Saturday in the Fifth Week of Easter, May 24, 2025

John 15, 18-21

Jesus said to his disciples: “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you. Remember the word I spoke to you, ‘No slave is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. And they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me.”

The Lord Jesus uses the word “world” (which translates the Greek word from which we get “cosmos”) to mean not only the opposite of spirit but as spirit’s antagonist.  It stands for everything that pulls at the soul to keep it from God, to derail it on its path towards God.  It is our baser instincts and bad habits.  It is our tendency to sin.  It is all the material pleasures and goods that distract us from virtue and faith.  We react to things of this kind in such a way that they seem to actively draw us in.  And then there are all the people around us who live for these pleasures and goods and try to ensnare us with them as well, appealing to our pride, our greed, our lust.  And behind all of this the devil and his armies, studying us and ready to act at all times.

“If the world hates you.”  Jesus speaks of the faithful believer striving to live virtuously who infuriates the wicked people around us who feel the believer must validate their choices by succumbing to them himself.  This can also mean how a person endeavoring to lead a good life struggles against his fallen human nature and denies himself things which may not be bad in themselves but which do not assist him on his journey to God.  This can also feel, at times, like a bitter fight,  “It hated me first.”  That is, Jesus was tempted more severely than any of his followers have been and yet he did not sin. But always sent the devil away empty handed.

“If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own.”  It would be so easy to give up, or even to compromise just once on something very small.  We begin to think we deserve some little reward for our hard work at self-denial.  But giving in like this often leads to a person’s virtuous life completely unraveling.  And then we take a deep breath and look around at all the pleasures and comforts available to us and think that it is not so bad after all.  And for a short while we feel free.  This is the world “loving” us.  But it is an illusion.  It is only fattening us up for slaughter.

“Because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you.”  The one devoted to Christ, however, knows himself to be chosen by him and to be filled with the graces he needs in order to ward off the advances of the devil, who will use whatever weapons he can against him.  The devil cannot abide any good work, any tiny act of faith.  If only one saint remained on the earth and hell was filled with every human ever created, the devil would rage as though he had enticed no one at all to follow him and he would fight with all his might to secure this saint for himself.  His hatred is unremitting and he works through the world to get at the believer so that the believer, at times, may feel the whole world is against him. Psalm 25, 16: “Look thou upon me, and have mercy on me; for I am alone and poor.”

“If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.”  The Lord Jesus does not hide the truth from his followers, whom he loves.  He teaches them to expect trouble because they belong to him.  He does not want them taken by surprise or despair because they thought they were safe from temptation or tribulation in this life.  But though these torrents pour into their lives, as long as the Lord is in the boat with them and they do not jump overboard in a vain effort to save themselves, they will be saved.  Psalm 107, 28-29: “And they cried to the Lord in their affliction: and he brought them out of their distresses.  And he turned the storm into a breeze: and its waves were still.”