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Jul 14, 2026 06:00am

Loving the People Who Hurt You

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It’s hard to be sympathetic toward someone who has only been cruel to you. When we
are mistreated, our nature longs for justice. We want to see the person who hurt us get their
comeuppance. They have wronged us, so they deserve to be wronged in return. And when that
feeling gets out of control, we might take matters into our own hands and pursue revenge.
Likewise, when we see injustice in the world. If someone is getting away with doing bad
things, we lean forward in our seats, anticipating the day they’ll get what’s coming to them. They
can’t get away with it forever, after all. At some point, their luck will run out and the
consequences of their actions will catch up to them. It can be all too easy to take unrighteous
pleasure in watching someone’s downfall.

In college, one of my favorite TV shows was a superhero drama called Arrow. It is a
serialized retelling of the comic book adventures of the superhero Green Arrow. Set in the
fictional Starling City, it follows a rich man named Oliver Queen who was stranded on a
deserted island for five years and came home to right the wrongs caused by his father and the
other billionaires in the city. Throughout the show, Oliver—dressed as a bow-and-arrow wielding
vigilante first called the Hood, then the Arrow, and eventually Green Arrow—would attack these
billionaires, forcing them to right the wrongs they had inflicted on the poor people of his city.
The show often criticized Oliver’s penchant for violence, but his crusade was always
treated as admirable. Oliver Queen stood up for the little guy and took care of those who could
not care for themselves. At first, he did so through extremely violent measures, hurting and even
killing the businessmen and criminals. But as the show went on, he realized death was not the
answer and that there were ways he could help beyond just executing anyone he believed was
in the wrong.

While there is a thrill to the idea of a vigilante coming in to fix all the problems of the
world, we know that in real life, that would lead to chaos. And while wanting that kind of justice
is a very human reaction, it’s also not the response Jesus had in Luke 13:31-35 when he was
exposed to the promise of violence and injustice that waited for Him.
As He continued His journey toward Jerusalem (begun in v. 22), He was confronted by a
group of Pharisees. Perhaps they had heard Him speaking about the narrow door into heaven; it
says in v. 31 that they approached Him “at that very hour.” As we know, the Pharisees were
opposed to Jesus in pretty much every way. They guarded their religion carefully, because they
feared He was trying to change it into something they considered blasphemous. It might be
surprising, then, to learn that they approached Him this time not to condemn Him, but to deliver
a warning.
“Herod wants to kill you!” they said. They referred to Herod Antipas, also known as the
Tetrarch. He was the son of Herod the Great, the so-called King of the Jews who had ordered a
massacre of boys two years old and under in Bethlehem, seeking to kill Jesus because he saw
the baby Messiah as a threat to his throne. Antipas was the brother of Herod II, also called
Herod Philip, and Herod Archelaus. They all shared portions of their father’s kingdom, with
Antipas receiving Galilee and Judea. Antipas sought to claim his father’s title, King of the Jews,
but Rome denied it to him.
The Pharisees were no fans of Herod’s. But they had no love for Jesus, either, so this
warning may not have been with noble intentions. Instead, they may have been pushing for
Jesus to return to their territory, where they’d have a better chance of being able to judge Him,
as opposed to the region of Perea, near Herod’s palace. Or, they might have simply been trying
to keep Jesus from spreading His message further by pushing Him back toward the places He
had already been, where His message was already well known—and had, for the most part,
already been accepted or rejected.

Jesus was unbothered by the danger. He gave them His answer—and in it, He showed
no restraint in calling Herod for what he was: a fox. Someone who was deceitful, cunning, and
wicked, but ultimately not that dangerous. This might have shocked the Pharisees, who were
wary of the political power Herod held, but Jesus was not afraid of the regional king, even
though he was the same man who had executed Jesus’ cousin, John the Baptist. He spoke
boldly against the king, just as John had. He confronted wickedness and hypocrisy at the
highest levels with fervor and boldness.

He said that He would go on His way “today, tomorrow, and the third day” (v. 33). He
was symbolizing that He still had time ahead of Him before His mission was complete, and that
until that happened, no one could stop Him. He said, “it is impossible for a prophet to be killed
outside of Jerusalem.” He didn’t mean that every prophet who had ever died had been killed in
Jerusalem; He only meant that it was often the very people the prophets represented that
ultimately killed them. He was speaking bluntly about the pattern of disloyalty and ungodliness
historically exhibited toward messengers from God—Himself included—and also prophesying
His ultimate fate in Jerusalem.

But when He recognized this injustice, Jesus did not respond with anger and aggression.
Instead, He began to weep. “O, Jerusalem! Jerusalem!” The Bible doesn’t explicitly state that
He was crying, but the way these words are phrased matches laments—the kind of words that
would be spoken by mourners at a funeral or those watching cities fall to an enemy army. Jesus
was heartbroken by the continued sinfulness of His people.
He said that, if it was up to Him, He would have gathered them like a hen gathering her
chicks. Drawing them close, sheltering them under her wings. He wanted to protect, comfort,
and have fellowship with the people of Jerusalem. “And you were not willing,” He said (v. 34). In
other words, God wanted that restoration, but His people did not. And while He did divinely use
their rebellion for His ultimate plan of salvation, He did not force their hearts in the direction of

rebellion. He merely used the wickedness that was already there as a tool, hardening their
hearts further like He did Pharaoh’s to lead to an inevitable conclusion (Romans 9:17).
But we shouldn’t take this to mean that God made them hate Jesus. If He did, then
Jesus would not have grieved the city. They were not puppets; God used the wickedness that
was already there. But if there had been goodness there instead—if they had welcomed Jesus
as the Messiah with open arms—He would not have changed their hearts and forced them to
crucify Him. Instead, He sent Jesus at a time when He knew they would not be receptive, and
He spoke in a way that inflamed them and guided their hearts toward hatred, knowing that in
doing so, He would be crucified, but that because of that, the Gospel could be made open to the
whole world, not just the Jews.

One day, though, they would welcome Him. In v. 35, He quoted Psalm 118:26 as a
prophecy, saying that one day, when He returns, Jerusalem will welcome Him as one who
comes in the name of the Lord. That time has not yet come, but we should continue to hope that
the hearts of the Jewish people—just like the rest of the world—would see Jesus as the
Messiah.
Jesus mourned those He knew would turn against them. Similarly, in Romans 9:1-3,
Paul said he wished he could give up his own salvation so that others could be saved. This is
not the attitude of one seeking justice against those who wronged them. It is one of unbiased
love toward people who don’t deserve it, but who God loves anyway.
This is an attitude that we should take in our own lives: Jesus confronted injustice, and
He stood up for the poor and mistreated. However, He was also heartbroken over the people
who would hurt Him, and He wished He could embrace them instead. That doesn’t mean we
should let ourselves be walked all over. It does mean we should be sympathetic even toward
people who don’t deserve it, because the truth is we didn’t deserve it either. Sometimes, the
best way to move forward is to offer forgiveness and compassion instead of holding onto anger
that will only fester inside us and make us bitter.

It’s not easy. It doesn’t come naturally. But it can truly be done through the grace of the
Holy Spirit.