I AM THE TRUE VINE (You are the branches) - John 15 v 1-11 THIS IS PART 1
This teaching on the vine (actually Vine) is all about abiding in the Lord. It will focus on dwelling and abiding. Just so we see the passage clearly I will put it here:
{{John 15:1 “I am the true vine and My Father is the vinedresser. John 15:2 Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away, and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it that it may bear more fruit. John 15:3 You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. John 15:4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. John 15:5 I am the vine and you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. John 15:6 If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up, and they gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned. John 15:7 If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it shall be done for you. John 15:8 By this is My Father glorified that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples. John 15:9 Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you. Abide in My love. John 15:10 If you keep My commandments you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. John 15:11 These things I have spoken to you that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.”}}
VERSE 1
Turn to John 15. The Lord said He is the True Vine – “I am the True Vine”. (verse 1) Now, at the outset, let us wonder why he introduced the word “true” and did not just say, “I am the Vine,” as He did a bit later. Well, the true vine grows in the perfect soil and in the perfect conditions, and from perfect stock. It does not suffer from blight and other diseases. It produces perfect fruit. The ordinary vine grows in a variety of soils, and ideal conditions are sought for it, but it still produces mixed quality fruit. The perfect conditions of the Lord’s Vine were the hillsides of opposition and the elements that battled Him. It is what a man faces that reveals the true mettle of that man.
This vine metaphor is not a new concept to the Jews who heard these words, as the vine and the vineyard were known symbols for Israel in Old Testament times and one of these we will look at. Turn to Isaiah 5 v 1-7. {{Isaiah 5:1 “Let me sing now for my well-beloved a song of my beloved concerning His vineyard. My well-beloved had a vineyard on a fertile hill, Isaiah 5:2 and He dug it all around, removed its stones, and planted it with the choicest vine. He built a tower in the middle of it and hewed out a wine vat in it. Then He expected it to produce good grapes but it produced only worthless ones.
Isaiah 5:3 “Now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between Me and My vineyard. Isaiah 5:4 What more was there to do for My vineyard that I have not done in it? Why, when I expected it to produce good grapes, did it produce worthless ones? Isaiah 5:5 Now let Me tell you what I am going to do to My vineyard. I will remove its hedge and it will be consumed. I will break down its wall and it will become trampled ground, Isaiah 5:6 and I will lay it waste. It will not be pruned or hoed but briars and thorns will come up. I will also charge the clouds to rain no rain on it.”
Isaiah 5:7 The vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel and the men of Judah His delightful plant. Thus He looked for justice but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, a cry of distress.”}}
Isaiah wrote this of the nation in his time that had departed from Jehovah. It adopted the idolatrous sins of the heathen nations and turned to sacrifices to idols. The rejected the prophets and despised the Lord. Now God gives a parable of The Vineyard. Verse 7 explains the two main symbols – the vineyard is Israel and also Judah which was delightful at the start.
The vineyard started to go mutant and did not produce what God expected and wanted. However look at verses 2 and 4. God did everything for Israel. He could do no more. He attended to every need, but the vineyard produced only worthless and mutant grapes. The worthless vines were the men of Israel. They were malformed vines that corrupted the vineyard of the Lord. He had no choice but to abandon them. The place was left to its own choosing and they chose idols, bloodshed and adultery. Not long after they fell into judgement in the invasion of Babylon.
(a). THE TRUE VINE WAS COMING. However, there was One coming, who was the true vine and would produce only excellent fruit from the Lord’s vineyard. In Isaiah 5, the well-beloved is the Father, Jehovah actually. His vineyard produced only sorrow and failure because of the faithfulness of Israel and Judah. In our passage in John, the Father is the vine keeper. Jesus put all things into the hand of the Father when He was here. He lived in dependence on the Father, still very God, but in human form, to teach us what true dependence really is. The Lord Jesus Christ, the True Vine, fulfilled all that the Father sent Him to do. The vinedresser watched over the True Vine and saw it produce fruit to the glory of the Father.
What was that fruit? Well, for the vine, it had to be the bunches of grapes, greater than those the spies brought back from Caanan when they went secretly to investigate. However, it was not bunches of grapes the true vine was producing (though in symbol it would be) but the multiplication of fruit He produced. The question was asked in the Godhead long ago – {{Isaiah 6 v 8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I. Send me!”}}
In this prophetic psalm, the Lord speaks – {{Psalm 40 v 6 “Sacrifice and meal offering You have not desired. My ears You have opened. Burnt offering and sin offering You have not required. Psalm 40 v 7 Then I said, ‘Behold, I come. In the scroll of the book it is written of me. Psalm 40 v 8 I delight to do Your will, O my God. Your Law is within my heart.’”}}
Look at these verses before us. In Isaiah, there is the question and the answer. “Who will go?” is answered by “Here am I. Send Me.” Now we know that in the first instance, this part of scripture applies to Isaiah himself, as he was commissioned by the Lord, but like parts of scripture, there is this double application. The Lord came willingly as the Lamb of God, as He was affirmed at the first, by John the Baptist. Look at Psalm 40 v 7, where, in this Messianic Psalm, He comes as the Word, written of, in the entire Old Testament scriptures, coming to declare the Father’s message and will. The Word was God and dwelt among us, but don’t miss the expression, “I delight to do Your will, O My God.”
