The World Hates Believers Because it Hates Jesus (John 15:8b, 20)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/29/2016

My Worship Time                              Focus:  The World Hates Believers Because it Hates Jesus

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  John 15:8b, 20

            Message of the verses:  “you know that it has hated Me before it hated you…Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’  If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word they will keep yours also.”

            There was a time in our country when there was not problem in mentioning the word Jesus for our country was mostly in agreement that God created the world and that Jesus was God’s only Son who came to earth to purchase mankind from sin.  This is not the case today as the gospel message and the Lord Jesus have been kicked out of our schools and also out of our government, and in many cases even out of the liberal churches.  So as this country and this world move rapidly toward the end times we can see that the world hates Jesus as much as He was hated when He was crucified, and the world hates His true followers.  I can’t help but to think of what happened after the 9-11 attacks in our country, and shortly after that there was a church service in a national church in Washington DC and one of the songs that was sung was “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.”  The problem was that they left out the second verse, as it is the only verse with the name Jesus in it.  Even after all of the people were killed they could not worship the Lord by singing that second verse. 

“Did we in our own strength confide,
Our striving would be losing;
Were not the right Man on our side,
The Man of God’s own choosing:
Dost ask who that may be?
Christ Jesus, it is He;
Lord Sabaoth His Name,
From age to age the same,
And He must win the battle.”

 

            The hatred of Jesus has been seen as we work our way through the gospel of John and it will culminate in His crucifixion which will take place soon after His prayer in John chapter 17, only a short time from when He is talking to His disciples. 

            The quote that Jesus gives “A slave is not greater than his master” is from John 13:16 “"Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him.”  MacArthur writes “There, however, the Lord was speaking of humblest service of a slave.  He, ‘the Lord and the Teacher’ (v. 14) had humbly washed their feet, and the disciples were to follow His example (v. 15).  Here Christ’s point was that the disciples should expect to follow His example of suffering (cf. 1 Peter 2:21); they had no right to expect better treatment from the world than He had received.  ‘If they persecuted Me,’ Jesus reiterated, ‘they will also persecute you.’  Earlier in His ministry Jesus had told them, ‘A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a slave above his master.  It is enough for the disciple that he became like his teacher and the slave like his master.  If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign the members off his household?’  (Matt. 10:24-25).  Believers identify with Jesus Christ in the ‘fellowship of His sufferings’ (Phil 3:10; cf. 2 Cor. 1:5; Gal. 6:17; Col. 1:24).”  Now I want to go back to the quote from Matthew 10:24-25 and talk a bit about that as this would actually happen in the 12^th chapter of Matthew when the Pharisees said that Jesus was doing His miracles in the power of Beelzebul which is another name for Satan.  Now as you move to the 13^th chapter of Matthew’s gospel you see that Jesus begins to speak in parables as He says “"Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14  "And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, And seeing you will see and not perceive; 15  For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed, Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.’ 16  "But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear.”  That was the purpose of His parables as they were stories that brought out truth and salvation but were hid from those who had gone so far as to say that the devil was the one doing His miracles.  Jesus gave up on them.  I just finished a book by John MacArthur which was on some of the parables that Jesus spoke and it was eye opening to me as to what the parables that he used in the book meant.

            Ok now for some good news from our Lord as He said “If they kept My word, they will keep yours also.”  As we have learned in our study of John many would reject the Lord’s teaching and many will reject His disciple’s teaching, and our teaching, but there will be some who receive the truth, get saved and grow in Christ so that they too can spread His word and go through this same process of having many reject, but some will receive it.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I am always thrilled when the Lord allows me to lead someone to a saving knowledge of His Son and be saved, knowing that they are one of the few who will going on the narrow road that has led to salvation.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  A praise from me as far as having a computer to continue writing my Spiritual Diaries on and then being able to put them onto my blogs so others can read them.  The problem with my wife’s computer, the one I am using now is that I had to slow down the mouse, some wisdom that I believe came from the Lord and I am thankful for that.

Memory verse for the week (Rom. 6:10) “10 For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “He was put into prison” (Genesis 39:20).

Today’s Bible question:  “In the Sadducees question, how many brothers married the same wife?”

Answer in our next SD.

12/29/2016