Will you join me in hating them all the way? This is the Daily Disturbing Podcast with Anthony Aneenon. Luke 14, verse 26. Struggle with me as we read this.
And I quote, if anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even their own life, such a person cannot be my disciple. End quote. That's a tough standard to meet. Even for those who already love the Bible.
Hey, come on, my mom and dad? I used to struggle with this verse until I had seen too many situations where the intervention of family members were the very reason why someone suffered tremendously. Yung pamilya pa ang rason kung bakit nagdusa ang isang miembro ng pamilya. So it's not so much hating the person, can I clarify?
But what the person may choose to do to you or the people you value. Like, come on, required college courses of high school graduates by parents you know it required upon kids who are totally against those choices Time Forced marriages of women with abusive often much older men How can we not despise that? And even extreme but sadly now more frequent cases of peddled kids, sold kids, right? By parents themselves for online sex trafficking.
So what does it mean? if you do not hate the actions of your father, your mother or these parents compared to what the Lord is telling you to do then we cannot, you and I cannot be the disciples of Jesus Christ even to our own family members there are times, there will be not yet if not yet for you those moments when you will have to stand against because of what you stand for these acts I hate and I pray I hate more consistently and passionately and I encourage you long to grow in hate as well. What the deepest parts of your core being, your core best self, definitely hate. If only we take time to reflect on what is truly going on within us Perhaps you can also benefit from setting your eyes upon heaven above or listening to your heart if Jesus lives within and ask him to give you a heart just like his that loves what he loves and hates what he hates too.
As David prayed in Psalm 139, Lord, don't I hate those who hate you and detest those who rebel against you? I hate them with extreme hatred. then if you read on in Psalm 139, in the succeeding verses, he asks God to what? To search his own heart.
See, because he also knows the condition of his heart. To see if there is any hurtful way in him. Anything that God may hate. And to redirect him to a better path, into a more righteous way.
1 Corinthians 16, 14. Let all that you do be done in love. All that you do, hating included. I must have shared this before.
Love all the way. It a principle that I embraced forever My kids as well have considered this as a practice If love let me explain is doing what best for someone else and going against the hateful thing that that person may be doing then hating what that person is doing and perhaps even stepping back from that person himself is the loving thing to do. Hate, therefore, in love. And love that person all the way.
One more thought to reflect on. God hated the nature of sin so much that it had to take a sacrifice so significant from him to destroy it. He loved you and me even more that he purposed his own son to be that sacrifice, to cleanse us from that nature of sin and to replace it with his own nature of righteousness. Sometimes, indeed, we do what we hate for the people we love.
But deep inside, We find true joy.