Why Would the World Hate Christians?
John 15:18-25,
18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. 20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. 21 But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. 22 If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have been guilty of sin,[a] but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father also. 24 If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. 25 But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’
We continue in our journey on this Thursday night, the longest Thursday night in history, and Jesus is preparing his men, and us, for the storm.
As the cross approaches, the God-man speaks with new clarity and striking self-focus. Fourteen times in this passages Jesus says I, me, and my. These are not passing, incidental references; it’s an emphasis.
And the effect of this emphasis is to help us. This is love. We’ve seen how chapter 15 is like a battlefield speech. Jesus is getting his men ready for hell to break loose. And when the world’s hatred shakes Jesus’s disciples, the greatest danger isn’t death. The greatest danger is falling away from Jesus.
So, he gets us ready: stay with me, stay in the Vine, and bear fruit. Love each other, with an expansive love that longs to draw others in. And as you expand outward in love to be Jesus’s instrument to bring others to him, and make room for others, be ready to encounter the world’s hatred.
The world’s hate contrasts with Jesus’s repeated summons to love (13:34–35; 15:12, 17). His disciples move toward the world in love and find themselves met with hatred. And notably absent is any sense of responding in kind. The implication is, keep loving even as your efforts to love are met with hatred.
Why would the world hate Christians?
Which raises the question, for Jesus’s disciples and for us: Why would the world hate Christians?
You might feel this very personally: Why would I be hated? I’m a Minnesotan. I’m nice. I don’t want to upset people. I want them to be happy, and I’ve found in Jesus the great Treasure. I want others to know Jesus. Jesus is love, and teaches love. Why would someone hate me for that?
It’s an important question. And Jesus wants us to know why, and he wants us to know how to handle it. That’s our focus this morning: Why would the world hate Christians, and what are we to do about it?
We’ll begin with the why, which is both simple, and has some layers to it. And we’ll end with Jesus’s two directives about how to handle it.
The World Hates Jesus
At one level, Jesus’s answer is simple: the world hates you because the world hates me. Jesus is the focus. The followers of Jesus are hated because they are followers of Jesus. And the world hates Jesus. Listen again how Jesus is the focus of verses 18–21, with it all culminating at “on account of my name”:
If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you…. 20 Remember the word that I said to you [in 13:16]: ‘A servant is not greater than his master [that is, Lord].’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. 21 But all these things [hate you, persecute you, disregard your word] they will do to you on account of my name…
“On account of my name” means because of me and what they think about me. They are mistaken, in some sense, as we’ll see. But they know some true things about him, and what they know they don’t like. Actually, they hate. It may often come out as dislike or indifference, but deep in the soul, it is hatred. (Their speech may be smooth as butter, yet war is in their heart, Psalm 55:21).
So, Jesus says, the world hates you because it hates me. That’s his simple answer and focus.
Why Does the World Hate Jesus?
But there’s another layer. You can also ask, Why does the world hate Jesus? Verses 22 and 24:
If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have been guilty of sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin…. 24 If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father.
The world hates Jesus because he, in a new way, exposes the sinfulness of their sin.
Now, we need to say more about “world.” What does “world” mean here? This is not the world of Genesis 1–2, the world created by God and untainted by sin. This is the world of Genesis 3 and since, the world under the power of sin (“the created moral order in active rebellion against God,” Carson).
This “world in rebellion” is the world in view in John 3:16: “God loved the world” — the world of sinners, set in opposition to God, loving sin, not loving him —God loved this hellbent, rebellious world in this way: “he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” That’s love. And God’s love in giving his Son is all the more stunning because the world he loved was the world dead set against him.
That’s the world in our passage: the world in love with sin, the world that hates God. No wonder such a world would hate Jesus. Jesus is God incarnate. He comes as the light, shining in the darkness. And in the light of his words and his works, the true nature of sin is exposed.
The sin was there before he came, when the Light himself comes, then sin is exposed like never before, and seen to be what it is: an assault on God himself.
There were lights for the exposing of sin before Jesus came: the light of nature, the light of Moses and the prophets. But the coming of Christ, the true light, so surpasses the previous lights, that his coming ushers in a whole new day. Yes, there was some light before, but the light of Christ is so strong, so pure, so bright, it’s as if the previous lights hardly shone. Like twinkling stars at night compared the sun when day comes.
