WWUTT 971 To Keep You From Falling Away?

Jesus told his disciples that the world was going to hate them because the world had hated him.

And he says in John 16, 1, I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away when we understand the text.

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And don't forget our website, www .utt .com. Here's our host, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. We continue with our study of the Gospel of John, and I hope that you have enjoyed this study as we've been in it for the past several months, continuing with Jesus' upper room discourse with his disciples.

Moving now into chapter 16, and I'll begin by reading the first 15 verses.

Jesus said to his disciples, I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away.

They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God.

And they will do these things because they have not known the Father nor me. But I have said these things to you that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you.

I did not say these things to you from the beginning because I was with you, but now I am going to him who sent me.

And none of you asks me, where are you going? But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.

Nevertheless, I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away.

For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.

And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment, concerning sin because they do not believe in me, concerning righteousness because I go to the

Father and you will see me no longer, concerning judgment because the ruler of this world is judged.

I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears, he will speak and he will declare to you the things that are to come.

He will glorify me for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

All that the Father has is mine. Therefore, I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

So as we come into chapter 16 today, we're really continuing what we had just finished in chapter 15.

Don't think of this as being kind of a break and moving into a different subject for just as what we had read at the end of chapter 15, we're still reading here at the start of 16,

Jesus telling his disciples that there are people who are going to rise up and persecute you.

And the reason they will do this is because they do not know me, Jesus says of himself, nor do they know my father.

If they hated me, they are going to hate you as well. So we should not be surprised when people hate us for the gospel that we believe in.

I think that some Christians, particularly those who are new in the faith or maybe immature in their faith, may be surprised when people hate them.

I think this is one of the reasons why Peter says, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you.

They're surprised because Jesus is so loving and he is so good and he has given us so much.

He is God in heaven who took on human flesh to die for us and rise again from the grave.

How could anyone hate that message? And so there are people will be surprised when the world will hate them for the godliness that they are pursuing.

But Jesus says to his disciples and the apostles, as he have even said to us through the scriptures, we should not be surprised when the world hates us.

As Paul said to Timothy, those who desire to live a godly life in Christ, Jesus will be persecuted just for pursuing godliness.

Jesus saying to his disciples, they've hated me. So they're going to hate you because you're not of the world.

I have called you out of the world. When we become followers of Jesus, we are marked as citizens of his kingdom.

So we become strangers and aliens to the rest of this world. Peter also makes that comment in in his first letter that we are exiles in this world.

Or as we sing in the old spiritual, this world is not my home. I'm just a passing through.

So the rest of the world is going to look at us as strange because we do not live according to the ways of this world.

We live according to our king in the kingdom that we have been promised to become fellow heirs of.

And so as citizens of that kingdom, that is what our longing as is for.

We no longer behave like the rest of this world, but we desire a heavenly kingdom.

And so because the world hates the king that we follow, who is our federal head, because that's that's the whole concept of a federal headship monarchy and things like that.

Since we are under that king, then the people who are of this fallen world and follow the ruler of this world, they're going to hate us because the ruler of this world is the enemy of the king who is enthroned on high.

So is there there is this conflict that is going on between the people of God and the people of this world.

But that does not mean that we can react to this world as though they were our enemies, as though we have some sort of violent conflict with them, for for that is not what we've been called to.

Romans chapter 12 says that if our enemy is hungry, we're actually supposed to give him something to eat.

If he is thirsty, we should give him something to drink. For in so doing, we heap burning coals upon his head.

Jesus said, you have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you.

One of these persons who was going to end up persecuting the apostles was

Paul, who at the time that he was persecuting them was known as Saul of Tarsus.

He was there when Stephen, the deacon, the first martyr of the church was put to death, and he was rounding up Christians to bring them back to Jerusalem to be put on trial, thrown in prison or put to death.

This was what Saul was doing until Jesus appeared to him on the road of Damascus.

And through this calling that Christ had given to this sinful, wretched, murderous man, he went from being

Saul who persecuted Christians to Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ.

And it wasn't anything mystical about the change in name. Saul was his Hebrew name and Paul was his

Roman name. So, you know, there's nothing there about he became a different person and his name was changed.

He used the name of Paul when he went to the Gentiles so that he would be received as a

Gentile and not dismissed as a Hebrew. But nevertheless, Paul was a man who persecuted

Christians. This is exactly the kind of man that Jesus was saying to his apostles was going to persecute them.

But Paul would be transformed from a persecutor into an apostle.

