"The World Hates You"

One of the most telling lies of our culture is that if we would all just love one another the world could achieve universal peace and and on the surface it seems true and right—love one another…that sounds good! But WHAT EXACTLY DO WE MEAN???

 D.A. Carson in his book, The Intolerance of Tolerance, speaks of the irony within our culture regarding any religious groups that hold an exclusive view of truth. Regarding hostile groups against the Christian faith Carson observes the attitude of many in the educational fields and Universities as saying:

“We tolerate everything except intolerance which is a bit troubling.  We tolerate everything except intolerance, so that if you don't agree with our view of tolerance, then we won't tolerate you whatsoever.  And then it becomes a highly selective kind of thing; some things you tolerate and some things you don't tolerate. And amongst the things that are least tolerated is confessional Christianity, so that in the name of tolerance there is a kind of bigotry that is becoming pretty strong in the nation.”

Let me go a step further….The problem is not that Christian’s Don’t Love (or are intolerant) , it’s that the world is defined by their Hate.

If the Bible says in John 3:16…”for God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son… Jesus says in essence in today's passage, "For the world so hated God that they Killed his one and only son…”

 If Jesus tells his disciples “All people will know you are my disciples if you have love for one another..” he says here “all my disciples will know who is of the world for their hatred of God the father, God the Son.

 In our message today we will observe four necessary ideas about the World and our relationship with it.