Help When Hated

Spirit of living God, would you fall afresh upon us now. That we would see and treasure Jesus.! That we would see and treasure Jesus. and that we would hold his words to heart.

All for the glory of you, Father. Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory because of your steadfast love and faithfulness.

And God, I just want to say thank you so much for giving us eyes to see the goodness of the gospel which is you. You are our treasure.

In Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. Kiddos, you're with us this morning. I'll try to keep you enraptured.

If you'd open up your Bibles to John chapter 15, we've been making our way through the gospel of John. That's our typical practice here at Christ the King Church. It's preaching through books of the Bible. And as you're turning there, John 15, 18 through 27, it's on page 1072, I've got a pressing question for you.

How do you handle being hated? How do you handle hate towards you?

Now, sometimes that hate can be an explosive hate like a volcanic eruption. It's heat. It's bright. You've got lava spewing all over you. It burns you.

Other times that hate can be a smoldering heat. It's kind of like glowing embers of a campfire that you don't know that they're there until you kind of step in it.

There's another kind of heat that I'll share with you later. But how do you handle heat? Whether eruptive or whether it is smoldering that is directed at you.

And some of you are like, what? What are you talking about? Nobody hates me. I am so nice. How can I ever be hated? I can't think of anyone who hates me.

Oh, unhated one. I know you hate. Whether that is explosive or smoldering.

I know you resent. I know you gossip. I know you avoid. I know you have hard feelings towards other people, which is all not loving. I know because I know myself.

How would you respond to your own hatred towards yourself? Most of us, when hated, it's either fight or flight.

If you're hated, you want to put up the dukes and fight back, knuckle sandwiches, let the fists fly, maybe it's not an actual knuckle sandwich, but maybe it's a verbal knuckle sandwich.

Others of us, when the heat comes, we're like, where's the exit? We want to split. We want to get out of there. Because with the heat of hate, we start to feel threatened.

We start going self-preservation. How do you handle heat? The heat of hate.

Do you know what I find really interesting about the passage we're about to look at this morning? Here it is. Jesus has just talked to us about abiding in him. He's the vine. We're the branches.

We're to bear much fruit to the glory of God the Father, and experience fullness of joy. Do I have an amen? Amen. And that means that when I am abiding in Christ, everybody's going to think I'm really nice.

You know what's striking about this passage? He makes a pivot. In verse 18, he makes a pivot. You abide in me, Christian, and the world will hate you.

Abiding in Christ results in being hated by the world. How do you deal with being hated, Christian? In 1965, the Surgeon General of the United States started stamping a kind of like caution on cigarette boxes, and it read like this.

Cigarette smoking may be hazardous to your health. But then in 1969, it went from a caution to a warning. And now it reads, the Surgeon General of the United States has determined that cigarette smoking is dangerous to your health.

This morning we have a Savior General warning that abiding in Christ is dangerous to your reputation.

It's dangerous to your well-being. And if you're not a Christian in the room, this Savior General is being very clear to you. It will cost you to follow Jesus.

So this morning, we're going to look at this passage, and I want you to see three groups of people, the hated, the haters, and the Helper.

Read with me verses 18 through 27. If the world hates you, since the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.

This is Jesus speaking. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. But because you're 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.

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 sins.

But now they have seen and hated both me and the Father. But the word that is written in their law, Psalm 69, 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. The hated, the haters, and the Helper.

Let's start with the hated. Who are the hated in verses 18 through 21? There's a New Testament scholar, his name is Robert Yarborough, and in his commentary on the Gospel of John, that he argues that the word if in verse 18, that starts verse 18, should be since.

Since the world hates you. He's talking to his disciples. This is just hours before Jesus is crucified. The Last Supper has taken place.

Judas has been possessed by Satan and has gone off into the night. Now Jesus is getting his disciples ready. This is the farewell discourse.

He's preparing for them for when he's absent from them. In 14.1, he says, let not your hearts be troubled. And then he exhorts them to abide in him, to bear much fruit.

And then here he pivots, and you'll be hated by the world. And just a reminder of who the world is. It's not the planet. Jesus is speaking about sinful humanity in organized rebellion against God.

Those who are dead in their sins. Those who are following the prince of the power of the air. Those who are under God's wrath, just wrath for their sins.

Those whom we once were among. You're going to be hated by the world. Not just the disciples, but those who would follow after the disciples.

