The KJV says: Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.
The NLT (The New Livining Translation says): Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful, unless you remain in me.
The introduction here shows us that connections matters.
Tell your neighbor: Don’t lose your signal I’m staying connected.
We live in a world that’s always connected by some type of signal, connection, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 3g, 4g, and even 5g. We have Snapchat, TikTok, and FaceTime, all of these different connections that connect us to the world, and yet many young people, and old feel disconnected from peace, purpose, and God.
I’ve learned that you can have 5 bars on your phone but still have zero bars in your spirit.
You can scroll all night and still feel empty in the morning.
But I love what Jesus said in John 15:4, Remain in me, and I’ll remain in you.
He was saying stay connected me. Because the moment you unplug from this source, you lose your strength. You now have an LTG connection which is most likely you are running a 3g connection, in a 5g Spiritual world.
Here’s what was happening:
Jesus is speaking to His disciples right before His crucifixion. He’s sitting with them, teaching them about what is to come.
And in that time, vineyards were everywhere, grapes, vines, and branches were common visuals in the Jewish culture., and everyone knew that a branch could not survive if it wasn’t connected to the vine.
So, Jesus used this real world image, to explain a spiritual truth:
He say’s, I’m the vine, which is the main source, and you are the branches, and if you disconnect from me, your life loses its flow.
He wasn’t giving them a farming lesson, He was giving them a faith warning.
He was saying: Don’t allow the noise of the world make you lose your spiritual signal.
And that message fits right into our generation.
Because we live in a time where people are connected to everything but Christ.
We check our notifications before we pray.
We scroll through feeds before we feed our spirit.
We talk to followers on the book, the gram before we talk to the Father.
We plug in our phones before we plug into the presence of God.
We update our status before we check out our spiritual levels.
If there is no connection, no power.
But here is the link for us to stay charged up.
When life gets loud, we need to stay connected.
When you feel weak, we need to stay connected.
When everybody else falls away, you stay connected.
Here are some truths about staying connected.
It is the source that gives the strength. What do you mean Pastor?
A branch doesn’t make the power, it receives it.
That means we don’t have to have it all together, so we need to stay connected.
The vine (Jesus) has everything we need: he has the peace, the joy, the directions, that healing, and the confidence.
And watch this: You don’t charge your phone once a year and expect it to last.
So don’t expect your faith to stay strong, if you only talk to God on Sundays.
Here it is Saints: Disconnection Leads to Weakness
When your phone loses signal, it starts searching harder for a connection.
Every phone constantly monitors the strength and quality of the tower it’s connected to.
If the signal drops below a certain threshold (like when you go into a dead zone, basement, or rural area), the phone recognizes that it has lost connection.
So our phone’s modem (the radio chip inside) automatically starts scanning radio frequencies used by your carrier.
It looks for:
It’s the same truth spiritually. When we stop praying, worshipping, or staying in the Word, our souls start searching, for other things to fill the void, and if they are not of God then they connect to the wrong things.
Just like a cell phone, our spirit are designed to stay connected not to a tower, but to the Source: God.
But sometimes, life takes us into spiritual dead zones, places of hurt, distraction, or discouragement, where the connection are weak or lost.
The Spirit Knows Something’s Missing.
When our signals with God drops, our spirit senses it.
You don’t feel the same peace, joy, or clarity. And that’s when our spiritual modem starts saying, something’s off, and I’ve lost a connection.
But here’s the good news: Jesus doesn’t disconnect from us, in fact, He waits for us to reconnect to him.
He’s not putting us down when we failed. Instead, He’s saying, I’m waiting on you to come back online.
Here it is: when we are connected, connection produces fruit.
Jesus said, You will bear much fruit.
Fruit means results, change, growth, maturity, and peace.
When you stay connected, you don’t have to chase blessings, blessings will chase you.
And when you stay connected long enough, and people will start saying, there’s something different about you.
Here it is. That’s the fruit showing up.
So, Jesus says Abide in me. The word abide means to remain, stay, live, or dwell continually.
Jesus isn’t asking for an occasional visit, instead He’s calling for a constant connection.
To abide in Christ means:
To depend on Him daily.
To remain in His presence and His Word.
To let His Spirit live freely within you.
It’s not a momentary faith; it’s a lifestyle of connection.
And as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself.
Jesus reminds us that a branch can’t survive apart from the vine, in fact, it will withers and dies.
In the same way, we cannot produce true spiritual fruit by our own strength or effort.
Without Christ, we may look busy, but we won’t be fruitful.
Without His flow of life, we’re just leaves with no life.
There was a teenager who loved her phone. It had every app, every picture, and every playlist.
But one day, as she was traveling to the countryside all of a sudden she had no signal.
She tried everything: turned it off, and turning it back on.
She waved it in the air, and even climbed up on a rock, but still no connection.
She was frustrated until someone said, young lady, the problem is that you are too far from the tower. You need to move closer to where the signal is strong.
And that’s when it hit her, the phone wasn’t broken; it was just out of range.
That’s how it is with God sometimes.
It’s not that we are just broken.
It’s not that we are a mistake.
It’s just that we are out of range from the master.
And all we have to do is move closer to the Source.
Don’t lose your signal, but say, I don’t know about you, but I’m staying connected.
When the world gets crazy. stay connected.
When life gets hard. stay connected.
Why should I stay connected pastor? Because connection brings power.
This world will try to pull your signal down, with stress, comparison, distractions, and fear. But Jesus said, say in me, and If you stay connected to Him:
You might have some trouble times, but you will have peace in chaos.
You will have purpose, in confusion.
You will have power, in weakness.
So plug back in.
Reconnect.
And charge your Spirit.
Because when you stay connected to the Source, you’ll never lose your signal again.
