18 “If the world hates you, understand that it hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. However, because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of it, the world hates you. (John 15:18-19 CSB)
After the events of Good Friday through Easter, we turn our eyes to our role as the faithful in this world. In the years that immediately followed the Resurrection, believers suffered greatly at the hands of the Jewish leaders and the Romans. Even one who was to become possibly the most influential of them all, Paul, was at this time persecuting the early church. But Christ told the disciples this would happen before he left in our scripture today. He continually tried to prepare them for the life that was to come.
Today, most of us, will not face this level of persecution. However, it is becoming more and more prevalent in todays society. We are now the outsider, the ones sought to be cancelled. Our message of truth and love is in question as truth becomes a joke and love is perverted in every way possible. Make no mistake, the world hates us couched in its own way.
But, as Christ said, this is because we are not of the world and He has chosen us out of it.
Read that last line again. Really consider what it says. He chose us! We think we chose Him, but He chose us before we were even born. Now many of the world will say this means we had no free will in the matter. But this is not true. Even though Christ chose us, we have the free will to not chose Him. Even when chosen, we can turn our back upon God. It is not His will, but He gives us that choice.
So, while being hated by the world may be difficult, being chosen by God is far superior.
