Good Morning My Beloved,
I feel so blessed by having each of you here today.
I am so incredibly blessed.
Thank you for joining us today..
Heavenly Father,
We are so incredibly blessed for the honor and privilege of prayer.
Thank You for our family here, a relationship the includes mutual edification
as well as a unity in purpose and spirit that goes far deeper than friendship
deeper than most human relationships.
But a relationship built upon the foundation of Your Word, which expands our vision
brings clarity, increases our love and compassion for others, and forgiveness,
as You have forgiven us, something Christ Himself displayed for us, even on the cross
His nature and His thoughts concerning others, for the children of men
The more we pray, the more we will want to pray
and the more we pray, the more we will receive
True worshipers worship You in both spirit and in truth
Lord, we give You our thanks
because we know that we have already received what we have pray for
we praise You, exalt Your name before men
create in us, Your image
All for Your glory and increase in the kingdom
In Jesus' name
Amen
"This I command you, that you love one another. 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. 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. 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."
John 15:17-25
Today's Message: If The World Hates You - Part 3
We all know that Jesus Christ laird down His life for us, a totally selfless action, crucified.
Such a love brings an affection that is sacrificial into the lives of those that are attempting to serve Him. The love of Christ, should motivate each of us toward working to supply the needs of our brothers and sisters, who are in need.
Let's look at Galatians 6:14, just look how dramatic it is: "But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world."
Paul is saying, that part of my existence is gone, it’s dead. I’m now a citizen of heaven. My Father is there, my inheritance is there, my Savior is there, my church triumphant is there, my reward is there. We're are in the world, but not of the world. We are aliens and strangers in this world.
Philippians 2:15 describes it well: "Prove yourself to be blameless and innocent children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world." So here we are in the kingdom of darkness and we are the lights. And what does light do? Ephesians 5:11, it exposes darkness. We shine on the darkness and expose it, and they hate us for it.
James 4:4 reverses that and says, "Friendship with the world is hostility toward God."
If you’re a friend to the world, you’re hostile to God. If you’re a friend to the world, you’re hostile to God. Just let that sink in for a moment.
"Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him" 1 John 2. So they hate us because we’re not part of them. We’ve been literally plucked out. "I chose you," that’s a middle reflexive. It would translate accurately, "I chose you for Myself and picked you out, took you out of the kingdom of darkness.” Put that with Colossians 1:13,
"For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son."
Now the ruler of the kingdom of darkness isn’t happy about that. He hates the righteous. Satan
hates righteousness.
The church goes out; preaches sin, judgment, hell, salvation, gospel, grace; the world hates it. You say, "Well, I don’t seem to be so hated by the system." I can elevate that pretty quickly for you. If you really want to be faithful as a believer try this.
Turn to 1 John 3:11, "This is the message which you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another; not as Cain, who was of the evil one." Wow. Why did Cain do what he did? He was of the evil one, Satan. He slew his brother.
Why did that kid go to school, take a gun and shoot people? I don’t think a psychological explanation is the answer, I think a theological explanation is the answer. He’s controlled by Satan. "Satan is a liar and a murderer," John 8. That young man was of the evil one.
Anybody who hates Christianity, persecutes Christians, is of the evil one. Cain slew his brother, not only because he was jealous. Sure, he was jealous. Not because he had some kind of psychological breakdown, personal crisis, not because he felt unloved and unfulfilled, or because his parents didn't love him but because his life and his thinking was controlled by Satan. That’s what is says, "For what reason did he slay him? Because his deeds were evil, and his brother’s were righteous."
Now please understand, I am not trying to minimize the effects of emotional abuse, or suggests that the victims themselves are weak. Abuse in any form is unconscionable and unacceptable. And as someone who endured sexual abuse, the effects can certainly be traumatizing and long lasting.
Let me tell you how you can quickly elevate the hostility toward you: Start identifying evil as evil.
"Pastor, I don’t really want to do that."
Here, let me help you; Catholicism is evil, the Pope is evil. He is from the kingdom of darkness. He is anti-christ. Anyone who would say that atheists are going to go to heaven is anti-christ. Jesus said, "You will die in your sins. And where I go, you’ll never come because you believe not on Me." Not only do you need to believe on God, but on Jesus Christ.
Allow me to continue, Pornography is evil. Gender tampering is evil. Adultery is evil. Promiscuity, having multiple sex partners or orgies is evil. Fornication is evil. Sexual, mental and physical abuse is evil. Human trafficking is evil. Prostitution is evil. Lying is evil. Pride is evil. Self - centeredness is evil. Self-righteousness is evil. Stealing is evil. While I could easily go on and on, I'm sure you get the idea here. While we must confront evil, we do not need to be cruel or mean, but we do need to do it. We must confront sin and be able to provide biblical truths as to why it is evil, explaining the consequences of sin. We do need to offer a way out from under it, through a personal relationship with Jesus. Who wants to save them!
That is exactly why they killed Jesus Christ, because He confronted the Pharisees, Sadducees and Sanhedrin, He said their religion was evil. And it was evil. Their lives were whited sepulchers, polished up on the outside with religion, but inside full of stinking, dead bones. They masked their sin, with their religion. Jesus saw right through it, and He called them on it. People do that today, they are evil, they are evil. And they hide behind the guise of religion.
