Proverbs 24:17. Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, and let not your heart be glad when he stumbles,
This proverb is pretty radical. In ancient days (and today, let’s be honest), no one would ever do anything kind for their enemy. So if and when your enemy falls, it would be considered quite normal, even expected, that you would be glad and rejoice.
The radical warning in today’s proverb concerns gloating. Do not gloat. Gloating feels pleasure at other’s pain, especially an enemy’s pain. Gloating finds joy in your enemy’s failures, sorrow, or shame. When those who oppose the gloater stumble and reveal their hypocrisy, rather than feeling sorrow with them, the gloater rejoices, feeling vindicated by their scandal. See, I told you so, is always on the tip of the gloater’s tongue.
God is no gloater. God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. God never finds delight the destruction of the wicked. Yes, God exposes sin, punishes sin, and destroys the wicked. All this is true. But God’s justice never comes with a satisfied spirit of vindication. God needs no vindication. He’s God. God’s destructive justice is always for the good of mankind, never for the good feeling of absolution.
Besides God himself, another great example of such egolessness was David. Though David prayed for his own vindication and deliverance from his enemy, King Saul, he never delighted in Saul’s downfall. At the death of Saul, David wept, lamented, sorrowed. He tore his clothes and fasted. Even though David was God’s chosen king of Israel, and even though Saul had spent years trying to destroy him, David refused to kill or even rejoice in the death of the Lord’s anointed, King Saul. Can you claim the same attitude?
What if Jesus had rejoiced over our sorrow, our falling, our stumbling? What if Jesus had stayed in Heaven and just said, see I told you so, each time we failed? Praise God we don’t serve a gloating God. Jesus overcame our evil with his good. He ended our sorrow with his own sorrow. He gave victory over our defeat by his own defeat. Which is why we who are in Christ can now adopt the same spirit of humility, of grace, of love. Love? Yes, love.
Matthew 5:44. I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.
If the proverb is radical, how much more so Christ’s command? Don’t rejoice or gloat over your enemy’s failure is difficult enough. But love your enemy? Bless your enemy? Pray for your enemy? Do good to your enemy? Proverbs simply tells us to avoid the negative. But Jesus tells us to do the positive. Talk about radical.
But not impossible. Not in Christ. I get it, we can barely do what Proverbs says and keep from being rejoicing when our enemies fall. But when we consider how loved we are by God (even when we were his enemies Christ died for us), the power of that perfect love can set our hearts free to love everyone that God loves. Even his enemy. Our enemy.
When you have all the love you will ever need from God in Christ, you no longer need to hate anyone. When you have faith in the eternal love of Christ, you can love everyone, even those who might wish you harm. Even those who might want you to stumble. How? By embracing God’s own love for them. A love that would take up its cross and die.
You: Are you a gloater? Do you rejoice at other’s failures, especially your enemy’s?
You in Christ: How does our union with Christ cure our tendency to gloat?
Christ in you: Is there an enemy you can pray for today? Bless today?
Pray: Father, you loved me when an enemy. May your love to flow through me to my enemies. Amen.
To Live is Christ 