GOOD FOR  EVIL

Dr. W. A. Criswell

Romans 12:14-17

01-09-55

 

Now, did you bring your Bible with you?  In the Bible and we’re in the twelfth chapter of the book of Romans, Romans the twelfth chapter.  We are going to read the fourteenth and then the seventeenth through the twenty-first verses. 

Now, you turn to your Bible.  And watch as I read it.  Romans 12.  Romans 12, the fourteenth verse, “Bless them which persecute you.  Bless and curse not.” 

Now the seventeenth, “Recompense to no man evil for evil.  Provide things honest in the sight of all men. 

“If it be possible as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. 

“Dearly beloved, avenge not yourself but rather give place unto wrath.  For it is written”—this is Deuteronomy 32:35—‘Vengeance is mine.  I will repay, saith the Lord.’

“Therefore”—and I read to you this morning out of Proverbs 25:21-22; this is an exact quotation—“therefore, ‘If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirsts, give him drink; for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.’

“Be not overcome with evil, but overcome evil with good.”

Before ever I start, there’s only one thing that possibly will need an explanation in this text that I read, “If thine enemy hunger, feed him.  If he thirst, give him drink.” 

In that unusual saying, “For in so doing, thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head,” and the most apparently—could be some other meaning that is lost and that we never discover, but so far as anybody knows—what that refers to is this: The building of a fire on your head would be very painful. 

So with a man who has done you wrong, and you in return, are sweet and gracious and kind to him, it hurts his heart.  It wounds him in his spirit.  It makes him feel contrite and unworthy.  Like you build a fire on a fellow’s head would cause him pain.  If you treat a man good who has treated you evil, it does something.  It stabs his heart.  It quickens his soul.  And that is the reference here. 

Now, let’s begin.  I suppose one of the first introductions that any child will ever experience as he walks down the road of life is the feeling of resentment that comes—and it is congenital it is warning, it is human nature—the feeling of resentment that comes when people do you wrong. 

And that is an early, early experience in life.  When people mistreat you and do you wrong.  I say, that is one of the first and earliest experiences in life.  And I’ll take mine own as an example.  But what I say, will be just typical of what everyone of you could stand up and repeat here tonight. 

When I was six years old, in school one of my playmates went to the teacher and told her something that wasn’t so that I had done.  And that teacher punished me for it.  She just nearly shook my eyeteeth out and she spoke harsh words to me.  And I didn’t do it.  It wasn’t my fault. 

And the feeling of resentment I had as a little fellow, I can feel right now when I think of that low-down, good-for-nothing scalawag! 

I remember when I was a kid, playing basketball, and one of those fellows on the opposite team playing us.  And I was just a little kid.  It wasn’t any world championship thing now.  I wasn’t making 40 points.  I was just playing on the team. 

And I remember that fellow, he came down the court and I was standing there with my right foot stuck out just about like that to guard and whatever to do to keep them from coming down there to that goal. 

And he deliberately with malice aforethought, he deliberately came up jumped up and put his full weight, coming down on the top of the arch of my right foot.  And it nearly killed me. 

He did that deliberately.  And I would have beat that ground, to have beat the living daylights out of him had I been big enough. 

I remember when I was about 12 years old—I came from a little country town of three or four hundred people—and went to the then to me big city of Amarillo.  I got a job in a drug store. 

And I didn’t know anything.  And I hadn’t had any experience.  And I hadn’t been anywhere.  And one of the men who worked in that drug store got me fired because I was a green country kid and didn’t know anything.  And he didn’t have any patience with me and he said all kinds of caustic remarks to me.  And the man who owned the store fired me on account of that fellow. 

Now in real life, from the time you can remember, those hurts and those wounds are part of the experience of your life.  And now that I have got to be a man, if I were to recount to you the things that I have seen and watched since I have become a pastor of the church, you’d almost lose your religion. 

Why, some of these deacons—not mine now, but some of them that I have had in this church and some of the other churches—are born congenital, brazen bald-faced liars.  That’s what they are.  And they have told the most impossible and atrocious and unspeakable things and done things that I think the devil himself wouldn’t do.  God’s supposed people! 

Now, all of us experience that.  You don’t go through life without things being said and done and about all of the things that enter into those experiences and remembrances, that when you think about them you just get so angry, you just flush. 

