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they have kept My saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things will they do
unto you for My name's sake, because they know not Him that sent Me" (John xv.17-21).
By the time these words were spoken the situation had radically changed: because of
persecution believers would need help the one from another, they would need to have
`love one for another'. From this time on there would be hostility between the world and
those `born of God', for `the whole world lieth in the wicked one' (I John 5: 19). The
time was approaching when it could be saith "(the Father) hath delivered us from the
power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son" (Col. 1: 13).
In this country we know little of persecution at the present time; but as the days darken
and `lawlessness abounds' we may find ourselves confronted with suffering for Christ's
sake, then we shall realize the need to show our love one for the other. There are those in
other countries who have for some time known the importance of caring for their fellow
believers: it has been forced upon them by the secular and Godless state. Yet perhaps in
our society, a society which is indifferent to the things of God, there is a greater need that
we should recognize this aspect of the worthy walk and of the will of God, for the
indifference of the society in which we live, breeds indifference in the believer unless he
is awake to the situation. Why am I so indifferent? Is it because you are indifferent?
And why are you so indifferent? Is it because I am indifferent? We each need all the
support and fellowship the other can give; and if one fails, all suffer with him.
We live in days when the hostility of the world and the Prince of this World for the
believe is coming to a climax, at a time when the `perilous times' to which Paul make
reference in II Tim. 3: 1 are drawing near (if they have not already dawned). What
practical advice has the Apostle for his young friend for those days? Beginning with
chapter 2: 15 "Give diligence (study) . . . . . the Word of Truth", he leads on through
`profane and vain babblings . . . . . ungodliness' to the perilous times, concluding that
passage with the injunction:
"But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of,
knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a child thou hast known the
holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in
Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be
perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works" (II Tim. 3: 14-17).
The only practical teaching for such times as those in which we live is that we give
diligence to the Word of Truth, recognizing that all Scriptures is given by inspiration of
God and is profitable.
Our first concern as we seek to know and do the will of God, walking worthy of our
calling and our Lord, should be to love God, and to get to know Christ. This may well
call for a reappraisal of our priorities and our commitments, may call for self-sacrifice in
order to give diligence to these matters, but as Rom. 12: 1, 2 points out (as we have
more than once in these studies suggested), it is as we present our bodies living sacrifices,
holy, acceptable unto God, that we shall prove what is the Will of God. We have the
responsibility to set our minds on things above, and not on things on the earth (Col. 3: 2)
the responsibility to fill our minds with the things of God.