The Impossibility of Neutrality

Morning. We’re going to be in John chapter
15 this morning, as it says in your bulletin. So if you want
to turn that way in your Bible, I appreciate Ron’s admonitions
to us this morning about where we are and kind of how we should
respond and not respond. The title of my message is in
the bulletin there and my sermon title and text were chosen and
the bulk of the sermon written prior to any of the events that
transpired yesterday. But I hope that this message
will be helpful to us in light of what’s going on. in our nation
and around the world. The scripture tells us that we
wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual
wickedness in high places. We are citizens of heaven first,
but most of us are also citizens of this country. And if it has
not been apparent to us up to this point, it should be becoming
more and more clear that this country is in serious decline.
We know that it’s God that ultimately stands in the way of our decline
or even our demise as a nation. But in the eyes of many, and
especially our enemies, it’s only those who are unwilling
to bow the knee to tyranny that stand in the way of that decline. And hopefully that includes all
of us that are striving to faithfully follow Christ and to continue
to say with the apostles, we must obey God rather than men.
Amen. And the situation we’re in is
difficult and say it’s even a dangerous time for the people of God and
for our nation and for the world. I totally agree with what Ron
has said, and that God is in control. He is sovereign. He has set his king upon his
holy hill. And that is our ultimate hope. Today, we’re going to strive to address what scripture says
about the profound spiritual problem we are facing and the
God-given response and the ultimate solution to that problem. So
if you turn with me to John 15, I’m going to start in verse 18
and read through chapter 16, excuse me, verse 4. If the world hates you, know
that it has hated me before it hated you. If you are of the
world, the world would love you as its own. But because you are
not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore
the world hates you. Remember the word that I said
to you, a servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted
me, they will also persecute you. If they have kept my word,
they will also keep yours. But all these things they will
do to you on account of my name because they do not know him
who sent me. If I had not come and spoken
to them, they would not have been guilty of sin, but now they
have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my father
also. If I had not done among them
the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin.
But now they have seen and hated both me and my father. But the
word that was written in their law must be fulfilled. They hated
me without a cause. But when the helper comes, whom
I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds
from the Father, he will bear witness about me and you also
will bear witness because you have been with me from the beginning. I’ve said all these things to
you to keep you from falling away. They will put you out of
the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when
whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God.
And they would do all these things because they have not known the
Father nor me. But I have said these things
to you that when the hour comes, you may remember that I told
them to you. I did not say these things to
you from the beginning because I was with you. If the world hates you, know
that it has hated me before it hated you. But the word written in their
law must be fulfilled. They hated me without a cause.” The following quote is attributed
to Dr. Greg Bonson, who has passed from this world a number
of years ago, who said this, the world isn’t neutral, and
you shouldn’t be either. The Lord Jesus didn’t call you
into his service so that you might be a secret agent of his
kingdom or putting up a pretense of being neutral or being open-minded
to everything. You must have the fear of the
Lord at the outset of everything. Neutrality is a myth,” end of
quote. Dr. Bonson, the champion of an
apologetic method that I think is quite good and quite biblical,
and he bases it on a verse in Peter. Chapter 3, verses 15 and 16,
and I’ll read it. But in your hearts, honor Christ
the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to
anyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you.
Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience,
so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior
in Christ may be put to shame. So the title of my sermon today
is The Impossibility of Neutrality. So what exactly am I saying that
it is not possible to be neutral about? The quote from Bonson should
give you some clues on that. But first and foremost, it’s
not possible to be neutral about the existence of the triune God.
It’s not possible to be neutral about the lordship of his anointed
one. We’ve already heard Psalm 2 mentioned,
and that’s where I want to go. Psalm 2, verse 1. Why do the nations rage and the
peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers take counsel against the Lord and against His anointed,
saying, let us burst their bonds apart and cast their courts away
from us. We’ll say more about the psalm later. But for now, I hope we can agree
that the natural state of the nations and of the peoples of
the earth has not been and never will be a state of neutrality.
