牧者心聲 Pastor's Message
11/01/2009 You Hate who? Me?
John 15.18-21. 18”If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me
first. 19If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is,
you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
That is why the world hates you. 20Remember the words I spoke to you:
'No servant is greater than his master.'[b] If they persecuted me, they will
persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also.
21They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know
the One who sent me.”
Don’t you just love the hard sayings of Jesus? But what is this
passage saying? That the world will hate me? Hate you? Hate us? I
thought the world was supposed to love us, since we are Christians and
we are known to do good things.
Like many questions, the answer here is yes and no.
Yes. The world loves us because we are His disciples. And in a
way, this means that we are apostles as well. As we have been brought to
Christ, we are to repeat the process and bring others into communion
with Christ. This is what it means to make disciples of all nations. So
when we bring those who are lost to Christ, they will rejoice that they
have been brought back to our Heavenly Father!
No. The world hates us for we know that this world is evil and
full of sin. And we know that there are many things of this world that our
Father hates. This means is that evangelizing about Christ, even locally,
can be difficult. The world does not understand things as we do. In many
respects, we are also seen as very different from the norm. We stand out
because of the weird things we say and do. For that, the world hates us.
But this means that we are to look like—and be—Christians. But
do we? Does the average person on the street look at you and your
actions and see something different? Could a passer-by see you and think,
“This person has something that I don’t have. I’m not sure what it is, but
I want it because it’s something that I truly need.” What sets you apart?
This distinction is what draws non-Christians to you and towards Christ.
I know. This idea of the world hating us is difficult to swallow.
But this is Christ’s claim, and his death is his proof. Those of us who are
with Christ, we have been, are, and will continue to be hated by the world.
But this depends on whether or not we belong to the world or not. Does
the world like or hate… you?
Brother Benjamin Chung
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