Deal With It

John 7:1-39

“The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil.” John 7:7

When I was a newer Christ follower, I had a very skewed perception of what it would look like if I “really followed Jesus closely”. I had the sense that I should be a pastor or something and if I were to take that step, my relationship with God would mystically help me bypass many of the regular troubles of life. I even thought that maybe I wouldn’t have to worry about getting the flu or any other kind of sickness anymore.

If there is anything in you that believes a relationship with God is meant to make life easier or help us avoid trouble, please just drop it. When a person chooses to follow Jesus, whether they recognize it or not they are choosing to walk a harder path and we get a picture of what that looks like as we look at the life of Jesus Himself.

Yes. You will still be susceptible to the flu when it goes around in the winter time. We still suffer from heart attacks and strokes. Cancer hits believers as well as nonbelievers. Your sports team will still often lose, even when you cry out to God during the game. We continue to suffer through all of the regular tragedies of life, but added to that comes an unwanted by-product of our faith – Alienation from the world.

It takes on various forms. Some people will actually want to kill you, for no other reason than that you love Jesus. In the first verse we see that the Jews were trying to kill Jesus. Certainly, in the life of the early church the Jews were among the most militant group involved in the persecution of Christians. Today, other religious groups and even governments are known to actively target Christians.

Fortunately, not everyone wants us dead. It’s more common in North America to simply be the butt end of a joke, and much of it comes from within our own personal connections and even family as we see here with Jesus in verses 3-5. If you make fun of a person with a disability, mental illness or facial deformity, that’s absolutely cruel, but poking fun at a believer, well, they just need to deal with it and get over it. And generally we do. I think. At least, I hope most of us just come to realize that it’s basically part of the gig, and feel little need to wallow in the self pity of being victimized by some grave injustice. I doubt your school or workplace has a support group for Christians who get made fun of. We’re supposed to be secure enough to handle it.

If you can’t handle being laughed at or ridiculed, maybe Jesus isn’t for you. He isn’t looking for cowards. He is calling a people out of the world, to be a part of His people. There are certain rights and privileges we give up in this life when we choose to align ourselves with Christ and this happens because choosing Him is actually about choosing a different nation. This is the nation of Christ, often referred to as The Kingdom of God. We don’t have a hockey team, border crossings, government offices, military or a national mascot. We have however received eternal life. Some think that’s worth surrendering not only their comfort, but their very lives.
How about you?