And worse, they justify their sinful evil ways. Just like those who would persecute and crucify Christ.
If you go back to John 7:7, John chapter 7,verse 7, Jesus said, He’s talking to the people. He said, “The world doesn’t hate you," just the people He’s talking to walking in Galilee, "but it hates Me. Why does it hate Me? Because I testify that its deeds are evil."
If we don’t say that, if we don't call evil, evil. If we don't call sin, sin, we ourselves are sinning. We’re sinning. You can say it in love, but it has to be said. They hate us because we’re not a part of the system, because by our life, we rebuke the system, and by our message, we condemn what the system is. We condemn everything about it. We condemn its philosophies, its religion, its ideologies, its goals, its objectives – everything. And that means hostility comes from individuals, but it also ramps up and comes collectively from primarily organized religion.
It’s maybe summed up in the words of 2 Timothy 3:12. Paul says, "All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution." Most of haven’t experienced anything close to the same degree of persecution; no one is burning us at the stake, at least yet. But somewhere in the world, believers are being killed, beheaded, shot.
The kingdom of darkness, seems to me, is taking over more and more and more aggressively this culture. The world hates us because we just don’t belong to it; and we’re living and verbal rebuke to this culture. What this culture affirms, we reject. Its standard of goodness and evil, we reject. Its tolerances, we reject. Its goals and objectives, we reject. We follow the Word of God, it does not.
I find it interesting, however, isn’t it, that so many people who are in the world today, like to call themselves Christians. But there is nothing Christ-like about their behavior, about their speech. But Jesus said, that’s to be expected. Jesus said, "Satan will sow tears among the wheat."
This is history of the church, this is the history of Christianity: we are hated because we are not of the world. We are an alien, sin rebuking entity in the middle of this evil world system. Satan hates us, demons hate us, and all the subjects of the kingdom of darkness are amassed against us. This is how it is. There’s a reason for that, a second reason, I’m just going to quickly introduce it: They hate us because we’re not part of the world, and they hate us because they hated our Lord Jesus. Go back to verse 18: "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you."
Let me just say this, anyone, and I do mean anyone, who hates Christ is evil. They are evil. Pure evil. Because there’s nothing in Christ to be hated, there is just nothing evil in Him. There's nothing to hate. Except that He called evil, evil. And so they hated Him, He said. "And if they hate you, they hated Me before they ever hated you." He said, "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."
Then verse 20: "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."
This is in Matthew 10:24
Here is a simple point: Those who are of the world, they’re going to treat us just like they treated Christ. Same Satan, same demons, same kingdom of darkness, same hatred of God, same hatred of righteousness, goodness, the same truth exists. They hated Him; be assured, they will hate us. That’s why they killed Stephen, that’s why they killed James, and that's why they killed Peter, that's why the killed Paul and John the Baptist. They hated them. They preached truth, they stood against evil! They hated that, so they killed them. And because of that hatred, that's why the slaughter of Christians has gone on ever since.
In Matthew 5, Jesus said, "You’re going to be persecuted; but blessed are you when you’re persecuted for My sake." You don’t expect to be treated better than your Lord. If He, the perfect one, was treated that way, how do we, the imperfect ones, expect to be treated any different? And if we are true Christians identified with Christ, we would expect the world run by Satan to have exactly the same attitude toward us and exhibit the same behavior toward us that they have toward Him.
In Closing....
Beloved, I really believe that we just have to accept that reality, and I think we have to be even more faithful in speaking the truth, which may even elevate the hatred, and the persecution. But it’s necessary, it’s very extremely necessary. We have to be faithful to God, we have to be faithful to Christ. Our commitment is not to the world, and that which is evil. Our commitment is to Jesus Christ! And let's be honest, that's going to ruffle more than a few feathers. People will hate it, They'll hate us for speaking truth, just as they hated Jesus Christ.
I’m not in the least surprised; you really shouldn’t be either.
Evil, things need to be proclaimed evil. And we need to say, "Your deeds are evil, and evil has consequences, and it’s divine, and it’s eternal, that unless you repent, unless you’re forgiven through the gospel of Jesus Christ. You will spend eternity in hell. But wait, there's hope. There's hope. You don't have to spend eternity there. Christs' saving grace is still available to you. But you must accept it." That's not being mean, that's biblical, that's truth. We must always proclaim biblical truth, with grace, mercy and love. We do not need to be mean to effectively do it
Its a very, very important position to take. One every believer in Christ must take. a position of truth. This is an important passage of Scripture. Oh, believe me, I have a lot more to say about this, but I'll address that next time. Sometimes, I get on something and I feel strongly about, and get carried away on explaining a particular section of Scripture. That happens. That happens. But all of this portion of Scripture is so important, it does take a significant amount of time to get through it. The Scripture requires, it commands it, and it deserves it.
This is so helpful. It helps us to know that we are so incredibly blessed, even when we’re persecuted for righteousness sake. We’re blessed when people speak evil of us because of Jesus Christ. Heaven opens up and blesses us, even in the midst of our suffering. There’s testimony to that through all history of the blessing that comes, even in the hour of death, to those who suffered martyrdom at the hands of evil sinners.
And now may the Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make His face shine upon you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.
Now and forever, in Jesus' name
Amen
Brian Monzon Ministries