Rejoice
Verse of the Day
"Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you." Matthew 5:11-12 KJV -or- "People will insult you and hurt you. They will lie and say all kinds of evil things about you because you follow me. But when they do that, know that great blessings belong to you. Be happy about it. Be very glad because you have a great reward waiting for you in heaven. People did these same bad things to the prophets who lived before you." Matthew 5:11-12 ERV
Lesson of the Day
So far, Jesus has told us to repent and follow Him. Yesterday, we learned that following Jesus comes with a price. Today, we will address some different things that we may go through because we follow Jesus Christ. Don't worry, though, because Jesus tells us to rejoice anyway.
Matthew 5:11 says we will be insulted, hurt, lied about, and talked about. Sounds bad, even stressful. I'm sure that we've all been through these scenarios before. I know I have. However, those things didn't happen just because we were following Jesus Christ. There are some cruel people in this world. Remember, we are all sinners, so we're bound to have an encounter with someone who just doesn't like us for whatever reason. Think about this, though: when we are following Jesus Christ, our reputations matter so much more because we are representing God. There are so many people who can't wait to put a Christian down so that they can discredit the faith.
Look at it this way: those people are trying to discredit God. These attacks aren't about us; they're about God. The enemy doesn't want anyone to learn how good God is. He does whatever he can to keep sinners from repenting and following Jesus Christ because he hates God, Jesus, and guess what? Us too.
Therefore, let them insult us, hurt us, lie about us, and talk about us. Jesus says the same thing. He says to be happy, and He gives us great reasons why.
- We have great rewards waiting for us in heaven.
- The same thing happened to Jesus Christ and the prophets.
Encouragement
As a Christian for over 50 years, I haven't experienced any physical pain, but I've definitely experienced mental pain. The enemy is crafty. He will find people close to you to cause you harm. My relatives said I was in a cult. Another family member called me a Philistine. Those things were very hurtful. I wasn't as into God as I am right now. I mostly played it safe, but now I'm really putting myself out there. Only the future will tell what's to come. It was hard to rejoice, but I kept doing what God led me to do. Sometimes, I smiled when I was sad, and sometimes, I showed my pain.
Jesus isn't asking us to fake happiness about the pain that we will face. He's pointing us past the pain to what the persecution proves: that we're on His side. He also wants us to be honored that we are experiencing what the prophets went through. Jesus Christ focuses on the reward, which is not down here on Earth but up there in Heaven.
Prayer
Dear Heavenly Father, You are worthy of all of our praises. We praise You because You are Holy. We praise You because You are Love. We praise You because You are Meek. Thank You for being with us through every hurt and pain. Thank You for preparing a place for us in Heaven. You asked us to follow You, and You knew that we would be in harm's way because of it. You're not asking us to do anything that You Yourself wouldn't do. That's why we love You so much. You loved us first, and we can depend on You to keep Your word and reward us for our faithfulness. Help us to stay faithful and protect us from the enemy's snare. In Jesus Christ's name we pray, amen.