This World Is NOT Your Friend!

Notes

In his book God Tells the Man Who Cares, A. W. Tozer observes a dangerous perspective among Christians. “Men think of the world, not as a battleground but as a playground. We are not here to fight, we are here to frolic. We are not in a foreign land, we are at home. We are not getting ready to live, we are already living.”

This perspective is dangerous and especially so today because the times we live in have changed. We no longer live in a Christian nation—it is truly more and more becoming an anti-Christian nation. How else would you describe the political correctness of today which forbids humor at the expense of anyone except Christians, when believers are blamed for the woes of the nation, and when popular culture finds blasphemy entertaining. History has taught us that it is a short step to persecution.

The words of Jesus should be particularly relevant for us. We, like the disciples, receive them during a time of relative peace and security. But our future is no less certain than theirs was on the eve of Jesus’ arrest. As the Savior prepared the remaining eleven disciples for ministry after His physical departure from the world, He urged them to draw strength from God through obedience and to nurture one another in the same kind of love shared within the Trinity. But He also wanted to prepare them for reality. While victory is assured, the followers of Jesus are soldiers in a great conflict between two realms: the kingdom of God and the world system ruled by Satan—the forces of light and darkness. And in this conflict, there will be hardship, gloom, suffering, and even death.

1. The world hates the Savior who chose us out of the world, 18-19.

The Lord Jesus is communicating to His disciples the source of the world system’s hatred of them. It is not if, but when their hared is displayed, to recognize that as disciples of Jesus they are recipients of their hatred for Jesus and what Jesus stood for and proclaimed to them.

The disciples are in a new relationship with the world system. They are now marked men, having once been loved by the world system but now hated because Jesus has chosen them and they are following Him, not the world.

2. The world rejects the word of the Savior, persecuting those who keep it, 20.

Jesus reminds them of His earlier words that evening after He had washed their feet. Now He applies it to rejection they will experience because of their position with Jesus. It is because a slave is not greater than his master that whatever befalls the master will impact the slave as well. Because the world, specifically the religious Jews, persecuted Jesus, the disciples will experience similar treatment. Their response to Jesus’ words informs the disciples of the response to the words regarding Jesus they will share with others. So as Jesus faced opposition to His words from the Father, so the disciples will face opposition to the words of testimony through the work of the Spirit.

3. The world has no excuse for their sin of rejecting the words and works of the Son, 21-24.

a. Why? Because they do not know the Father, 21.

The disciples will be persecuted because of their relationship with Jesus and their words about Jesus will be rejected because they also rejected Jesus’ word. They do this because they do not know God; even though they claim to love and follow Him, they have rejected the one God sent. In the same way, they will reject the disciples whom Jesus has sent.

b. Their sin is without excuse because they hate Jesus’ words, 22.

The coming of Jesus was a promise fulfilled. The words He spoken were not on His own initiative but were the Father’s words to the people. The religious leaders revealed their heart in their response to the words of Jesus (God). Their rejection of His words demonstrated their sin against God, who sent Jesus and the message Jesus shared with the people.

c. Their hatred for the Father and the Son is revealed in rejecting Jesus’ works, 23-24.

Their hatred of Jesus demonstrated visibly their hatred of the Father who sent Him. Jesus declares that the works / signs He had done among them were a testimony against them. Jesus did the Father’s works. No one else had ever done what Jesus had done, yet having seen these works, the response was on of hatred of Jesus and by extension the Father whose works Jesus was doing.

4. The world rejects the testimony of the Spirit of truth, 25-27.

a. Their rejection was prophesied, v. 25.

The Lord was not surprised by the reaction of the world, as seen in the religious leaders of Judah. The rejection of Jesus and his disciples is found in the very Law to which those rejecting them claim to be loyal, thus further demonstrating their culpability. This very activity of hating was cited in Psalm 69:4, alluded to or cited seventeen times in the New Testament. Here the innocent psalmist is complaining to God about his persecutors. So, Jesus is not just using a convenient proof text but making connection with an important type. He is using Scripture to assure his disciples that they should not be surprised by what he is experiencing nor by what they themselves will experience. God is in control.

Thus, Jesus is giving the disciples two grounds for assurance, Himself and the Scriptures. They should look to Him for His example and for what He has said to them. They also gain confidence through what they find in the Old Testament, understood in relation to Jesus (v. 25). The Scriptures in general, and the Gospels in particular, continue to play such a role in the lives of faithful disciples today.

b. Nevertheless, God’s testimony continues by the Spirit through Jesus’ disciples, 26-27.

From his own witness and that of Scripture Jesus now returns to the witness of the Spirit and his disciples. Their witness stands in marked contrast to the rejection by the world, confirming the fact that Jesus and those associated with him are not of this world. Referring to the Spirit as the Spirit of truth (v. 26) provides yet another contrast with the world, which has rejected Jesus out of error.

Jesus says he will send the Spirit from the Father (v. 26), thus affirming both that the Spirit is associated in a primary way with the Father and that the Son is involved in his historical mission (14:26; 16:7). Then Jesus refers to the Spirit as the one who goes out from the Father (v. 26). The meaning of this line has been the source of enormous controversy right down to today. Many Western Christians would say the going out is another way of referring to the historical mission of the Spirit. The Eastern church, on the other hand, sees this as referring to the eternal relations within the Godhead: this procession of the Spirit is not into history; it is the coming forth of the Spirit from the Father from all eternity. The Son is God begotten, the Spirit is God proceeding, and the Father is the one source of both.