No matter how many books are written or speeches are given
or songs are sung about imagining it being different, this reality
will stay the same until God puts an end to evil in this
world. Neither is there any reason to
believe that somehow people are brought to a place of neutrality
before they’re brought into the Kingdom of God, transferred out
of the Kingdom of Darkness into the Kingdom of His Beloved Son,
as the Apostle Paul writes in his letter to the Colossians. We’re not brought to a place
of neutrality first, as far as I can see from the Scriptures.
Rather, we’re made friends straight out of being God’s enemy. We
go from hatred to love, no in-between state, no state of neutrality. So today, we’re going to explore,
first, the focus of the world’s hatred. And second, we’re going to explore
the extent of the world’s hatred. And thirdly, we’re going to explore
the response and the ultimate solution to the world’s hatred. But before we do that, we pray
together if you’ll join me. As you come today, before you,
Lord, we’re aware of a great divide in our society and our
world. It goes far beyond mere political
differences. There’s a divide that has been
created because you chose us out of the world, because you
took us out of darkness, and because you called us into your
marvelous light to proclaim your excellencies. Help us to strive
to do that which you’ve ordained us to do. Help us to be more
and more focused and faithful and fruitful in the days to come, no matter what the outcome. In the short term, Lord, we know
that your kingdom will never end. For your glory and our good,
we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen and amen. So before we dive
into today’s message, I want to take you back briefly to a
message I preached last November here at PBC entitled Christ the
True Vine. That message was taken from this
first chapter of the first part of John 15, the first 17 verses. And as I said in that message, there’s
a number of commands and admonitions in this passage. There are even
a number of warnings, all of which are important. But as I
argued then, none of them are more important than the main
point found in the first verse where Jesus utters his seventh
I am statement here. There in the book of John, he
says, I am the true vine, and my father is the vinedresser.
If you get a chance, go and listen to that sermon. But in it, Jesus was emphatically
identifying himself as the fulfillment of all the types and shadows
concerning the person and work of Christ, promised in the Old
Testament, found in the Psalms and in Moses and in the prophets. He was the fulfillment of all
those types and shadows. And we explored in some detail
the idea that Christ was pointing in particular to the picture
of Israel as the vine that God had brought out of Egypt and
had planted in the promised land and carefully cultivated in order
that they might bring forth good fruit. So Jesus here in John 15 calls
himself the true vine, because the vine that was the nation
of Israel failed to bring forth the fruit that should come as
a result of being united to God by faith. But where Israel failed,
Christ triumphed. Right? So he says, I am the true
vine. He did not in any sense merely
try and fail. He did not come into the world
to merely try, for instance, to save sinners. He came to actually
save his people from their sins by living perfectly, dying sacrificially,
rising triumphantly on our behalf, which is basically the gospel,
right? And the fact that he is As a
true vine, the source of all life and blessing is central
to our understanding of how we should be striving to live, how
we should be striving to grow in our ability to bring forth
good fruit. We looked at some of the circumstances
of what has come to be known as the Upper Room Discourse,
as well as his instruction to his disciples in that message,
which came right on the eve of his death and resurrection. We
noted that John tells us that God loved his disciples to the
uttermost, or completely, or perfectly, and that love was
expressed not only in such things as washing their feet, but even
more importantly, in giving them the instructions and admonitions
that we find in John 15. That teaching was all designed
to enable them to be more and more as to more focused, more
faithful, more fruitful in the midst of a truly hostile world.
hostile world, which in many ways I think we could say Jesus
protected them from up to that point. Right? And he commanded them to abide
in him as the true vine, to cling to him as the singular source
of life. He commanded them to abide in his love and to love
one another even as he had loved them. And we pointed out that
all of that is ultimately about what we are focused on in life,
ultimately, about the need to remain focused upon Christ and
especially focused on our need for Him. Their justification
before God was, you could say, a done deal. He says to them
in verse three, already you are clean because of the word that
I’ve spoken to you. Already, it’s done. clean, you’re cleansed. Their justification in God’s
sight was not based on them trying to do what they should be doing,
but on Jesus’ perfect obedience. The bedrock of our relationship
with God is Christ himself, right? That’s the light of the world,
the door of our salvation, the only way to the Father. I thought
of this hymn which is an old hymn, and I like
old hymns, because there’s generally a lot of good theology in them.
