The vine and the branches John 15:1-7
I was in the hospital the other day and I noticed a sign on the wall of the little store by the entrance. It said, “Chips $1.35.” And I remembered buying the same size bag for a nickel. Anybody else remember that? Now, we pay more for the tax than we do for the product. When I graduated from high school my grandmother got me a brand new suit. It cost thirty dollars. Now, you’d be lucky to find a new shirt for thirty dollars. And my first job was working in a variety store and I got paid 55 cents an hour. And I can’t think of anything that you can buy today with 55 cents. The fact is, we live in a changing world and it’s not always changing for the better.
I heard one guy say, “I wish I had a dollar for every dollar I spent, because then I’d have all my money back.” Well, everything’s changing but the good news is; the word of God never changes. And salvation is still free but it’s never cheap.
Today, we’re in the middle of the sermon that Jesus gave to His disciples just before He went to the cross. It began in chapter 13 where He taught them what true discipleship was all about and He did this by washing everybody’s feet and I believe He’s telling us to do the same. And simply put, that means that we are all called to be servants and not just to be served.
And then in chapter 14 He re-emphasized the doctrine of the trinity and He taught them about the ministry of the Holy Spirit who would indwell and empower the life of every believer. Did you get that? If you know the Lord then you are indwelt by the Spirit and if you aren’t indwelt by the Spirit than you are none of His.
And then He defined the meaning of loving God as true obedience which is the evidence that He is in us and we are in Him. And what I mean by this, is that we do what we do for God because we love Him and because we love Him we’ll love those He has called us to serve. And whether we like it or not there are some people in this world who might be above or below our class structure but we are still called to serve them.
One time when our kids were very small we were going to Ontario to visit the grandparents and we always enjoyed going up through the states. The problem was; every body but Sally got the flu as we were on our way and we all had our turn at being sick. When we got to Freeport, Maine Sally had to buy the kids new jackets to replace the ones that were ruined on the way. They were nice yellow and blue matching nylon jackets.
Well, it was raining and we were taking a break from driving by going through the different stores when a very snooty sales lady was trying to be friendly and she said to Caitie who was only about four at the time, “My, what a lovely jacket.” And Caitie said, “My mommy bought it for me cause I threw up all over my old one.” And this lady who had her nose up in the air looked like she wanted to have it in the waste basket. She was trying to humble herself by talking to Caitie but she didn’t realize how humble she’d have to get.
As we look around us, we realize that we have a lot of extra room but there’s no room for snootiness. Wouldn’t it be awful if someone came into this church and the first person they said hello to was a little bit less than friendly. I know you may find this hard to believe but God can use a smile or even a kind word to really make someone feel welcome.
When I was at Guelph we had two men in our church who made it their mission in life to say hello to everyone that walked in the door. One of them stood at the front door and greeted every one who came in and the other stood at the back of the sanctuary and greeted every one he met. And no one told either one of them to it. Listen, is it any wonder that the church doubled in size in five years? People felt welcome, because they were welcomed. And aren’t we simply showing the love of God to others by doing this?
In chapter 14 Jesus emphasized the work of the Father and He used the word Father 21 times in 42 verses. And then in chapter 15 He talks about Himself and the role He has in the matter of salvation and beyond and He actually uses the word ‘I’ 71 times in 31 verses. And when we get to chapter 16 the emphasis will be on the role and the ministry of the Holy Spirit.
Well, now we’re at chapter 15 and as I told you most commentators believe that all five chapters were one message but they also believe that it was given in a couple of different places as they traveled along the road. And the reason they say this is because as Jesus was talking it almost seems as though the background is changing as He goes along. For instance, He began in the upper room where He washed their feet, they had their meal and He taught them and then they might have been walking past vineyards and that sparked the conversation about the vine and branches that began in chapter 15. And then in chapter 17 we have that great high priestly prayer and obviously He was alone in the garden except for Peter, James and John.