Us. Not the OG disciples. Us too. Whether it is some kind of explosive hate, or smoldering hate, or another hate, then I'm going to tell you, Jesus says that the disciples will both experience fruitful abiding in him that is full of joy and hatred from the world.

That's extraordinary to me. But you know what? That speaks of reality to me. All who are abiding in Christ and bearing fruit for the glory of the Father by the power of the Holy Spirit will be hated by the world.

The question is why? Why will the world hate us? Well, Jesus gives us some reasons here. In verse 19, he says this. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own.

If you are still in the world, Christian, the world would be like, we love you. You're part of the family. Then he says, but because you're not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

You once were of the world, but now you're not of the world. You're out of the world because I chose you and because you're out of the world that you used to be in, the world's going to hate you for that.

How does that work? Here's how it works. Well, we once were of the world. Before we were regenerated by the Holy Spirit and before we repented of our sins, before we put our trust in Jesus, we used to be numbered with the world.

We fit right in. We were gladly living for sin. We were gladly, though not aware, following the prince of the power of the air. We were fine with all that stuff. But when Jesus saved us, he called us out of the world to himself.

And now we are no longer of the world, though we are still living in the world, but now we stand out from the world. Here's how that shakes out.

Here's how, here's why you're hated for that. You make crazy claims.

Jesus said, I'm the way, the truth, and life. No one comes to the Father but through me. It's an exclusive claim of salvation. There's forgiveness in no one else. There's no other name given among men by which we can be saved.

It's only the name of Jesus. And so that means all Muslims are out of the running to be saved. All Jews are out of the running to be saved.

All DYI, do-it-yourself kind of religions are out of the running. It is offensive to people. When you make this claim, yeah, what I believe is the only way to heaven, people are offended by that.

But it's just not that. When you start saying things to other people about Jesus' sexual ethics, I believe that homosexuality is grievous in God's sight.

It's sinful. Because Jesus in Matthew 19, he lays out what human sexuality should be, how it should be experienced.

One man, one woman, four life, joined together by God in marriage. And so that means adultery is wrong. That means cohabitating before you're married is sinful and wrong in God's sight.

You say that enough around people and they will avoid you and hate you. And then there's just the awkwardness. Oh, here comes Mike to the family gathering again.

I wonder what he's going to preach on today. Oh, look it. Here comes rainy cloud, Mike. He's going to rain on our sin parade. You know what it's like.

You're just trying to be faithful and you get avoided. You get talked about behind your back. You don't get invited to stuff.

When I was a freshman in college, I did, I made a bold move as a freshman football player. Bold move, maybe dumb, but bold.

And nobody invited to the mic at any parties. I've seen as a freak. Your non-Christian friends say, hey, let's get drunk this weekend.

You're like, no, no thank you. Non-Christian friends say, man, it's been rough. You want to go get high? You're like, no, no, no, no thank you.

When someone like, hey, let's go. Everybody is working for the weekend. Everybody's looking for a new romance. Let's get lucky.

No, no, no, no thank you. Look at this porn thing. No, no, no, no thank you. Do you mind lying on your expense report? We got to make things work.

Hey, I didn't study for my test. Can I look over on yours? Cheat, cheat, never be. No.

Can't do that because it's going to grieve my king. You do that enough and you know what? People are going to hate you.

Who made you judge and jury? You know what I'm talking about. You're looking to abide in the vine. Let his word abide in you.

You're just like, I want to experience the fullness of joy of living for Jesus and you get hated. It's where we live, folks. We've been called out by Jesus, by his grace, by his initiating grace.

He has called us out of sinful humanity in organized rebellion against God and he has called us into redeemed humanity in organized worship of the living God to bear fruit, to bring glory to his name.

Once you were of the world, but now by God's grace you have been called out of the world, yet you still live in the world, so you're going to catch heat.

This is Jesus telling me that. This is what conversion does.

When you put your faith in Jesus, he brings about this radical change of who you are at the heart level. Not just behaviors, behaviors, but behaviors that change because he's changed your heart.

The spirit of God has changed your heart. Now you want to obey him. Now you want to live for him and it's going to cause you to stand out from those who you've been living with for years.

Another reason Jesus gives is he says, you're not greater than me, remember? If they persecuted me, they're going to persecute you. 18, if the world hates you, since the world hates you, hey, it hated me first.

You know what one of the greatest consolations is when you are suffering the heat of hate from non-Christians? It's knowing this. You're seeking to abide in Jesus in the moment and you're like, oh Lord Jesus, you know this firsthand.

