Equal And Opposite

The renowned physicist, Sir Isaac Newton, put forth three basic laws of physics. The third law says that for every action there is an opposite and equal reaction. For example, if you have a see-saw and you push down on one end, the opposite end goes up by an equal amount. If you were wearing ice skates and were on the ice, holding a ball, and you pushed the ball away from you, you would move backwards. If you have ever fired a gun, then the recoil is the reaction to the explosion of the gunpowder and the bullet leaving the barrel.

In some countries and cultures, punishment is similar to this. If you steal from a person, you might have a hand chopped off, in a sense an equal reaction. In Mosiac law, the concept of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, followed the same line of reasoning.

When Jesus came and walked on the Earth, He changed this concept of Mosiac law. He also had an equal action/reaction principle to His teaching. The difference was that His reaction to evil was an opposite, but positive, one. He said that if someone slapped your cheek, instead of hitting him back, you turned and offered the other cheek. If a Roman soldier ordered someone to carry his armor for a mile, as was the law under Roman rule, then the positive reaction was to carry it a second mile instead of trying to figure out how to even the score. Even when He was put to death on the cross, He showed us an equal reaction. While He could have used His power to punish those who killed Him, He forgave them. Equal and opposite. Returning good for bad.

How about you? What your reactions to things that are done to you? If someone does something nice for you, what do you do? Sometimes a heartfelt “Thank you” is appropriate enough. A favor done for you doesn’t incur an obligation, but if you should see an opportunity to return the favor in some way, then you should certainly take it. Perhaps a nice thing done for you by a stranger could cause you to do something nice for a different stranger. I am sure you see the drift of this and can come up with your own ways of being an opposite reactor.

All of this niceness is great, but how about the other side of life? What do you do to the person who wrongs you in some way? Maybe they do something that hurts your feelings or causes you to get angry. Getting revenge in some way is certainly an equal reaction. What if your reaction is stronger than their original action? So, they try to balance the books and it goes back and forth, escalating higher and higher. That is not what Jesus taught us to do. Based on His example, we should return at least an equal amount of good for the wrong done to us. There is no telling what such an example might do to another person. What if your positive reaction showed them how it is supposed to be done? What if they talked to you or someone else about it, curious as to why you didn’t return bad for bad, and that curiosity ultimately lead them to Jesus? Not only would you have given them an equal reaction, but you would have given them something even greater.

The life you lead, the people you meet and with whom you interact, offer you countless opportunities to perform equal and opposite reactions. What are your reactions going to be? Are they going to be negative, which plays right into Satan’s plans, or are they going be to positive, just as Jesus taught us through His words and his actions? It is up to you to grab the right one. The question is: Will you do it?