All right.  What do you do?  What do you do?  And what people do individually they do collectively.  What they do by the one, they do by the millions.  What they do by unit, they do by nations and organizations. 

Now, what do you do?  What do you do?  All right.  Here’s what you can do.  You can retaliate.  You can double up your fists and you can recompense evil for evil.  That’s what you can do.  You can fight back. 

That’s where those Kentucky feuds come from, one fellow spitting in another fellow’s face.  And that guy spit in another guy’s face.  And he rolled up his fist and he hit him.  And that fellow doubled up his fist and he hit him. 

And when that guy socked that man and then that guy’s brother socked that fellow.  And then that family had it in for that family.  And it isn’t long until there is a feud.  And some of those feuds went on for generations and generations.  As they shot one another down and killed one another on the face of the earth. 

That’s what war is.  War is a retaliation.  You do this to me and I’ll do that to you.  That’s why you have had in this generation in which you live in this century, that’s why you have had the bitterest wars the world has ever known. 

At the end of World War I there was an unjust treaty made against Germany.  Maybe France had a cause to be bitter.  She’d been invaded three times by those German wars.  But however it was, France dictated an unholy, an unholy judgment against Germany.  And Germany abided the day and abided the time until she could retaliate. 

And how she did it!  And so we had World War II.  And at the end of World War II, the leadership of the United States of America was blindly led by men like Markansaw [sic] and then blindly led by his own blind self. 

And instead of trying to achieve some kind of a fair and equitable judgment upon Germany, they sat down in those conferences and, unknown to the people of America and unknown to our Senate and unknown to all of the rest of the world, the leaders of the United States of America made secret commitments to the destruction of the only state that could ever stand between us and the spread of the Soviet Communistic empire. 

Consequently today, we face today a hydra-headed monster because of the doctrine of retaliation, evil for evil.  “We will make up Germany,” they said, “an agrarian state.  And we will dissect her and rend her apart.  And she’ll never rise again.” 

Now, by day and by night, we tried to resurrect the little part over which we might have some type of control.  That war, it breeds evil.  It breeds hurt.  It breeds disaster and world destruction. 

What shall I do with evil?  I will fight it back.  I will recompense evil.  I will retaliate.  Not only does it create evil in others, but when we retaliate, it creates evil in ourselves. 

You hate me.  I’ll hate you.  You did me wrong.  I’ll do you wrong.  You hurt me.  I’ll hurt you.  You shed my blood.  I will shed your blood: an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. 

And the evil comes into me.  It comes into us.  We become like our enemies.  They hate.  We do, too.  They despise.  We do, too.  They war on sight.  We do, too.  We become like our enemies.  That’s the horror and the tragedy of recompense.  Evil for evil. 

Now, let’s turn aside.  Let’s turn around.  Let’s look at the Savior.  Let’s look at the preaching of the great Christian and the apostle Paul.  How do you do evil?  How do you do evil?  What do you do with hurt and bitterness?  What do you do with wrong and injury?  What do you do with evil? 

All right.  This is what you do.  First, “If it be possible as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.”  You got a rotten, good-for-nothing neighbor, and his dog ruined your yard and garden.  And his kids don’t stay at home.  And they go over there and they do all manner of things.  That’s your neighbor. 

What do you do about your neighbor?  He does all kinds of things that just drive you to distraction.  What do you do with him?  What is the easiest thing in the world?  To fall out with your neighbor. 

You don’t like his kids.  You don’t like his dogs.  And you don’t like his blaring radio.  And you don’t like his parties that go until four or five o’clock in the morning and really get going strong towards daylight.  And you don’t like all of those things that go on. 

What do you do about the fellow down there in the office and he’s a despicable kind.  You’d almost rather die than work by him.  And he doesn’t treat you right.  What do you do about these people? 

All right.  If you are a Christian, this is what you do.  Get along with him.  Brother, get along with them.  Get along with them.  Whatever it takes outside of a violation of a great moral principle, get along with them.  Get along with them. 

A drunk came into a bar and he had a long list of names in his hand.  And around there they said, “What is that, that long list of names in your hand?” 

And he said, “Here, here I have the names of all of the men in this town that I can whip.” 

And a big fellow walked over there to him and said, “Is my name on that list?” 

And that drunk looked over there and he said, “Yes, sir, yes, I have.” 

And the fellow drew himself up to his full height and said, “You can’t whip me.” 

He looked down his list and he said, “Did I take your name off the list?” 

“As much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.”  Get along with them.  Get along with them.  Get along with them.  As much as you can, get along with them.  Don’t let a nasty situation arise over you.  Don’t let it come in your office.  Don’t let it come in your home and in your neighborhood and among the people where you live. 

As much as you can, live peaceably with all men.  What do you do with evil?  What do you do with injury, personal insults, and hurt?  What do you do with corruption in the world? 

All right.  A second thing, we are insofar as we can and are able, we are to retard it.  We are to stop it insofar as we’re ever able. 

Jesus said, “Ye are the salt of the earth.”  And one good member in a bad family—a mother sometimes, a daughter sometimes, once in a while a son, once in a while a father, one good member in a family—or how much does that one good member do, one good member, one good, fine friend in an organization? 

There are a bunch of cheapskates.  There are also a bunch of drunkards and gamblers.  They don’t have respect for God and the Lord or for life.  They are a sorry bunch.  There are a lot of organizations, apparently, everybody in them are almost like that. 

But there is one glorious Christian and he is a blessing.  Oh, how they are conscious of him.  They know he’s there.  He may be the butt of every fiery story.  He may wield an influence that he himself doesn’t realize.

One in an organization, just a few in a wretched city: the Lord God said to Abraham, “Abraham, if I can find in all of Sodom, if I can find ten righteous men, I’ll spare Sodom.” 

For the lack of 10, just 10, Sodom was destroyed.  That’s what we can do.  We can retard it.  We can stop it.  That’s what salt does.  It stops corruption and disease. 

What can we do?  What can we do in the presence of evil and wrong and injury?  This is what we can do: We can lend ourselves to the creation of the more glorious and worthy way, a more blessed principle, a more glorious following. 

These Christian virtues, [faith] and humility and meekness are not static.  But they are accurate and vigorous and quickened and alive.  Good is not just the absence of evil, but good is positive and directed.  It has an energy and it has a tremendous working for it.  Chalmers preached a great sermon one time entitled “The Explosive Power of a New Affection.” 

When evil comes, it comes because there is a vacuity.  There is nothing there.  And it seizes and it takes hold and it grows.  But good can grow.  Righteousness can grow.  Faith can grow.  Love can grow.  Humility can grow.  Devotion can grow.  Consecration can grow.  These things are tremendously active and vibrant and vigorous.  They are quickened and alive. 

Let me illustrate it so you know what I am talking about.  You know why these teenagers vandalize?  You know why they get together and up and down these streets they put firecrackers in these houses and they put fire in those automobiles and they wreck these homes sometime.  And if there were a bunch of teenagers that came into our church last week and did all of that damage over there.  You know why that vandalism on the corner from the kids? 

I tell you why.  They are indulged.  They have nothing to consume their mind.  I suppose that child labor is a horrible thing.  They say it is a horrible thing.  I have seen child labor in India and that kind of child labor is horrible. 

But I tell you another thing that is horrible, to allow boys and girls to grow up indolent and in laziness and without any conception of what money is worth and what work is.  It is also a horrible and unspeakable thing. 

Our boys and our girls, as boys and girls, their lives and their times ought to be dedicated and their energy consumed—I don’t mean that they have to be driven to work all of the time—maybe part of their energy consumed in directed work.  But let these kids loose, there is a vacuity in their lives and they fill it with unspeakable things that teenagers do. 

Why do you think that a man drinks?  A guy in Birmingham was asked, “Why do you drink?” 

And he replied, “It’s the driest way out of Birmingham.” 

There’s an emptiness in his song.  There is a vacuity in his life.  And he has to do it.  He’d go crazy if he didn’t. 

I don’t have to drink.  You don’t have to drink.  But there are lots of people who don’t have in their souls and in their life what you have in order to fill that void, that emptiness.  They drink anything to calm themselves and get away from themselves. 

Do you know why a guy ambles down to the bar to meet a girl?  And most fellows, most fellows that are not given to a wonderful love and friendship, to a wonderful partnership at home, most of them by and by, will amble down to the bar. 