There are some that aren’t quite so good, but this one is very
good. My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but Holy lean on Jesus
name writing on Christ the solid rock. I stand all other ground
is seeking sand. All other ground is sinking sand. They were already clean because
of the word that he had spoken to them, but their sanctification
was not going to be the same kind of thing as their justification
before God. Becoming more and more like their
master was going to be Similar in the sense that, like every
other part of their salvation, it was based upon the finished
work of Christ. But this aspect of their deliverance
was going to be not a forensic declaration, not a, you’re innocent
because Christ’s righteousness is imputed to you. Justification
was going to be rather a lifelong process. Excuse me, sanctification.
Justification is a done deal. It’s immediate. As soon as God
grants you faith, he declares you righteous with the righteousness
of Christ. But sanctification, as we know,
is a lifelong process. And it was going to be a process
in which they would be sorely tested and tried so that they
must never forget that, as it says in this first part of John
15, apart from him, they could do nothing. They must never forget
that God ordain Christ to be divine and
they’re the branches. There’s a difference between
us and him, right? There’s a fundamental difference.
He’s the source of life, we’re the recipient of life. The relationship was one of dependence,
complete and total dependence upon the one who God sends into
the world to proclaim good news to the poor, to proclaim deliverance
to the captives, recovering sight to the blind, the Spirit of the
Lord being upon him for that mission. It was a relationship
in which he was not in need of them, but they were in desperate
need of him. The vine doesn’t need the branches, though he
has chosen to use us. He’s chosen to involve us in
this fruit-bearing enterprise, but it’s not out of necessity
on his part. I hope we don’t imagine that
he could not have done it some other way. I think he could have
done it all without us if he had so decided. But as Christ says in this first
portion of John, You have not chosen me, but I’ve chosen you
and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit and
that your fruit should remain. And God’s choice of them through
Christ’s person and work would need to remain at the forefront
of their hearts and minds in order for them to continue to
be willing and able to do what the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were calling them to do.
They’re going to need to be continually transformed. by the power of
the Holy Spirit through the Word of God because fruitful branches
must be pruned in order to bring forth more fruit. And I would
agree with some other commentators who said the instrument that
God uses in pruning us is His Word. He uses circumstances,
he uses trials, but ultimately the instrument is his word. Like
the sharp two-edged sword we read about in Hebrews, it’s living
and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to
the vision of soul and spirit, joints and marrow, discerning
the thoughts and intents of the heart. So the Lord in this first
part of John 15 is very clearly speaking to them in a way that
was intended to challenge them and instruct them in all of these things to help them be fruitful branches,
to be more focused, to be more faithful. And he was focused on the need
for them and for us to love one another, right? He says in verse
17, these things I command you that you love one another or
so that you love one another. Abide in me. Abide in my love.
And apart from me, you can do nothing. And I’ve chosen you
and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit. We’re
all spoken with the same Indian mind. But in verse 18, there’s
a definite switch, isn’t there? And perhaps we could wish that
he had left it at, you just need to love one another. Right? But he doesn’t, does he? He begins
to talk about the very opposite. He begins to talk about the hatred
of the world. And that brings us to our first
point, the focus of the world’s hatred. He says in verse 18,
again, if the world hates you, you know that it hated me before
it hated you. The if in this verse is, as far
as I know, always translated that way. I don’t think it’s talking about,
well, maybe they do and maybe they don’t. but more how much
they do or how much they don’t, to the extent that they hate
you. Might make it a little clearer, but I’m not going to argue with
qualified translators too much. But the next verse tells us,
the world hates you because I’ve chosen you out of the world,
right? So again, it’s not so much a question of if the world
hates you or not. If you’re in Christ, if you’re
chosen out of the world, there’s this conflict that is as you’ve
been placed into. It’s immediate. It’s universal. And not everyone is obviously
as turned off as Your neighbor may be. Some people are nicer. Some people are less anti than
others. But the underlying problem still
remains. So what is the focus of the world’s
hatred? Clearly, Christ is saying that the focus of the world’s
hatred was first and foremost upon him. If they hate you, know that they
hated me before they hated you. And it’s not just that they hated
him prior, but that the hatred for God and Christ is the ultimate
thing for the world. The world has a problem with
you as a father of Christ because they really, really have a problem
with the God you serve and with Christ who you worship. And that problem did not just
arise in the first century, did it? It goes way back. It did not just show up during
the earthly ministry of Christ. Perhaps it was most clearly seen
there, but it certainly didn’t start there. And we have already
been in the book of Psalms today, and I’ve mentioned Psalm 2, but
I’ve actually had the privilege of studying it a little bit in
a class I take on Monday nights that helps people like myself
who try to go out and preach to the the people of our community.
