The world is changing. American society and culture is changing, at least in most places across the nation. Certainly some places buck trends, but as I said in the preview post here, even my Amish neighbors, famous for resisting change, are themselves embracing incremental change. Amish from 25-30 years ago would be aghast at how some in their culture have changed. Where we see dramatic change, however, is in the wider culture. In the throes of change, some American Christians say they are facing persecution. They believe that our nation was one the bastion of religious freedom, and now Christians are being targeted.
I think people who say Christians are being persecuted in America are wrong. Here’s why.
In John 15:18, Jesus and his disciples have just had the last supper, and they are walking just outside the city of Jerusalem to the nearby Garden of Gethsemane, where the Gospel of Luke tells us that Jesus has been spending time each evening in prayer that week. Along the way to the Garden, Jesus continues teaching the disciples, a teaching he started in the upper room.
He knows what they don’t know, that he has at most a few precious hours left with them before he is betrayed by Judas, arrested, denied three times by Peter, abandoned by the rest of his disciples, tried, beaten, and crucified to death. These are precious last words that we have been studying for weeks now starting in chapter 13 and which have a few more weeks yet as he teaching continues through the end of chapter 17.
Scan backwards in chapter 15 to verses 11-17. There Jesus emphasizes the command he started this long teaching with in chapter 13 (see that post here), “love one another.” Now he makes a rather sudden transition to the idea of hate. Look at John 15, verses 18-19,
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.”
The world hates you? What is Jesus talking about? Doesn’t that seem exaggerated? Does the world hate Christians?
Notice that Jesus starts with the word “If,” meaning that whatever he is talking about is not a guaranteed or permanent situation. It might happen. It might not. It’s nothing like what I hear some bombastic preachers, writers and radio personalities suggest, that the world hates Christians. That’s not what Jesus said. He used the word “if”. Jesus is conditional, measured, explaining a possibility.
Furthermore, when Jesus uses the word “world”, he is not speaking of every single person in the world. Not everyone hated the disciples. Not everyone has hated Christ-followers through all the centuries. Some do, for sure. But not all. We need to understand Jesus with some nuance here.
So who or what is Jesus talking about? When he is referring to the world, one scholar believes he means “people associated with a world system and estranged from God.” (Louw & Nida) When Jesus mentions the world, therefore, he is talking about people who are not his followers.
In his day, he faced plenty of opposition. The religious elite, particularly, were not fans of Jesus. That’s where it gets tricky because the religious elite believed they knew God, but their heart and actions showed otherwise. Particularly their opposition and persecution of Jesus revealed their lack of knowledge of God, because Jesus is God. Jesus is saying to his disciples that they would be wise to prepare for the possibility that they, too, will face opposition.
But how should the disciples prepare their hearts and minds for potential opposition? Jesus says they should prepare for opposition by remembering that the world hated him first. His followers should not be surprised if opposition comes their way. Though Jesus lived the beautiful, abundant, flourishing Kingdom way of life, not everyone saw his way of life as good, primarily because he called the powerful and wealthy to account. When his followers likewise strive to live the Kingdom way of life, they could face similar opposition to what Jesus faced.
Looking back on 2000 years of the history of the church, we see plenty of examples of this. The first followers of Jesus would face persecution within weeks or months of the start of the church, as we read in Acts chapters 4-8. When they proclaimed the good news about Jesus, and then invited people to enter the Kingdom, the disciples were arrested, jailed, beaten, and one of the first deacons, Stephen, was killed. Mistreatment of people because they are striving to follow the way of Jesus has been happening ever since.
From time to time I hear people make veiled threats like “Well, okay. That kind of persecution isn’t here in America yet, but it’s coming.” I find that sentiment of “persecution is coming” to be inflammatory, dramatic, and misleading. We American Christians need to get to know about real persecution worldwide before we make statements like that.
It still happens today, and that is why we have Persecution and Voice of the Martyrs magazines in our church lobby. You and I live in a land of freedom of religion, where we face no threat from our government. I know that people suggest that Christians are persecuted in the USA. But it is not true, because we are not being jailed, beaten or killed for following the way of Jesus. We are not being asked to deny Jesus publicly or face the consequence of arrest or worse. Pushback and difference of opinion is not persecution.
Over the last 30 years, in fact, the US Supreme Court has not only upheld, but it has expanded protection for freedom of religion. This past week in fact the high court made numerous rulings in favor of protecting freedom of religion. One was in favor of a postal worker who did not want to work on Sunday, and the other was in favor of a website designer who did not want to create websites for certain weddings. Whether you agree with the postal worker, the website designer or not, the point remains. The court expanded protection of freedom of religion.
I am not saying there is zero religious persecution in the USA. I’m saying that religious persecution is illegal in the USA, and if it exists, it can be fought for and won. Certainly, the postal worker and web designer could say they were facing persecution, they sued for protection, and they won. I disagree with both of these individuals’ claims about persecution, but I will defend their right to make interpretations about religious freedom. Thus I support the Court’s expansion of religious freedom, as long as it is freedom for all religion. I say all that to confirm my larger point here. We Americans are not being persecuted. Not even close.
So do Jesus’ words not relate to Americans? Should we just skip this passage? No. I think Jesus’ teaching relates in a significant way. Here’s how. My sense is that if we are people who try to live like Jesus lived, his beautiful, flourishing way of life, calling injustice, oppression and marginalization to account, serving the least of these, prophetically confronting the power-brokers and wealthy, the less popular you will be, and you could face backlash. In this consider who persecuted Jesus. The Religious Powerholders. In other words, when we live like Jesus lived, we should expect to face backlash from religious people, from other Christians.
What I am referring to is the role of prophetic truth-telling. Jesus was many things, and one of things was a prophet who told the truth about God, about humanity, society, culture, and life. He confronted the wealthy, the religious, the powerful, the hypocrites, the spiritually apathetic. And it did not go well for him. The role of the prophet is not an easy role. But we need prophets. We need people who are willing to speak the truth in love, even if it costs them.
I think of Shane Claiborne and the Simple Way Community in Philadelphia. Search them and study how they attempt to live the Jesus way of life in their urban neighborhood. Read Shane’s books. He is provocative. You might not agree with some of his political stances, but you cannot deny that he is seeking to live the Jesus way of life in our world.
For example, he has supported an organization called Raw Tools, where they accept gun donations and then cut up, melt down and refashion the guns into tools for gardening, attempting to address not only the problem of gun violence, but also that of food deserts, all while following the teaching of Jesus to put away the sword, because his Kingdom is about beating swords into plows. Raw Tools is quite literally beating guns into garden tools.
My sense is that some, maybe many, followers of Jesus are neglecting this part of Jesus. What I am referring to is a bold, gracious, kind, generous, loving, Fruit of the Spirit, speaking about the marginalized, the hurting, the poor. I am referring not just to speaking, but also a life of serving those outcasts, those downtrodden, the fatherless, the widow, the foreigner, the refugee. The very people Jesus welcomed and spent time with.
Because so often our life choices speak far more powerfully and clearly than our words. Speak and live the Jesus way, and you just might face pushback. I think we could go so far as to say that if we speak and live the Jesus way of life, we can expect to face pushback. Even in a culture where we have freedom of religion.
So while we might face pushback, we do not face systemic persecution, but many others in our world today have and others do. Jesus says to them, “So did I. I know what it’s like, and I am with you. I am for you. Take heart.”
Photo by Jose P. Ortiz on Unsplash
Engaging Scripture 