“Bearing Witness”
[John
15:18-16:4a]
March 5, 2017 Second Reformed Church
Last week, we saw that Jesus
explains that Christians are to love one another with the same love that He
loves us – we are to love each other sacrificially for the sake of the
Gospel. We are even to be willing to die
for each other if it will promote the Gospel and protect its purity.
We are to be known for our love of
each other – and that will baffle the world, because we are not all the
same. The world looks at similar groups
of people who are unbelievers – and they won’t have anything to do with each
other – they even try to kill each other.
The world does not understand how such different people could put their
differences aside and love one another for the sake of Jesus Christ.
In this morning’s Scripture, Jesus
turns to the fact that the world – unbelievers – cannot understand the message
of the Gospel – in fact, they are offended by it – so much so that they hate it
and hate those who believe and follow it.
First, we see that Jesus’ followers
are hated and persecuted because Jesus is hated and persecuted.
“If the world hates you, know that it has
hated me before it hated you. If you were 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 kept my word, they will also keep yours.”
We need to begin by understanding the
expression Jesus uses: He says, “If the
world hates you” – and the expression we don’t see in English is that Jesus is
speaking in a positive and certain way – as though He says, “If the world
persecutes you, and you most certainly will be persecuted” – there is no
question of “if” as we would understand it.
Jesus is saying that Christians – believers – will be hated and
persecuted.
And Jesus explains that the reason
Christians will be hated and persecuted is that He is persecuted and
hated. If the leader of a group of idea
is persecuted or hated, those who follow him and try to be like him and do the
things he would do will be persecuted and hated. Just consider the way we treat our presidents
in recent history: those who hated
President Obama would oppose and hate anything his supporters in Congress would
do. Similarly, we see the same thing
happening now with President Trump.
The message of Jesus is terribly
offensive: it says that every single
person is born spiritually dead and in rebellion against God and the only way
to be right with God is through Jesus – through believing in Who He is and what
He did to secure salvation, and in the repenting of sins. This goes against our fallen pride – we are
born believing that we can do it and we don’t need help. The ancient philosopher, Protagoras, said, "Of
all things the measure is Man, of the things that are, that they are, and of
the things that are not, that they are not" (http://www.ancient.eu/article/61/)
– there is no higher authority than humanity – and especially me – it hurts to
fall off that high a horse.
God says, “None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they
have become worthless; no one does good, not even one. Their throat is an open
grave; they use their tongues to deceive. The venom of asps is under their
lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to
shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have
not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Romans 3:10b-18, ESV).
And the response of the world is, “How
dare you say something like that! I am a
self-made person. I have done everything
myself. I am a good person. I don’t need anyone. You can’t talk that way about me.” And when they have been “pushed to the
limited” by God’s Word, they will call us a hate group and persecute us and
kill us for our evil speech.
Jesus tells the Eleven that they are not
part of the world because God chose them and took them out of the world by
making them believers – just as we who believe are not part of the world,
because God has chosen us to be His and made us believers. As Paul reminds us, “even as he chose us in
him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless
before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through
Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his
glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved” (Ephesians 1:4-6, ESV).
And so, we are called to proclaim the Good
News of Jesus Christ again and again to a world that hates us and persecutes us
– to one degree or another – we have mentioned that our brothers and sisters in
the Middle East and elsewhere are suffering at the hands of the world in a way
we do not usually experience at this time – so we are to be patient. We proclaim salvation to a dying world, and
until God gives a person a new heart and causes them to believe – they won’t –
they will just stare us down and ask, “How dare you?”
But that should not get us down – we
should not be discouraged, because Jesus was hated and persecuted first. We are in good company if we are being
persecuted and hated for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. If we are being hated for saying the same
things and believer the same things and living like Jesus, then we ought to
rejoice, because it proves we are His!
And, we have the same enemies as
Jesus. We are fighting against the
world, the flesh, and the devil – and the world will strike back because we are
telling them they are wrong and they cannot help themselves – only God can make
a person right with God. And so, we
humbly receive hatred and persecution for the sake of the Gospel, and never
back down from proclaiming that there is only salvation through Jesus Alone.
Second, Jesus says that anyone who hates
Him hates God the Father.
“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.’”
Jesus explains that those who hate Jesus
and persecute Him and His followers do so because they do not know God the
Father. They have not been reconciled to
God, so the Gospel appears to them as nothing more than a philosophy to hate –
a religion of intolerance.
Since Jesus manifested Himself both by
word and by deed – since He did everything He needed to to prove He is God the
Savior and He said everything He needed to to prove that He is God the Savior,
and the reaction of the world was to reject Him, the world is guilty. There is no excuse.
If Jesus didn’t do the works of the Savior
and didn’t speak the words He did to prove He is the Savior, then the world
would not be guilty, but since Jesus clearly manifested Himself to the world
and the world rejected Him, the world is guilty.
And the world hates Jesus as part of the
fulfillment of prophecy, as it is written, “They hated me without cause.”
We find this prophecy in multiple places:
In Psalm 35, verse 19: “Let not those
rejoice over me who are wrongfully my foes, and let not those wink the eye who
hate me without cause” (ESV).
In Psalm 69, verse 4: “More in number than
the hairs of my head are those who hate me without cause; mighty are those who
would destroy me, those who attack me with lies. What I did not steal must I
now restore?” (ESV).
