The World Cannot Hate You

“The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil.” (John 7:7).

Jesus is saying that the given current state of the human affairs, one in which excludes and opposes God at every turn, this world cannot hate you. It can only hate me.

Why is that? Why does mankind hate and despise Jesus? Is it because He is the Christ? The Son of God? Because Jesus is the way, the truth and the life? No, none of that. The world hates Jesus because He testifies of them and the evil which is them. In short, Jesus reveals sin and the world doesn't like that.

The English word “testify” comes from the Greek root word “martys”. It’s where we get the word martyr from. Often times the Bible transliterates martys as “witness” or to “bare record”.

In today’s world a martyr is usually thought of as someone who kills themselves for a cause. But being a martyr is to speak the truth regardless of consequence. This is not the same as being an antagonist. It’s not intentionally assuming an adversarial position or attempting to provoke someone. 

A true martyr speaks truth and nothing but the truth without concern of consequence, whether the consequence is positive or negative.

How different this world would be if truth is the only thing put forth. How different this world would be if truth was the only thing we would receive. Both are choices we make.

“…that the works thereof are evil” The evil is a reference to a perilous time for Christians. It’s a time of pain and suffering. This is to be expected when God is omitted from our life.

The word “evil” is derived from the Greek, “ponos” meaning pain. It expresses especially the "active form of evil". This kind of evil brings, “toils, annoyances, perils; of a time full of peril to Christian faith and steadfastness; causing pain and trouble” (Vine’s).

So here we have an offended world bringing its evil ways, attacking Jesus, not because He showed the world the way of righteousness, but because He showed the world their way of sin. This is what infuriates the world, its true self.

“For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world. (1 Corinthians 11:31-32)

The world thinks of itself as holy and right. The world will not recognize nor repent of its sins. The world can not and will not tolerate the chastening of the Lord. Because the world will not condemn sin, the world itself will be condemned by sin.

Yes, God is love and God loves everyone. But, understand this. God’s love is not a permission slip to continue sinning. God’s love for us does not mean that He will conform to our will, wishes, desires, philosophies and thought.

We show our love for God by recognizing sin for what it is, repenting of our sin, following God and living righteously. Because we love God we change for God. God never changes for us. It is impossible for Him to change because God is perfect. Perfection can only change to imperfection, and God can’t do that. God is immutable, unchangeable and perfect

Where people get confused is when we stumble and fall. God forgives the regenerated repenter. As a child of God (As John explains in his epistles), we no longer sin because our sins are covered by the blood of Christ. But God does not forgive the sins of those who deny Him, deny His word, truth, righteousness and continue in their sins. These are the reprobates and the apostates. God loves everyone, but not everyone will be forgiven and saved. The choice is ours. God has done His part. That will never change. But we have to do our part. Change happens with us, not God.

One final thing. Jesus said something confusing when He said, “The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth”.

The world loves itself. We are of the world. But we as Christians have had firsthand experience when the world did in fact, hate us. The reason being is that Jesus is a part of us. Two become one. What the world reacts to isn’t us, it is the Jesus inside us. Remove Jesus from our life and the world will love us all along the path to Hell.

Bill Hitchcock