Abide - Accept the Good with the Bad

John Bunyan - Became a Christian at 21 in 1649. Did not conform to the church of England. Imprisoned for many years of his life for preaching Christ. Famous Christian Author “Pilgrims Progress.”

“Therefore, I bind these lies and slanderous accusations to my person as an ornament; it belongs to my Christian profession to be vilified, slandered, reproached, and reviled, and since this is nothing but that, as God and my conscience testify, I rejoice in being reproached for Christ’s sake.”

Jesus is the vine and we are branches connected to Him. We belong to God.

READ (JOHN 15:18-25)

Jesus was preparing the disciples for His departure.

He invited them into the arena of conflict He shared with the Lord.

When is suffering worth the struggle?

Childbirth

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Athletic Championships

Jesus on the importance of suffering often.

“Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs. You are blessed when they insult you and persecute you and falsely say every kind of evil against you because of me. Be glad and rejoice, because your reward is great in heaven. For that is how they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” - (Matthew 5:10-12)

“But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ. More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Because of him I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them as dung, so that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through faith in Christ—the righteousness from God based on faith. My goal is to know him and power of his ressurection and fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death, assuming that I will somehow reach the ressurection from among the dead.” - (Philippians 3:7-11)

Both of these passages display a positive nature toward suffering.

As believers, we must learn to accept the good with the bad.

Learning to accept suffering is part of our Christian growth.

1. Christians Do Not Belong to the World.

18. Conditional Participle. “Hates you… as it does”

Jesus was despised and rejected by man. (Isaiah 53)

The world system, run by Satan hates Jesus.

Hate is a work of the flesh. (Gal. 5:20)

Jesus was rejected by the Jewish leaders who believed his crucifixion was done to honor God.

He was treated as an alien intruder to their way of life.

If the disciples had been in league with the Sanhedrin, they would have been embraced.

But they belonged to Jesus and were chosen to bear fruit.

Tension - They were to love people and seek their salvation, but the world rejected their love and persecuted them.

Our culture is terrified of rejection to such a high degree that we will appease everyone and lose sight of God’s acceptance.

Who do you seek to appease? Who do you belong to?

“Persecution is simply the clash between two irreconcilable value systems.” - John Stott

2. Persecution Guarantees Victory.

Jesus did not mean to suprise his disciples.

If they did this to Jesus, the same attitude would be directed to them.

Persecuted - To run swiftly to overtake or attain. To pursue with hostile intent.

The people would persecute the disciples because they represented Jesus.

If they faithfully represented Christ, the world would relate to the disciples as they did Jesus.

V. 20 - Some would receive and keep the word.

Witnessing to others can be discouraging when no one seems to listen.

We witness knowing that we will bear fruit even if it’s only a remnant.

This is supposed to be hard.

“If a Christian is not having tribulation in the world, there’s something wrong.” - Leonard Ravenhill

3. With the Gospel, There are No Excuses.

Because Jesus came and proclaimed his Father’s kingdom, everyone had to account for His message and presence in the world.

To reject God is to who him hostility.

There were no excuses that could be made.

“Without cause” - (Psalm 69:4)

His opponents saw the signs and miracles and rejected Jesus anyway.

Good people who struggle for truth and righteousness often attract the anger of those who feel threatened by their goodness.

Pregnancy Center’s Being Destroyed.

If Jesus had not come, we would all have an excuse for our sin… But he did come...

To recognize his truth in your life forces you to be honest.

No such thing as a little bit of belief.

You can’t date Jesus on Sundays and live in the world the rest of the week. Jesus is only here for marriage.

Are you willing to accept hostility from the world knowing that you are a fully accepted child of God?