Our blessed Lord evidently supposes that his people will be persecuted for righteousness' sake. But, This, it must be confessed, is a very improbable
case —
\_The very character of his jjeople seems to preclude the idea. Were the disciples of Christ the very reverse of what they are, we might well expect them to be objects of hatred and contempt. But who can hate the humble, the meek, the pure, the peaceful, and those whose chief desire is to serve and
honour God? What connexion can there be between
the verses of our text, and the whole preceding context? One would imagine that the declaration before us was altogether destitute of any foundation in fact.
That their very righteousness should be the ground of their suffering, appears still more strange. If they were obnoxious to the charge of sedition, or to any thing else that rendered them bad members of society, one would not wonder that they should be evil treated on those accounts, notwithstanding they might in other respects be eminently holy. But that their conformity to Christ should be the true reason of the world's enmity against them, seems incredible.]
But we are taught to expect that it would exist —
[Our blessed Lord warned all his disciples, that they would receive, each in his appointed measure, the very same treatment as he received*^. And his Apostles guard us against being surprised or offended at it*'.
We must not indeed imagine that our enemies will avow the real ground of their aversion : they will not say, I hate you for your piety : they will give some other name to piety : tlicy will call it fanaticism, or hypocrisy ; and under that character will raise up their voice against it. When the Jews threatened to stone our Lord, he said to them, " Many good works have I done among you; for which of them do you stone me?" They replied, " For a good work we stone thee not ; but for blasphemy ; and because that thou, being a man, makest thy- self God*^." In like manner they sought to put him to death for violating, as they alleged, the sanctity of the Sabbath day*^. But whence came all this zeal for God's honour, and for the observance of the Sabbath ? Were they all so holy and so righteous ? No : in the midst of all their pretended concern for God's law, they were ready enough to violate it themselves, and even to commit murder : which was a demonstration, that the reasons they assigned were mere pretexts; and that the
b John XV. 18—21. and xvi. 1 — 3.
<= I Pet. iv. 12. 1 John ill. 13. <* John x. 32, 33.
« John vii. 19, 23.