THE teaching of Jesus in the last part of this Gospel is so well-known that I have never, I now realise, given it the attention that it deserves. But “familiarity breeds contempt” is not a truism that we should ever be happy applying to the Bible.

In the past, I have made the lazy assumption that each command in vv.27-31 was making the same sort of demand on us. The fact that they are all counter-intuitive encourages this. The life of a Christian is a topsy-turvy thing, in which curses (poverty, rejection, injustice) turn out to be blessings; and blessings such as wealth and status become curses that cut us off from God.

So, we begin at the beginning. “Love your enemies.” How is this possible? It does not, after all, say “Behave lovingly,” which most of us could probably manage at a push. It just says “Love”. I sometimes find myself listening to young adults who are unhappy because they feel attracted to someone who does not reciprocate. They may rack their brains to think of ways to change themselves so as to win the other person’s affection. I try to help them to see that feelings of attachment cannot simply be created like this. They either happen, or they don’t.

When love does not awaken naturally in us, it is just not possible to conjure it out of thin air. That makes this Gospel command difficult to understand and apply to our lives. It makes me think of Dickensian heroines who try to mould themselves into whatever some other person requires them to be. They shoulder the burden of emotional fakery to conform to a purpose that they have been conditioned to regard as higher than their own happiness.

One way to solve the puzzle is to blame the speaker, Jesus. Perhaps his teaching is unreasonable. But that is not an answer that Christians can accept. Another unacceptable solution is to say that the fault lies with God the Father for putting such extreme words into the mouth of his Son. That will not do either. We could take the time-honoured course of blaming ourselves (it saves so much time), but this would be wrong, too.

In the end, like Sherlock Holmes after a three-pipe problem, we get what must be the right answer because it is the only answer left. The difficulty can lie only in the words themselves — more specifically, with the word “love”.

We are used to hearing that there are different kinds of love in the Bible. In English, we need work-around words to distinguish love for God from love for our life-partner or children, our work, or our favourite book or music. The love-word used here refers to specifically Christian love (agape). But, even when we know this, we cannot “solve” the problem; for we still do not know how it is possible for us to evoke true Christian love in ourselves.

The answer is right in front of us, in the passage itself — although, when we read it as a simple list of “aims and objectives for Christian people”, that answer is hard to spot. So, think of ”love your enemies” as the course objective for the Christian learner: then what follows are the course materials that you need to work through to win your coveted qualification.

We cannot make ourselves love people even when they are nice, or kind, or generous. Making ourselves love our enemies is impossible unless we act on the other instructions. Doing good to those who hate us is a practical step. It does not depend on an emotion, but on human resolve and commitment. Blessing those who curse, and praying for abusers, is practical, too. It can liberate us from cycles of wrong and retaliation, and from other people’s agendas. Perhaps their enmity and abuse comes from a place of pain. But it is their problem; it does not have to be ours, too — although we must also consider the possibility that some fault lies in us.

Turning the other cheek, and giving more of our stuff to people who take from us, are also ways of loving others. Instead of doing emotional gymnastics, we must live the values that we aspire to, until they catch light in us. The flame may not be especially bright or hot. But imperfect love is still better than no love at all.