He went from persecuting to being persecuted for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Jesus says here at the start of chapter 16, the reason why he's telling his disciples these things is to keep them from falling away so that they would not be surprised at this trial that comes upon them, but rather that they share in the sufferings of Christ.

Yesterday was Father's Day, and I shared on Twitter about my dad, that in the last eight or nine years, the kinds of things that he has gone through, he's been fired from two ministry positions, one of which was a ministry that he built.

And both times when he was dismissed from those jobs, he was never told why he was being fired.

Just people just didn't like him anymore, something. We don't know. We don't have any idea why they let him go because they were so unbiblical in the manner in which they handled those situations.

He was in a serious accident several years ago, and it wasn't too far from where I lived.

And so I went down there and saw my dad in the hospital in a brace, completely closing in his body just in case he had some sort of spinal injury.

They didn't want to move him too much unless he become paralyzed. He had a physical ailment, very nearly could have killed him.

And yet this man who has gone through so much, especially in just less than the last 10 years, continues to soldier on in ministry.

He's still working in ministry, and he continues to do this for the gospel of Christ. He's not out to try to please men, but to please

God. And he taught me this at a young age, that even when no one is watching you, you still have to work for the

Lord because you are working first and foremost for God before you are working for any man.

So my work ethic in ministry came from my dad because I saw him working so hard for the kingdom of God.

And so likewise, I have followed my father's example in working for the kingdom.

And it's tough for me sometimes to watch my dad go through some of the things that he's had to go through just in the last several years, and even more than what

I've just detailed for you right here. It's very difficult to see, but at the same time, I understand according to what the scriptures say, that when my dad struggles in ministry in the way that he has, and yet he continues on and does so to the glory of God, he is sharing in Christ's sufferings.

And through this, he's also being sanctified. He is being made more and more into the image of Christ.

And it makes him long more and more for the kingdom of God to come. What we share in, in Christ's sufferings here on earth, we will share even more in his glory when we get to the kingdom that he has promised to us who endure to the end.

2 Corinthians 1 .5, the apostle Paul says, for as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ, we share abundantly in comfort as well.

When Paul was writing to the Philippians, and that letter was written from jail, he said to them, indeed,

I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my

Lord, for his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain

Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible,

I may attain the resurrection from the dead. And as Paul had also shared with his own protege,

Timothy, in 2 Timothy 2 .3, share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.

So we understand also with the apostle Peter, when he said, rejoice in so far as you share

Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

The present sufferings that we go through do not even compare to the glory that awaits us if we endure to the end.

So Jesus is sharing that with his disciples here, but they would understand they're going to share in his sufferings.

They would also share in his comfort and will share in his glory. John 16 .1,

I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away. Now, what we read in the last lesson that we looked at last week, closing out chapter 15, we saw the contrast between those who hated

Jesus, hated me without a cause, he says, and those who will bear witness about Christ through the leading of his spirit.

There are those who did not know Jesus. They hated him. They hated him without cause.

They didn't know him. They didn't know the father, but we know him and we have his spirit.

And so we do not hate Christ, but love him and desire to obey him. As Jesus has said to his apostles, you will show me that you love me when you keep my commands, when you obey what

I have commanded you. And so Jesus says to his disciples, I've said all these things to you to keep you from falling away.

And then we have that contrast again, even here at the start of chapter 16, he's talking to those who will so that they will not fall away.

And now he's going to mention those who are not with him, but they're going to claim that they are look at verse two.

They talking about those who are going to persecute, the apostles will put you out of the synagogues.

Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think that he is offering service to God.

Look at the first part of that of that statement. Again, in verse two, they will put you out of the synagogues.

Now that was that was a that was basically a death sentence to a Jew. That was a sentence of eternal condemnation.

Practically, if you had to be put out of the synagogues, you were being put out of the very place where the word of God was being spoken.

How else would you get the word of God if you couldn't go to that place on the Sabbath and hear the words being spoken or any time that anyone could go into the synagogues and hear the scrolls, the ancient scriptures, the prophets, the law being read.

If I am put out of the synagogue and I no longer can hear the word of God proclaimed, that was horrible.

That was terrible for a Jew to hear that. And Jesus is saying to his apostles there, these people who are going to persecute you, they are going to think they're doing

God's work. And in so doing, they're going to put you out of the synagogues and they will think that's doing

God's work, removing you actually from the word of God. The irony of that is that those who are going to treat you in such a way don't understand that word themselves.