And, here, we see Jesus’ fulfills it –
more evidence against those who hate Him.
Third, the Holy Spirit bears witness with
us.
“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.”
Again, as we look at this promise of
bearing witness, this is spoken first to the Eleven, but it applies to all
believers, because we are all called to carry the Gospel to the ends of the
earth and to all of Creation.
“When the Holy Spirit comes” – which
He did on the day of Pentecost – and He has indwelled every believer since then
– God the Holy Spirit, sent by the agreement of the Father and the Son to
indwell believers – He bears witness to Jesus being God the Savior and we bear
witness with Him.
The Holy Spirit helps us to know
what to say and to stand when the hatred and persecution come at us. Yet, as we bear witness to the Gospel
together – it is an uneven witness: God
does not equally bear witness with us.
No, the Holy Spirit takes the “heavy end,” as it were. Ultimately, those who reject the Gospel are
rejecting Jesus, first and foremost, so the witness is first and most heavily
weighted on God’s side. God chooses to
use us to bring His people to Himself, but the work, the hatred and persecution,
and the glory belong first and foremost to God.
So, as we bear witness – as we have
been commanded – as we are hated and persecuted – let us always remember that
God bears the brunt of all things, and we find our comfort in Him, as He
sustains us as a branch in the Vine and refreshes us with His love and
joy. And, we comfort each other as we
stand together and love each other – even to the end.
Finally, Jesus prepares us by
telling us what will happen.
“I have 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 will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor
me. But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may
remember that I told them to you.”
Jesus explains to the Eleven that they
will bear witness to Him being God the Savior throughout the world, and the
world will react by hating them and persecuting them, just as they persecuted
Him. And we ought to except the same
thing.
It is an aberration if we explain the
Gospel and call on people to repent and believe, and they are happy with us and
tells us that what we have said is wonderful, but not for them. That is not normal – and it may not be what
they are feeling inside – especially if we continue to tell them that they must
repent and believe or face the full-on Wrath of God for their sins.
In love and faithfulness, Jesus
prepares us for what will happen if we proclaim the Gospel – as we are
commanded to do – just as He told the Eleven:
The Jews will throw the Eleven – and
other believers – out of the synagogues.
The non-believing Jews had taken the Word of God and invented another
religion out of it. We know that
because, if they believed the Word of God, they would have believed Jesus and
been one of His disciples, but they didn’t – the Jews wanted Jesus dead.
And the Jews wanted the Eleven and
all of His disciples dead.
As Jesus promised – they were hated
and persecuted:
Peter was crucified in Rome – upside-down,
as he requested.
Andrew was crucified in Greece.
Thomas was speared to death in
India.
Philip was executed in Carthage.
Matthew was stabbed to death in
Ethiopia.
Bartholomew was executed in Asia.
James was stoned and the clubbed to
death in Syria.
Simon the Zealot was executed in
Persia.
Matthias – the replacement for Judas
– was burned alive in Greece.
Paul was decapitated in Rome.
And John died in exile on the Isle
of Patmos. (http://www.christianity.com/church/church-history/timeline/1-300/whatever-happened-to-the-twelve-apostles-11629558.html)
They were killed this way, because
the world believed they were honoring God.
They did not know the Father – they hated Him – they believed in
something other than the Truth and wanted to destroy the Truth.
Understand, the United States is a very
strange place: we are a people of all
kinds of religions, but most people don’t really believe. We have to go to the Middle East – and places
like it – to see people being killed for their faith – for the sake of the
gods.
In the United States, we don’t tend
to stand up for our faith and say there is only One Way through Jesus. No, we buy into the lie that there are many
ways to God – after all, that’s what Oprah says! I have friends who tell me that God doesn’t
care what we believe, so long as we are faithful. What kind of god is that?!
When people say that all religions
are the same – they just teach us to love one another – we must say, “No!” We are called to bear witness to the world
that Jesus Alone is God the Savior.
There is no salvation except through the work He accomplished. Unless a person believes and repents, he will
suffer eternally and not be received into the Kingdom of God. Christianity is not a matter of differing on
the type of chip we like – it is the difference between eternal life and eternal
death – between believing the Truth of God and believing the lies of the devil.
Let us be comforted by Jesus – that
He has told us how the world will react as we bear witness. Let us take our comfort and hope in Him and
in the hope of the restoration of the Creation to come at Jesus’ return.
Let’s go forth and bear witness –
ready for people to hate us and seek to have us put to death for it. The Holy Spirit enables us to proclaim the
Truth of Jesus. And we are to go!
One caveat: we are not given the freedom to be
jerks. We are to love our neighbors and
bring the Gospel to them with patience and persistence until they believe or
until they kill us, but we are to do so in love. If people hate you because you’re a jerk,
that’s on you.
Let’s pray:
Almighty God, we thank You for
calling us out of the world and making us Your people. We thank You that Jesus prepared us for the
reaction of the world to the Gospel, and we are humbled to be despised with our
Greater Brother, Jesus. Help us to take
comfort in the Holy Spirit and to rely on Him as we go forth to bear
witness. Keep us proclaiming Your Gospel
in love, and bring many people to salvation through us to Your Glory. For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment