Through Christ and the outpoured Spirit, we experience a fullness that Abraham rejoiced to see only from afar. The word hope is often used flippantly, carrying little more weight than a flimsy wish. But biblical hope is firm and sturdy. Biblical hope is squarely centered on the character of God, the truth of His Word, His great and very precious promises, and above all, Christ Himself, the hope of glory.

Texts such as Romans 11 and Galatians 6:16 indicate that Jesus’ disciples are, in fact, the true Israel of God, the people whom He has chosen to bring blessing on the world and to dwell with forever. Knowing that we are the Israel of God encourages us to cling to God for blessing just as our forefather Jacob did (Gen. 32:22–32). Let us consider the significance and great hope that disciples have as the true Israel of God.

“Are you the teacher of Israel?” (John 3:10). Such was the nature of the question posed by our Lord Jesus to Nicodemus. Yet it was much more than a simple inquiry. The rhetorical effect should have awakened the Pharisee to seriously ponder how he could instruct God’s people if he himself did not understand the things above. Even more profoundly, how could he teach Israel if he did not know of the true Israel?
Some of Nicodemus’ responses seem quite reasonable. After all, how can a man be born when he is old? It is the dawning of the new covenant that sublimely answers this question. But we do well to remember that the new covenant answers that question out of the resources of the old covenant. Christ compels Nicodemus to see that he must possess the very thing that the ancient sacrament always called for: a circumcised heart. Who is the true Jew but he who is one inwardly? And now, standing before his very eyes, is the sum and substance of all the promises of old—the Messiah himself, the true Israel.

From the very outset, the Gospels unveil for us the many ways that the Christ is “the Son of David, the Son of Abraham” (Matt. 1:1). We are meant to see that He would succeed where Israel had failed.

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If no one dislikes you on account of Christ, it’s probably not because you have become greater, more endearing, more friendly to the lost than Jesus, the apostles, or the lineage of persecuted Christians and martyrs throughout church history. If no one dislikes you on account of Christ, it is likely because you have been too quiet about Jesus, too lukewarm for him, or too much like the world for them to notice the difference.

The kind of man you hate reveals what kind of man you are. “But I hate him,” Ahab declared of Micaiah, God’s prophet.
Jehoshaphat, the righteous king of Judah, sat with Ahab, the wicked king of Israel, to deliberate one question: Should they go to war together against Syria? Peace had lasted three years with the pagan nation, but Ahab desired the strategic city of Ramoth-gilead for Israel. He questioned aloud to Jehoshaphat, “Do you know that Ramoth-gilead belongs to us, and we keep quiet and do not take it out of the hand of the king of Syria?” (1 Kings 22:3).
Jehoshaphat consents to fight with Ahab, but desires to hear first from the God of Israel. Ahab calls his four hundred prophets, who, with one voice, give their hearty Amen! “Go up,” they say, “for the Lord will give it into the hand of the king” (1 Kings 22:6).
The kind of men from whom you solicit counsel tells us what kind of man you are.
These men were no messengers of Yahweh, and King Jehoshaphat knew so. Diplomatically, he asks, “Is there not here another prophet of the Lord of whom we may inquire?” (1 Kings 22:7). To Jehoshaphat, four hundred counselors of any other god could not substitute for one man of Yahweh. There is one, Ahab reluctantly responds, Micaiah. “But I hate him,” Ahab gasps before discretion tutors the statement.
Why did Ahab hate the true prophet? “I hate him, for he never prophesies good concerning me, but evil” (1 Kings 22:8).
Ahab loved the four hundred yes-men around him. He loved prophets feasting with him, prophesying pleasantries. He loved to hear his own positive thoughts returned to himself unaltered. He loved only affirming words, positive words — not the untamed and unpredictable words of God’s true prophet. The kind of man Ahab hated revealed the kind of man he was.
What Kind of Man Are You?
Now, to turn and see the story from Micaiah’s perspective (the point of this article): The kind of person who despises you also may tell you what kind of man you are. Ahab hated Micaiah because Ahab hated Micaiah’s God.
Wasn’t this because Ahab couldn’t comfortably untether the servant from his Master? Micaiah’s allegiance to the living God was not superficial — wasn’t a religious hobby to be picked up and put down. Ahab knew Micaiah didn’t serve the Lord just during office hours. His devotion went to the heart. Ahab would kill the prophet before he killed the prophet’s faith. Can the like be said of us?
This son of Imla was God’s man through and through. Whether talking to the false prophets or to the king himself, he was his Master’s man. Whether struck in the face and questioned by Zedekiah or thrown into jail by Ahab, he was his Master’s man. Whether Ahab invited him to feast at Jezebel’s table, or invited him for a wine-tasting from Naboth’s vineyard, or asked him about going to war with Syria — Ahab knew what he could expect from this lone prophet of the Lord: to deal with the Lord’s man. Ahab could expect God’s truth spoken through God’s messenger. And he hated him for it.
Confrontational Christlikeness?
So, we might then ask, do the right people dislike us?
What? you might think. If we are mature believers — truly humble and gentle and patient and loving and compassionate — will we really ever be disliked? Hatred and disgust may be reserved for those argumentative and obnoxious professors — but not us. Clanging cymbals, flies buzzing about the ear, hornets stinging any who disagree — these are rightly disliked. But we give the gentle answer. We listen and respect others.
Many Western Christians, it appears to me, are tempted with and indulgent in an agreeableness unknown to Micaiah. We stand ready to give the compassionate word, the soft encouragement, the positive uplift — but do not go on to ever risk anything that might displease. We are not disliked more because we do not say many things that are dislikable to the spirit of the age. Unbelievers at work or online or in our families feel free to parade their profanities and perversities before our ears and eyes without restraint, but it is ours, apparently, to keep quiet and let them perish out of politeness.
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We would do well to model our ministry after these men. They were men of integrity. They saw their calling as one of dignity and worth. They loved the church because Christ loved it. 

The sermon was the minister’s attempt through reason to encourage faith as it affected this life and the next. They were committed to a style that was plain but not dull. Each minister was pledged by his own creed to use a balance of doctrine and practice, faithfully devoted to the exposition of the Word of Scripture, and understood by all. Every Puritan sermon began with a definite Biblical text. Once a text was selected, the preacher’s immediate duty was to clarify it in all possible ways. Thus the lengthy Puritan sermon had a structure of its own. It had a triple division into Doctrine, Reason, and Use. In contrast to the sermons of the Anglican divines such as Andrewes and Donne which were weighted down with classical quotations, the sermons of the Puritans were restricted almost entirely to Biblical citations because evangelical teaching was the first aim of the sermon. They did, however, refer to a Luther, a Calvin, or even each other on occasion, in addition to citing several of the church fathers, such as Jerome or Bernard.
Each sermon was an attempt to identify from the text an axiom of theology and to discuss its practical applications. In procedure, the text was taken apart by the method of analysis into its component parts and usually set out again as a proposition. After the logical analysis of the passage, the practical appeal was made by the pastor who attempted to make the Bible applicable to real life.
In defining the process, Horton Davies observes, “The doctrines had to be explained to the congregation and their contraries refuted. The second division of the sermon was a logical defense of the assumptions of the first section. It was insisted that apparent contradictions were to be reconciled, and that little time was to be spent in answering trivial objections or mere cavillings. The third section intended to drive home the practical advantages of belief in the particular teachings and concluded with encouragements.”
Richard Baxter affirmed this tradition by stating, “The preacher’s aim should be first to convince the understanding and then to engage the heart. Light first, then heat. Begin with a careful opening of the text, then proceed to the clearance of possible difficulties or objections; next, to a statement of uses; and lastly to a fervent appeal for acceptance by conscience and heart.”
While being masters of divinity, the Puritans were also masters of practical divinity. To these men of the Word, there was no doctrine that could not be practice. To them, all that was practiced had to be founded on sound doctrine.
Lastly, Puritan preaching was bold preaching. The Puritan preacher was not afraid to let the preaching of the Word of God offend sinners. As Samuel Hieron said in his Preacher’s Plea, in 1629, “As men love nothing more than their sins, so they loathe nothing more than the discovery thereof.” The Puritans realized that there would always be a violent reaction to bold preaching, but that it was absolutely necessary.
To re-quote Baxter, “You cannot break men’s hearts by jesting with them, or telling them a smooth tale, or pronouncing a gaudy oration. Men will not cast away their dearest pleasures at the drowsy request of one that seemeth not to mean as he speaks or to care much whether his request be granted or not. If you say that the work is God’s, and He may do it by the weakest means, I answer, it is true, He may do so; buy yet His ordinary way is to work by means, and not only to make the matter that is preached, but also the manner of preaching instrumental to our work.”
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