And when Jesus comes, the sinfulness of sin becomes apparent: sin is rebellion against God. Hatred of God. Preferring of other things to God is cosmic treason. Longing for and loving created things over the Creator himself is treason.
And remember, it’s Thursday night. There will be no more outrageous display of the sinfulness of sin than when sinners conspire to put God himself to death the next day. The cross is the ultimate exposé of human sin: sin is an attack on God.
So, why does the world hate Jesus? Because he exposes the true nature of sin, and takes away excuses for sin. That’s one layer.
No Longer “of the World”
But Jesus gives us another layer in verse 19, for why the world hates Christians:
If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
Jesus has talked before about choosing his disciples (John 6:70; 13:18), and as recently as verse 15:
“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide…”
It’s not that the disciples first chose Jesus; he chose them. They were once of the world. They were born in rebellion against God. They loved darkness rather than light. Yet, Jesus took the decisive step to pluck them out from the world, and make them his own.
But the sinful world, in rebellion against God, loves its own who love sin, not God, and affirm sin and celebrate sin. But when Jesus plucks his disciples out from the world, the world doesn’t like that. The world hates that. And I know many in this room have experienced that hatred very personally.
Jesus chose you. He opened your eyes. You came to faith in him and began to follow him — and your old friends or your family didn’t like it. Maybe they kept up a veneer of Minnesota nice, and you didn’t sense any deep hatred, but Jesus is telling us here what was, what is, going on: the world in its sin, with guilt-ridden conscience, desperately craves the affirmation of its sin, and fears the exposure of the sinfulness of its sin — and it hates when its fellows in darkness see the Light.
This hatred can be stirred when we’re plucked out, or when we refuse go back in, as 1 Peter 4:3–4 says,
the time that is past [now that the Light has come] suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. 4 With respect to this they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you [speak evil of you, say things that make you look bad].
Yet, what’s the posture of our hearts to be like in moments like this, when the veneer comes off, and hatred begins to seep out? We don’t hate them in return. But we remember we were there, but for the grace of God. We were “of the world,” but Jesus drew us out. So, we have the spirit of Titus 3, which calls us…
to be ready for every good work, 2 to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people. 3 For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. 4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us… (Titus 3:1–5)
The World Does Not Know the Father
Which brings us to one last layer, the bottom layer, for why the world hates Jesus. Now, we pick up the final pieces:
The end of verse 21: “because they do not know him who sent me.”
Verse 23: “Whoever hates me hates my Father also.”
End of verse 24: “now they have seen and hated both me and my Father.”
The world’s love for sin, and hatred of Jesus, shows that they do not know the Father.
This is true of all who do not know Jesus: they do not know God. There are no “good people” who are honestly mistaken about God and not culpable in their sin. They may hide their hatred of the Father well (with speech smooth as butter), but if they are not in Jesus, they do not know God; and they will be “gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned” (John 15:6).
This is an exclusivist bottom layer. You know that term “exclusivist”? It means, as Jesus says here, he is the exclusive way to God. There aren’t other ways around him or apart from him. Jesus is the Word, the revelation, of the one God who made this world, and over and against whom the world stands in its sin. Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, Jews who reject Jesus as Messiah do not find other paths to God. Jesus is the one way, the one God provided, and all who reject Jesus reject the only God. So, in Jesus’s words in verse 23 is a condemnation of all world religions, including secularism, except for the one Jesus brings.
Which lands on the world as profoundly offensive. And lands on Jesus’s people, who know themselves sinners and undeserving, as the best news in the world: you mean there’s a way! In my sin, in my guilt, in my weakness, there’s a way!
So, we have the focus of the world’s hate and the layers. The world of darkness hates Christians because it hates Jesus, the light. And it hates Jesus because he exposes the sinfulness of sin. And it hates his people because Jesus chose them out of the world. And at bottom, the world hates Jesus, and his people, because the world does not know the Father.
So, what do we do about it?
Jesus clearly means for verses 18–25 to have an emotional effect on us. There are six ifs in this section, which makes it read almost like poetry, with a rhetorical effect. Jesus wants us to be ready for the world’s hate, and stay with him and love one another — and keep endeavoring to expand the circle of our love.
