Friendship with Jesus In A Hostile World

Introduction: The World Hates You

California Legislation Threatens Parental Right of Non-Affirming Parents.

Why do I mention this legislation? We live in a world that is continues to increase its hostility towards followers of Jesus.

This is the world that we inhabit. This is the world that we have been sent into by Jesus.

One temptation believer face - the darker the world, the greater temptation to huddle up and hunker down.

In this farewell discourse, Jesus is preparing his disciple to carry out the mission he has appointed them to in the midst of great hostility and even danger.

He is also preparing us for the same mission and we are faced with a world that doesn’t appreciate our message and our convictions.

Read John 15:12-27 (focus in 12-17 want you to see greater context)

The Lasting Fruit Jesus is talking about is the fruit of souls. It the fruit of making disciples while living on mission with Jesus .

We have been chosen and appointed to bear this fruit. We have been chosen out of the world and set apart for a particular task - being a witness for Christ. This is our mission - to make disciples, to connect all people to Christ, his community, and his calling.

How are we supposed to live on mission in a hostile world?

Living on Mission in a Hostile World - Three Principles

Fruit-Bearing Mission is the Overflow of Christian Love

Living on mission starts in this community with our love for one another.

The first priority of the church is not mission - its love for one another.

Revelation 2:1-7 “1 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: ‘The words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands. 2 “ ‘I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. 3 I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name’s sake, and you have not grown weary. 4 But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent. 6 Yet this you have: you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. 7 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.’”

1 Cor 13:1-8 “1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.”

Jesus establishes a high bar for this love in vs. 13-14

Jesus asks us to love one another the way that he has loved us - by laying down his life for us.

You know what this means for the church - it means that we don’t get to have a negative, bitter, complaining, and easily offended disposition towards one another.

This means that we don’t get to hold grudges, this means that we don’t have the freedom to be petty, this means that we don’t cut off relationships and live in some kind of excusable state of division.

We are called to lay down our lives for each other - until we have the mind of Christ in this way toward each other how are we able to love a world and live on mission in a world that hates our message?

I have a unique experience in the world as a pastor since what I do for vocation is directly related to Christianity - people find out your a pastor and everything changes - people tend to hold you at arms length…but I have also experienced it in the church over the years - people not believing the best of your intentions, being hyper critical and negative, …I guarantee negative, bitter, complaining church people can do nothing in the world for Jesus, nothing.

What a minute preacher - but she said this, he did that, you expect me.....Jesus said lay down your life. He didn’t just say it, Jesus gave his life to make his enemies his friends.

Learn to lay down your life for one another and then you will lay down your life for the lost.

Let me also challenge you that its really hard to lay down your life for one another if you aren't a member of local church - where there is a commitment to each other.

Think of a brother or sister in Christ who you have harbored bitterness in your heart towards, you purposefully avoid them or don’t have anything to do with them - you need to make that right as quickly as possible - and the Love of Christ will begin to fill you up and overflow…it may be scary, it may be hard to set aside your pride…but it will honor savior.

Do you have a critical, negative spirit? - repent of that. You can’t lay down your life for others if you cant e lay down your preferences and opinions, your hurts and your offenses. It will honor your Savior who laid down his life for his friends.

Remember - Jesus laid down his life for those who fail to lay down their lives - he died for all of our sins…which is why we press on to be like him and do what he says.

You Will Thrive on Mission When You Embrace Your Identity in Christ. (14-15)

What is identity? - I don’t know if you ever watched the Jason Bourne movies - but Bourne was a CIA asset who entered into a program that essential erased his identity and turned him into an assassin - one of the main plot lines is that Bourne is trying to the put pieces together to rediscover who he truly was…You identity is how you answer the question - Who am I? Sin erases or reprograms us in a way that we have a difficult time seeing ourselves as creatures made in God’s image who exist for his glory…we see ourselves in may other terms. Jesus wants us to rediscover the core of our identity.