You are a sympathetic high priest. You've been hated too. You know this. There is great assurance in these words.

He's the first to be hated. He knows the hate. You can summarize this in verse 21. It's this, but all these things they will do to you on account of my name.

On account of my name. And that's just more than the name of Jesus. when the Bible talks about the name of someone, they're talking about all of who they are.

All of what they've done. It's what that name represents. And what Jesus is saying is when you catch heat for me, it's for me.

it's for who I am, God in the flesh, the Son of Man, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, our risen King, catching heat for me, for my sake.

So to abide in Christ will result in you bearing fruit for the living God, and part of that is joy and the fullness of God, and yet you will be hated too.

The haters, well, we're the hated, and it's a result of abiding in Jesus. Are you abiding in Jesus? Jesus? Are you? So we now move from those who are hated to the haters.

You want to start fighting? Yeah, let's talk about the haters. A word about the haters. Those who will hate us on account of the name of Jesus.

Who are the haters? In verse 21, at the end of verse 21, we're told who the haters are. Look at the end of verse 21. Because they do not know him who sent me.

What Jesus is saying is you will be hated because your haters do not know the one who sent Jesus, which kind of sounds innocent.

Oh, they just don't know. And so we're being hated because of people's ignorance. ignorance. It's not that. This isn't some kind of like innocent ignorance.

These people who don't know him who sent Jesus, they are people who have rejected him who sent Jesus. This is conscience rejection.

rejection. You're catching heat by people who don't agree with you. They've rejected Jesus, the Son of God, the Christ, and the Father who sent him.

What they're doing is they're rejecting God's plan for the fullness of time, his fullness of time plan of salvation. They are rejecting it. And in verse 22 we read, if I had not come and spoken to him, they would not have been guilty of sin.

Oh man, what does that mean? What sin is he talking about? It's the sin of rejecting Jesus. I mean, they have, they don't know the one who sent Jesus.

They don't know God, the Father, and they have rejected his sending of the Son. That's the sin Jesus is talking about.

They are without excuse. Jesus had clearly revealed who he is.

He'd made some crazy claims. Remember this one at the end of John 8, before Abraham was, I am? And he was rejected for that.

So what this is talking about is the sin of unbelief. The sin that goes, it's not believing that Jesus is God incarnate, the good shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep.

It's a rejection of that. You see, here's what you need to understand, Christian. Our haters are actually haters of heaven. Their hatred for you is just symptomatic of a greater hate.

And they're without excuse. We see it again in verse 24. Jesus says to them, if I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin.

But he did do these works. And they are responsible for that. He's the one, do you remember this? He healed the guy on the Sabbath by the pool of Shalom.

Do you remember this? He gave sight to a man born blind. Do you remember this? He raised Lazarus from the dead? Nobody else has done anything like it.

He himself said he would die and be raised on the third day and he was raised on the third day. No one else has done anything like that.

And they still rejected him. Brothers and sisters, the people who we will experience the heat of hate from, they're without excuse.

Romans 1. They've rejected the God of heaven. And God has handed them over to their sin. Which brings me to a kind of heat.

heat. It's not the explosive heat. It's not the smoldering heat.

It's the seductive heat of the world. It's 1 John 2, 15-17. It's the world trying to woo you away from your God to delight in the things that grieve God.

if you're a married person in the room and someone tried to seduce your spouse, you would not say that that person is loving you or your spouse, would you?

You'd say they're hating you. The world hates in a variety of ways. One of them is to pull you into its own way of being in their rebellion against God.

They have rejected God. God has put on the conscience of all men. His law has been written on their hearts and they willingly reject it.

That's why Jesus starts talking about whoever hates me hates the Father. You reject me, you reject him. God loves God. Last week I tried to show you that this chain reaction of God's love like a cascading waterfall.

It's God the Father loves God the Son and God the Son loves you and me individually, Christians, and that cascading love then moves out from us to other Christians.

It's the opposite with the world. the world hates you because the world hates Jesus, because the world hates the Father. They would never say it.

The world's hatred for you, brother and sister, is just symptomatic of the rejection of God. unbelief is not neutral.

Unbelief is not neutral. It's going to show up in some form of heat, whether explosive or smoldering or seductive.

So how do we respond to our haters, those who are dead to God, who are following the prince of the power of the air, whether they know it or not, who are under God's wrath?

How do we respond to them? We love those who hate us. We love them. We don't hate back.