In these verses are two imperatives, two commands, that lead us to what Jesus wants us to do about the world’s hate. So, he’s told us the why, with its focus and layers. Now what to do: he wants us to know in verse 18, and to remember in verse 20. So, know what? Remember what?
1. Know this: the world hated Jesus first.
What’s that do? It helps us get ready. The world hated Jesus, so much so it put him to death; and we’re his, we’re with him. We should expect the world’s hate, know it’s coming, and not be surprised by it.
The effect of the if in verse 18 is far more like a when: When the world hates you, and it does. The end of verse 19 says, “the world hates you.” Verse 20: they will persecute you.
So, 1 John 3:13 says, “Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you.” That’s what Jesus is doing here: keeping us from getting caught off guard. Like 1 Peter 4:12:
Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you…
And to help us in John 15, verse 25, Jesus draws in a line from Psalm 69: “they hated me without cause.” Psalm 69 is King David, “a righteous sufferer who is zealous for God but is persecuted by God’s enemies for no good reason” (ESVSB). This is true of Jesus. And it will be true of us who are his.
And critical to the pattern of Psalm 69 being true about Jesus, and being true about us, is that we don’t give the haters any good reason.
Twin dangers face us once we learn that the world, at bottom, hates Jesus, and hates us: we could try to avoid their hate or provoke it. As thoughtful members of a society, it’s easy to figure out the fault lines between Jesus and the world — and we can easily avoid them or easily provoke them. Knowing that the world’s hate is coming doesn’t mean we seek to dodge it, nor that we try to prompt it. It’s there, and it’s coming; don’t let the world’s hatred steal the agenda one way or another.
There’s a vast difference between expecting it and trying to excite it. I expect the government to want more of my money, but I don’t try to excite it. And there’s a world of difference between the holy, Christlike expectation of the world’s hate, and unholy, un-Christian attempts to excite the world’s hate. Cities Church, we wanna be the right kinda hated.
We are hated, and will be hated, and we want it to be for the reasons they hate Jesus, not because we’re fools on Jesus’s terms just as much as the world’s.
Contagious zeal for Jesus that accumulates detractors on account of him is one thing. Learning how to enrage people and garnish it with Jesus’s name is another. And worse yet is falling away from Jesus because of his haters.
So, know this: the world hated him first. We expect the world to hate us too. And we’re pleasantly surprised and don’t try to sabotage it, when the hatred ebbs at times.
2. Remember this: Jesus is great.
I love verse 20: Jesus says, “Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’” Which is not mainly about the lowliness of the servant, but about the greatness of Jesus.
Don’t miss this: Jesus is great. Remember this, he says: your Lord is great. Which may sound simple but is powerful.
In 1856, Charles Spurgeon was preaching to more than 10,000 people in a packed-out hall when agitators interrupted the service by yelling fire. A stampede ensued, and seven were trampled to death; thirty were seriously injured. In the horror of it all, Spurgeon suffered a severe emotional breakdown, and the event left a mark on him the rest of his life. He faced critics, (haters) and went into depression over it. Years later he testified,
I was pressed beyond measure and out of bounds with an enormous weight of misery. The tumult, the panic, the deaths, were day and night before me, and made life a burden.
How did God rescue him? He says,
From that [nightmare] I was awakened in a moment by the gracious application to my soul of the text, “Him hath God the Father exalted” (“God has highly exalted him,” Philippians 2:9). The fact that Jesus is still great, let his servants suffer as they may, piloted me back to calm reason and peace. (Lectures to My Students, 162 [1954])
There it is: “Jesus is still great.” Seven are dead, thirty seriously injured. But Jesus is still great. When the storm comes, look for the greatness of Jesus.
When for his sake, you sense their hate,
Remember that your Lord is great.
And part of that greatness is that you get to be with him. What holds John 15 together is that you’re with him, on his side. Hated with him means loved by him! And united to him! You’re with Jesus! Enjoy him.
Cross of Hate and Love
It’s heavy to spend a whole sermon dwelling on the world’s hate for Jesus, and for us. But then we come to this Table.
The cross is a demonstration of the world’s hate. Sinners conspired together to put God to death. And the cross is the ultimate demonstration of love. “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).
