I think we need that in this day. I know a lot of people are. It's just the trend. People are not reading in this day. They're not. Studying. To show themselves approved. And I'm not condemning, I'm just saying it's kind of a almost a natural thing, and I'm thinking about maybe. Starting the morning service at quarter of. As soon as Sunday school stops, boom, we'll start. We won't take five minutes and go right into the service. So maybe I have a little more time. This passage, when Jesus is teaching here in John 15, verses 18 down through 25, he's dealing with the way the world will treat you. and he's dealing with why. He takes all the responsibility on himself. It's me. It's because of me. You see that in verse number 18, they hated him first. And so that's, he takes the responsibility for why you're hated by the world. He said, they hated me. And if you're like me, and if you're of me, you belong to me, they'll hate you for sure. There's no doubt about it. Every Christian will suffer persecution. Everyone in some manner, form, some way. If they're like, if they're like the Lord Jesus Christ, they're a testimony. They're an example of his righteousness. They walk with him. They live by the word of God. Uh, they, their light shines. It's pretty evident that if the light shines they're gonna see it as the evidence of the radiant glow of God in your life Shines out as a testament that you're like God They're gonna hate you Because you belong to Jesus and he says you're good. He's trying to prepare the disciples Second application to us trying to prepare us It's a it's a preparation that is very difficult to do. I'll do that in just a moment. But it's something that's, if you try to apply this to your life without really considering a lot of things, you'll see that it's difficult. And I wanna deal with some of those difficulties if I got time. Anyway, let me go a little faster. He said here, he says, if you were of the world, if that was you, if you was of the world, you live like the world, you lived after the philosophy world, you look like the world, talk like the world, smell like the world, you have the same kind of a Spirit of the world. There's even a language of the world of first John Talks about they speak of and the world Understands and acknowledges them and they know one another by their own vocabulary the way they use it Christians don't talk like heathens like lost people You can tell by the very manner of speech The way people talk if they got the slang talk or there's a lot of slang that goes around in the world and most of the time you really don't know where it started and what it all it means or how they apply it and yet here the Christian lot of times picking up i heard preachers picking up some of the slang back years ago and i thought you know what you're saying do you know what that implies do you know that is a filthy word you're using and here you're up there preaching like you're the know of the bible and you're using an immoral word but that's what everybody else said i'm saying you christians do not look, talk, act, walk, go, and fellowship, and agree with sinners. They're separate, they're upright, and they're holy. And so there's going to be, he said, if you are the world, the world will love his own, and they do, they do, they have a special I guess they call it camaraderie or whatever it want to be a loved one for one another a care for one another and If if if they invite you and like like your company Beware When men speak well of you beware it's sending out the wrong message if you're a Christian and sinners just Love to be around you sinners Entice. Oh, I want to dig into that but I won't But the Christian the Christian He's not of the world but she but because but because For that reason because you're not of the world But I have chosen you out of the world I've chosen you out of the world and I made a choice the way you're gonna live. Let me just interject something here that's clear. You will always be confronted until you die in this world that God chooses just certain people for salvation. They call it the elect or the chosen. Let me read you a verse that if you'll let this verse get in your mind, you've got an answer. It's something that you ought to memorize. John chapter one, verse 12, but as many as receive him, but as many as receive him, to them gave he power, choice, to them gave he power. to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name. You have to make your own decision to be saved. The chosen He's speaking of here, and it's what it speaks all the time of, of what He chooses for you to do with your life. He chooses the way you're gonna live. That's the Bible. The Bible gives you a choice that Jesus laid down. It's not man. It's not man that draws up the different types of ways for you to live, the different standards. I'm glad some of that other stuff took off. You don't hear much of it. Preferences, all these things, no, that wasn't in the Bible. But a lot of people believed it. I even heard lawyers say, well, there's some things that people have preference on. I said, you gotta be kidding. Somebody take this Bible and show me where God says you really got the power if you want to make your own choice how to live or make a decision. You can't find that in the Bible. If you find this in the Bible, look at me and listen to me, then you've taken the Lord off