Love and Hate
Posted By Joe on May 4, 2009
This morning, two verses came to me. It must have been the Holy Spirit and I wanted to share them with you.
The first was something Jesus shared with His disciples in the upper room. It concerns hate: the hatred of the world towards God and His followers.
"If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.... He who hates Me hates My Father also." John 15:18-19, 23.
I've read this verse many times but this morning, something about it hit me differently today. The first truth of this is that the world hates God the Father and Jesus the Son. And if the world hates Them, then it goes to follow that they will hate us Christians, too.
The other verse that came to me was also in John and puts this into perspective.
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life." --John 3:16.
Probably the most popular verse in John and maybe the entire Bible. Do you see the counterpart to the world's hate? The world hates God but in spite of that, God loves us so much that He gave us His Son--the sacrificial Lamb of God--to take away our sins so that we can spend eternity with Him!
The Creator of the Universe loves you and I and paid for our sins at the cross and casts them into the depths of the sea where they are forgotten! (Micah 7:19)
May He Increase!
About the author
Joe, the world can hate me all it wants. The feeling is at times unfortunately mutual! I do not plan to hang around here forever. I have better places to go. See ya there!
Will,
I do love your sense of humor. If I never make it to Pennsylvania, yes, I will see you in the next life!