An abrupt transition from love to hate; John 15:18.

Title: An abrupt transition from love to hate; John 15:18.

 

Announcements/opening prayer:

 

The transition from the end of 15:17 to this new section is rather abrupt. Throughout vss. 1-17 the focus is on the close fellowship that unites Jesus with the believer. But now the overriding emphasis is on the hostility that will be directed against the disciples as well as all believers after Jesus’ departure.

 

John 15:18 "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.

 

From here to verse 25 we have a paragraph of persecution and hatred. It’s almost mind numbing to realize that this can and does happen to believers who express the love of Christ and it is something that every believer must be able to overcome. Overcoming the persecution of those who demean Christ means that their attacks do not distract you from your destiny to realize your election by completing your plan so that you achieve the capacity for escrow blessing and thus glorify God to the maximum.

 

No person, no matter how close they are to you or how much love you may have for them is worth distracting you from that.

 

The key words are the actions of hate and persecution.

 

The hatred and persecution arise from the world. This is not the physical earth. It refers to an organized system that hates Jesus Christ.

 

“world” - ko,smoj[kosmos] = an organized system of thought, institutions, and people developed by the creature genius of satan.

 

It includes everything from religion, to systems of government, political thought, and concepts of life. But the world is first of all an organised system of thought. Secondly, the world is a system of organizations, all of which are outside the framework of the divine institutions like international organizations, religious organizations, and so on. Thirdly, the world is a category of people the unbelievers, e.g. John 17. The word kosmos describes all of these—a system of thought, an organisational system, and a type of person.

 

In our Lord’s great prayer on our behalf He doesn’t ask for us to be taken out of the world but to be delivered in the world through the sanctification that comes from positive volition towards His word.

 

John 17:14 "I have given them Thy word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

 

John 17:15 "I do not ask Thee to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one.

 

John 17:16 "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

 

John 17:17 "Sanctify them in the truth; Thy word is truth.

 

John 17:18 "As Thou didst send Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.

 

John 17:19 "And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth.

 

John 17:20 "I do not ask in behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word;

 

John 15:18 "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.

 

The conditional clause is a first class condition, “if and it does hate you.”

 

This is a system of though, organizations, and people that are antagonistic towards Christ. This system is ruled by satan. Because the believer is in Christ and has the word of Christ the antagonism towards Him is aimed at you.

 

Satan is the ruler:

John 14:30 "I will not speak much more with you, for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in Me;

 

Such a system is so evil and hate filled that it would have destroyed the human race had God not given certain restraints to protect the human race.

 

The Father has given divine establishment principles as well as the restraining ministry of God the Holy Spirit to ensure that the cosmos doesn’t destroy the human race.

 

2 Thess 2:7

For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way.

 

The HS is taken out of the way, not out of the earth, at the Rapture of the Church and the Tribulation is the reality of how chaotic the world can get without His restraining.

 

Matt 24:22

"And unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect those days shall be cut short.

 

Until that time all believers live within a system of evil and hatred that persecutes them to the extent that God allows. The system is designed to test you with the result that you fail [peirazo].

 

In the same helpful way, the HS is given to us to restrain a certain escalation of evil within. From vs. 18 to the end of chapter 16, in the midst of the warnings of hostility, there is a repeated and explained promise of God the HS as our helper, mentor, and advocate.

 

The restraining of divine establishment and the HS are also protecting freedom and free will so that the gospel can be taught throughout the world.

 

Satan attacks the four categories of divine establishment [volition, marriage, family, nationalism] as well as the communication of the Gospel.

 

What is playing out in our nation right now is the same as it has been for every client nation since the Roman Empire. After the client nation enjoys tremendous prosperity the people get satiated, forget about sacrifice and virtue, the church gets corrupted with wealth, and the people expect prosperity all the time and demand it from the government [New Deal]. At that time satan is more than willing to infiltrate the government with those who will promise prosperity, but the cost is freedom. The people value prosperity and security more than freedom and allow government controls, regulations, and the redistribution of wealth. The record has been playing over and over for almost 2000 years.

 

 “Pick any three letters of the alphabet, put them in any order, and in the acronym you will discover an unnecessary federal agency.” Economist Milton Friedman

 

In his State of the Union Address in 1944, Franklin D. Roosevelt stated that the old rights of the original Bill of Rights had adequately protected the American people; however, with new threats, new solutions were needed.

 

Of these old rights he said, “They were our rights to life and liberty.” In response to new dangers, we must add the guarantee of “security.” [FDR]

 

That will come, Roosevelt pledged, only with an extension of entitlement that entails the right to a job, a home, health care, and education.

 

I’d like to quote this section of Roosevelt’s speech and then I’ll leave politics.

 

“This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights - among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty. As our Nation has grown in size and stature, however - as our industrial economy expanded - these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness. We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence.” [Annual message to congress, Jan 11, 1944]

 

In this speech he argued for a second Bill of Rights, even though 11 amendments had already been added to the original 10.

 

The storm that caused this was designed with some luck by satan. Great prosperity ended in the depression of the 1930’s. God was preparing us for war while satan saw it as an opportunity for greed and entitlements resulting from want. The war got people back to work at government expense and the victory in war made for an extremely prosperous free market America. All the while the market prosperity (with recessions here and there) went hand in hand with increasing government and that prosperity blanketed the ill-effects and tremendous increase of government expenditures.  There has been 60 years of governmental increase and increase in entitlements along with a decrease in freedom and individualism and now it’s very clearly out of control.

 

What does this have to do with you?

 

Satan is subtle and sometimes he gets lucky [which is a secular way of saying that God allows him some added ground] and he can subtly and slowly degrade your spiritual life while you think you’re prospering.

 

The message of the cosmos is that happiness consists of the amount of materialism a person possesses. Christ and the believer stand up for true happiness, which is contrary, and so they are hated.

 

John 15:10 "If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in His love.

 

John 15:11 "These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.

 

Since this time I could go on for hours on how government program after government program had risen, and government offices have been created all at the cost of over 20 trillion dollars and which haven’t done anything but weaken us and our economy.

 

This is the KOD at work. And as they work to destroy the prosperity of the client nation, they work to destroy your spiritual life out of hatred for grace, truth, and Christ.

 

As the people in the nation get greedier, more self-absorbed, and more evil; they more despise grace, truth, Christ and they turn their “claws” on the believer.

 

John 3:20

"For everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.

 

To hate is to live in darkness: 1 John 2:11

But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

 

If you increase your agape love towards them there will not be recognition of it so as to bring them to repentance, but only greater hatred as they are exposed to more light. It is pearls before swine.

 

2 Cor 12:15

If I love you the more, am I to be loved the less?

 

They also hate the Father: John 15:23

"He who hates Me hates My Father also.

 

John 15:18 "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.