I said He was probably passing through a vineyard because He often used things that were close at hand to illustrate what He’s trying to teach them and we often do the same thing. For instance, when the Pastor wanted to illustrate the love or sacrifice of Jesus a week or two ago he pointed to the cross and he did that because it’s something we’re all familiar with and it’s also something we can see it right in front of our eyes. And Jesus often did the same thing with His disciples.
I was thinking about this portion of scripture last week and something occurred to me. Let’s say I came over to the church for something and I stopped at the office to say hello to the Pastor and he was quite exited and started sharing with me about a new series he was developing on the life of King Saul. So, he started talking about the family Saul came from and how he had been his father’s errand boy and he was just getting into it when the phone rang. It was his wife and she said, “Don’t forget that you said you’d get the paint for the bathroom sometime today.” He says, “No problem, I’ll go down and get it right now.” Then he hung up the phone and said to me, “I’ve got to go to the hardware store, so why don’t you come along and we’ll grab a coffee on the way.” So, as we got in the car he went on to tell me that Saul had been from the smallest tribe and yet his family was rather important and that might have contributed to him having an ego problem and yet he had no reason to because he had come from such an insignificant tribe as compared to the others. Well, we stopped for coffee and while we drank it he mentioned how Saul first met Samuel and the influence he had on his life. Then when we went into the hardware store where he shared how Saul was chosen by God and this was not only a shock to him but also to his family as well because he had never been a religious person to start with. Then we’d leave the store and drive back to the church and when we were in the car again he shared about the initial success Saul had experienced when he got all fired up about the enemies of God’s people. And as we went back into the building he might share more about Saul and all the problems that he had spiritually.
Now, a few days later I might be telling someone else what the Pastor had told me and I might share the basics of what his messages were all about but I wouldn’t bother telling them where I heard the various parts of the series because that would be irrelevant what I was trying to say.
And I think the same thing happens with John. He’s retelling the exact conversation as he heard it but he’s ignoring all the details of where he heard it because those details don’t relate to the events that actually happened.
What I find interesting is that Jesus often used common things to represent and remind us of spiritual things and when we see the common things our minds tend go back to the things He said.
When I was only about five or six years old my mum and us four small children were moving away from a really dumpy apartment in Toronto which was owned by a drunken old lady. As we were about to leave I remember this woman gave me an American nickel, you know the one with the buffalo on the back and she said, “Whenever you see that old buffalo on a nickel I want you to think of me.” Now listen, that was over fifty years ago and I still think of that miserable old woman every time I see an American nickel.
And do you know what? Jesus used the exact same technique when He said to His disciples, “I am the true vine.” He was using something very familiar to bring something else to the disciple’s mind.
Look at verses 1 to 3 again where He says, “I am the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.”
Jesus tells us He’s not just the vine but He is the true vine, His Father is the vine dresser and we are the branches. Well, the statement that He is the vine and they are the branches doesn’t really affect us the way it would them because they saw vineyards all the time and besides that we also miss the religious significance of what He was saying. You see, the Jews thought of Israel as being the true vine and they based this on several scriptures in the Old Testament.
For instance, in Jeremiah 2 God said to Israel, “I planted you as a choice vine.” In Ezekiel on 15 different occasions the prophet likens Israel to a vine.” In Hosea 10 the prophet said, “Israel is a luxuriant vine.” And then in Psalm 80:8 says, “Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen and planted it.”
And the one section that really tells of God’s evaluation of Israel at the time of Jesus is a prophetic passage that’s found in Isaiah 5. It says, “The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.” And there the prophet depicts God as the farmer who had planted the best-looking, best-watered and best-tended vineyard in the entire Mediterranean Basin. The grapes that grew were plump and heavy with the juices that would lead to a bumper harvest, but when the day of harvest came and the farmer pulled off some grapes to sample them, he discovered that the grapes were bitter. I mean, they were terrible, sour and useless. Something had gone terribly wrong and so, in a disappointed and heartbreaking fury, the farmer dismantles the vineyard and plowed the whole thing under.
In the Old Testament days Israel had been a special place and it was inhabited by a special people and both they and their land were chosen by God. And as far as God was concerned anyone who wanted a relationship with Him had to come through Israel but now that the Messiah had come, He instituted the New Covenant and this was no longer the case. And so, what we see here is that Jesus wasn’t just claiming to the vine but He was actually claiming to be the only vine. He was actually taking the place of Israel as God’s means of blessing for the rest of the world.
And listen, He wasn’t just doing this because He deserved the position more than they but because they had failed so miserably in being God’s blessing for the nations. I mean, the whole New Testament shows us not only how far from God the leadership had drifted but even how much they disliked the common people.
Look at the Pharisees for an example, they were supposedly the cream of Israel’s religion but at the same time they were actually a perversion of what they were supposed to be.
They were supposed to be ministering to the needs of the nation and yet we see them using the nation to further their political gains. They were using the woman taken in adultery to trap Jesus into breaking the law. They tried to get the man whose eyes were healed in John 9 to say that Jesus was a lawbreaker. And when Jesus healed the man who had been crippled for thirty-eight years they tried to kill the Lord for healing on the Sabbath. And when He raised Lazarus from the dead they wanted to kill them both. And these are just a few of the examples of the kinds of things they did. No wonder He told them, I’m here to take over the job you were given to do because I am the true vine and you certainly aren’t.
Throughout the Old Testament Israel was constantly referred to as having been God’s choice vineyard because that was what they were supposed to be but now Jesus was telling Israel that He is the true vine. And basically He threw in the word true to remind them that the false vines of Israel’s history had produced nothing but sour grapes.
The vine itself had become so much a symbol of Israel that it appeared on coins that were minted during the Maccabean period, which was the four hundred years between been the Old and New Testaments. And during the time of Christ, we are told that Herod’s Temple had a tremendous vine on the side of it that was overlaid with gold and some have estimated that it was worth $12,000,000. Israel had always been God’s vine, but it had become unproductive, so a new vine was established.
A vine planted in the ground speaks to us of the humility of one who came in the form of man to be planted in the earth. And a vine is also a perfect illustration for showing fruit bearing as the evidence of spiritual productivity.
Then we turn our attention to the husbandman or the common term is the vinedresser. And the main job of the vinedresser is to take away everything that’s not only unnecessary but also anything that inhibits growth. I mean, he cuts off the dry and useless branches and let’s the main stalk remain during the winter months to develop inward strength. And just when these vines look like there’s no hope left they’re actually preparing to produce something of value. And then when the branches grow He removes both the smaller ones and what we call the suckers so that only the fruit-bearing branches can receive nourishment. Otherwise, the vine might look great from a distance but no fruit will ever be produced.
When I was a Youth Pastor in Guelph we had a team in the cheerleading competition in New York and as we were on our way back the bus driver said he knew a guy who had a vineyard and if we wanted to we could stop and pick some grapes. And as we pulled up there were rows and rows and rows of grape vines. I love grapes and I was looking forward to some but imagine if we got there and there were no grapes on the vines. I would have been disappointed but if I was the farmer who did all the work of planting and fertilizing these vines and then found out that it was all a waste of time and effort. I mean, he’d really be angry.
So, there’s a lot of preparation in the production of grapes and in a similar sense there’s a lot of work in getting us to produce spiritual fruit as well. For instance, aII the vines need to be pruned.
There is a wordplay that we miss in the English but it’s in verses 2 and 3. The word prune in verse 2 and clean in verse 3 almost sound the same in the Greek and basically they are similar in the English. And He tells us we are pruned or cleansed according to the word He has spoken to us.