They think that they're doing the right thing, but they're actually doing what is contrary to the word that they have been entrusted to keep and teach to Israel.

They are going to put you out of the synagogues. And indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think that he is doing this in service to God.

It is murder in the eyes of God. It is to be equal to having persecuted the prophets before Jesus had come.

The prophets who came speaking a word from God and the people persecuted them all the way back to Abel, according to Jesus in Matthew 23, when he's issuing the seven woes to the

Pharisees, he says that the righteous blood shed on earth is on your hands from the blood of righteous

Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar.

And even likewise, John, because they rejected the word of John, even though it wasn't the Pharisees themselves that would have put

John the Baptist to death. It was Herod that did that. But Herod was part of Israel.

He was a king of Judah. So he should have known that John the

Baptist was one who was sent by God. And even the people of Judah were still putting the prophets to death.

Jesus was going to be put to death by the Pharisees because they were of the same ilk as the wicked

Israelites who had persecuted the prophets. This persecution was going to come upon the apostles as well.

And the people who persecute you are going to think that they're doing service to God.

That was, by the way, also the apostle Paul before he was the apostle, of course, when he was

Saul of Tarsus, when he was persecuting the Christians, he thought what he was doing was

God's work. He even describes when he's talking to the Philippians that he was a man of zeal.

And kind of the undertone of that statement is that he was so zealous for the word that he thought that he was keeping, that he was willing to put

Christians to death because he believed Christians to be blasphemers and heretics.

When the reality was it was the other way around. He was the one that was blaspheming and he was the one that was heretical and he deserved judgment for the way that he persecuted the children of God.

But the Lord was merciful to him and he was turned from this persecutor of the church to an apostle, a messenger of Jesus Christ, a preacher of the gospel because God was merciful, because God had shown grace to the apostle

Paul. Before that, he thought what he was doing was the work of God. Instead, God showed him, here's really what working for me is going to look like.

And Paul was persecuted for his faith. Indeed, Jesus says the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God.

And we go through that even now. There are people who are going to persecute us, ridicule us, betray us, turn their backs on us, and they're going to think they're in the right.

They're going to think, I'm the one that was keeping the word. I'm the one that was being a good Christian. You were not.

You know, of course, we've got the extreme cases where somebody like, for example, sues a baker for not baking a gay wedding cake and then says, well,

Jesus would bake the cake. OK, so you're going to have those extreme examples like that. But the more practical examples that you and I, Christians in everyday life, are going to face are going to be those who are going to hate us for the godliness that we pursue.

And they're going to think that they're in the right because they were actually doing the Bible right. I was living as a good

Christian. I was the one that was truly following Jesus. You're the one that was all mixed up.

And we need to submit ourselves to Christ in those circumstances. Again, not lash out as though we're violently responding to an enemy, but we need to follow the example of our

Lord. First Peter 2, 23, when he was reviled, he did not revile in return.

When he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

And we must do the same. We must respond with kindness to our enemies, even when we know they're in the wrong, even when they are being unjust toward us.

I think that we need to present our case soundly and lovingly, hoping that we might turn a person from their error to understanding the truth and being united with the body of Christ instead of being so divided from one another.

But in the event that we have made all of the friendly appeals that we can, and yet those people who want to be so offensive toward us continue in their way, we need to entrust ourselves to our sovereign

God who is in heaven for he searches mind and heart. May he convict us of our hidden faults that we may not fall into the same error and try to nitpick one another and look down on one another and think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think.

Let us be in humble submission and service to one another. As we continue in our

Christian walk here in this world, we will suffer, we will be persecuted, and we're just going to go through difficult trials and circumstances because it's part of life because of this fallen world.

But may these things bring us more and more into the arms of our

Lord who comforts us and protects us and has promised us an inheritance in his eternal kingdom, which anything in this world just cannot, cannot compare to.

Jesus said, if the world hates you, know that it hated me before it hated you, and I have said these things to you to keep you from falling away.

Remember what James said, James 1, 2 through 4, count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness, and let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

Let's conclude with prayer. Our Heavenly Father, I pray that as we've read these things today, we come to understand the struggles that we're going to go through in this life, but this causes us to rely more on Christ.

We put our trust in him. Psalm 56, 4, in God whose word

I praise, in God I trust, I shall not be afraid. What can flesh do to me?

May we rely fully upon you today in the comfort of the promises of our great

Lord and King, Jesus Christ. Amen. Gabriel Hughes is the pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas.