Left Exposed
Whether we like it or not, if we follow the Lord Jesus, we are on the front line somewhere. It might be at work or at school or at a social gathering or inside your own home, but there is someplace where people look at you and say "you're one of them". In my workplace, I've been described as "a right wing Christian nut job." This was in response to my confirming that, yes, I am a Christian.
We cannot be surprised by any of this. Jesus warned his followers that they would be persecuted and that people would say all manner of foul things about them all because of his name. I think this passage from John's pen captures it well: the world listens to those that make sense with what it already believes. The whole idea of a self-sacrificing incarnate God is a radical intrusion into all the world's accepted wisdom. It violates and rewrites all the world has accepted as truth.
Unless the Holy Spirit has opened your mind, unless you've reached a point where you are open to listening to the gospel, everything a Christian talks about is absolute madness. That's precisely where we are in the secular western world of the 21st century. The prevalent attitude is "Just keep to yourself, OK?"
What do we make of this? Well, if we're on the outs with the culture around us, we can be thankful that we are in with the One who truly matters. Remember, no matter how isolated or quarantined we may feel, we are with the One who has won already. That's what John is telling us here. Hold onto to Jesus. Never let go. And pray earnestly for those who don't know him.
Created about 2 years ago