I want to say the unwashed masses. A lot of times, it’s not necessarily
masses of people most of the time, but to whoever happens
to be there. But we’ve been studying this,
and Psalm 1 and 2 are, in some sense, has been argued, and I
think it makes quite a bit of sense. Introduction to the Book
of Psalms. It starts with the blessed man
in verse one of Psalm one, that walks not in the counsel of the
ungodly, right? And then it goes on to point
out in chapter two, verse one, that the nations are not blessed,
they’re not happy, and that the peoples are not like the godly
man outlined in chapter one. They’re angry and even enraged
with God. They’re tumultuous. in their
empty-headed protestations. The psalmist asked the question
in verse one of Psalm 2, why do the nations rage and the peoples
plot in vain? Or do peoples imagine a vain
thing or meditate upon emptiness? Some of the stuff you hear, you
just go, wow, that’s so profound. And you’re being totally sarcastic,
right? And you have a right to be. The
kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together
against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, let us
burst their bonds apart and cast away their courts from us. So
why do they rage? Why do they plot in vain? Very
simply, it’s because of who they are. It does not excuse them,
but they cannot help themselves. They’re taken captive by empty
lies and vain deceit because it’s part of their nature, I
would say our nature, when we’re talking about our flesh, to embrace
such things. Fallen humanity wants to be autonomous. They desperately want to be a
law unto themselves without at the same time admitting that
in the process, all restraint would be cast away. Let us burst
their bonds and cast away their courts from us. Let’s cast away
the courts. Let’s cast away the restraints
of God. But we’re going to come up with another set of rules.
We’re going to construct our own God with some better rules,
right? Not that anyone has no ultimate,
that anyone has no God. Everyone worships, right? Everyone
has something that’s ultimate. We’re going to tell people that
they need to be good for the sake of goodness itself. Wow,
that sounds good, right? Though underneath it all, goodness
must really now remain vague and undefined. Love is love,
we hear. But let’s not bother with who
gets to define what love is or is not. But the focus of the
rage and the animosity is the Lord. It’s against the one true
God of Israel. It is against the God that reveals
himself in creation and in our conscience and ultimately in
Christ. The apostles quote these very
verses in Acts 4 and affirm what we’re saying about the focus
of the world’s hatred, I believe. you turn to Acts 4. In it, we see the story of Peter
and John, right? They healed the lame man at the
beautiful gate. And through the power of the
Holy Spirit and the name of Jesus, they heal this man. And as they’re
teaching, as they’re talking to people, as they’re preaching
Christ as the one who has done this, the power of his name.
They’re set upon, they’re arrested, they’re put in custody and brought
before the council and ultimately commanded to neither teach nor
speak in the name of Jesus any longer. These are the rulers, this is
the council. And we know, or should know, that
when government authorities tell us
to do what God says we shouldn’t do or to not do what God says
we should do, there’s really only one response. There’s really
only one way to answer them, and that is what the apostles
did. They replied, we must obey God rather than men. And so when
they let them go, when they went back to the assembly and reported
what had happened, They began to pray, and where did they go? They went to Psalm 2. And in
verse 24 of Acts 4, we read the prayer that they
prayed. And when they heard it, when they heard all that had
happened, the assembly, they lifted their voices together
to God and said, Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth
and the sea and everything in them, who threw the mouth of
our father, David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, why
did the Gentiles rage? and the people’s plot in vain,
the kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers were gathered
together against the Lord and against his anointed. For truly
in this city were gathered together against your holy servant, Jesus,
whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with
the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel to do whatever your
hand and your plan had predestined to take place. God is sovereign
because he was sovereign in the worst crime that would ever be
committed in this world, the worst travesty of justice, the
most oppressive act by any group of people. But God predestined
it to take place, didn’t he, for his purposes. And they said,
now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant that your servants
continue to speak your word with all boldness. while you stretch
out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through
the name of your holy servant Jesus. So what is the focus of
the world’s hatred? It couldn’t be more clearly revealed
than in the unlawful arrest and illegitimate prosecution and
subsequent murder of Christ at the hands of sinful men. The kings of the earth set themselves
and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and
against his anointed. But as we said, it didn’t just
happen to take place. God predestined that it take
place. Some people are more comfortable
with God allowed it, which is true. But if you can stop something
and allow it, there’s a sense in which you are ordaining it.
