Hated By the World - John 15:18-16:4

©August 22nd, 2021 by Rev. Rick Goettsche SERIES: John

We have all heard the saying, “make sure you read the fine print!” It comes from the tendency of contracts to have the undesirable portions obscured by smaller text, legalese, or just a sheer volume of words. We know that often when people are trying to sell you something, they don’t tell you the whole story, only sharing the good parts and leaving out the hard parts. Even commercials do this now. I tend to be a person who reads the fine print (in part, because I’m suspicious of advertisers) and I noticed throughout the Olympics they had athletes in advertisements for medications. The clear implication was that if this world-class athlete uses it, you should too. But the commercials contained fine print that almost always said the athlete in question did not actually take that medication! People attempt to mislead us by only telling us the upsides and trying to obscure the downsides.

This morning we get to see the “fine print” of the gospel message. But unlike the advertisers of our day, Jesus doesn’t try to hide anything. He speaks plainly to his disciples to let them know the cost of the gospel. He doesn’t want us to be surprised when trouble comes. He reminds us that though the gospel is good news, there will also be bad news we have to contend with in this world. We’re going to unpack that today and examine what we should expect and how we should respond.

The World Will Hate You

Jesus starts by telling his disciples not to be surprised when the world hates them.

18 “If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first. 19 The world would love you as one of its own if you belonged to it, but you are no longer part of the world. I chose you to come out of the world, so it hates you. 20 Do you remember what I told you? ‘A slave is not greater than the master.’ Since they persecuted me, naturally they will persecute you. And if they had listened to me, they would listen to you. 21 They will do all this to you because of me, for they have rejected the one who sent me. 22 They would not be guilty if I had not come and spoken to them. But now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 Anyone who hates me also hates my Father. 24 If I hadn’t done such miraculous signs among them that no one else could do, they would not be guilty. But as it is, they have seen everything I did, yet they still hate me and my Father. 25 This fulfills what is written in their Scriptures: ‘They hated me without cause.’ (John 15:18-25, NLT)

Jesus tells the disciples there is a good chance the world will hate them, because it hated him first. Why did the world hate Jesus? We can understand the hatred of some people: terrorists, mass murderers, evil dictators; such people seem to worthy of hatred. But Jesus did not fall into any of those categories. Jesus did nothing wrong, so why would anyone hate him?

First, Jesus changed the status quo. It’s a universal axiom of life that people don’t like change. Even when change is for the better, we don’t like it because we’re comfortable with the way things are. We’ve gotten used to things and we know what to expect, so we’d rather not have to change things up. Jesus upset the way things were.

The Pharisees and Sadducees had created a list of rules people needed to follow to be right with God. The rules were more than anyone could bear but they were clear, and people had been told this was the way to God. Jesus changed all of that. Jesus changed the way the people looked at the commandments in the scriptures. Throughout the sermon on the mount we hear Jesus say, “You have heard that it was said…But I say to you…” Jesus was challenging people to go deeper, to look beyond outward appearances to the heart. This was revolutionary, and it was a major change. So the people hated him.

Second, Jesus was a light shining in the darkness.Have you ever woken someone up in the morning by just turning on all the lights? Maybe someone has done that to you. Maybe as a parent that’s how you wake up your kids…or how your kids wake you up! Whatever the situation, the response is always the same when someone turns on the lights after you’ve been sitting in the dark. People recoil from the light, they squint their eyes, and they try to hide from it until their eyes adjust again. That’s exactly what happened with Jesus. The people were in the dark, but they were comfortable until Jesus turned on the light.

Jesus showed people their sin. They had been able to persist in their belief that they were basically good, and that if they just tried harder, they would make their way to God. Jesus shined a light into people’s hearts that showed them they were sinful to their very core, and had no hope but to seek a savior. Though this was true, it wasn’t what anyone wanted to hear.

I don’t know who first told the story, but there is a story of a missionary to the unreached tribes in Africa who moved in among the tribesmen. One day he was visited by one of the chiefs, a woman. As she came to see him, she encountered a mirror he had hung on a tree. She looked and saw her face, complete with frightening war paint and contorted features. She had never seen herself before and asked the missionary who the awful person was in the tree. When he explained it was her reflection, she demanded to buy the mirror. Eventually he allowed her to purchase it. She immediately ran outside and smashed it, so it would never make such awful faces at her again.

This is how we tend to respond to God’s light in our lives. We don’t like what we see, so we hide, we try to push Him away, we attack. Which is why the world hated Jesus.

