Turning The Other Cheek In The 21st-Century

Most of us have heard the phrase about turning the other cheek when someone starts to bully you or try to start a fight with you. More specifically you most likely heard or read this somewhere in church because this is from the bible.

You have heard the law that says the punishment must match the injury: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say, do not resist an evil person! If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also. -Matthew 5:38-39

Well, how does that work in today’s time with Christians? Does that mean us (Christians) are supposed to just let people hit us and not defend ourselves?

What if you do fight back? Does that make you wrong?

These are the questions I’ve struggled with after reading this in the Bible. Speaking as someone who had no faith growing up I wasn’t one to start fights but I would surely never let someone start something without reacting in some sort of way physically.

Fast forward to me becoming a Christian, my response to wanting to physically stand up for myself or others became much more complicated from that single bible verse mentioned above.

I don’t really think there is a black-and-white answer here I think there is definitely a grey area and I think it’s a huge gray area, I believe that God knows that you have to stand up for yourself and those that you care about or certain people will just run all over you in life.

Then on other hand I find myself trying to interpret the Bible in a way that it fits the way I want it to mean.

This if something that a lot of people do because there are a lot of confusing parts in the Bible that don’t seem to have a direct meaning to most of us reading it so we try to guess or make that verse fit for whatever reason we want it to.

Doing this is one of the most dangerous things you can do when reading the Bible which is why I recommended getting a Bible that has modern day explanations to go along with it so that you can try to eliminate this as much as possible.

I’m getting a little off track here.

What Do Others Think About This

I have went back-and-forth with friends, family and everybody else about what they think about this and I’ve gotten so many mixed results.

Overall it seems they come to same type of answer which is basically that don’t let someone run all over you, defend yourself in situations where you need to.

However with that said, don’t go out looking to throw down with anyone who make look at you funny.

If someone starts to actually start to fight you for whatever reason then standing up for yourself is not a bad thing and you shouldn’t feel bad for it.

How I Came To My Type Of Thinking On This

Instead of me just trying to pretend this is what this verse means and that’s final type of thinking I went looking for some sort of connections with it in the Bible.

I won’t list all of them but I’m going to list the one that did stand out to me the most.

Most of us have heard of Samson In The Bible, the man given great strength to help fight his enemies but lost his powers when he cut his hair. Ignoring the hair part here, why would God give Samson such valuable strength if it wasn’t to defend himself and those around him?

This was a main reason where I realized that God knows there are bad people on this earth and sometimes we have to take a stand against them where some of those times being where physical altercations comes into play.

Final Thoughts

I know most of us wish we we’re as big as Tim Tebow so that most of the time our size could be the deterrent from anyone even trying to start anything with us or our friends.

Unfortunately we’re all not blessed with this. This leaves us with at some point in our lives to where we’re put in a position where we may need to defend ourselves or those around us.

I’m not advocating violence in no way, shape or form, unless that violence is in the form of tackling on the football field!

I just don’t want my fellow Christian brothers out their to feel about standing up for yourselves. Please let me know if you feel different and why on this topic because I always enjoy a good discussion on things such as this.

Thanks for sticking with me till the very end!