Feeling Uncomfortable in the World

First John 2:15 tells us, “Do not love the world or the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” Last time we defined the world as the evil system controlled by Satan which is set in opposition to God. Obviously, from this verse, the love of the Father and the love of the world are incompatible. They can’t co-exist together.

Why? Because God is the enemy of the world’s sin and values. We know that. God hates worldliness in all its guises. Therefore, it is impossible to love and serve God while loving and serving what God hates and while doing what God has commanded us not to do.

I’m going to quote to you a series of verses that show this: Jesus said in Matthew 6:24, “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” So, how do we ever think we can pull it off trying to love and serve both – God and the world?

Don’t we realize that James said in James 4:4 said? “Adulterers and adulteresses! (That’s what loving the world is – spiritual adultery) Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” That’s one reason we can’t love the world: It’s incompatible with being a Christian. To love the world turns us into the exact opposite – an enemy of God.

The second reason we can’t love the world is this: The world is not our natural habitat. We don’t belong to the world, but to the kingdom of God. In John 15:19, Jesus said, “If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”

Do you understand that? God has called us out of the world. He’s given us a new home, a new identity. Philippians 3:20 says, “Our citizenship is in heaven.” We are aliens down here. Hebrews 11:13 calls us, “strangers and pilgrims on the earth.”

What is the moral? We should be as uncomfortable, as unnatural in the world, as we would be underwater. A SCUBA diver can survive underwater only with artificial support, and then only for a limited time. We as believers can survive in this world only through our reliance on the Holy Spirit.

Someone who gets too comfortable in this world and doesn’t seem to mind the sin all around him – man, how can he be saved? I don’t know, maybe he’s not. I don’t know about you, but I get all uncomfortable around sin. It bothers me to see people drinking, especially around my kids; and you can hardly go to a picnic area anymore without seeing that. And doesn’t it offend you to hear people curse and use the Lord’s name in vain? It’s almost painful. And doesn’t it embarrass you to see people half naked, like on a public beach, or hear them talk about their sex lives?

I’d better be careful, or some of you might think I’m talking about television and accuse me of going beyond preaching to meddling. But how people can sit there and watch that stuff day after day, I just don’t understand. Why does that stuff offend us? It offends us because Jesus has called us out of it. When Jesus called men to be His disciples, He said, “Follow Me!” He expected them to leave their fishing nets and tax collecting booths and all their private causes. He expected them to forsake whatever occupied their time and attention, whatever occupied their affections and desires, and follow Him. That’s at the heart of being a disciple of Jesus Christ.

Where is your heart? Have you given Christ your undivided love? Remember, the first of the Ten Commandments was, “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.” Jesus said the greatest commandment was to, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, and your might.” Are you obedient to them?

Certainly Christians can be unfaithful to God. But like in a marriage, adultery doesn’t change the legal statue, but it does bring disgrace and heartache. And it destroys fellowship. So if you are a Christian, don’t flirt with the world. Don’t let it allure you. Don’t have a love affair with it. Love God instead.