his throne. If he's not Lord of your life, if he's not telling you how to live, how to walk, if he's not telling you how to dress, if he's not telling you how to think, if he's not telling you what you need to do and how you need to live that life that's holy and pure and godly, then you're running your own life. The Christian, the Christian isn't living his own life. Is there a verse that says, but you're not your own. You're bought. You're bought as a sacrifice. You're brought with a price. People say, well, I got my own will, and you're pretty dumb about the Bible, or else you're lost, one of the two. You're not your own, you're not your own, you're responsible even when this body is not your own, it's the Lord's. I'm so tired of hearing statements all around that contradict the word of God, contradict the authority of God, take away the lordship of God. And I think, oh, that sounds so good. I thought, where are you people at? When do you ever read your Bible? When do you talk to the Spirit? Where do you get your rule of order of your life? Jesus said, it's my fault you're gonna be hated. And he said, it's evident that you are gonna be hated because you're gonna be like me. You're not gonna be of the world. You're not gonna look like the world. You're not gonna go where the world goes. You're not gonna be involved in the pleasures of this world. You're not gonna have fellowship with this world. Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. People that are lost have unfruitful works of darkness. That you and I have no business being around. He said, but I have chosen you out of the world. That choosing he made was a choice of you living for him. I've got a verse that I want you to turn back to, and I believe it'll help you to see this truth. Turn back into the book of Luke. I believe that's where I want to be. Let me get my reference real careful here, because I'm going. Luke 14. Luke 14. Let's put it in at verse 27. And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me cannot be my disciple." What has God chosen for us? You're reading here, this is his choice for you, that your sensual, selfish life is over. Except a person takes up their cross, except they're willing to take up the death of the Lord Jesus Christ applied to their life. Notice verse 26, and I didn't want to use these, but it says, if any man come after me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brother and sister, yea, and his own life, also cannot be my disciple. God gives you a, shows you an example there of just how He has to be preeminent. He has to be first in your life, before your children, before your wife, before your husband, before yourself. He's to have first place in your life, the preeminence. Seek first the kingdom of God, His righteousness, all these things after you. It has to be, it has to be a giving up of self. He that saves his life wants to run it himself. Nobody gonna tell me what to do. Nobody gonna tell me how to live. Nobody tell me where I go and what I can do or not. I'm saying to you, they're gonna hate you. This world is gonna hate you. This world is gonna hate you if you're like Jesus. They crucified Christ. I can't tell, and I don't know for sure, and I've heard a lot of preachers say, and I have no doubt about it. You can see when you read through the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, just how people would change in their attitude towards Christ. I mean, if somebody stirs them up, they're ready to throw a stone, too. They're listening to them, they listen to them preach. Some believe, and the next thing you turn around, and they're ready, all of them ready to stone him. So I'm saying, I don't know. I don't know who was at the cross. I don't know who was at the judgment, Pontius Pilate. Some say that even those that were healed, and I don't have no way to prove this, so I don't, I'm not dogmatic about it. But even some, maybe no doubt, that were healed by Jesus. That's possible. Nine lepers never did come back, did they, or say thanks. It's possible. Possible there, in Pilate's hall, that some of the very people he helped, some of the very people that maybe before back there in John, I think it's 10, where they were followers of Christ, and that he made those statements, and they followed him no more, could have been some of them there. At Pilate's judgment hall, screaming. Crucify Him. Crucify Him. You've seen people, you've been around people that one time said they loved the Lord, and later on they could curse Him. And you've seen people like that. It's not hard for me to understand the Bible when you realize the truth that sinners hate righteousness, godliness, holiness, purity. They hate it. It's a testimony against their wicked lives. It's a testimony that constantly grinds in their conscience. You're wrong! You're wrong! You're guilty! You're wrong! You're wrong! Who wants to be told they're wrong? Nobody. Nobody wants to be told that. They hate for somebody saying the way you're living is wicked and you're going to hell. Can you imagine if that stuck in your mind and you really believed to hell? They just dismiss it. Well, let me go just a little bit farther here and I'll close. You see, Jesus, Jesus didn't teach us to hate in return. He says, you're gonna be hated. And it's gonna be something that's just gonna be natural. It's gonna be the normal, a guy named Lee