4 Reasons To Stay in the Vine
John 15: 1-8
Jesus had been talking to his disciples about effective relationships between God and man. As it is now, there was a lot of knowledge about God, even by the elect of the day, but there was little personal relationship with Him. So the Lord began to describe the union between Himself and his church under the parable of the vine.
If you go and look at a tree, plant, or even a grape vine, you know that it all has roots. In the roots the life is received into the thing. It is through the roots that water, nutrients, and minerals are taken in. But, if the roots are taken up, then life will end. Also, if you take a limb off a tree, or a leaf off a plant, and leave it by itself, it will soon wither away and die. Jesus is trying to say the same thing in this passage. In verse 5 He says, “…for without me ye can do nothing…”. Plainly stating, without Him we can not, and will not survive.
There is a thrust in society for personal independence.
1. children are taught not to have to obey parents
2. they are taught to isolate from family
3. married couples divorce
4. people go against healthy traditions
All of this is done in the name of independence. But, God is into unity. Most especially in the spiritual life, He wants us to be unified with Him. We need to stay a part of the vine.
4 REASONS TO STAY IN THE VINE
(1)v.2 “he purgeth it…”. Whether or not we believe it, it is vital to our success that he purges us. What this means is He takes off all the dead, no good stuff, only to allow the good part to continue to grow. **we need to let God rid us of some bad stuff**
(2)v.5 “bringeth forth much fruit…”. The question must be asked, do we want a little blessing, or a big blessing. We should know that there are more blessings than we will ever know, if we will only believe God for it. And Jesus said, if we would stay in Him, we would not just bear a little fruit, but much fruit.
(3)v.7 “ye shall ask what ye will…”. There are times in life when it seems like we can’t get prayer answered for anything. We pray, fast, claim scriptures, etc. but nothing seems to work. A lot of the time, though, our problem is in the fact that we are not connected like we should be. Jesus said if we abide in Him, and His words in us, no matter what it is, just ask and its yours. Many times we can’t win the battle, and the real reason we can’t is because we are not in tune with Him.
(4)v.8 “Herein is my Father glorified…” The greatest reason of all, is so the Father can gain glory through your life. He does this by the things He does through you to bless others. (gifts of spirit, prayer for sick, helpless, bound, bless someone financially, etc.) It’s all about Him, not about us!!!
