit "to illuminate the truth of the Gospel in their hearts. "Let them experience the mercy of God "the way that I have experienced the mercy of God "through Your Son and trusting in Him." You know what we're saying when we think our enemies are undeserving of the mercy of God? You know what we're doing? We're being like the Pharisee in Jesus' parable, who said, "Lord, thank You that I'm not like this man. "Thank You that I'm not like this tax collector. "I do all the right things. "I've earned it. "I thank You for that. "I thank You that I'm not like him." But the tax collector, what did he do? He beat his breast. He wouldn't even look up, he had his face down, and he said, "Have mercy on me, God, a sinner." That should be all of us. None of us should be thinking we are deserving. All of us should be saying, "Have mercy on me, O God, a sinner. "And thank You, Lord, for Your mercy. "Teach me to go out and speak of it to others "and show it to others." Because if you are willing to accept the mercy of God, but you are unwilling to see the mercy of God go out to others, then what you are saying is that you deserve the mercy of God and they don't. And here's the truth, they don't, but neither do you. And yet you've experienced it. But how can you experience the mercy of God without giving it? So, we look to the cross to remember that Jesus came for sinners, for undeserving sinners, not for the righteous. And we get on our knees and we pray. And we pray not just for sinners, but we get on our knees as sinners and pray for sinners. We get on our knees as sinners who have experienced the mercy of God, and we pray for more sinners to experience the mercy of God and to come and to know this great God and Savior who has come into our lives and has rearranged our hearts and has made us new and has given us eternal life. The final way that we look to the cross is we look to the cross, or we look to the effective nature of the cross. Jesus didn't just pave the way for sinners to find their salvation for themselves, to find their way to heaven for themselves. Jesus purchased sinners. The blood of Jesus on the cross bought each and every believer who will ever come to know Him. It wasn't just like He made a path. He did that, yes. But He actually purchased us. The cross is effective. It has done something in the lives of people. And when we look to the cross, we can remember that God sent His one and only Son, not just so that people might come to know Him, but so that there are people who will come to know Him. And until the day He returns, He promises that more will come to know Him. There are people right now who do not know Jesus, they may be in this room, they may be outside the room, they will come to know Him. They will come to know Him. I'm not saying it's everyone, but there are those who will come to know Him. And when we look to the cross and we remember that Jesus purchased people, then we can pray for God's mercy to go out. Take a look at what happens after Stephen prays and finally dies: Acts 8:1-4. "And Saul approved of their killing him. "On that day a great persecution broke out "against the church in Jerusalem, "and all except the apostles "were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. "Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. "But Saul began to destroy the church. "Going from house to house, "he dragged off both men and women "and put them in prison. "Those who had been scattered "preached the word wherever they went." In the end, we see these results: first of all, that Jesus saves the worst of sinners. If you're here this morning and you've never decided to follow Christ, you've never trusted Him, maybe you just didn't like Him, maybe you just said, "I'm too far gone for any mercy." Wherever you may be at, this is the message we wanna say to you is that Jesus saves sinners and Jesus changes lives and He rearranges hearts and He gives eternal life. If that's you this morning, I wanna invite you to pray and receive Him. And we could talk about that afterwards. There's gonna be people up here afterwards that I invite you to come and talk with. But I want you to know that Jesus saves the worst of sinners. This man, Saul, who was ravaging the church, he had a motto of every man, woman, and child, too, just the opposite of ours. His motto was, "I'm gonna drag off "every man, woman, and child to prison "if they believe in Jesus." Our mission is that every man, woman, and child would have repeated opportunities to hear and see the Gospel. And guess what? That became his mission too. 'Cause this man named Saul, later his name would change to Paul and he would become an apostle of Jesus. He would write much of the New Testament that we have. After his life was completely changed by Jesus, he would go around the world planting churches and making Jesus known. Having experienced the mercy of God, even when he received beatings, even when he came across persecution of himself, having experienced the mercy of God, he continued to give the mercy of God and speak of the mercy of God. Paul is the fruit of Stephen's prayer. He was there, he heard it. He heard Stephen pray, and he became the fruit of Stephen's prayer. And as Jesus saves sinners, I want us to see that the Gospel goes out further. Because God is sovereign, He has the uncanny ability to take what was meant for evil and turn it for good. We saw at the end in verse four that people were scattered. And everywhere they went, they went about preaching the Word of God. They were actually fulfilling the next part of the commission Jesus had given. You remember, Jesus said, "You're gonna be my witnesses starting in Jerusalem, "but then you're gonna go out to Judea and Samaria "and to the ends of the earth." Well, so far it stayed in Jerusalem. Guess where they're going now? To Judea and to Samaria. And later Paul will go to the ends of the earth. God is sovereign, and He uses these things to see the Gospel go out further. The Huaorani tribe, that Jim Elliot and his friends tried to reach, would eventually have many people come to know Jesus and experience the mercy of God. Even many of the men who actually threw the spears that day would come to know Jesus. Today, over 15% of that tribe are evangelical Christians. That's a higher percentage than Buffalo. And it all happened because one woman took a few friends and she said, "I'm gonna pray for my enemies. "And I'm gonna go and move among my enemies, "and I'm gonna share the mercy of God with them." I don't know who or what has come to your mind as we've been talking about these things today. There's a lot of people in this room, a lot of different stories. I don't know who or what has come to your mind as we've been talking about these things. I do know that there's people who've been hurt. I do know that there are people who have experienced really hard things. I want you to know that I know praying for your enemies is not an easy step. But I want you to know that the Lord, He's with you and He knows you. And we can look to Him in order to get into a place where we can pray for our enemies. Right now, what we're gonna do at every campus is we're gonna take a few minutes and respond in prayer with a few prayer prompts, just like we've been doing over the past couple weeks. But we're not gonna get together. We're just gonna bow our heads and close our eyes. I'm gonna give you a few prompts that you can go to the Lord in prayer on your own and be in prayer with Him. So, let's go ahead and bow our heads and close our eyes. And I'm gonna give us a few prayer prompts. First, let's pray that our enemies would see the Gospel at work in our lives and hear our testimony to it. Second, let's pray that our enemies would experience the power and mercy of the Gospel in their own lives. Last, let's pray that our enemies would one day be used in a mighty way by God to make the greatness of the Gospel known further in the world. God of heaven and earth, our great God and Savior, You've sent Your one and only Son to die for us who were once Your enemies. And there are many people in the world, some who have done harm to us, some who have wronged us, some who have openly cursed You, who will come to know You because You are still a powerful God, You are still a God of mercy, You are still a God who saves sinners. We pray that You would use us, Lord, and our prayers to build Your church. Help us, Lord, because it's a difficult thing to pray for our enemies. Help us to look to the cross. Help us to look to the grace and the mercy we find there. Help us to look to the power that we find there to pray for our enemies. And Lord, we entrust the rest of the work to You to move in their hearts. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen.