Mark 3 is a perfect example of the lengths to which rebellious people will go to silence those who uphold righteousness.
The Pharisees were hell bent on making Jesus Christ look like the bad guy when all He did was good His entire life.
When He healed the sick, they criticized Him for healing on the Sabbath and assigned to Him the power of the devil in casting out demons. I suspect that they were jealous that He healed at all, they had no power to do it, so they undermined His reputation through their accusations and gossip.
This is what we can expect as believers. We will do good things and be accused of evil motives or faulty thinking, when actually we obeyed God.
If you set a nice table for guests you will be accused of putting on heirs. If we choose to avoid wicked family gatherings we will be accused of snobbery. When we choose not to attend the wedding of divorced and remarried people we will be criticized, even called hateful and judgmental. Notice they are judging that we are judging. Irrational and controlling people are never consistent because everything they do is based on emotion rather than reasonable facts.
All one has to do as a born again believer is obey Christ and you find yourself under attack.
I recall the time a friend's family decided not to have a television anymore. They found it distracting to the family time and school work, not to mention all the evil that the children thought they wanted to watch.
After the decision to throw out the television, without telling anyone else about it, the relatives came to their home, noticed it was gone, asking why. After receiving the answer the relatives called the parents self righteous, even saying they thought they were better than everyone else.
Sometimes I am astonished that believers will judge someone over the removal of a television but those same people will become enraged if anyone else calls them to account over real and damaging sin in their lives.
Was removing the television from their home a wicked or self-righteous thing? NO, it was a personal choice for the family that pertained to them alone, and yet they were "judged" for their own choice in their own home.
When extended family feel free to judge non-sin issues merely to appear superior, that is when it is time to remove the family from those who would undermine our personal choices in order to follow the direction of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is convicting to those who love their rebellion. Those who want to be free from conviction of any kind will rage at us for our own personal choices.
I noticed too over the years that those who judge on non-sin issues, usually about home decorating or clothing styles, have little depth when it comes to spiritual matters, even though they claim to be "Christian."
Those who love to act superior over us based on our own personal choices for our life that are not sin, are themselves self-righteous. These people hate that we are moving forward in spiritual growth, leaving behind all the bondages of the superficial life style.
Narcissists always want us to be inferior to them and they are enraged when we do not follow their way. The anger builds inside of them, this is why they rage at the silliest things, they are releasing their anger, sort of like a relief valve. They cannot hold in the contempt very long, it must be released for them to "feel" better, but only for that one time, it will have to be released again, the next time we make our own choices.
Proverbs 29:9 "If a wise man contendeth with a foolish man, whether he rage or laugh, there is no rest."
The purpose of these little essays? Its simple, when we understand the enemy we are not in bondage to their tricks. When we are confident that we are obeying Christ, the enemy has no power over our decisions and we do not live in fear of the reactions of others over our own personal choices.
Hallelujah!!!!
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