John 15:18-21 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me.
John 17:14-16 I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
I read an interesting thought yesterday by the late Vance Havner. I hope it will be a blessing to you as it was to me.
Dr. G Campbell Morgan said,"The world hates Christian people if it sees Christ in them." It will tolerate the watered down compromise of a church found in modern Christianity, but it hates Christ and will hate us. We are sheep among wolves... there is no way under Heaven to reconcile the once-born with the twice-born, the wolves with the sheep.
The only way for the church to escape hatred and hostility is to secularize the church and conform to this age; but if we escape hatred and hostility that way, we only invite contempt and scorn, for the world has no respect for a compromising Christian. A sheep trying to act like a wolf is a ridiculous sight to behold.