It pleased the Father to bruise Him, to put Him to an open shame, but in all these things, He was doing the Father’s will. He became the sin offering for the world; more correctly, He came as the sin offering for the world. The Lord came as all the I AMs of John’s Gospel. He did not become any of them. He was them eternally. He came as the True Vine that would produce a harvest of joy to eternal life. But He also came as the grain of wheat, and in this there is a parallel with the Vine. Let us look at the scripture – {{John 12 v 23 and Jesus answered them saying, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. John 12 v 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains by itself alone, but if it dies it bears much fruit.”}}
(b). THE CARE OF THE FATHER AND THE SON. What we are taught here is that a life which is lived selfishly unto oneself, produces nothing as it remain alone in isolation, but if that life dies to itself, it produces a harvest. It applies to a farmer’s sowing – the grain that falls into a crack in the seed sower never advances past being an isolated grain, but the grain in the soil produces the head of grain. The Lord spoke this as application to Himself. If He had retained His life and not gone to the cross, then His life would remain His own, but by dying, He has produced much fruit to salvation. You and I today are just a minute part of the fruit. In the parable of the Sower, the grain that went into the soil produced 30, 60 and a 100 fold of harvest. Both the grain of wheat and the Vine produced a harvest to eternal life.
The fig tree and the olive tree are other symbols of Israel, and the vine has great application to them. The Lord is their true vine, the One from whom Israel should have received all their sustenance and spiritual vigour, but they cut themselves off from the vine, and wanted to live in independence so they could sin more and more. May I say that Christians can also try living an independent life from God or partially so, but it does not work, and we will examine that shortly.
It is time we looked at the passage in John 15 v 1-14. You all know the expression “to be in Christ”. It can also mean we are connected with Him in the sense of being grafted into Christ. You know, the vine does not produce fruit. Its purpose is to make the framework and support for the branches, and they produce the fruit. In verse 1 we see Jesus is the True Vine and our Father is the vinedresser (NASB ESV) Gardener (NIV) Husbandman (KJV) Vineyard keeper (HOLMAN). I think the NIV is weak here with gardener. The Greek word really means that the Father is the Owner and also the One who tends to the health, growth, and pruning of the branches on the vines. We therefore have in this verse, that Jesus is the True Vine and the Father tends to the health and grape production of the branches. Do you know what you are? You are the branches.
VERSE 2
This verse is so important as it explains the very reason for this teaching to us. The vineyard owner wants fruit, good fruit in clusters, which will be for his joy. Likewise the Father wants to see fruit in us too, even overflowing clusters. There are two cases given to us – the unproductive branch is taken away; the productive branch is pruned so that it produces even better fruit.
Take a quick look at verse 4. Do you see the word “abide” – “remain” in the NIV? In verse 2 do you see, “he takes it away”? This passage has resulted in some wrong teaching getting into the church and the verses here are misapplied. Young Christians can be fearful they are not measuring up and may have slipped and therefore have lost their salvation as if God cut off their branch. I just want you to keep that in mind as we look carefully at what the Lord is actually saying.
ALL ABOUT FRUIT BEARING NOT SALVATION
Firstly, let it be said emphatically, that THIS PASSAGE HAS NOTHING WHATEVER TO DO WITH SALVATION. Not for one second let that be in your thoughts. So, then, what is the passage all about? It is not hard to work out because it is self explanatory. It is all about fruit bearing, producing fruit for the vinedresser, or as we know, The Father. It is all about a Christian being in Christ and producing fruit. When the vinedresser inspects his vines, and sees a branch that is not thriving, or looks sick, what does he do? Well, he takes it away.
Careful, now. Not to do with salvation, but usefulness. There are many Christians the Lord can not use because they are sickly and worldly and they are producing no fruit. They are not productive for fruit bearing. If you are like that, the Lord can not use you to produce all the Christian graces we should be showing. It does not mean loss of salvation, but it does mean loss of service. You can no longer be useful in the Lord’s service. He cuts you off from service, until you come back to Him and allow the Spirit of God to have His way with you afresh.
Then in this verse 2, there are those who experience the pruning, yet the pruning is for those who are producing fruit, which may seem strange to us at first. The purpose for the pruning is stated – that there may be even more fruit-bearing. How many of us like pruning, that is, like to be pruned? I don’t. The branch may have a small side shoot that is starting to grow, which if left unattended, will cause a lesser yield on the branch, so the shoot must be snipped off. The position of the branch may need to be altered and the vinedresser will do that, for he knows exactly what must be done for each branch. So it is, in our lives. We can develop side shoots that will not be good for us, and we may need a little twisting and re-altering and stability. Sometimes we may need a little clean up. (How are branches cared for).
GOD’S DISCIPLINE IN OUR LIVES
The Christian has the most perfect Vinedresser – our Father in heaven truly loves every single branch that is attached to the True Vine who is Christ, so He will prune the branches and attend to any of their wayward tendencies. He does it in love, for not only, does He want the best harvest, but He wants each branch to be the very best. He wants you to shine in glory in this world. He wants you to stand out as being part of the Vine. He wants you to produce much fruit. Above all, He wants you to become more and more like the Vine as you clothe yourself in Christ, being made conformable to His image.
Discipline is not pleasant if God needs to chastise us, but the results are splendid. Any pruning the Father does to you, is to bring you closer to the Vine, our dear Lord Jesus Christ, and to make you more strongly attached to the Vine. The most notable passage in the New Testament dealing with discipline is the Hebrews one, this one – {{Hebrews 12 v 5 and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons, “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by Him, Heb 12 v 6 for those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He scourges every son whom He receives.” Heb 12 v 7 It is for discipline that you endure. God deals with you as with sons, for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? Heb 12 v 8 If you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Heb 12 v 9 Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them. Shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? Heb 12 v 10 They disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness. Heb 12 v 11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful, yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”}} (the abundant clusters of grapes).
My dear fellow Christians, this is what the Lord wants for us – to “yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness”. You know, the word “yield” has two meanings in English. Both are contained in this statement which is what God wants from all His redeemed people – [Yield yourselves to Christ, in order that you might yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness.]
God bless you all. That ends PART 1. PART 2 will follow on in the next posting.
ronaldf@aapt.net.au
