Dear Gramps,

Please help me to understand why it is so hard to turn the other cheek. Was that advice meant for someone else and not me?

David, from West Monroe, Louisiana

Dear David,

That advise was meant particularly for you. If you could possibly master it, look what it would do for your pugilistic nature! The idea is not, with masterly self control, to avoid throwing a punch, but the idea is to placidly accommodate the anger of another. You see, the Lord knows how to run the show. If you hit some guy back, what is the next step? And the next one after that? You might as well go into the ring and get paid for it.

But if you “turn the other cheek” i.e., if you respond kindly when treated roughly, you throw the other guy off balance. It’s like opening a door just as someone starts to push on it–he falls on his face, and you gain the upper hand. You want to really hurt a guy? Turn the other cheek! This is the way Paul put it in Romans 12:19-21.

Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.

So if you want someone to really get it, let the Lord take care of it. He will meet out exactly the punishment that the guy should get. If you try to do it on your own, you’ll foul it all up–either too much or too little. Besides that, if you take the punishment of another out of the Lord’s hands and try to do it yourself, the Lord won’t stop you. He’ll just let it go, and you are now the operative. If you louse it up then you become liable for judgement. Take the easy way out, turn the other cheek.

Gramps