John
7:6-8 Then Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet
come, but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me
because I testify of it that its works are evil. You go up to this feast. I am
not yet going up to this feast, for My time has not yet fully come.” NKJV
Imagine someone you love dearly drowning in the
Mississippi River and you are helpless to get to them and save them from the
water. How awful, dreadful, and hurtful would that scene look like if you had
to witness such a tragedy? But what if as you were screaming and shouting in
terror, someone came out of nowhere and disregarded his own safety and the
danger of the great body of water and went in willingly and rescued that person
you loved dearly. What would be your response to such a person? It would be a
heart overflowing with gratitude. This is what Jesus Christ did on the cross
for you sinner. We have seen it recently expressed by many of the victims and
family members of the victims of the Boston bombing that survived because
someone took of their shirt and helped stop the bleeding from their arms or
legs. We have heard and seen many more testimonies like that from other tragic
scenes that have played out in the past. Love and gratitude should be the
natural reaction when these visible displays of heroism are carried out by
others. We human beings are designed in our natural bodies to resist and fight
the death of the body as long and as hard as possible to preserve its life.
Well, sadly it is also natural for human beings to
fight hard to hold onto and preserve the sin in our hearts and lives. We all
were born with hearts that are deceitful above all things and desperately
wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). Each one of
us are not able to see our hearts in this condition and are prone to think that
wicked hearts are in the two men that set off the bombs at the Boston Marathon
or the men that flew the airplanes into the twin towers in New York City. But
the Bible is unrelenting in testifying to each one of us that are own
individual hearts are wicked, unclean, and sinful from birth. Our Lord Jesus
Christ came to earth to not only die for man’s sin but also to testify to every
person that their hearts were so sinful, wicked, and immoral that none are
worthy of heaven. To put it bluntly the Lord Jesus came to burst man’s bubble
when it came to him being good. Everywhere our Lord went He was confronted with
very religious Jewish rulers who felt they were good and pleasing to the Lord
God of Israel. These men made themselves good before God by what they did daily
in their religious activities.
Today we still find a world filled with people that
don’t see themselves in reality but believe they are too good to be eternally
damned to a place like hell; if it even exists many will say (Jehovah’s
Witness). The idea many so called good people have is that they are not
deserving of judgment. Our Lord Jesus Christ came to tell this entire world
that its deeds, actions, lifestyles, etc. are all evil and not just the Hitler,
Bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, or any other cruel dictator we might place on this
list. The majority of the people of this world have so rationalized sin that
they have made sin equal to nothing more than a bad habit, a wont, an untamed
passion, an insecurity, or a wrong custom, or some questionable desires. Sin
cannot be redefined and it still wreaks havoc in the lives of everyone under
its enslavement. When the Military Commanders are instructing their new
recruits the proper technique to handle and use a hand grenade you better
believe there is a right way and a wrong way to do so and the evidence of which
way was taken by the military person is very clear and evident when the grenade
goes of safely away from the person or if it blows up in the person’s hand or
near the person. Our Lord Jesus came to this world to speak against everything
in it that is evil. This is why He was pursued constantly during His earthly
ministry to be killed. Those who did not want to see any change in the worldly
system established then and now hate our Lord Jesus Christ with a fervent passion.
Even if that hatred is not expressed outwardly and verbally it is very clear
and present. The Name Jesus is the only One used as a swear or curse word and
it is used regularly everywhere in this world today in that manner. You never
find people using the name of Muhammad or Buddha or Krishna as a curse word.
I have said this many times from the Word of God and
it needs to be continually repeated and that is with our Lord Jesus there is no
partiality or favoritism with Him. Our Lord Jesus calls abortion evil and every
man or woman that supports this evil act is not in favor with our Lord Jesus
Christ. Our Lord Jesus calls sexual perversion evil and it is His words given
to Moses to write in Leviticus 20:13
and to the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians
6:9-10 and He does not cover in His blood the people who live in this
manner or support those who do. Our Lord Jesus calls witchcraft, wizards,
sorcery, and other forms of magic evil and an abomination to Him as He also
gave Moses to write in Deuteronomy
18:9-14 as well as the Apostle Paul in Galatians
5:20. The teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ then and now arouse and stir
up the people of the world to strike out against it and Him. The men and women
who truly are partakers of His Divine Nature (2 Peter 1:4) must never expect people who are still in their
natural state or condition (1
Corinthians 2:14) to welcome them with loving open arms as we stand against
the evils mentioned above as well as the many others that are common place in
our world today.
The Apostle John wrote these words from our Lord
earlier in this epistle, John 3:19-20 “And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into
the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were
evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the
light, lest his deeds should be exposed. NKJV A people still in love with their sins will naturally reject and
hate the One who comes along exposing and condemning such behavior to be evil. The
Apostle Paul also wrote for our understanding that when people give themselves
over to an ungodly, immoral, profane, and evil lifestyle they rarely want to go
forth in that manner alone and so they join themselves (if you will) with other
likeminded people so that it perhaps might bring legitimacy to their chosen
course and also because it gives them pleasure to see others doing the same
things (Romans 1:32). This world
will always hate our Lord Jesus Christ as long as individual hearts are blinded
to the truth of the gospel of His death, burial, and resurrection for their
sins and what power there is in this very fact, but our Lord Jesus is plucking
out a people from the world and making them His own. All who love our Lord
Jesus with a passionate uncompromising love and devotion will be hated, but we
are always of good cheer because our Lord Jesus has overcome the world. Amen!
Psalms
11:5 The LORD tests the righteous, But the wicked and the one who loves
violence His soul hates. NKJV
Proverbs
9:7-8 “He who corrects a scoffer gets shame for himself, And he who rebukes a
wicked man only harms himself. Do not correct a scoffer, lest he hate you;
Rebuke a wise man, and he will love you.” NKJV
“There are those who hate Christianity and call their hatred an all-embracing love
for all religions.” G. K. Chesterton
“Man can certainly flee from God but he cannot
escape him. He can certainly hate God
and be hateful to God, but
he cannot change into its opposite the eternal love of God which triumphs even
in his hate.” Karl Barth
1886-1968
“Those that hate goodness are sometimes nearer than those that know
nothing at all about it and think they have it already.” C. S. Lewis
“We must keep from sin. If Christ has indeed saved
us from sin, we cannot bear the thought of falling into it. Those who take
delight in sin are not the children of God. If you are a child of God, you hate it with a perfect hatred,
and your very soul loathes it.” Charles Spurgeon
If
you do not know the Lord Jesus Christ and His amazing healing power, pray this
from your heart to the Lord Jesus Christ (you speaking directly to Him), Dear
Lord Jesus, I confess to You that I am a sinner and I need Your forgiveness. I
believe You shed Your Blood and died for my sins. I believe that You rose from
the dead proving that You alone are God. I repent of my sins. I want to turn
from my sins. I ask You Dear Lord Jesus to come into my heart and take control
of my life. I want You to be my Lord, Savior, and my God. Amen...
Sincerely in Christ,
Clifford D. Tate, Sr.
Author of “Silent Assassins of the Soul - Are you
Broken by Pornography and Masturbation? You can be Restored by the Lord Jesus
Christ and brought into Deliverance, Freedom, and Victory! A Guide for Men and
Women in the Enemy’s Crosshairs” e-book available now @ Amazon Kindle, @ Apple
I Bookstore for IPod, Barnes and Noble for Nook, Reader Store for Sony Reader,
Kobo, Copia, Gardners, Baker and Taylor, and eBookPie…
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