And this is the way it is with God. God is ultimately in control
of everything, which should be a great comfort to us. It does
not make the crime any less heinous But it does help us understand
that God is sovereign in allowing what He allowed for His purposes
when it came to the death of Christ. He’s sovereign in the
suffering of Christ, and He’s sovereign in any suffering that
we as His followers endure for the sake of Christ. Is that true? Is He in control of whatever
happens to us? especially when it comes to the
hatred of the world, the persecution that we might face, even death. People in this country, we don’t
really have to think about that so much. But around the world,
it is a different story, isn’t it? But the disciples, evidently,
may have been tempted to think that because of who Christ was
and because of what he came to do, that they were going to be
able to live an essentially trouble-free life. As Christ, he came to popularly,
the idea was, came to conquer the Romans, came to free them
from their oppressors. And I think they probably, a
speculation to some extent, but he had to fix their thinking
to some extent. He had to prune them to some
extent because he had to say, look, it’s not the way it’s going
to be. Your life is not going to be
problem free from now on because of me. I remember when I came
to Christ, but God saved me, I should say. And I thought for a moment, Shortly
thereafter, does this mean my troubles are all over? Does this
mean that everything’s gonna be wonderful without going into
a whole lot of detail? It did not take long for that
notion to be soundly refuted. He did deliver us from the capital
T trouble that we’re in with God, but he has not designed
that we should have no tribulation in this world, right? If you haven’t heard that yet,
sorry to break it to you. Being a Christian does not mean
your best life now. It just doesn’t. I mean, it means
a lot of things that are way better than that, but it doesn’t
mean that in this world you’re not going to have any troubles
or trials. That’s not Christianity. That’s not what Jesus taught.
And he’s telling his disciples here, that they’re going to have
to deal with this. They’re going to have to understand
what they’re facing, as we read in 16, so that they don’t fall
away. Now, there’s a whole other area
of teaching that we won’t get into on that, but that we’re going to face tribulation.
And that tribulation does take different forms at different
times in our lives. We can rest assured, though,
that all that is allowed to penetrate the shield, to come through and
hit us, to some degree or another, is allowed for good reason. Someone quipped once that no
significant amount of time can be spent in Bible study without
someone mentioning Romans 8.28. And get that out of the way now. Romans 8.28, right? What does
it say? And we know that for those who
love God, all things work together for good. Not all things are
good, but they work together for good to those who are called
according to his purpose. Because those whom he foreknew,
he predestined to be conformed to the image of his son, nor
that he might be the firstborn among many. rather than we have
the golden chain of redemption that ultimately it leads to glorification,
ultimately it leads to total freedom from sin, the presence
of sin. Penalty, power, and presence
of sin are something that we’re progressively set free from.
He predestined us to be conformed to the image of his son. But he perfected even his own
son through suffering, through persecution. And he has ordained
that we also would perfect it through the same kind of suffering.
He didn’t take a poll on that. I don’t know how that poll would
go. 30, 70, maybe. Will we vote for it and say,
yeah, I’ll sign up for that? But if it was good enough for
the perfect son of God, should we really be trying to come up
with a better plan? It’s like, you know, I just think
it would be better if it was like this or that. And yet we’re
tempted to do so, aren’t we? He says, we’re blessed when men
revile us and persecute us and say all manner of evil against
us falsely. And we’re like, yeah, I’m not
so sure about that. Maybe it’s really preferable
for us to be able to fly under the radar for the most part.
Can’t I just try to live a good enough life that people begin
to wonder what’s going on with me? And maybe ask, what’s your
secret? Can’t I just be so nice that
people are naturally attracted to me? Can’t I just try to be
a good witness to people without really trying, without really
saying anything that’s going to offend them or upset them?