And there are two kinds of branches mentioned here. There are those that bear fruit in verses 2 and 8 and there are those who do not in verses 2 and 6. The branches that bear fruit are easily identified as believers and the ones who do not are the unbelievers who actually look like believers. I think Jesus is referring to the ones who bear fruit as the eleven disciples who stayed with Him while the one who doesn’t is Judas.
Look again at the last half of verse 1 where Jesus says, "And my Father is the husbandman." This tells us that the Father has the same love for "the branches" as Jesus does. And there are three ideas here. There is His protecting care and this tells us that He’s always concerned about what happens with each and every one of us. And then there’s His His watchfulness and that lets us know that nothing ever escapes His eye. Just as the gardener is always watching to see the condition of each branch of the vine and he’s watering and pruning whatever needs it, so the Father is constantly pre-occupied with the needs of those who are in Christ. It also reminds us of His faithfulness. He makes sure that no branch is ever allowed to waste away and although we don’t like to hear it, He never fails to use His pruning knife. I mean, if a branch doesn’t bear fruit He does what He can to help it and if it is does bear fruit it says He purges it so it will bring forth more fruit.
Listen, Jesus says. "My Father is the husbandman." This tells us that He doesn’t give an angel the task of caring for the vine or its branches and this also reassures us of the most tender and faithful care possible.
We’re told that the gardener prunes or cuts back the vines on two different occasions. The first time is prior to the winter months in order to prepare them for the growing season and the second time is when the growth begins and then He prunes or cuts away the shoots that aren’t fruit bearing.
Verse 2 says the Father as the vinedresser purges the vine "that it may bring forth more fruit." Verse 8 tells us He wants the branches to "bear much fruit." And that the Father "taketh away" the branches that fail to bear fruit. Verse 2 doesn’t say He fixes them up but it says He cuts them off. Verse 6 says that those branches are gathered, thrown into a pile, and burned. They tell us their wood is useless for firewood. So, the branches of the vine are consumed in a bonfire.
Every once in a while we’ll see someone come to the church, make a profession, get baptized and in a very short time they’ll drift away and never come back again. We have no right to judge and it’s our hope that they will come back but we also have to realize that many of these are fruitless branches that the Father decided we’d be better off without.
The second work of the Father in verse 2 is to purge or prune "every branch that beareth fruit." That phrase refers to the true Christian. I discovered that the art of proper pruning is, like so many other things, a remarkably complex and specialized skill. Apparently the average grape branch can put out as many as 300 buds. If all of those were allowed to mature, they would all be sour. So farmers need to cut back a fairly large percentage of those buds so that the remaining ones will have more sap to go around, increasing both the size and flavor of the mature grapes.
The Father’s work on Christians is not a final work but it’s the continuing work of purging. The word purge means "to cleanse" or "to prune" in the context of the allegory of a vine. The Father purges or prunes every branch that bears fruit so that it might bear more fruit.
Every once in a while we’ll see a Christian who looks like they’ve got the world by the tail. I mean, they’ve got the looks, the money, the position and the connections. And yet, after a while things seem to fall apart for them. It’s like God takes away the things they felt so secure about and they’re left with only Him to trust.
When we were at the Word of Life Bible Institute there was a student who pulled up in a brand new Triumph sports car. As he got out I noticed that his luggage consisted of matching leather bags. And he had also had a new guitar with him. It was a Martin D 28. It was probably the most expensive guitar available at the time. I talked to him for about five minutes and in those five minutes he told me about his real estate holdings that consisted of land in just about every state in America. He said he got it all from his grandmother. Listen, he was a very wealthy kid and I think he expected to be treated as such.
He asked the way to the administration office where the rooms were appointed and I told him where it was. Later on I found out that when he was given his cabin he walked in and saw his roommates and walked right back to the office and asked them for another room. You see, the problem was, he not only had to share his cabin with five other guys but they were to put it kindly, five of the stupidest students you had ever met. Now, listen, they were all nice guys but they really had problems when it came to academics. They weren’t as we say, the sharpest knives in the drawer.