Third, Jesus was a threat. Jesus wasn’t out to hurt anyone, of course. His entire purpose in coming to earth was to set humanity free from sin. But He was a threat to the way of life the people knew. Under the worldly way of thinking, we are the masters of our own destiny. We determine what’s right and wrong. We judge for ourselves whether we are doing well or not, and we imagine we can clearly judge others as well. Unsurprisingly, when we compare ourselves to the world around us, we tend to conclude we’re doing pretty well. This way of thinking sets us up as God. Jesus takes that away. He makes it clear that we don’t get to play God. For anyone who believes they have some measure of authority or power, the coming of true authority and power in the person of Jesus is a grave threat. It threatens to take away everything they hold dear. It threatens to take away their power. So people hate Jesus.

The world hated Jesus, even though He had done nothing wrong. Not much has changed. The things people hated about Jesus when He was on earth are still true of Him. Jesus still changes the status quo, shines light in the darkness, and is a threat to our imagined power and authority. So even today, people hate Jesus.

Generally speaking, people are ok with you talking about spirituality and even about God, provided you don’t try to make any claims of exclusivity or impose your beliefs on them. But the second you bring Jesus into the conversation, people have a visceral reaction. As soon as you mention Jesus people get defensive, because they understand that Jesus demands to be Lord of their lives. People don’t want to make Jesus Lord of their lives. Even today people hate Jesus.

Jesus’ point to the disciples (and us) was that if the world hated him, even though he did nothing wrong, we should not be surprised if the world hates us as well. He reminds us that they are not actually hating us, but rather the reflection of Jesus they see in us.

This drives home an uncomfortable point. We are supposed to be like Jesus, which means we should expect the same treatment Jesus experienced. Practically, this means if we are not facing persecution in some form, it may indicate a problem. It may mean we are more like the world than we are like Jesus. It may mean we are compromising our faith in order to fit in. But we are supposed to strive to be like Jesus, even if it means the world will hate us.

To be fair, we can be hated for other reasons though too. We can be hated for our sin. If we are hateful, rude, arrogant, mean-spirited, or dishonest, these things can lead people to hate us as well. So when people withdraw from us or even attack us, we need to take an honest inventory and ask why. We need to look for ways we may have hurt them, been insensitive, or might be in the wrong and consider those things before concluding people hate us because of Jesus. If people hate us because of our sinful attitudes or behaviors (even if it’s “Just the way I am!”), then we need to deal with those things first, because we aren’t representing Jesus well with those sinful attitudes.

But sometimes even when we have genuine motives and have done all we can to love people they will still hate us because we of our affiliation with the Lord. This is what Jesus tells us to be prepared for.

The Good News

Jesus doesn’t just give us bad news as he tells us what to expect though.

26 “But I will send you the Advocate—the Spirit of truth. He will come to you from the Father and will testify all about me. 27 And you must also testify about me because you have been with me from the beginning of my ministry. (John 15:26-27, NLT)

The good news is that Jesus promises we don’t face persecution alone. He has sent the Holy Spirit (the Spirit of truth) to be with us. This would be an incredible encouragement to the original disciples because they had Jesus with them for 3 years, and after He left, they would feel all alone. But they wouldn’t be. The Holy Spirit would be with them. He is with us as well.

What does the Holy Spirit do for us? He gives us the ability to serve faithfully, helps us make progress in holiness, and gives us wisdom and insight in the world around us. But Jesus also says the Spirit will testify about Him. The Holy Spirit testifies to us about Jesus in several ways.

· He speaks to our hearts and convinces us of the truth of the gospel. The Holy Spirit is the One who moves in us to draw us to Christ. He is pivotal in the process of our salvation.

· He reveals scripture to us. The scriptures are inspired by God, and the Holy Spirit gives us the insight we need to understand and apply them to our lives. We depend upon Him to draw us deeper into God’s character through God’s Word.

· He speaks directly to our hearts. Over time, we learn to listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. He leads us in the way we should go and applies truth to our lives. I’m amazed how many times people come out of a worship service and say the sermon was exactly what they needed to hear. That is not due to the skill of the preacher (because often what I was trying to say was not what people ended up hearing), but the work of the Spirit, causing us to see the truth we need to see.

The Holy Spirit is an active and essential part of the life of a Christian. We are dependent upon Him in all things, and knowing He is with us should give us courage, no matter what we face in this world.

Jesus promises that the Holy Spirit will be with us, but He also adds some responsibility to us. He says that just as the Holy Spirit testifies about Christ to us, we also must testify about Christ to the world. What does it mean to testify about Christ? When a person testifies in court, they speak about their experience and what they know to be true. This is what we are called to do. We can talk about how people need a savior. We can share how Jesus has changed our lives. We can speak clearly that Jesus alone is our source of hope. This is admittedly scary. We don’t know how people will respond, and we know not everyone wants to hear the message. This is why Jesus reminds us that the Holy Spirit is our Advocate. He will enable us to speak truth, even when we’re scared. He will use us to change the hearts of people who hear our testimony, even when we don’t think we’re qualified. And He will give us strength to keep testifying to the truth, even when people attack us. Jesus promises that even as we face the bad news of a world that may hate us, we don’t face it in our own power. And that’s good news!

Why Reveal This?

I said at the beginning that usually when there is a downside to something, people try to hide it in the fine print. Jesus doesn’t do that. He is clear about the fact that we will face persecution, rather than trying to downplay it. Why does He do that? He answers that for us at the beginning of chapter 16.

“I have told you these things so that you won’t abandon your faith. 2 For you will be expelled from the synagogues, and the time is coming when those who kill you will think they are doing a holy service for God. 3 This is because they have never known the Father or me. 4 Yes, I’m telling you these things now, so that when they happen, you will remember my warning. I didn’t tell you earlier because I was going to be with you for a while longer. (John 16:1-4, NLT)

Jesus says he is telling us about the persecution in advance, so that when it comes we will not abandon our faith. In other words, He is telling us about it in advance, so we can count the cost before choosing to follow Him.

What will the cost be? He tells the disciples they will be expelled from the synagogues, and that those who tried to kill them would think they were doing a service for God. And that is exactly what happened to the early believers. They were indeed expelled from the synagogues and many were killed. Some were even killed in the name of the Lord (this is what Paul did before God changed his heart.)

Being expelled from the synagogue was not like being expelled from a church, because if you’re expelled from one church there are other churches who are ready to welcome you into their fellowship. James Montgomery Boice gives us a glimpse of what being expelled from the synagogue meant.

…excommunication meant separation from the spiritual life of Israel. For the one who was excommunicated there would be no worship, no sacrifices, not even the reading of the Scripture—for the Bible was not available to normal people. The Scriptures could be found and heard only in places of worship. To be excommunicated meant losing those benefits and more…. Moreover, the banning of an individual from the synagogue would have a devastating effect upon his social life and his economic well-being. Former friends would shun him, considering him worse than a pagan. He would be exiled from his family, ostracized. He would lose his job or else, if he was self-employed, his customers. He would even be refused the right of honorable burial.[1]

There is a significant cost for following Jesus. We may be ostracized, we may lose social standing, we may lose business, we could even be killed. The worst part is that this persecution often comes at the hands of religious people, who believe they are serving the Lord by doing so! History records many examples: the early church experienced this, we saw it during the Inquisition, during the Reformation, and around the world today. Those who follow Christ will be persecuted, just as He was, sometimes even by those claiming to serve the Lord.

The gospel message is unpopular, but it is still true. We must refuse to water down the gospel message in ways that make it more palatable to the world. When we don’t talk about sin, or when we tell people that if they come to Jesus then he’ll make them wealthy and solve all their problems, we are no different than advertisers who hide things in the fine print. The gospel is good news, but there are still parts of it that are hard. Our responsibility is to hold out the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth—and show people that the blessings of the gospel make the hard stuff worth it.

Conclusion

Admittedly, this is not a fun message to hear. Nobody wants to face hardship. We don’t want to be persecuted. We want people to like us! But Jesus says the gospel message is divisive because it flies in the face of what the world wants to hear. The gospel calls people to a place of decision, and not everyone will decide to follow Christ. Some will seek to silence and attack Him—and us in the process. So, if we will be persecuted for standing with Jesus, how should we prepare ourselves? I have some suggestions.

Don’t panic when trials come. Jesus didn’t promise us a life of ease. He promised we would have trouble in this world. Sometimes it comes because of our relationship with Jesus. When trials come, don’t be surprised—it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve messed up. If you’re following Jesus, it’s what is supposed to happen.

Keep your life above reproach. No one is perfect. We all sin and have moments of weakness. But we need to be honest about our sin and seek to make it right. When we are known as people who strive to live in obedience to the Lord, it makes it harder for people to attack us legitimately. When we live the way God told us to, we make it clear that if we are being attacked it’s only because of our faith in Christ.

Hide God’s Word in your heart. When trials come it is tempting to get so focused on the world in front of us that we lose sight of the truth. God’s Word is our source of strength, as it reminds us of God’s promises and it reminds us that the gospel is true. When we can see the bigger picture beyond our current struggles and see God’s hand in everything, we can stand firm. To do that, we have to know God’s Word.

Remember God can use your trials to reach others.If we remain faithful even in persecution, the world takes notice. Remember that even facing trials faithfully is a way we can testify to the truth of the gospel.

There’s no fine print, persecution is part of the Christian life. Jesus does not pretend the Christian life will be easy, but He does promise that enduring in faith will be worth it. If you live for Christ, the world will persecute you, because the world doesn’t like Christ. But our challenge is to see the bigger picture, and remember that our faithfulness honors the Lord—and that makes it worth it.

©August 22nd, 2021 by Rev. Rick Goettsche SERIES: John

[1]Boice, James Montgomery. The Gospel of John: An Expositional Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2005.