This was the reality of the half-brothers of Jesus prior to His resurrection (though they later trusted in Him; cf. Gal. 1:19; Jude 1).
It makes you wonder, doesn't it, how they could be so close to Christ — seeing His lack of sin day after day for years, hearing His speech that was so different even as a young man (cf. Lk. 2:41-52), and then seeing His public ministry of preaching and teaching — and yet dismiss His claims and reject faith in Him.
Jesus tells them (and us) why they rejected Him (and why people continue to reject Him): because they loved the world and its enticements more than they loved Christ. The world hated Christ, wanted to kill Christ and rid itself of the ministry of Christ, but the world did not hate the brothers of Christ (Jn. 7:7). There is only one reason that the world will not hate someone — if that person is part of the world system and loves the world (Jn. 15:19). The brothers had succumbed to the attraction of temporal delights and pleasures called worldliness and rejected Christ.
We don't use that word "worldliness" too much anymore. It sounds quaint to our "modern" ears. Old-fashioned. Even legalistic. But it was destructive in the time of Christ and it is destructive today.
What is meant by this term worldliness? David Wells offered a helpful discussion of it in a recent interview:
Worldliness is that system of values in any given culture that makes sin look normal and which makes righteousness look strange or alien. It’s what gives public affirmation, public credence, public approval to fallen human life. It’s what comes out in poll when someone says, "Well, everyone is doing it." That is worldliness. That is where you get public sign-off on what is wrong, and it exerts enormous coercive power because people feel as if they’re odd or strange if they don’t go along with a certain way of looking at life or living life or having certain things or doing certain things or being certain people. That’s worldliness.
He also adds that there is a temptation in addressing worldliness to deal with trivialities. But worldliness is about competing loyalties — you cannot love the world and be a friend of God. (You might read the last part of the last sentence again.) This is John's message as well — worldliness is comprised of fleshly lusts (don't think that just means illicit sex; it's much more than that), hedonistic (self-indulgent) and lusty desires, and arrogant pride. In short it is anything which does not and cannot originate with the Father (1 Jn. 2:15-17). It is, as Iain Murray wrote, "departing from God. It is a man-centered way of thinking."
We (like the brothers of Jesus probably did), think that the influence on us is not so terribly dangerous. (How else will pastors be able to justify watching profane television shows and movies and listening to heretical music and be able to call it "relevance" instead of impurity and unholiness?) Yet in Scripture "world" refers to that which has been warped by sin and tormented by beliefs and desires that are uncontrollable. It is hostile to God (sometimes openly, often subtly) and is that from which believers have been delivered from, not that to which we have been delivered (1 Pt. 2:9).
Two final words are helpful — one old and one recent —
The world is too much with us; late and soon
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! [William Wordsworth]
Most of us recognize the danger of exposing ourselves to sinful content, so we tend to set arbitrary limits based on how much we think we can "handle." When a movie or TV show presents us with mild or infrequent profanity, and occasional adulterous affair, or a limited amount of gratuitous violence, we sort of weigh the danger level. We act as if we each have a "sin threshold" beyond which we dare not go. We might as well ask how much of a poison pill we can swallow before it kills us. [Josh Harris, "Christians and Media."]
Worldly desires will delude us into thinking two dangerous thoughts (as Jesus' own brothers did for a time) — our sin is inconsequential and Christ is insignificant. Beware of worldly desires. With them, you may be near in proximity to Christ, but in reality you will remain far, far away.
2 comments:
Often your 'leftovers' are a full-meal deal. Thank you for feeding me this morning!
Glad that they are of benefit to you. Often after preaching I find that useful things ended up on the "editing room floor." This is just another means to try and build the truth into the lives of our church family and beyond.
Thanks for your repeated kind words.
Terry
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