Do you remember the story of Paul's conversion in Acts 9? Paul, the apostle Paul, before he was an apostle, he was an apostle of hate.

He was sent forth to persecute the church, the redeemed of God. And then Jesus shows up and totally flips him. He repose him. He was doing the deeds of darkness murderous, destructive, and then Jesus flips him.

and makes him an apostle of the gospel. That's extraordinary. God loved the apostle Paul more than Paul hated Christians.

Christians. And we are to love those who hate us. Do you remember Jesus teaching about how to respond to our enemies in Matthew 5?

We are to love our enemies just as God has loved us when we were his enemies. One of the things that I've been waiting to tell you is never forget that you were numbered among the world.

Never forget that. You too used to be dead to God, alive to your sin, following the prince of the power of the air.

You were under God's wrath. You were a happy non-Christian and then Jesus interrupted all that because his love was greater than your sinfulness.

God's God's grabbed you. He chose you out of the world and that has a tenderizing effect. It must have a tenderizing effect on us when we are on the receiving end of heat from non-Christians that some we love, some we don't have relationships with.

We must love them. This is the way of the gospel. This is gospel love. This is how we love in the spirit those who hate us.

in the heat of hate, we love in return. We love our haters for the glory of God.

The hated, the haters, and now the helper. In verses 26 and 27, Jesus circles back to the Holy Spirit.

Now, you may be sitting in your pew thinking, wait, hold on a second. You want me to love those who hate me? How can I do that?

I'm living with them. How does that work? You can't do that. The Holy Spirit can. love you. You need an empowerment by the Holy Spirit to enable you to love like Jesus.

If you're feeling the heat of hate, help has already arrived, Christian. The Holy Spirit who has indwelt you, is eager to fill you afresh so that you can respond to your haters in a way that pleases God.

A couple weeks ago, I gave you a crash course in the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not an it, but a who, a person. He's a he. He's present.

when Jesus is talking about here of him, he and the Father sending the Holy Spirit to us. He's coming to indwell each of us.

He's powerful. He bears the fruit that is like Jesus. Love, joy, peace, and he brings peace.

So when you encounter the heat of hate from the world, whether that's explosive, whether that is smoldering, if that's seductive, the Spirit is your ever-present help in time of trouble.

Psalm 46.1, God is our ever-present help. The Holy Spirit is like the ultimate ever-present help. He's on board, wanting to help you resist Christ.

Here's how the Holy Spirit helps. One, he helps us bear Christ-like fruit in the heat of hate. It's extraordinary.

When you are relying, abiding in Christ and being enabled by the Holy Spirit and things get hot, you're like, I love you back.

How can I pray for you? You're walking by the Spirit. If you're taking notes, would you write down Psalm 1? Would you write down Jeremiah 17, 5-8?

When we are abiding in God, these passages talk about heat coming upon us, and we bear fruit in the heat. Under the heat of hate, we can actually experience joy.

Maybe you remember Paul and Silas singing in the Philippian jail cell with their ankles in stocks. Midnight, they're singing, Lord, you're awesome.

We are so happy. Joy. Acts 5, the leaders of the Jerusalem church have just suffered for Jesus, and they come back to the church rejoicing for suffering for Jesus.

Okay, I've been waiting on this. I've been waiting to bring you here. Remember the Sermon on the Mount? It starts with Beatitudes.

Matthew 5, 10, 11, and 12. blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account, for my name's sake. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

we, when we catch heat for Jesus, we're like, praise God, thank you Jesus. Qualification. If, if your non-Christian supervisor is getting mad at you because you're chronically late, or you are, you are being mean, don't, don't think that you're being persecuted for Jesus.

you're not. But when we can drive direct lines to people's hatred for us, because of Jesus, we get to rejoice.

The Holy Spirit gives us joy, he helps us to love, he brings about peace, we can be settled in God, knowing that we are walking faithfully with him, even though we are experiencing the heat of hate.

The second area the Spirit helps us is to bear bold witness to Christ. In the heat. The Holy Spirit seeks to bear witness to Jesus.

Has anybody had to bear witness in a court of law? You get up on the stand, and a bailiff comes. Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

And you're like, yes. The Spirit of God is going to bear the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about Jesus Christ.

The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. He's going to bear witness to your spirit of the truth, of who Jesus is, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

truth, and then you will bear witness to Jesus, too. The truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth, who he is, of what he's done.

