SERMON: “The World Will Hate Us” (John 15:18–25)

“The World Will Hate Us” (John 15:18–25)

Series:               “John: Life in Christ’s Name”          Text:                 John 15:18–25

By:                    Shaun Marksbury                         Date:                August 4, 2024

Venue:              Living Water Baptist Church            Occasion:             AM Service

 

I.              Introduction

We live in a world that often promotes tolerance, acceptance, and inclusivity as its highest virtues.  Yet, as followers of Christ, we find that the world does not want to apply these virtues to us.  While we are called to love our neighbors, serve others, and be a light in the world, we can sometimes find that this does not win us positive responses.  In many places in the world, Christians are often persecuted, and here, we find that people purposefully twist our words and intentions. –

This is a reality of which Jesus Himself warned us.  He told us that the world won’t meet us with open arms. In fact, He gave us a sobering reality: The world will hate us.  As one commentary notes,

If Christians think that the message of love in Christ will generally be well received by the world, they are in for a big surprise, just as the disciples had to learn.  Love is not the usual pattern in social orders where power and domination are rampant and where the Good News runs counter to cultural commitments.  The love of Jesus does not sell well on Madison Avenue and Times Square in New York or Whitehall and Piccadilly Circus in London any more that it did on the Via Dolorosa in first-century Jerusalem or in the central Forum of Ancient Rome.  Disciples of Jesus are, accordingly, advised to take this section very seriously as they contemplate their relationship to the world.^[1]

This is not a message we hear often today.  We might prefer to think that if we live good, upright lives, we will be respected and appreciated.  Some think that we can be so nice, no one will want to hate us.  Yet, the world’s hatred is not because we are doing something wrong, but because we are doing something right — we are living in union with Christ.

Jesus tells us that just as the world hated Him, it will hate us too.  We must understand this reality not just for theological understanding, but for practical living.  If we don’t understand this, we may be caught off guard when hostility comes our way.  Worse still — we may be tempted to compromise our faith to avoid it.

Today, we will look at three reasons why the world will hate us, according to Jesus’s words in John 15:18–25.  First, the world hates us because it hates Jesus.  Second, the world hates us because it resists conviction.  Third, the world hates us because it rejects truth (vv. 24–25).  Let’s consider the first of these.

II.           The World Hates Us Because It Hates Jesus (vv. 18–20)

If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.  If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates 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.

Let’s consider again what the “world” is.  It might mean anything from the planet to the varies people groups, Jews and Gentiles.  Here, however, the term refers to anything opposed to God.  This is the world that cannot receive “the Spirit of truth” (John 14:17).  Its ruler is the devil (cf. 14:30).

Understand that there is no question of this hatred when Jesus says, “If the world hates you.”  That’s a conditional that will prove to be the case.  Later, we read, “Do not be surprised, brethren, if the world hates you” (1 John 3:13).  Similarly, 1 Peter 4:12–13 says, “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing, as though some strange thing were happening to you; but to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing, so that also at the revelation of His glory you may rejoice with exultation.”  He just says to keep in mind that the world hated Him first.

It will crucify Him.  Jesus says here that the world hates Him.  We must recognize that the world will even come to hate us as it does our Master.  Worldliness is a hatred for Christ and His words.  He says that “it hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil.”  He bears witness about the works of the world, and He tells His disciples to understand that, at times of hatred, the world first hates Him.  We will face the same hatred.

Of course, the Lord never calls us to be jerks.  However, every Christian should have a healthy antipathy with the world.  As James 4:4 says, “You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God?  Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”  We are not practicing love for the Lord when we try to get the world to love us.

Some Christians do not understand that.  They tell people that they are not “that kind” of Christian.  They try to make themselves seem more reasonable to worldly people by denying the history of the Book of Genesis, or some of the miracles of Christ.  Some say that they’re only the red-letter Christians, meaning that they reject the “hateful” or “ignorant” rhetoric of the Apostle Paul regarding women and homosexuality.  They want the world to like them, and they are making themselves the enemy of God in the process.

If you want to demonstrate your love to Jesus more than anything else, then you are going to draw the hatred of the world.  Just consider how the Pharisees reacted to Jesus —  they despised Him not just for His claims, but because He exposed their hypocrisy.  Similarly, Christians who faithfully represent Christ will often face disdain because they mirror His light in a dark world.

The world doesn’t hate its own.  When Jesus’s unbelieving brothers mocked Him, He replied, “The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil” (John 7:7).  Note also that Jesus calls out their persecution as past tense before He is crucified.  Persecution isn’t a line that exists only if someone is murdered.  Galatians 4:28–29 says that Isaac was persecuted by Ishmael, referring to the mockery he endured as a small child (see Gen. 21:8–9).  This same hatred gets transferred to genuine believers living in obedience to Christ.

We must remember that we have been called out of the world, as v. 19 says.  We no longer belong to the world.  Our values are different.  As one commentary notes, “A believer, having left the kingdom of darkness and having been transferred into the kingdom of God’s Son (Col. 1:13), has a different joy, purpose, hope, and love.  He now has certainty, truth, and a standard for life.”^[2]  The world is not our home.

Jesus sovereignly elected us from the world.  As He said in v. 16, “You did not choose Me but I chose you.”  True disciples of the Lord not only bear His mark, they also shine with a righteous life like Him.  This stands in contrast to the darkness of the world, and Jesus warns us that, because of this “the world hates you.”

Again, some Christians think they can change this.  Jesus says in the next verse, “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.”  No amount of capitulation on our parts will change this.  Some Christians seek to be “winsome” to abate some of the world’s anger; the saying I always heard was we need to “winsome to win some!”  While we should seek to cause undue offense, we must also not believe we’ll ever get the world to love us.  Some Christians act as though they can do better than Jesus, that they can be nicer than Him and His apostles.  However, if you are truly called from this world by Christ, the world will bring its hatred for the Lord to bear in your life.

In fact, a Christian can only get the world to stop hating him through one means: repeated capitulation.  The Christian must continue to ask for forgiveness Christian beliefs.  He must say that Christians are wrong about whatever subject the world is upset about, assuring everyone that he’s one of the cool Christians.  He will have to communicate a rejection of anything distinctly Christian and an embrace of worldliness. 

A Christian who doesn’t want to go down this path must expect persecution.  Our application of godly principles in Scripture will oppose the world around us.  As Scripture says, “Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim. 3:12).  This will happen, then, as we hold to God’s word and proclaim it.

Still, there’s a glimmer of good news here.  V. 20 ends, “if they kept My word, they will keep yours also.”  Presuming we speak the same word as Christ, we can expect a warm reception from those who want to keep Christ’s word.  This tells us that some of our moralizing to the culture isn’t always as effective as we hope.  If they don’t respect the word of Jesus, they won’t respect ours.  The people in culture need Christ!

This reminds us that the animosity we face is a reflection of the world’s rejection of Jesus Himself.  They not only reject Him, they reject the light He represents.  That brings us top the next point:

III.        The World Hates Us Because It Resists Conviction (vv. 21–23)

But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me.  If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin.  He who hates Me hates My Father also.

The world loves darkness.  As John 3:19 says, “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.”  Thus, the world hates Jesus, who is the Light, and it hates us as fellow light-bearers.

As such, the world is always trying to silence us when we speak the name of Jesus.  In Acts 4:17, the city council said, “But so that it will not spread any further among the people, let us warn them to speak no longer to any man in this name.”  They also sent Saul of Tarsus out with “authority from the chief priests to bind all” who call on upon the name of the Lord (9:14).  Of course, those plans proved unfruitful, but they arose because the world hated the conviction the name brought them. 

This is why persecution continues.  Of course, in some Jewish quarters, Christians are still persecuted, and converts to the name of Christ are ostracized.  Militant atheists also revile Christians for following Jesus, and Muslims put them to death in other countries.  The whole world unites in hatred of the name because of the conviction of sin Jesus brings.

They do this because they don’t know God.  This is an ongoing theme in this book (John 8:19, 55; 16:3; 17:25).  Some, like the persecuting Jews, might claim to persecute in the name of God.  Today, in our country, some progressive Christians might even persecute more conservative Christians, reporting their names to the FBI as “extremists” and trying to engage in smear campaigns!  (I blocked one such prominent Christian leader on social media after he made that threat.)  Those who engage in such actions prove they don’t know the true God.

If they knew God, they would know His word and keep it.  He says in v. 22, “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin.”  Jesus says something similar to this in John 9:41, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.”  Jesus had also previously said that “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him” (John 14:23).  Conversely, those who hate Jesus will not keep His word.  They also hate the Father, as well.

Again, this is about conviction.  It’s not that some wouldn’t be sinners, but some don’t know the full depths of their sin.  As one commentary notes, “There are different kinds of guilt. Unwitting sins can be excused more readily than intentional ones. All people sin and are guilty in God’s eyes as a result, but not all are held equally accountable (Lk 12:47–48; Rm 5:13–14).”^[3]

Light exposes what’s hidden, and God’s Word reveals the darkness of the human heart (Eph. 5:13–14).  The revelation can come now or later; “And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do” (Heb. 4:13).  This isn’t just a warning, though.  He says, “for everything that becomes visible is light.”   Jesus is the light of the world (John 12:46) and He makes His disciples light (Matt. 5:14).  The light of the Lord transforms (cf. 2 Cor. 4:6), which is why it’s important to bring the deeds of darkness into the light.

Another way of thinking about this is that the world hates truth.  It hates truth about sin, about God, and about itself.  That brings us to the final point:

IV.        The World Hates Us Because It Rejects Truth (vv. 24–25)

If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.  But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, ‘They hated Me without a cause.’

Sometimes, we think that the problem is information and education.  We think that, if we could give an unbeliever in the world enough archeological facts and logical syllogisms, even the most ardent skeptic would have to confess the truth.  While God can use anything to bring people to Himself, we err in thinking that the problem with unbelief is a lack of information.

Sinners will naturally want to reject the truth.  Jesus performed undeniable miracles in the presence of crowds of eyewitnesses.  He healed lepers and sent them to the priests for official verification.  He uttered undeniable truths which aligned with God’s previous revelation.  However, the world still rejected Him.

This denial of truth isn’t restricted to the Jews.  Think of Pilate, who famously asked, “What is truth?” (John 18:38).  Even when faced with the embodiment of truth in Jesus, Pilate chose to deny it.  Similarly, when we stand for biblical truth in a culture that prefers relativism, we encounter hostility.

Jesus says that it’s the opposite of an information problem.  He says, “If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.”  He performed wonders that no one could explain; He said in 10:37: “If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me.”  This verse highlights the irrationality of the world's hatred — despite clear evidence of the truth, they choose to deny it.

Sometimes, we have to contend with the fact that there is no rational reason why people reject the truth of God.  As Jesus says and quotes in v. 25, “But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, ‘They hated Me without a cause.’ ”  As the MacArthur Study Bible explains here, “Jesus quotes Pss. 35:19; 69:4. The logic here is that if David, a mere man, could have been hated in such a terrible manner by the enemies of God, how much more would the wicked hate David’s perfect, divine Son who was the promised king that would confront sin and reign forever over His kingdom of righteousness (see 2 Sam 7:16).”^[4]  Understand, the Pharisees and the people of Israel aren’t supposed to be the enemies of God; they should desire the Messiah-prince who comes to fulfill all prophecy.  Yet, irrationally, they do not.

Of course, the reason is abundantly clear.  When Jesus comes, confronting sin, no one wants to receive that correction.  The only image of Jesus accepted today is that of the friend of sinners, where Jesus interacts with prostitutes and tax-collectors — but no one wants to hear that He was calling them to repentance.  Folks want to remain unchallenged in their sin, so they reject the biblical Jesus.

V.           Conclusion

It’s easy for us to perceive the world’s rejection as a personal attack, and that’s because Jesus and His Word are so personal to us.  Yet, we must remember that the world’s hostility reflects its rejection of Christ, of conviction, and of truth.  When we understand this as we speak with worldly people, we can put aside our personal offense and redirect conversations accordingly.

This can help us to stand firm in the face of growing persecution, as well.  We can take comfort in our union with Christ, knowing that we share in His sufferings and will also share in His glory (Rom. 8:17).  As Matthew Henry noted,

Let an unbelieving malignant world know that their enmity to the gospel of Christ will be looked upon in the great day as an enmity to the blessed God himself; and let all that suffer for righteousness’ sake, according to the will of God, take comfort from this; if God himself be hated in them, and struck at through him, they need not be either ashamed of their cause or afraid of the issue.^[5]

Persecution for the sake of godliness assures us that we are on the right path.  These truths can help us to withstand in the evil day, drawing on His grace to face of opposition, knowing that our Lord will judge and set this world right with His second coming.

 

 

 

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^[1] Gerald L. Borchert, John 12–21, The New American Commentary, (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2002), 25B:152–153.

^[2] Edwin A. Blum, The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, 1985, 2, 326.

^[3] Ted Cabal, Chad Owen Brand, E. Ray Clendenen, Paul Copan, J. P. Moreland, and Doug Powell, The Apologetics Study Bible: Real Questions, Straight Answers, Stronger Faith, (Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, 2007), 1604.

^[4] John MacArthur Jr., Ed., The MacArthur Study Bible, electronic ed., (Nashville, TN: Word Pub., 1997), 1616.

^[5] Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible: Complete and Unabridged in One Volume, (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1994), 2021.