Loving our enemies, then, does not mean that we are supposed to love the dirt in which the pearl is buried; rather it means that we love the pearl which lies in the dust. Since the people who encountered Jesus found that he uncovered this level, and they therefore did not stand before him as criminals but as the lost and sought and mourned children of God, they were changed by those eyes. Under that gaze their original destiny revived; it was loved into being, as it were. Therefore they went away changed. God does not love us because we are by nature lovable. But we become lovable because he loves us.