Don’t Repay Evil With Evil

You’re at your friend’s house and suddenly, he turns around and says, “Oh, and by the way, I just figured I’d let you know…I stole some of your money out of your wallet the other day, keyed the side of your car, AND I think your hair is probably the ugliest thing I’ve seen today!”

Your first reaction is to stand there…stunned.

Then, when you finally process what he just said, you want to stop back something equally as mean…after all, he deserves it doesn’t, he?
Proverbs 24:29 says otherwise.

Do not say, “I will do to him just as he has done to me;
I will render to the man according to his work.”

Or in other words, we shouldn’t be repaying others based on how they treat us.

So, yes, you could yell insults at your friend or even threaten to do the same thing to them, they’ve done to you, but in the end…that would make you just as ‘bad’ as you considered them to do. In a similar way,  if you’re not willing to forgive your friend, will they be willing to forgive you when you apologize?

It’s really easy to speak your mind.

It’s even easier to lose control of your anger and do something you’ll later regret.

But in the end, neither yelling nor retaliating will make you ‘feel better’. In fact, it will probably make you feel worse, because in the end when someone has offended you, offending them in return isn’t going to succeed in taking away the punch of the insult.

Thus, instead when someone wrongs you, it’s important to let them know they’ve hurt you, BUT not to let your temper get the best of you. Instead, pray for peace, take a deep breath, and figure out what the next right step would be.