Jesus had been telling His disciples that they would be persecuted. This daily devotional looks at who they – and us – are to remain in our faith.
Nuggets
- Jesus wants His disciples to remain strong in the faith.
- Even when trials come, we are to remain in the faith.
- Even when the trials are brought by people who don’t know the truth, we are to remain in the faith.
- It may take a while for us to understand everything God is telling us, so we have to remain in faith until we do.
Devotions in the Living Life Connected to Christ series
In the verses of the last two devotions, we talked about how Jesus warned the apostles that they would be persecuted. Now, He told them why He was telling them all these things.
Let's Put It into Context
Here is a running list of nuggets for the series.
Remaining in the Faith
“I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away” (Jn. 16: 1 ESV)
Jesus wants His disciples to remain strong in the faith.
It was going to be hard for the apostles to remain strong in the faith after Jesus returned to Heaven. It is hard for us to stay on the narrow path.
Glossary
Satan is going to throw everything he has at us to try to get us to renounce God. That is especially true when we are doing exactly what God wants us to do.
But look at what Maclaren said. He wrote, “Sorrow that comes punctually in accordance with His word plainly comes in obedience to His will.”
Resource
Pastor Steve and I were talking about this today. It is easy to get discouraged when Satan is hammering at us from all sides.
But Satan is hammering at us because we are being obedient to God’s Will. Satan wants to do everything in His power to keep us from growing ourselves, growing others, and growing our churches.
That isn’t going to stop — unless we cave and become disobedient. We have to be prepared for the long haul.
Remaining in Persecution
“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” (Jn. 16: 2 ESV)
Even when trials come, we are to remain in the faith.
We have to remember the apostles were Jewish men. No, they might not have gotten to the rabbi and scribe level.
But I don’t think Jesus would have picked part-time worshipers. They left their families (Peter was married). They left their jobs.
They gave up about everything to follow Jesus.
As much as Jesus tangled with the scribes and Pharisees, it wasn’t surprising that Jesus told the apostles they would be kicked out of the synagogue.
This would have been a big deal because it was more than just being kicked out of church. Society would have shunned them, making them outcasts and cutting them off from the privileges to which they had become accustomed.
The topic of the contention may have been disconcerting for the apostles. Bottom line, the disagreement came down to was Jesus the Messiah or not?
This was something in which the apostles would have to keep a firm belief. They couldn’t waiver. They couldn’t compromise.
They would have to say, as Peter did, “… ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God’” (Mt. 16: 16 CSB).
So, Jesus told the apostles they had excommunication in the future. But that wasn’t the worst.
“… Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you …” (Jn. 16: 2 ESV).
The verse doesn’t say if. It says when.
Their deaths were going to happen, and they wouldn’t be pretty.
Serving Jesus was going to hurt, and they would have to pay the ultimate sacrifice.
All because the ones persecuting them thought they were doing what God wanted them to do.
I know, that is sad. But don’t we do the same thing sometimes? Maybe we are serving God, and we really don’t want to stop, but God wants to call someone else to that ministry.
It is hard to walk away.
Maybe we want to provide a service that God thinks is more of a worldview ministry than we do.
Okay, my examples may not totally fit. The point is that we want to do what we want to do regardless of what God wants us to do — and that is wrong.
Watkins clarified for us that service here means worship. “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship” (Rom. 12: 1 ESV)
Resource
That really puts a different spin on this verse. The hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering worship to God.
That really drives home the point that we think one way, but we are wrong. We have to worship God’s way.
Our service is our worship of God only when we are following His plan, not ours.
Isn’t it sad to think some will spend a lifetime thinking they are serving God, but end up being a Pharisee?
Remaining When the Ignorant Rule
“And they will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me” (Jn. 16: 3 ESV)
Even when the trials are brought by people who don’t know the truth, we are to remain in the faith.
Many worldview people think they know right from wrong. They don’t. They don’t know what God’s Word really says.
Still, they persecute disciples because we remain steadfast in God’s truth.
Maclaren said something where I hadn’t thought of it that way. He wrote, “The world is the apostate Jewish Church.”
Resource
Let’s think about that. An apostate is someone who has turned away from their beliefs. In this instance, they would have turned away from God.
That did happen. When Adam and Eve sinned, they turned away from God.
So, instead of being the beginning of the Jewish Church, Adam and Eve were the beginning of mankind’s sinful nature.
That is what the world is. The world is used to identify any who has not been regenerated — in other words, has not ABCDed.
- Regeneration is being changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive and the internal new birth and requickening that God brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit.
- Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin.
- The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
- Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Glossary
Let’s take that a step further. In Jesus’ day, the Pharisees were supposed to be the cream of the crop in the Jewish church.
Person of Interest
But Jesus spent a lot of His three years telling them that they didn’t have it right. Check out Matthew 23: 1-12 as one instance.
The Pharisees, too, turned away from God. The trouble is that they didn’t realize it.
Unfortunately, there will always be those. Jesus Himself warned about them. “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven” (Mt. 7: 21 ESV).
The foundation of remaining firm is knowing God. Understanding Who God is and what Jesus has done for us is the key.
Remaining until Understanding Comes
“But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you” (Jn. 16: 4 ESV)
It may take a while for us to understand everything God is telling us, so we have to remain in faith until we do.
We’ve talked in the previous devotions that Jesus was trying to comfort the apostles. By telling the apostles all He has in the previous verses, Jesus was trying to shore up their faith. When they were in the midst of their trials, they could look back and see Jesus had warned them that there would be days like these.
Ooo, baby. We need that. Even more than the heads up, we need to know the comfort of God being in charge.
Jesus, as God, knows everything that has passed, everything that is happening, and everything that will happen. Who better to tell us about something we are going to fear?
When we read through the Scriptures, we see that there was a lot of things the apostles didn’t understand at the time when Jesus said it. Some, they had ah-ha moments as Jesus was tying all things together. Some had to wait until after the resurrection for it to totally make sense.
The apostles obviously were able to put it all together.
Making the Connections
Really, nothing much has changed. There is polar opposition to Christ in society today.
We, as disciples, have to face the persecution that comes with it.
Is this going to be easy? Ooo, baby. No way!
But we are not alone. God will never leave us. He, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit have taken up residence in our hearts.
How Do We Apply This?
- Jesus’ mission is now carried out by the church. We just have to go do it.
- We need to keep buried in God’s Word.
- We need to remain in an attitude of prayer.
Resource
Father God. We thank You that You are always with us. We thank You that You tell us some things that are going to happen. We want our service to be worship of You. Give us strength when the persecution comes. Amen.
What do you think?
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