And he’ll [sit] there.  And then will come over a cheap girl and say, “Honey, could I have a drink with you?  Or would you buy one for me?” 

Why does he do it?  I’ll tell you why.  Most of the time, it isn’t because he likes the filthy and the dirty and the cheap and the prostituted.  But there is an emptiness and loneliness and he doesn’t know how to fill his heart and he doesn’t know what to do with his soul.  So he ambles down to the bar and looks for a cheap, make the date.  That’s why he does it. 

Do you know why fellows smoke?  I’ll tell you why.  Because they don’t know what to do with their hands.  They don’t know what to do with themselves.  They don’t know what to do. 

Here you are, you sit down.  What do you do with your hands?  Well, there they are.  What do you do with the things?  What do you do with them? 

And smoking gives you something to do.  You sit down there and you got to find it.  You got to reach around for a match.  You got to strike it, you got to strike it.  You got to strike it. 

And you put it in your mouth.  And you got to run down a do-winky, an ashtray.  And you got to sit just so and it gives you something to do.  It is the emptiness of your life that makes you do it. 

All of these things and I’m not putting smoking in the same category with drinking and off-colored dating, but I say all of those things come because of the emptiness of life.  There’s not anything on the inside. 

And I am saying that to illustrate that goodness is positive.  Goodness is energetic.  It’s quickened and alive.  And the way to overcome evil is by instilling great energizing works and principles and dedications that belong to God without which you can fight and war and preach and pray forever and evil will never be overcome. 

All right.  Let’s go on.  What shall I do with evil?  What shall I do with hurt and injury?  This is what we do.  We leave the recompense to God.  “’Vengeance is mine.  I will repay,’ saith the Lord.” 

“Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay,’ saith the Lord.” 

It isn’t my job to recompense the reward that evil people incur.  It is not mine.  That belongs to God.  If you came to this court, studying the Bible this week, there are in the Book of Revelation, there are the terrible judgments of Almighty God reserved against that awful and final day. 

There are the judgments of the Great White Throne, when the resurrected wicked dead shall stand before God and receive the works done in their flesh—these awful things of falling into the hands of the living God.  The wheels of God grind slow, but they grind exceedingly fine. 

I’m not to judge.  I’m not to recompense.  It is not mine to reward.  That belongs to God.  Let God repay.  He will.  He will.  I’ve always thought that David who so many times could have struck Saul down—down to the hem of his garment one time and held it up from afar just as though Saul if he was close enough to take his sword, and the same sword he dropped and plunged into his body, and there he just cut the hem off of his garment. 

I often think of David and his soldiers and around him and his friends around him said, “David, why don’t you slay that wicked man who tries to slay you?” 

And David replied, “It is not for me to touch the anointed of the Lord.  It belongs to God.”  And the Lord dealt with him.  That’s right.  That’s Christian. 

And one other thing, what shall we do with evil?  What shall we do with hurt and injury?  This is what we shall do.  We shall recompense good.  We shall return good.  We shall overcome evil with good. 

God help me, how do I do it?  He who speaks evil, we shall speak good.  He curses.  We shall bless. 

 

You can talk about me

Just as much as you please.

I’ll talk about you

Down on my knees.

 

Ah, that we could!  “Be not overcome with evil, but overcome evil with good.”  A kind gesture.  A gracious word.  A kind thought of remembrance.  Ah, it takes more than anything that I know of.  That’s hard.  That’s hard.  But most of the time it works. 

Somebody says something wrong about you, somebody speaks evil of you.  Let me tell you what you do.  Get a hold of a friend who will be careful to relate to that fellow and say something marvelously good about him.  And by the grapevine it gets to him.  See what happens. 

It is the coals of fire on his head.  He’ll be coming around.  He’ll be saying something nice to you.  And he’ll be saying something nice to you because for the evil that he spake, you have returned good. 

Just this and I’m through.  There is not anymore moving or precious story in God’s book than the story of Joseph who was hated by his brothers.  They despised his looks.  They despised his strength.  They despised his words.  They hated him.  He was his father’s favorite. 

There he came walking with his coat of many colors.  They didn’t have a coat of many colors.  Joseph got it.  It was his father’s pet.  He was his momma’s pride and joy.  They hated him. 

And upon a day, they put him in a pit to die.  And one of them said: Let’s don’t lose this money if he dies.  That doesn’t mean anything for us.  Let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites. 

So they got some money for him, and took his coat of many colors and put it in a kid’s blood, in kid’s blood, and took it to their father and said, “This is what we found in Joseph’s coat.”  A wild beast has slain him and eaten him up. 

And they sold him to the Ishmaelites, and Joseph was down into Egypt.  And he was a slave there.  And the years passed. 

And then those stories when those brethren came down to the land of Egypt to get food for the family’s land of Judea.  And then when Benjamin was brought back and in Benjamin’s sack the cup was found, and they come before the lord of all Egypt who is Joseph, their brother.  They come before the lord of all Egypt who is Joseph. 

And Joseph says, “On account of this thievery, you can return back home, but Benjamin has to stay here, my slave surety.” 

And Judah came near unto him and said and made that dramatic appeal for the boy, Benjamin, “How shall I go up to my father and the lad be not with me?” 

And Joseph could contain himself no longer and he wept aloud.  And he caused the Egyptians to leave and Joseph said unto his brethren, “Come near.  Come near.  I am Joseph.  Is my father still alive?” 

And his brethren could not answer him, for they were troubled in his presence.  All of those days of hate and bitterness, all of those hours when they looked upon him to die in the pit, all of those times, they came back and they were troubled in his presence. 

And Joseph said, “Come near to me, I pray you.  Come near.” 

And they came near and Joseph said, “I am Joseph, your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt.  Don’t be grieved nor angry with yourselves that you sold me, for God sent me before you to preserve life.  God sent me before you to preserve your prosperity.  It was not you, it was of God.  It was of God.” 

And he turned to his own brother, the son of his own mother, he turned to Benjamin and he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck and he wept and Benjamin wept.  Ah, isn’t that of God?  Isn’t that of the Lord?  Isn’t that in the highest traditions of the Holy Book?  Isn’t that Christian? 

Dear people, anybody can fight back.  Anybody can curse and return.  Anybody can be angry.  Anybody can recompense evil for evil.  But if you do, what do you more than others? 

How, what, would others say, “O great God, what a noble Christian.  What a dedicated life.” 

To be Christian and let the Lord answer.  Let the Lord recompense.  Let the Lord judge.  But as for us, God shall lead.  The Lord help us.  And for us, we are to return good for evil. 

Well, I will pray.  Let’s pray.  Wonderful Savior, Who, reviled, reviled not again.  Being cursed, cursed not in return.  Being wounded and despitefully used, prayed for those who crucified Him. 

O Savior, how does a man ever measure up to the calling we have in Christ Jesus?  It is so natural.  It is so much of the flesh to return the bitter and hasty word with a caustic and burning reply.  It is so easy to fall into the pattern of hating those who hate you. 

Dear Lord, how could we ever be children of the Father?  when we act and live lie the unregenerated world.

Lord, give me a double portion of the grace and mercy of the spirit of Jesus.  Not to be good for nothing.  Not to be negatively good.

But Lord, dynamically and actively good.  Given to the work of the Lord.  Filled with all of the things of Christ and his church and the work of Jesus.

And may those people, Lord, may they find in these holy admonitions read from this book tonight, may they find encouragement to bring religion out of the clouds and out of the sermon and out of the pulpit and put it into life.

Our hands are not filthy because like a theologist or like a chemist or like a drug woman, they have the earth on them.  And we are no less Christians out here in the common ways of life trying to live Jesus, than we are at prayer, or listening to the message from the preacher in God's house.

Master, as we're Christians here, in this holy place, tomorrow when we go to work may we be no less Christian there.  But to do it Jesus, we need help, God help us.

Now master, as we sing a song, if there is somebody you give us tonight, put into his heart to come.  And we will thank thee for answered prayer.  In the lowly Jesus, in his spirit of humility and in his precious name, amen.

Now, while we sing our song, somebody, you, tonight, Pastor, I give my heart and life to the Lord Jesus.  I'm coming into the church.

Here I am, or here's my family or here's my little boy and my girl. God must make the appeal.

God must woo and draw.  As the Lord shall say the word, would you come and make it now.  Make it now.  While we stand and while we sing.