So, this guy went right back to the dean of men and said, “I want to be put in a dorm with normal people.” And the dean lean back and said, “These guys need someone to love them. They need someone to help them with their homework or they’re not going to make it. Did you come here to strut your stuff and enjoy yourself or did you come here to learn how to serve the Lord?”
He thought for a minute and he said, “I’ll show you, why I came.” And he went back to that room and made sure all five of those guys graduated with him a year later.
When he left Word of Life he married one of the students and he and she went to the Philippines where they became the dorm parents at a Christian school. And after a couple of years he found out that he had a severe form of cancer and the last I had heard he was undergoing chemotherapy back in the states.
Now, why did all this happen? I think God loved him enough to give him exactly what he needed. And he needed something to show him that he needed God more than anything else. And do you know something? God knows that what we need isn’t always what we want. And listen to this, God also knows that we won’t be grateful when He gives us what we need. And do you know what the best part is? God loves us too much to listen to our whining about how we deserve better.
God prunes the lives of believers to take away whatever is inhibiting their growth. In other words, He prunes the areas of our lives that we might think are really necessary but He knows we will be much better off without.
It’s interesting to note that fruit bearing is a passive activity on the part of the branch. If the branch simply abides in the Vine, then the Vine will produce its fruit. I don’t know about you, but I find that truth liberating! It means that I’m not required to do anything but abide. It’s the Vine’s responsibility to produce His fruit in my life and that frees me from having to work on growing the fruit He wants.
Jesus says, “Every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it, that it may bear more fruit.” And here we see that God wants more from us than we want from ourselves. So what does He do? It says He prunes them. This is a drastic step in which difficult situations come to a Christian’s life which in time will enable him to be more successful spiritually. And the key is, He wants to bring more fruit into our lives. Listen, you might be content to coast along and don’t care about the issue of fruit but God isn’t. In other words, God is going to bless us whether we want it or not.
Do you see His purpose for the difficulties we face? They might come because we’re lazy or on the other hand it might be because we are being faithful but in either case God is going to use them to make our lives more than we intended them to be. And it always makes more sense to work with God rather than to work against Him.
Every once in a while there are things that happen in our lives and we might think that God doesn’t know what He’s doing, if He’s doing anything at all. And the thing we forget is that God is more concerned with our spiritual growth than our physical health. He’s more concerned with our spiritual growth than our financial prosperity. He’s more concerned with our spiritual growth than He is with our happiness. And in case you don’t get it, God is more concerned with our spiritual growth than anything else and that’s because all these other things will pass away with time but spiritually we’ll live forever and He wants us not only to be the best we can be but also to collect all the rewards we can get, so we’ll have something to rejoice about for all of eternity.
What is this fruit that God wants us to bear? It takes many different forms and I just want to mention a few of them.
A For instance, winning others to Christ is called fruit. Paul wrote to the church of Rome in Romans 1:13 and said, “Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you, (but was let hitherto,) that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles.” In other words, he wanted to win some people for the kingdom.
And then in his collection of wisdom sayings, Solomon said in Proverbs 11:30, “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and he who wins souls is wise.” And there are many other pictures in the Bible of the ministry of witnessing and leading others to Christ and they’re all related in some way to the issue of fruit bearing.
For instance, Jesus compared soul winning to catching fish when He said, "Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of men." And then in Matthew 9 He compares the missionary to a reaper or a harvester and then Paul compares the evangelist to an ambassador in 2 Corinthians. The prophet Zechariah pictures the soul-winner as a fireman who is snatching a burning stick from the fire. And these pictures all tell us that there are times when soul-winning can be a dangerous and dramatic experience while at other times we’ll calmly and patiently sow the seed of the Word and wait for the harvest. Sometimes others work with us and we cast the net into the sea and catch many fish and there are also times when we witness personally to one soul and as ambassadors we’ll share the good news of the Gospel and invite them into the kingdom.