wrote a book, The Normal Christian Life. And I don't know about all about, and I tried to read some and it didn't get too good, but the Christian life is just one filled with opposition from the world, hatred from the world. And if it's not, if it's not, there's kind of something wrong with us. But he still didn't teach us to go on and hate them in return. Let me read this. I got a couple of thoughts I want to deal, and I'm just not getting them all I want to read. Look at Matthew 5. Matthew 5. Sermon on the Mount, verse 43. You have heard that it has been said, thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. He said, you've heard that and you think that's right. You believe that's the way it ought to be. But he says, notice he says, but I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you, that ye may be the children of your, what's the next word? Have not I been saying ever since I started preaching this message to you, if you look like Jesus, act like Jesus, talk like Jesus, think like Jesus, holy like Jesus, Don't believe these lying preachers say you can't be holy. If they tell you they can't be holy, you tell them to throw their Bible away. Holy men of God spake, and they were moved by the Holy Ghost. The Bible speaks of holy men all the way through it. They're lying. They're not telling you the truth. I used to try to be careful with all this, but I've gotten to where I know I don't have much time. So I'm just going to tell you how I really believe. I'm saying to you, out there in a lot of places, you're hearing things that people want to hear. There's nothing that people, I wish you'd listen to this. There's nothing people want to hear more than God will let you live a sinful life here and bless you in heaven. People want to hear that. They did in the Old Testament, and they're doing it in this Testament. The same thing. That's what Laodicean spirit's all about. Tell me I'm all right. Tell me I've got everything I need. Tell me I'm good. Tell me I'm saved. I noticed that little track back there, and I never had read that one before, and there's a few of them back there, and I mean, he wrote a good track. It says, soul winning or salesmanship. And so far as I've read, it's good. It does a good job. It does a real good job. may be the children of your..." Don't children kind of take the appearance of their parents? Don't you think Jesus, don't you think the Father wants you to look like Him if He's your Father? which is in heaven, for he maketh the sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth the rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not even the publicans the same? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you do more than to others? Do not even the publicans so? Be therefore, another word that you need to take out of your Bible according to the majority of the preachers today, be therefore perfect even as your father, even as your father, even as your father. Let the Bible, let the Bible, please let the Bible speak. It don't matter what men say. You can live, and I really believe the devil himself invented that word. Sinless perfection. I believe the devil himself invented that. It's hard to refute, especially in this day. Hard to refute. It ought not be. It ought to be simple for us to deal with. But because of the level, the low level of Christianity, and there's so many that believe that Christians can be sinners. It's hard to refute that, but it's a lie. I wouldn't even believe this verse. Therefore, all, therefore, he says, be ye therefore, perfect. Is that what the Bible reads? Well, if we'll take up the standard status quo, whatever you wanna say, We need to change that. There's no such a thing. It's impossible. No, I believe the Bible. Can I preach five more minutes? I want to finish my message. I'm going to preach just five more minutes because I really want to deal with this thought that would help us. It's difficult. It's difficult to be to be in this situation. Let me just try to go through it quick. We're designed, we're designed with a heart that has a longing for affection. We're designed that way. We love to be loved. I don't care who you are. Everybody loves to be loved. And when Jesus says, those people out there that's not saved are going to hate you. Well, they won't say it. Well, they pretty well let you know they don't invite you over. You don't get a lot of invitations if you live right. A lot of them of your own kin. A lot of them, your own kin don't like you. If you live right, they don't. They don't want you setting the table, talking about the Bible and the goodness of God and praising God and praying. They don't want that. That's hard to deal with because we're designed to love. We're made that way. Now the world's corrupted it and saying all these wicked kind of lifestyles is love, but it's not love. But God has put in you, God has put in you and me, a longing to be accepted. You want people to think well of you. You want people to agree with you. You want people to feel comfortable around you. And Jesus said, they're going to hate you. Then he tells us over here in Matthew, he says, but you still have to show love. Even though they hate you, you got to love them. Regardless of how their spirit and their attitude is towards you. It's a difficult thing to do. Difficult. I'm with you. I know there's people out in that world that I