What is the context?
Paul extends the call to sincere love into difficult relationships. Believers are to bless persecutors, share in others’ joy and grief, live in harmony and associate with the lowly. Humility changes whose company they seek and how they respond to others’ lives.
He then forbids repaying evil with evil and calls for peace wherever it is possible on their part. That qualification recognizes that one person cannot control everyone else’s conduct. The responsibility is to pursue what is good without making retaliation the answer to harm.
The final commands put revenge in God’s hands and replace it with concrete kindness: feed a hungry enemy and give a thirsty enemy a drink. Paul draws on Deuteronomy and Proverbs before gathering the passage into the call to overcome evil with good. His instruction concerns how believers act, even when the other person remains hostile.
How is this passage commonly understood?
Christians commonly understand the passage as rejecting personal revenge and calling for active kindness toward enemies. Seeking peace and showing compassion belong together with trusting God to judge rightly.
The burning-coals image receives different explanations. Calvin’s comment on verse 20 understands kindness as either softening an enemy or troubling the enemy’s conscience. Wesley’s notes on verses 20–21 also emphasize overcoming opposition through kindness. These explanations keep attention on doing good; the passage does not promise that every enemy will respond in the same way.
Where does this fit in God's plan?
Paul’s instruction shares the pattern of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 5:43–48: love enemies and pray for persecutors, reflecting the Father’s generosity toward the righteous and unrighteous. Luke 6:27–36 likewise connects kindness to enemies with being merciful as the Father is merciful.
The Old Testament quotations already place justice and kindness together: vengeance belongs to God (Deuteronomy 32:35–36), while the enemy’s hunger calls for a meal (Proverbs 25:21–22). Life shaped by God’s mercy does not need to copy the evil it encounters. It can entrust judgment to Him and seek another person’s good.
What is our position?
We don't have a position on this passage yet. When our study reaches a conclusion the text supports, it will appear here.