Description
In this episode, we explore the challenging verse from Luke 6:22, which speaks about being blessed when hated, excluded,… (visit YouTube for more)
Transcript
Here’s a verse that we may not necessarily want to get behind, but it’s in the Word of God, so we have to pay attention to it, even though it doesn’t necessarily tell us what we might want to hear. Luke chapter six, verse 22. Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil on account of the Son of Man.
Yikes. Do you want to be hated? Excluded, reviled looked down on spoken evil of, of course you don’t. I don’t either. But Jesus said, look, folks, when this happens to you, consider yourself blessed because it’s happening because of whose you are. If people say and do these evil things about you because of me, then that only means you are in a good place. You are in my care.
Now. This isn’t something that we can be expected to look forward to, is it? We are not going to enjoy or want to be hated in our flesh. And yet the Apostle Paul said that he was able to be content in all circumstances. So we have to look to God, don’t we to gain an eternal perspective on what is happening to us here on Earth.
Most of us, I hope, won’t have to go through the suffering and the persecutions that experienced by the early Christians. But still we are often marginalised as Christians and thought little of because of our strange beliefs.
And if that is the position you find yourself in, then my friend, this verse is particularly for you because it comes with a blessing. Persecution is a sign that you are God’s. And if you are Gods, then your eternal destiny is secure.
So these strange things that we wouldn’t choose, are a cause for rejoicing. Sometimes what we find in the Bible is strange, but always true.
