“Why do we have to be so dif­fer­ent in so many ways?”

“The nat­ural  man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God: for they are fool­ish­ness unto him: nei­ther can he know them, because they are spir­i­tu­ally dis­cerned” (I Corinthi­ans 2:14)

Why should we look for approval from peo­ple who sim­ply are inca­pable of grasp­ing spir­i­tual things, and who there­fore call them fool­ish­ness? God has called his church to be com­pletely dif­fer­ent from any­thing else in the entire world. I Peter 2:9 states we are a “pecu­liar” or unique peo­ple, and to the world every­thing we do is dif­fer­ent. God’s true church walks strictly accord­ing to the word of God regard­less of what the world thinks, or whether any­one else agrees.

Every now and then we should stop and ask our­selves: “Why do I look for the world’s approval? What has the world done for me?” Con­stantly search­ing for approval from this world will leave you hope­lessly dis­ap­pointed, for they will only approve their own. The only thing we owe to the world is to bring them the gospel, but we owe Jesus every­thing. We should not even care what the world thinks as long as we are pleas­ing Jesus.

Jesus Him­self was “despised and rejected of men” (Isa­iah 53:3). He was hated, spit upon, called crazy, accused of hav­ing a devil, and the list goes one. Are we greater than He? Jesus plainly tells us in his word that if we are His chil­dren we too should expect to be despised. John 15:18–20 says it best:

“If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have cho­sen you out of the world, there­fore the world hateth you. Remem­ber the word that I said unto you, The ser­vant is not greater than his lord. If they per­se­cuted me, they will also per­se­cute you; if they have kept my say­ing, they will keep yours also.”

These words were cer­tainly ful­filled in the dis­ci­ples of Jesus. Every one of Jesus’ dis­ci­ples were mar­tyred except for John, and he was plunged into boil­ing oil but mirac­u­lously deliv­ered. If the world treated the great dis­ci­ples like this, why do we expect the world to treat you any bet­ter. To gain the friend­ship of the world you would have to turn your back on Jesus, all the apos­tles, the early church, and the church all down through the ages even until this present moment. There has never been a time when God’s true church had the approval of the world.

Jesus pro­nounced a bless­ing upon those who face reproach for His name:

“Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall sep­a­rate your from their com­pany, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like man­ner did their father’s unto the prophets” (Luke 6:22–23).

The apos­tles con­sid­ered it an honor to suf­fer and be per­se­cuted for the Gospel’s sake. They were con­stantly being called before the lead­ers of the city, and beaten, and com­manded not to teach or preach in the name of Jesus.

“And they departed from the pres­ence of the coun­cil, rejoic­ing that they were counted wor­thy to suf­fer shame for his name” (Acts 5:41).

It is time for us as believ­ers to fol­low the exam­ple of the apos­tles. It is time we hold our head up high, and join the mighty army of those who are not ashamed of the gospel. What we have is truly a pearl of great price, worth far more than any­thing this world could ever have to offer. Let the world say what it will, but as for us, we will join Moses, who chose “rather to suf­fer afflic­tion with the peo­ple of God, than to enjoy the plea­sures of sin for a sea­son; esteem­ing the reproach of Christ greater riches than the trea­sures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the rec­om­pence of the reward” (Hebrews 11:25–26).

Taken from Ques­tions Pen­te­costals Ask by David F. Gray, 1987. Word Aflame Press: Hazel­wood, MO.