talk to, and it's hard for me to even Reason this out. I mean, they're not saved. You ask them and, you know, they don't even go to church. But yet they'll kind of show a little friendship to you. Well, it's kind of a, it's kind of a something that really there's no depth to it. There's no real meaning to it. Many are cordial just because they want to be loved or thought well of. They don't want to show their real attitude towards you. If you got there and you started preaching to them, tell them what a sinner they are, they'll show you how much hate they have for you. But as long as you and I just kind of have a casual conversation, you know, and I've got them, I've got a man, you know, they'll say hi to me and want to talk. As long as we talk about the weather and talk about their interests and what they like to do, we can have a good friendship. And I'm not talking of being a friend, I'm just talking of cordial kind of a relationship. But it's hard. It's not easy. God's calling us. And if you'll do what the Bible says that I just read over here in Luke, if you'll take up your cross, if you'll die to self, stop all this about me. What about me? Me, me, me is supposed to be gone. It's Him. I stand for him, not me. I stand for how you treat him, not me. If you and I, if you and I can't bury that me-ism, put it on the cross, seek God's deliverance from constantly wanting people to treat us right, respect us, baloney, baloney, it never get that way. You'll never get it. You can't force people. Take up your cross. That's my choice for you. You want to know why I chose you? You're here for one purpose. Look at me, and I'm going to close. You're here to never represent yourself. You're here to be an ambassador for the Lord Jesus Christ. You're here to represent Him, not me. I'm here, I'm to be a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ. And my responsibility is in the ministry of reconciliation, regardless of how they treat me or what. I'm representing Him. And you start talking to many people about Jesus, and they're gonna tell you something that you don't wanna hear. Some of the same people you laugh and joke with, if you bored out on them, you dealt with them about the Lord Jesus Christ died for their sins, how they're rejecting Him, how they're resisting the truth, how they're one step from hell. One step. I pull out of the post office up there, and a lot of times it'll flash through my mind how close I was to death. I was talking to a guy, and I laid the church checkbook on the hood of my truck was talking to him. You know, just run our mouths. I got in the truck, took off, and I got to the very edge of the four-lane highway. I stopped, and the checkbook went out in the middle of the highway. Church's checkbook. I jumped out, honest before the Lord. It had to be an angel. I jumped out, and I'm right there, ready to run out, and here it comes. One step would have put me in eternity, just one. One, one. When are we, when are we gonna stay? Jesus even asked for us at his word. Who will go? Who will go for me? Who's gonna stand for me? Who's gonna represent me? Who's gonna take some of the hatred and bitterness and all these other things? Who's gonna take some of that for me? Do it for me! Can I be just openly honest with you? Would you say maybe that's why we have a difficult time of witnessing? Because we don't want our feelings hurt. I believe it. Must I be carried to the sky on flowery beds of ease while others fought to win the prize? and sailed through bloody seas. Let's stand. There's a cross to bear. I don't think we ever sing it. I don't think it's in any of our song books. But the old song goes, must Jesus bear the cross alone And all the world go free. No, no, the songwriter said, no. There's a cross for everyone. And there's a cross for me. I choose you. He said, I choose you. I've chosen you. I've chosen you because you believed in me. You trusted me. You said you want to live for me. So I've chosen the life that I want you to live. I've chosen how you want you to represent me. Not be ashamed of me. God help us. God help us in these days. Osong Wright says, stand up, stand up for Jesus. He's soldiers of the cross. Father in Jesus name, I pray give us the grit and the boldness, the determination. I'm preaching this morning and know without a doubt that certainly I fail in areas of this myself. of standing at times, I'll walk away and say, I should have said this to him. I should have answered it this way. I should have dealt with him. And Lord, we fail you. We got that love of self in there enough where it's, I don't want to be hurt. I pray you'd work on our lives and Lord, I pray you'd break down this. And I guess you'd call it cowardness. Maybe you'd call it denial. I don't want to hear that, but maybe, maybe we'd fall in that category of denying our Lord as Peter did three times. I don't know him. I don't know who you're talking about. I pray, Lord, it should give us the strength, the wisdom, the will, the backbone, the courage. I know the disciples in Acts prayed for holy boldness, and you gave it to them, and they spoke the word. And I pray you'd help us to be that kind of people. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen, amen, you are dismissed. ♪ She has a big smile and she has big eyes ♪ ♪ She has a big smile and she has big eyes ♪ ♪ She has a big smile and she has big eyes ♪