Matthew 5:40

“If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also.

     It is very hard to master the attitude that Jesus had. In fact, that is what makes His commandments so difficult. Not only are his precepts hard to obey, we see that He did obey them in His own life. In fact often times, His obedience was in order to help us. So we may be frustrated by what it is that we are asked to sacrifice, but it is moot when we understand how much Jesus Himself sacrificed.

     Jesus here commands us that if someone were to sue us that we not only give them our shirt, but our coat as well. The next law is like it, that if we are compelled to go one mile we should go with them two. This is where the phrase, “Go the extra mile,” comes from. We are not just to ignore someone when the mistreat us. We are to act upon them with love. It is one thing to ignore the insult of someone else. It is quite another to pay them a compliment, and to do so without sarcasm or malice.

     Yet Jesus obeys this command to the fullest. He was mocked by all those whom He came to save. Not only did He ignore their insults, He went ahead and saved them anyway. He could have just ignored them and came back to Heaven and let all men suffer the fate they deserve. Instead, he went the extra mile. Not only did he not repay evil with evil, he overcame evil with good (Romans 12:21).

“If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also.