In all of this fruit-bearing work of witnessing, evangelism and missions we always have to keep one thing in mind. It’s God who does the work through us. We are simply the instruments in His hands. Or as Jesus said it so simply, "Apart from me you can do nothing."
B Another kind of spiritual fruit is holiness or the sanctified life. Holiness and sanctification are always two sides of the same coin. On the one hand it involves our putting off sin and on the other hand it involves putting on what is good, pleasing and perfect in the sight of God’s.
C A third kind of fruit is generosity as we learn to share with others the blessings God has given us. We are told in Romans 15:28 that when Paul gathered an offering from the Gentiles for the poor saints in Jerusalem, he called the offering "fruit." And one of the characteristics of the early church was that they joyfully shared what they had. It wasn’t communism; it was Christian compassion. In Acts 2:44-45 it says, “All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.”
I don’t believe that God has commanded us to follow their exact example but He has told us to share with those who are in need.
Giving to God and in His name to others is not just something we do; it’s the result of who and what we are.
D A fourth kind of spiritual fruit is our good works. Paul offers a prayer in Colossians 1:10. “And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work.” So, our fruit is our works and we all know that we’re not saved by our works but we were saved for works. As Matthew 5:16 says, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.
The unsaved person on the other hand can’t perform any good works. He is dead as far as spiritual things are concerned, and according to Hebrews 9:14 he can only do "acts that lead to death." But, when the life of Christ moves in, the result is, we will be busy doing service for God, or as Colossians 1:10 says, we will be, "bearing fruit in every good work." And the beautiful thing is that all of our works are tailor-made for each individual believer. Paul says in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” This tells me that God has given each one of us our own ministry to fulfill in the place where He has put us.
E The last fruit I want to mention is the praise and worship of God. The author of Hebrews exhorts us in Hebrews 13:15, “Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise--the fruit of lips that confess his name.” Praise is so very important because praise is what we are made for. God created us to live for the praise of His name and He wants and demands our praise. The Psalmist says in Psalm 66:8, “Praise our God, O peoples, let the sound of his praise be heard.” And in Psalm 96:2, “Sing to the LORD, praise his name.” Praise, after all is the language of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Well, that’s all the good news. God saved us and wants to make our lives fruitful. But, in verse 2 there is also a warning where it says, “He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit.” This refers to God removing people from his vine because they were not fruitful. And it’s a fearful image. What will happen to a branch when it is no longer in the vine? Verse 6 gives us the sad answer, “If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.” Now listen, these branches are not referring to those who are in the world but to the unsaved who are in the church. So these words of judgment are a warning to all of us because all of us need to examine ourselves to see where we stand with the Lord.
I don’t believe a fruitless branch can represent a Christian because there is fruit in every Christian’s life. With some Christians you’ve really got to look a long time to find a couple of lingering grapes, but there will be fruit in the life of every believer and we see this in several verses.
a) In Ephesians 2:10 we are told that, "We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." In other words, the fruit of salvation is good works. You see, if God saved you then He also intends to work through you. I’ve hear so many excuses why people aren’t able to do anything but I’ve also seen a few examples of people who served the Lord in spite of their problems.
I used to visit Aunt Jenny in the Drew and for those of you who never had the privilege of meeting her, she was an old lady in a wheelchair who wasn’t capable of going anywhere but that never stopped her from ministering for the Lord. Whenever she read in the paper that someone had a child die she always wrote them a letter telling them how she had lost eight of her own children and how God had given her the strength to go on. And several times I was visiting someone who had lost a loved one and they said, “I got the loveliest card from Aunt Jenny.” She shared the encouragement with others that she had received from the Lord. And that’s good works!
b) James 2:17, "Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead." So, any life without works is not what we’d call an active faith but a legitimate saving faith is always productive, even if it’s only in a minimal sense. In other words, we’re all called to do whatever we can.