Even in the midst of heat, it might get hotter because you're bearing bold witness to Jesus, but your date gives power. The thing that he wants you to do because the Holy Spirit, Acts 1, 8, gives power for us to be witnesses to him wherever we are.

We're to bear bold witness for Jesus. What Jesus seems to be saying here is that the Holy Spirit, the helper, the spirit of truth, will empower us not just to bear Christ-like fruit when heating, but to bear Christ- glorifying witness in the heat.

There's nothing here that says about reducing the heat. This past Thursday, Jenny and I are in a life group, and we are in our life group together, and a dear sister was wondering out loud whether she is being faithful to Jesus, whether she's abiding in Christ because she wasn't experiencing kind of like the heat of persecution.

And Jenny and me, we know this sister, and she's like totally legit. You know what I said to her? You know what your pastor said to her? You're being persecuted just not to your face.

People are talking about you behind your back. There's no way that you can be living the way you are without ruffling feathers. They're just not saying it to your face.

And then she shared a little bit more. I'm like, oh, there it is. You are getting persecuted. And you know what she said at the end of it all? I just want to be bold for Christ.

Me too. Brothers and sisters, we have a helper. The third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, the greatest ever present help in time of trouble.

And he has been sent by both God the Father and God the Son, Trinity citing, he's been sent, that we would bear fruit and bear witness.

So when you experience the heat, don't fight back. Don't flee for the exit door.

Don't frolic with the world. Be faithful. Be faithful. Bear fruit, bear witness with the Spirit's help.

It matters what you say and how you say it. He's the helper. Hated, haters, the helper.

Here's the point. If you are abiding in Christ, you will be both hated and helped. If you're abiding in Christ, Christian, you will both be hated and helped.

That applies to middle school students and high school students, young adults, whether you're in the workplace or college Carthage shout out, clock it.

It'll be both. So here's some questions. Are you willing to be hated for Jesus? Are you willing?

Remember the Surgeon General Warning? How about the Savior General Warning?

If you're not a Christian in the room, you need to realize that becoming a follower of Jesus isn't going to be a walk in the part. I don't know who you've heard about Jesus from, but if they're saying to you, come to Jesus and your life will be great, that's not true.

You'll be hated. Oh, but Jesus is worth it. Now, if you're a Christian in the room, let me, let me just, let me, I need to choose my words carefully.

Nobody told me about this. What do you mean I'm going to be hated? I thought I just need to be nice. Does it change anything?

Does it change anything about the Jesus you claim to know that you'll be hated for him?

Because if you're saying, I don't know about that, let's save ourselves a whole bunch of heartache and you just need to stop professing to be a Christian. Because Jesus is very clear, if you are not willing to suffer for him, if you're ashamed of him, he's going to be ashamed of you.

But here's what this does. If you have an unwillingness to be hated for Jesus, do you know what it's actually exposing? Your true love.

Do you love what people think about you more than Jesus? Maybe you're in your pew right now and you're like, man, that would be hard.

If I got heat, man, I want to. I would want to be hated for Jesus. I would want to want to be hated for Jesus. I kind of want to lean towards being hated for Jesus, but I'm a little scared.

I'm kind of willing. Do you know how to be willing to be hated for Jesus?

You treasure Jesus above all else. You make Jesus your first love, your greatest treasure, and out of the overflow of your heart, you will speak, and you will suffer for it, and you'll be like, wait, hold on a second.

Greater, less than, or equal to. Is Jesus greater than, less than, or equal to what the world thinks about me? Greater. By far. The world offers no life.

The world cannot forgive you of your sin. The world cannot promise you eternal life in glory with God. You can't do it. Treasuring Jesus is prioritizing Jesus.

It's abiding in Jesus. And so, even in the heat, Jesus is to a Christian what oxygen is to a firefighter in a burning building.

He's your life. breath. And that breathing, the actual O2, is Holy Spirit breath. Earring into you, strengthening you.

Are you willing to suffer for Jesus? You can. By abiding in Jesus. Another application is love your haters.

Another application is be brave. How do you deal with being hated for Jesus? Helped by the Holy Spirit.

If you are abiding in Christ, you will both be hated and helped. But remember, blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

Let's pray. Lord Jesus, would you count us worthy to suffer for your name? Not so that we can feel good about ourselves, but that we can be faithful.

Father, would you pour out the Holy Spirit afresh and full that we would magnify Jesus among all people? Would you add to our number more men and women who will who will joyfully suffer for your name?

In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen.