(19) If ye were of the world, the world would love his own.--The force of the expression indicates the utter selfishness of the world's love. It would love not them, but that in them which was its own. (Comp. Note on John 7:7.)

I have chosen you out of the world.--Comp. John 15:16, and Note on John 7:7. There He had told them that the world could not hate them. The very fact of its hatred would prove a moral change in them, by which they had ceased to belong to the world, and had become the children of God. Both thoughts are repeated in 1John 3:13; 1John 4:5.

Verse 19. - If ye were of the world - i.e. still a part of it, deriving your life, maxims, and pleasures from it; if you could sympathize with its vulgar passion, and its temporary fleeting excitements, partisanships, and bigotries - the world would be loving (ἐφιλεὶ, notice the form of the conditional sentence, a supposition contrary to fact, therefore anticipating the negative clause that follows, "but ye are not of the world;" notice also that φίλεω, the love of affection, not ἀγαπάω, the love of reverence and profound regard, which you are to show to one another and to me) - would be loving its own. The world loves its priests and mouthpieces, its own organization ("Caiaphas, Pilate, Herod, and Judas, and all devils," Luther); the world loves its own offspring. But because ye are not of the world, but I chose you, withdrawing you for my service, out of the world (the two meanings of ἐκ here differ; the first ἐκ denotes origin, the second corresponds with the compound ἐκ in ἐκλέγομαι), therefore the world hateth you. I have caused you to break with it, and you are no longer "its own." Just in proportion as you are one with me, you draw upon yourself its hatred of me. "The offence of the cross" is not ceased. Thoma comments on the harmony between this statement and that of the Acts, Epistles, and Apocalypse, whose colors and features are here, as he thinks, drawn upon. It is profoundly interesting to trace the fulfillment of the Lord's prescient words in earlier Scripture (1 Peter 4:17; Romans 8:17; Galatians 6:17; Philippians 3:10; Hebrews 12:3).

15:18-25 How little do many persons think, that in opposing the doctrine of Christ as our Prophet, Priest, and King, they prove themselves ignorant of the one living and true God, whom they profess to worship! The name into which Christ's disciples were baptized, is that which they will live and die by. It is a comfort to the greatest sufferers, if they suffer for Christ's name's sake. The world's ignorance is the true cause of its hatred to the disciples of Jesus. The clearer and fuller the discoveries of the grace and truth of Christ, the greater is our sin if we do not love him and believe in him.If ye were of the world,.... Belonged to the world, were of the same spirit and principles with it, and pursued the same practices:

the world would love its own; for every like loves its like; the men of the world love each other's persons, company, and conversation:

but because ye are not of the world: once they were, being born into it, brought up in it, had their conversation among the men of it, were themselves men of carnal, worldly, principles and practices; but being called by Christ, and becoming his disciples, they were no more of it; and as he was not of the world, so they were not of it, though they were in it. The Jews distinguish the disciples of the wise men, from , "the men of the world" (u), pretending that they were not; but this is a character that only belongs to the disciples of Christ, in consequence of their being called by him out of it:

but I have chosen you out of the world: which designs not the eternal election of them, but the separation of them from the rest of the world in the effectual calling, and the designation of them to his work and service:

therefore the world hateth you; and since it was upon that account, they had no reason to be uneasy, but rather to rejoice; seeing this was an evidence of their not belonging to the world, and of being chosen and called by Christ out of it.

(u) T. Bab. Kiddushin, fol. 80. 2.