15:18
Jesus has just said some quite amazing things, stressing the closeness of the relationship that the disciples can expect to have with Him and with the Father, through the Holy Spirit. Now He focuses on the opposition they will face. One might have thought that if we know God then all will be well, but this neglects the fact that the world is in rebellion against God. We so often forget this, thinking that if only we are nice enough everyone will like us! Also in evangelism the impression is often given that if we do the job properly then people will believe the gospel.This is not true. It takes the work of the Holy Spirit and the grace of God to change the heart of a rebellious person, and in all evangelism we are speaking to rebellious people (and we too were once rebels). So if the world hated Jesus, which it did, we should not be surprised if it hates us because of Christ. And John was well acquainted with persecution.
15:19
This verse expresses the situation very clearly, and is a lesson that the church so often forgets, in fact gets it completely the wrong way round. If we were of the world then the world would love us, but we are not of the world. Indeed, Jesus chose us out of the world. When the church tries to be like the world or to be liked by the world, then it is being utterly foolish, and is being unfaithful to God. Moreover, we are not helping the world! The world and its ways are on a fasttrack to destruction. Why would anyone who genuinely loves the world (i.e. in the God sense of loving the world) want to encourage it along that road? Yet this is what a lot of the church is doing! In Christ we have the solution that can get people off this destructive road to hell, and bring them to the way of life.
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