Day 11: A Scripture about Family/Friends

^{Okay, I think I have chosen a rather strange odd passage to fulfill this prompt.  I have pondered what to choose for several days -- maybe someone noticed I haven't posted in awhile!  : )    This one struck me.  These verses come up in a conversation between Jesus and His followers about the temple and the prophecy that it would be destroyed.}



So here goes:


^{Luke 21:16-19
16} But you will be betrayed even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death, ¹⁷ and you will be hated by all because of My name. ¹⁸ Yet not a hair of your head will perish. ¹⁹ By your endurance you will gain your lives.

Wow!  Hear those words of Jesus to His disciples.  He was not promising them a rose garden.  On the contrary, He tells them that the people who had loved them the most in their lives up to this point are going to turn against them, are going to hate them.  Some of them will die at the hands of their family members or friends!  (Now -- someone explain to me verse 18!  On the surface, it seems to contradict what Jesus has just said.  It must mean that they will gain salvation as in "to die is gain.")

But if I had been standing there, listening, I wonder what my reaction would be.

And I think today of the followers of Christ in Egypt who are suffering this week because of their beliefs.

If you find my thoughts about this scripture to be a little disjointed -- so do I!!  : )