Among Friends
Do you think the disciples of Jesus understood what it mean to be his friend?
"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another. "If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me before it hated you. If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, 'Servants are not greater than their master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also. But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my Father also. If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not have sin. But now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. It was to fulfill the word that is written in their law, 'They hated me without a cause.' - John 15:12-27
It is easy to hate.
People don't need a reason to hate you. They can blame it on your association with someone else, as they did with the friends of Jesus.
They can hate you for your beliefs.
They can choose to hate you for how you look or talk or even if you do nothing at all.
Jesus wants his friends, and we are included among them, not to focus on being loved by this world. There is a true, greater love that we should focus on and that is the love of God.
What this world has to offer does not lead to a better life, but can bring us down.
So, the focus we should have is on Jesus and the one who sent him.
If we aim to please God, to be instruments of His love in the world, we will find ourselves going into those places where light and love are lacking.
Hatred lives there, hatred and fear.
If we are not afraid, and we truly seek to show people that God is love, we can defeat evil and hatred.
We will never fully eliminate hatred in the world, but we can bring more who are lost into the warmth of a loving and caring God.
More to come...