You are a friend of the King of Kings

vs. 14 puts our friendship within the context of the authority of Christ - we are not friends with a peer, we are friends with the sovereign of the universe and it is a privilege to do what he commands - namely here to love one another. YOU ARE A FRIEND OF JESUS, YOUR CREATOR.

This must be central to our identity

-I may see myself as Mandy’s husband, Josiah and Abby’s dad, Son of Dale and Toni, Pastor of Covenant Church…these are important aspects of my identity....there are also internal, private aspects to our identity that are probably mostly unhealthy…I see myself as fearful, or ugly, or a failure, etc…these things are harmful to believe as essential to Who I am....The number one truth I need to believe as essential to who I am…I am a redeemed friend of Jesus.

Vs. 15 - we are not merely servants. but Jesus has brought us back into a sphere of intimacy with himself. He doesn’t just issue commands and assignments, he has disclosed to us the heart of his most intimate relationship - his relationship with the Father.

This is how Jesus wants his followers to think about themselves in a hostile world…when the world is reviling, and hating, and criticizing, and tempting - our identity cannot be rooted in the world, our identity must be that we are friends of the king.

In Revelation 3:14-22 Jesus is speaking to a church that has become worldly and their identity is in money and influence and accomplishment - notice his enticement to them is to fellowship with them as the king who grants the right to share his throne....this is quite amazing. “14 “And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: ‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation. 15 “ ‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! 16 So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. 17 For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. 19 Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. 20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. 21 The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne.”

Jesus is calling us into a loyal, submissive, intimate friendship with himself - this identity sustains and empowers the church on mission in the world.

Now - how do you know if your identity is somewhere other than in Christ - you find out when that part of you that you idolize the most is somehow diminished or taken away…we must foster a firm belief that Jesus laid down his life for us that we would become his close intimate friends, friends of the king. Notice - he made us his friends!

Jesus Chose You and Appointed You to Bear Lasting Fruit. (16)

I am going to focus in more on vs. 16 and the doctrine of election next week…I want to emphasize for today that Jesus is reminding his disciples that he chose them for this purpose. He called them, chose them, and equipped them to establish the new covenant church.

And since he did the choosing and set apart his disciples to bear lasting fruit - he furnishes his followers with everything they need…in other words all of his friends who are appointed to live on mission for him have all of the resources of the kingdom at their disposal.

In other words - we have no insurmountable obstacles to accomplish our mission

the condition of the world, unbelief in people’s hearts, financial resources, opposition, government, persecution, satanic opposition - are these obstacles - sure - but they are nothing to God.

Was Goliath an obstacle to Israel - yes - if David just came with a slinghot.

1 Sam 17:45 “45 Then David said to the Philistine, “You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.”

Were the walls of Jericho and obstacle to Joshua and the people of Israel?

Joshua 6:2 “2 And the Lord said to Joshua, “See, I have given Jericho into your hand, with its king and mighty men of valor.”

Was unbelief and hostility an obstacle for Paul?

2 Thess 3:1-5 “1 Finally, brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored, as happened among you, 2 and that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men. For not all have faith. 3 But the Lord is faithful. He will establish you and guard you against the evil one. 4 And we have confidence in the Lord about you, that you are doing and will do the things that we command. 5 May the Lord direct your hearts to the love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ.”

He trusted in the resources of the Lord to accomplish his purposes.

We have been chosen, redeemed, and appointed to make disciples in the midst of hostile world with all the resources of the kingdom of God at our disposal!

Conclusion: The Greatest Fight in The World

“Our mission, like our Lord's, is to gather out the chosen of God from among men, that they may live to the glory of God. Every saved man should be, under God, a saviour; and the church is not in a right state until she has reached that conception of herself. The elect church is saved that she may save, cleansed that she may cleanse, blessed that she may bless. All the world is the field, and all the members of the church should work therein for the great Husbandman. Waste lands are to be reclaimed, and forests broken up by the plough, till the solitary place begins to blossom as the rose. We must not be content with holding our own: we must invade the territories of the prince of darkness.”

We enter this fight with the greatest friend we could ever imagine and with the army of the redeemed who we have been called to love.