Now, is there anything wrong with trying to live a good life
or trying to be nice or trying to be a good witness? Of course
not. But isn’t it a different story
if we’re trying to do those things as an alternative to what God
has told us to do? That brings us to our second
point, the extent of the world’s hatred. Verse 19 of John 15, if you are
of the world, the world would love you as its own. But because
you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world,
therefore, what? The world hates you. Remember
the word I said to you, a servant is not greater than his master.
If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they have
kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things
they will do to you on account of my name because they do not
know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken
to them, they would not have been guilty of sin. But now they have
no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my father
also. If I had not done among them
the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. But now they have seen and hated
both me and my father. But the word that is written
in their law must be fulfilled. They hated me without a cause. They had no reason, no legitimate
reason to hate Christ. No legitimate reason. No one
has any legitimate reason to hate God, obviously. God is perfectly
holy, righteous, and just. Never treated anyone unfairly
in all of the existence of mankind. The late Keith Green said something
along these lines. If any of you are old enough
to remember Keith Green, he has some great music out there.
He was a singer. But he said, when I was a seeker
of truth, the world was pleased with me. But when I told them
I had found the truth, what? Suddenly, everything changed. The hatred of the world extends
to those who have been chosen by him. When your king is no
longer their king, we suddenly have a problem, don’t we? It’s
not that the world genuinely loves anyone, but there’s a type
of love that those who are opposed to God have for the people they
consider to be on their side. They will really be happy with
you if you claim, especially to once have been a Christian
and now You’re not. Now you’re some kind of deconstructionist. You may even be something of
a celebrity for a while. Deconstructionism basically says
that certainty is not possible. Certainty is bad, and they’re
certain about that. Right? For many, thinking that
you know anything for certain is a certain sign of low moral
character, hubris, pride. It may even be OK, in their eyes,
for us to, in some sense, say, well, I believe in God. But to
say that you know that God exists, that you know that Jesus is who
he claimed to be, is certainly forbidden. He brought us out of the world
into the light. We can actually see things. We
can actually make sense of knowing things for certain. And that
certainty is not allowed. Let us cast their cords from
us. Let us break their bands. So what is the extent of the
world’s hatred? It clearly extends to Christ’s
followers as well. And it doesn’t really matter
how vocal or not vocal you are about your faith. The hatred
is still there. You could be as silent as a church
mouse. I don’t know if we have any church mice around. They’re
keeping quiet. I haven’t heard them. You could
be as silent as a church mouse for all your life, and the world
would not really ever accept you and love you. They are just
perhaps in doubt of where you actually stand, right? But if they ever find out, they
will not continue to make a pretense of loving you or of accepting
you. You are not of the world, and
the world will not love you as its own, because he’s chosen
you out of the world. And he goes on to say, a servant is
not above his master. If they’ve hated me, they’ll
hate you. And there’s a lot that really
pushes back against this in not just the world, but in our churches,
in churches that I’ve been part of and probably in churches you’ve
been part of. There’s a fair amount of pushback just saying
something along the lines of, we just need to try to be more
like Jesus, even be Jesus to people, perhaps, whatever that
means. But they seem to forget that being Jesus to people did
not, you know, Jesus being Jesus to people did not result in some
kind of universally positive response. People liked the food. They liked the wine. It was really
good wine. That’s what we’ve tasted. They
were amazed at the miracles of healing, all that he did. But
in the end, he was despised and rejected. Despite the fact that
he did everything with perfect love, with perfect sensitivity,
with perfect timing, with perfect everything else, despite all that perfection,
he was rejected. So our final point, what is the response to the world’s
hatred? was the ultimate solution to
the world’s hatred. Verse 27 of John 15. Verse 26, I’m sorry, when the
helper comes whom I send to you from the Father, the spirit of
truth who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. And you also will bear witness
because you have been with me from the beginning. He tells them of some difficult
times to come. They’re going to put you out
of the synagogue. They’re going to think they’re offering service
to God if they even go so far as killing you. And he’s speaking primarily of
the Jews at this point, but it extended to the Gentiles as well,
obviously. Christ is leaving them. warning them that persecution
