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The Lord tells His disciples what to expect from the world and how the world will treat them.
He tells them, “I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.”
“know that it hated Me first”
The Lord is not telling His disciples this in order to deepen their anxiety or to cause them to fear, but just the opposite. He is preparing them for the persecution to come, as the result of following Him. He is saying, do not be surprised, do not be caught off guard.
The evil world system loves its own. The world system does not love the God of the Bible, it wants nothing to do with the God of the Bible. We sometimes lose sight of this reality.
We hope to “win” the world for Christ. After all, it is not Christ’s will that any should perish, but that all would come to repentance. But this will not happen because the world hated Christ without a cause. And the world hated His disciples and still do. However, we continue to preach the gospel, not with the expectation of winning the love of the world, but with the expectation that the chosen of God, will hear and heed the gospel call, by the drawing power of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus said to them, “they also will persecute you…for My names sake, because they do not know the One who Me.”
Their hatred toward the Lord came at no surprise. In fact, He points out to His disciples, the enemies hatred toward David, who was a mere man. How much more, would the enemies hate the sinless Son of God? You want to know why the world hated Jesus? They hated Him because He was the Light, that exposed them of their sin and confronted them with the reality of who He is. Rather than turn away from their sin, they hated and rejected the only One worthy to forgive them.
Jesus assured His disciples that persecution would come, and opposition would be encountered as the result of following Him. Nevertheless, there is no joy, like the joy of following Christ.
We are reminded by Jesus in...
10 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 “Blessed are you when men cast insults at you, and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely, on account of Me.
12 “Rejoice, and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
So remember...
When you find yourselves being persecuted for doing that which God approves of, remind yourselves that the kingdom of heaven belongs to such people.
Consider it a blessing and a great honor, every time the insults are flung at you, and every kind of false accusation is made against you, because of your steadfastness to Christ.
The prophets before us were persecuted as well. Persecution is par with the course! Let joy and gladness reign your hearts, why? Because your reward is great in heaven!
Now listen…YOU ARE NOT ALONE! You never were, you never will be!
God is Omni-Present. He is every where, in all places, at the same time, at all times, and He has been from the beginning of time.
Yes! Jesus was going to ascend back to His rightful position in Heaven, but Jesus would still be present with them and in them by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Jesus foretells His troubled disciples, “I will not leave you comfortless.” There is One whom would come after Him, who would be a Teacher, a Comforter, a Helper. He has many wonderful attributes and His work is amazing.
Jesus, the Son of God would send God the Holy Spirit to indwell His disciples and empower His disciples to continue the work of God.
He says here in...
26 “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness of Me,
27 and you will bear witness also, because you have been with Me from the beginning.
When faced with the worlds hatred, hostility and persecution, the disciples, empowered by the Holy Spirit, continued to testify of Christ. True disciples continue to fulfill this promise until this very day. Testimony of Christ our Lord continues to be fulfilled as Christians around the world risk their lives, even unto death.
Jesus explains...
1 “These things I have spoken to you, that you may be kept from stumbling.
Jesus used this same phrase, “these things I have spoken to you,” back in our last Chapter.
11 “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.
Jesus desired that His disciples have the fullness of joy. In fact, He want them to have the same joy in the fullest possible way. That’s why He spoke about “these things.”
Now again, He tells why He has spoken about “these things”…
1 “These things I have spoken to you, that you may be kept from stumbling.
Not only does He desire that His disciples have the same joy as His in the fullest, possible way, but He wants them “kept from stumbling.”
That is…He spoke these things to keep them from falling away from faith.
Remember? In chapter 14, Jesus says to them, “let not your heart be trouble?”
There are things in life that will dishearten us and cause us to lose heart.
There are things in life that will test our faith.
There are things that may cause us to doubt or question our faith.
Jesus forewarns His disciples and believers today, that persecution will come to those who follow Christ.
His Living word that we turn to, instructs us to remain steadfast in the faith, come what may.
John MacArthur makes this observation regarding the persecution of the Apostles...
Hostility has always come to those who genuinely follow Jesus Christ. From the inception of the Church, the apostles endured intense persecution.
They were ridiculed, beaten, arrested, thrown into prison. Peter, Andrew, and James the son of Alphaeus were all crucified according to ancient Christian tradition.
Bartholomew was whipped to death and then crucified.
James the son of Zebedee was beheaded, and so was Paul. Thomas was stabbed with spears; Mark was dragged to death through the streets of Alexandria; and James the half brother of Jesus was stoned by order of the Sanhedrin. Philip was also stoned to death.” (End of Quote)
Still today, many Christians continue to face intense persecution around the globe because of their loyalty to Jesus Christ.
But Jesus reassures the Apostles and his disciples today, that we DO NOT face the world’s hostility alone. Our witness to the world is accompanied and empowered by the witness of the Holy Spirit.
These things (He) has spoken to you, that you may be kept from stumbling.(in your faith)
Through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit, God would comfort, strengthen, and aid the disciples in the midst of their conflict with the world.
The Lord now explains some of the specific persecution the disciples would face in the coming hour.
2 “They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God.
3 “And these things they will do, because they have not known the Father, or Me.
4 “But these things I have spoken to you, that when their hour comes, you may remember that I told you of them. And these things I did not say to you at the beginning, because I was with you.
The Lord never glossed over the truth when it came to counting the cost of being His disciple.
HE said in...
23 And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.
24 “For whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it.
The Lord illustrated this truth by giving a parable found in...
28 “For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost, to see if he has enough to complete it?
29 “Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation, and is not able to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him,
30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’
31 “Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and take counsel whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand?
32 “Or else, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks terms of peace.
33 “So therefore, no one of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.
Some have frivolously built their ministry by offering a god who will give them whatever they want in life. They present Him as a god that can be ordered to do as man wishes. Some paint discipleship as a picture of comfort and ease, offering prosperity, health and wealth to those who are seeking such things.
Many today have bought into the scheme and they have chosen the broad road, the easy road. They claim justification with no limitations, with no expectations, with no consecration or sanctification.
However, Jesus Himself NEVER offers His disciples comfort and ease, but quite the opposite. He says the gate is straight and the way is narrow and few are those who find it. It is a hard and difficult path, but it is well worth the difficult journey, for it alone “leads to life”.