The Father as the one ultimate source of all is true to the thought of this Gospel and the rest of Scripture, but it is doubtful that this verse is dealing in its primary sense with the eternal relations between the Father and the Spirit. The word used for from (para) does not denote source in this sense. Indeed, the line in the Nicene Creed referring to the eternal relations is “I believe in the Holy Spirit … who proceeds from (ek) the Father.” The Greek fathers who refer to the eternal procession use ek and even change para to ek when referring to verse 26 in this connection (Westcott 1908:2:213). Furthermore, the language in our verse (para) is used elsewhere in John to describe Jesus’ coming forth from the Father on his mission within history, though with a different verb (16:27; 17:8). Thus, the going out probably also refers to the historical mission of the Spirit. Jesus repeats the thought in this way to emphasize that the Spirit is from the Father—that is, like Jesus himself, he is not of this world.

The Spirit is going to testify about Jesus (v. 26). Because he is being sent to the disciples—whom I will send to you—it would seem his testimony is to the disciples, who in turn will testify before the world. Further details about the Spirit’s testimony will be given shortly (16:8–15), but first the testimony of the disciples themselves is introduced.

The disciples were chosen out of the world (v. 19) and are now said to be witnesses because they have been with Jesus from the beginning (v. 27), referring to the beginning of his ministry. This implies Jesus is speaking primarily to the eleven in these chapters. They have been along for the whole trip so they can tell the whole story (cf. Acts 1:21–22).

Acts 1:21–22 NASB95

“Therefore it is necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us— beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He was taken up from us—one of these must become a witness with us of His resurrection.”

Because the Gospel is not just an abstract message but an account of what God himself has done and said as he was incarnate, history matters enormously, and the role of eyewitnesses is crucial.

“The New Testament is … neither a collection of thoughtful essays nor an attempt to construct a system of ethics. It bears witness to a unique history, and it discovers the truth in the history.… The fourth Gospel persuades and entices the reader to venture a judgement upon the history” (Hoskyns and Davey 1947:181).

The Gospel of John is itself a primary example of the witness referred to in verse 27. The eyewitness testimony is now available through the New Testament, which is foundational and is the criterion of all claims to bear witness to Christ.

These two verses, then, introduce the offense which the disciples are to wage in the face of the world’s hatred and persecution, with the disciples’ giving voice to the Holy Spirit’s witness against the world.

5. We are forewarned that we might stand firm when inevitable persecution arises, 16:1-4.

John 16:1–4 belongs with chapter 15. “These things” refers to everything Jesus had to say about the believer’s relationship to the world, which is strained at best, hostile at other times, and can become deadly. Jesus revealed this to the disciples so they would not be startled and then stumble in their spiritual walk. However, as with many of Jesus’ lessons, they did not take heed and all of them stumbled and fell. Upon His arrest, they fled. During His crucifixion, most hid. Before His resurrection, all despaired. After His resurrection, they doubted. And before the coming of the Holy Spirit, they faltered. Only after receiving the Holy Spirit did they act decisively and speak boldly.

Jesus predicted the scourge of religion upon the backs of genuine believers. Indeed, religious people would kill believers thinking they were pleasing the Lord. An example is Paul, who later became an apostle: He was among the crowd of religious authorities who murdered the first Christian martyr, Stephen (Acts 7:54–8:1).

Verse 4 reminds us that the disciples mat not have understood these words of Jesus at that moment—but they would later as the Spirit reminded them of what Jesus had said. They wouldn’t have to wonder, “Are we struggling through persecution because of some failure on our part?” No, persecution was expected, a normal consequence of living in hostile territory during the great conflict between good and evil, between the Lord and the ruler of this world, Satan.

In the last verses, Jesus explains how to prepare ourselves for the persecution to come…and it is coming:

1. Rely upon the Holy Spirit to supply wisdom, abilities, and courage (15:26). Jesus promised the Spirit would provide all that believers need to faithfully bear witness of Christ.

2. Faithfully proclaim divine truth and stand firm (15:27). The only effective weapon against evil is truth. The Holy Spirit will bring knowledge of Jesus Christ to mind and enable us to communicate His truth. And, because truth-tellers have been guaranteed persecution, He will supply supernatural courage to endure evil with dignity.

3. Keep from being ensnared by evil (16:1). The Greek verb translated “stumble” is skandalizō [4624]. The main idea carried by the term is “closing on something,” like a spring-loaded rabbit trap. It later became the word of choice for deliberately placing a trip hazard in the path of another to cause a fall. Jesus urged His disciples to abide—that is, obey His command to love one another—in order to avoid falling into the snare of the world. When we fail to love one another, we behave like the world, which serves self at the expense of others.

4. Never forget that persecution and the rise of evil are inevitable (16:4). When evil triumphs over truth, we quickly begin to wonder if we have done something wrong, or if we neglected to do something we should have. Jesus warned His disciples that evil would appear to enjoy victory upon His death and burial, but that His suffering was part of the divine plan to redeem humanity from the beginning. He suffered and died to atone for the sin of humanity, not because of any specific failure on the part of the remaining eleven disciples.

Along with this, let’s draw three helpful distinctions:

1. There is a great difference between picking a fight and enduring persecution. — Jesus never sought trouble nor invited persecution, yet evil found Him because evil always seeks to destroy truth.

2. There is a great difference between loving the world and becoming a part of it. — The world has declared itself the enemy of all who believe, so why would we who are followers of Christ do as the world does?

3. There is a great difference between living in fear and exercising caution. — Jesus took reasonable steps to avoid capture in public, keeping His location private at other times. Jesus knew His destiny and faced it with courage.