is coming. It’s going to be some difficult
times. Everyone who read the book of
Acts, except the apostles, was forced to flee Jerusalem after
they have this great, great thing going on. And people were generally
kind of impressed with it, maybe, but that didn’t last long. But as we read these verses about
the way things were going to be in the first century, we must
admit that things in our country are not as bad as that, right? It’s not to say that things are
not bad, but we have freedoms and protections that the apostles
did not have. And there are other differences
between the situation that the apostles would immediately find
themselves in in our situation. The apostles would be able to
speak when the time came under the direct inspiration of the
Holy Spirit. You’ll remember when Jesus told
them not to consider what they would say or prepare beforehand
when they were brought before hostile rulers for their Christian
witness, because it would be the Holy Spirit speaking through
them. We’re not convinced that we have
that today. Not in the same way as the apostles
did. Neither are we empowered to perform miracles in the way
the apostles were empowered to perform them. Not to say that
miracles don’t happen, but… We do have that same Holy Spirit
of truth, though, don’t we? That proceeds from the Father,
the helper, who is sent to be our comforter, the one who comes
alongside us to empower us, to help us, to do what we cannot
otherwise do. The Spirit testifies to our spirit
of Christ, of our intimate relationship
with God, the Father, And the Spirit works through
us as we endeavor to faithfully follow and proclaim the only
solution, to respond to the hatred of the world in the way that
he has called us to. Christ is the solution to evil in the world, to hatred
in the world. The Spirit comes, the Spirit
is given to bear witness about Christ. And the Spirit, in that
sense, does not work independently of His people. We read in, further on in John
16, that the Spirit convicts the world of sin, righteousness,
and judgment, but the preaching of the gospel is given to us,
His people. The apostles were called to bear
witness because they had been with Him from the beginning. There are no apostles today despite
some people’s claims, but we are all called, as Scripture
says, to bear witness. That witness does include our
manner of life. the way we’re trying to live, but it should
never be limited to our manner of life. The solution to the
world’s hatred that Christ was presenting to them was not to
hide out and hunker down, even though the situation they were
facing was much worse than anything we are facing today. The solution was to go and bring
forth fruit. The apostles were chosen to go.
They were chosen for a mission, and so are we. You did not choose
me, he said in John 15, 16, but I chose you and appointed you
that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide
so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give
it you. Our prayers must be coupled with the willingness to step
out of our comfort zone on to the mission field that we have
all around us because the only solution, the only proper response
to the hatred of the world, the only solution to the hatred that’s
natural for all of us is the only one who ever loved God
and neighbor perfectly. He’s the only solution to the
problems and to the vitriol, to the hatred that’s either in
our hearts, which as Christians, if we had no hatred, Jesus wouldn’t
have to command us to love one another. We have problems loving
each other, friends, let alone loving the world. And we need
to take it seriously. Christ is the solution. If you
go back to Psalm 2, just really quickly, there’s so much in that
Psalm. Open your apps. So in response to the hatred
of the world towards God and Christ, says, he who sits in
the heavens laughs, the Lord holds them in derision. And he
will speak to them in his wrath and terrify them in his fury,
saying, as for me, I have set my king on my holy hill of Zion. I will tell the decree, you are
my son. The Lord said to me, you are
my son. Today, I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make
the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession.
You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces
like a potter’s vessel. What’s the final solution? I
mean, our response should be Holy Spirit inspired, Holy Spirit
empowered. love, and speaking the truth
in love, knowing that the ultimate solution is Christ, and Christ
is going to come. That prayer was answered, and that the nations
are His heritage. People from every tribe and tongue
and kindred and nation People that can talk better than I can,
maybe many languages, right? A lot of people around the world
speak many languages. We mostly just, but they’re going to be worshipping
around the throne because he has set his king upon his holy
hill. He said, now therefore be wise, be warned of rulers
of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and
rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son lest he be angry
and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled. God is serious about the eradication
of evil and we should be too. That blessed
are all those who take refuge in him. May that be our message. May that be our proclamation.
The excellencies of Christ. The fact that He is the only
refuge that we have. Amen. Pray with me. Thank you Lord
for