c) Matthew 7:16-17. "Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so, every good tree bringeth forth good fruit but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.” And then verse 20 concludes by saying, “Wherefore, by their fruits ye shall know them." This tells us that the attitudes and actions of a person reveal whether they’re a believer or not. I think Matthew is telling us that there’s no such thing as a believer who is not spiritually productive.
d) Matthew 12:33. "Either make the tree good, and its fruit good, or else make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt; for the tree is known by its fruit." It’s the same idea, you’ve either got it or you don’t.
e) Matthew 3:7-8. "When [John the Baptist] saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth, therefore, fruits befitting repentance" In other words, bring forth fruits that are evidence of your salvation.
f) Romans 6:20-22. "When ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things of which ye are now ashamed?" The answer that’s implied is, you had none, and they had none because they weren’t saved and any fruit they had was the fruit of sin. The contrast comes in verse 22 where he says, "But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life." So, every believer has everlasting life, which is the end of a righteous life and people who don’t bear fruit cannot be believers.
Jesus said that some of His followers are like branches who bear fruit but they need to be pruned and others are like branches that don’t bear fruit and are ultimately they’ll be eliminated by being cast into a fire. And that could be why we see some people come to the church and make a decision and then fall away. God is simply purging His body of those who made a false decision.
To be fruitful, we need to know the Lord and then we need to get into His word. I’ve told you time and time again about the habit I began about thirty years ago where I committed myself to spending ten minutes a day reading the word of God. Not only does this feed me but there are times and I hate to admit it but I’ve been really ticked off at God because I wanted to do my own thing rather than what He wanted me to do but when I got into His word He’s got me right where He wanted me.
Gandhi the famous Hindu once said, “You Christians look after a document containing enough dynamite to blow all civilization to pieces, turn the world upside down and bring peace to a battle torn planet. But you treat it as though it’s nothing more than a piece of good literature.”
Neil Cole said, “Many Western Christians have been deluded into thinking that a verse a day keeps the devil away. For many, their entire intake of God’s word consists of reading a verse off a calendar and listening to a sermon once a week.”
Listen, we all need to remain in Jesus and get into his Word and in order to make this clear Jesus used this image of the vine and branches. After all, everyone knows that branches are completely dependent on the vine. You wouldn’t even have a branch if there were not a vine in the first place! And the branch never outgrows its need for the vine.
When a child is conceived, he or she is totally dependent on the nourishment of her mother’s womb for nine months. And then for some time after that they are dependant on their parents to feed them but children do become independent at some point but we never are. Once we are born again we are eternally dependant on God.
I’m always amazed at the many people who claim to be Christians but have other vines in their lives and we all need to ask ourselves, "How many things do I attach myself to, so I’ll feel good? For some, their vine is their bank account, their education, sexual relationships, popularity, skills, friends, possessions, or social relationships. Some people even think the church is their vine and they’ll attach themselves to a system of religion when the only vine any of us should have is Jesus.
Conclusion: Jesus is the True Vine. His desire is to live His life through you and I so that we might bear fruit for our Heavenly Father. As we close, there are a couple of questions that need to be asked.
1. Are you "in the Vine"? Have you ever been saved? Do you know that you are or are you just waiting until the last day to find out? Listen, if you’re not sure, please see either the Pastor or myself and make sure.
2. If you are in the vine are you "abiding in the Vine"? Are you drawing your strength from Him so that He is able to produce spiritual fruit both in and through you life?" And by fruit I mean the fruit of the Spirit which are listed in Galatians 5 and these are love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and temperance. Are these things growing in you? And can you also think of fruit in terms of souls that you had part of winning for Him. Now listen, I don’t think every one has the ability to be an evangelist or pastor but I do think that all of us can witness or invite someone out to church. And if we’re faithful in doing that God can bless and use our efforts.
3. And in the same sense let me ask you, are you bearing fruit for Jesus today?
Are you being the testimony you should be or are you just coasting through life waiting for the judgment to find out you could have done a lot more and in the end gotten a lot more rewards.
