If you want people to like you all the time you are going to have problems with serving God. If you want to climb social ladders you will find yourself climbing out of the Kingdom of God. It is a hard truth because we all want people to like us. There is, of course, something valid in that. We naturally want to get along with people and we want to find favour with people whenever we can. That is valid. We should never try to alienate or offend people deliberately. At times Jesus did that but he did that in his role as judge to polarise people. You are not the judge. You are to be a peace maker and a minister of reconciliation. Don’t try to pick fights and get into arguments. There is no virtue in that. On the other hand, you must come to terms with the fact that your choice to surrender your life to God is confronting for people. They will feel threatened by you because you represent a truth that they are in conflict with, even if they are not conscious of it. People will find all sorts of excuses to disregard your witness. They may, as Jesus says here, even be hostile toward you. People are fiercely defensive of their autonomy. They don’t want someone telling them that they are facing the wrong direction in life. People don’t want to be wrong. The key, for your part, is to do everything in love. That way there can never be any valid charge against you. Love conquers all.
How can you demonstrate God’s love today?
Read John 15:18-16:4
