Every person has been put on this planet for two reasons, first, to know God and secondly, to show that God in their life! So basically, everything less is just a waist of time!
The average Christian doesn’t know the difference between union with Christ and communion with Christ: (verse 5 is key)
· When we come to Christ we are a branch – that’s union.
· When we bear fruit as a branch – that’s communion.
Now get this…salvation commences with a union, it continues with communion and it consummates with a reunion! Mark it down; communion is the hardest part of the Christian life!
LifePoint: To abide in Christ is to experience an extreme connection with God!
So let’s look at:
1. The Fruitfulness God Demands. Vs. 1,2
a. The Process.
What is a vine? Well vines have shoots, small buds, then foliage, then a flower and finally some fruit. This is Jesus.
What is a vinedresser? He works in the vineyard with only one interest in mind, he want to find fruit. He’s not interested in the foliage or the flower, only in the fruit!
Vs. 2
“Take away” = literally to lift up. To raise an object up, holding something. Used in the Bible many times in raising a child.
So what does this mean for us? Sometimes the branches on the grape vine sage to the ground, the branches get dirty, insect infested and a lack of sunshine, etc.
So the vinedresser comes along and lifts up the sagging branches! This is exactly what God does to his children at times. If we are not walking in the Sonshine of His love, walking in sin, God is duty bound to lift us up back to the place He wants us! Lifting up may come in many different ways…through discipline, etc.
Isn’t that just like God in our lives? If we are really honest about it, we can only say that God is always good to His people!
Remember, God is determined to bring us closer and closer to the image of Christ everyday of our lives!
Romans 8:29 “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to image of His Son.”
“Predestined” = marked out, appointed, determine beforehand. May I say that God marked out our lives long before we ourselves confessed Christ as Lord.
Verse 2 is debated among scholars…if this teaches that a Christian can lose his or hers salvation, then it contradicts many other verses in the Bible:
John 10:28 “And I give them eternal life and they shall never perish neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.”
John 18:9 “…Of those whom you gave Me, I have lost none.”
Romans 8:35 “Who shall separate us from the love of God.”
But let’s see this word “lift up” used in the O.T. where this word originates…
Isaiah 63:9
Exodus 19:4
Then Jesus uses the same word again in…
Matthew 11:28,29… “Come unto Me, all you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take ( same word as in vs.2) My yoke upon you. Let Me teach you, because I am humble and gentle, you will find rest for your souls.” NLT
LifePoint: No branch is ever to be barren of fruit, but a rather a bearer of fruit!
b. The Progress.
God wants every Christian to maximize the production of fruit in their lives!
In the best vineyards in the world of yesterday and still today, the vinedresser makes or breaks the progress of the vineyard! It takes about 5 years of experience and the proper education to be qualified for this job. Today millions of dollars are at stake!
He must not only know how to cut, but how much to cut and when to cut! These are some of the secrets to the best vineyards in the world.
Vs. 2 tells us the progress. First, we get saved. Secondly, we begin to bear fruit, but God isn’t satisfied until we are bearing much fruit!
How does a vinedresser prune a branch? Two ways:
· He cuts away the fruitless part of the branch.
Key: every branch not producing fruit is sucking from the producing branches.
· Secondly, he goes to the producing branch and looks for dirt or contaminates and cares for it.
How does God prune us? First let’s look at the word.
“Prune” = literally to cleanse.
Vs. 3: “You are already clean” (Christians are already spiritually and postionally clean)
Careful…if we get the wild idea of rebelling! Tests, trials and tribulation could be a steady diet for us. This is God’s way of getting His huge pruning shears and cutting away the dead parts of our lives or cleansing the part of our lives that’s in need.
Hebrews 4:11, 12
2. The Faithfulness God Desires.
How does the branch produce fruit? Vs. 5a
The word “abiding” in used 10 times in this chapter.
LifePoint: The branch does not produce the fruit. The branch only bears the fruit. The vine produces everything!
Vs. 4
The branch can only produce the foliage and the flower, but only the vine produces the fruit. Without the vine the strongest branch is helpless as the weakest branch. The most beautiful branch is as ugly as the ugliest branch!
Vs. 5 b “…For without Me you can do nothing.”
What does it mean to abide in Christ?
a. Studying the Word of God. Vs. 7
When the child of God looks into the Word of God and sees the Son of God, he is changed by the Spirit of God into the image of God, by the grace of God, for the glory of God!
b. Knowing the will of God. Vs. 10
c. Doing the work of God. Vs. 5
You see, the most important part of your Christian life is not the preaching, singing, giving and serving, but rather the part of your life that only you and God see. Because it’s this part of your life that keeps you unfruitful, unforgiving and unreliable for God!
Here’s a simple equation to help our understanding:
Fellowship with Christ + faithfulness to Christ = fruitfulness for Christ! So, if we are not fruitful, check out this equation in your life!
3. The Fruitlessness God Detests.
Verse 6 is also a highly debated verse. If not understood properly this verse will mess up your theology!
First let’s examine:
· “If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered.” Notice that the subject changes…Jesus is not talking about the same people as in verse 1-5!
· Then who are these that are thrown out? Simple, those who have a faulty connection to Jesus. You say, “Is this possible”? Yes! Judas was a good example!
· Remember, a branch is only good for two things: bearing fruit or burning in fire!
Matthew 3:7-12
(The context shows an immersing of judgment)
Revelation 20:11-15 “…Great white throne judgment.”
Key: A person is not saved because he abides in Christ; rather a person abides in Christ because he is saved! Do you see the difference?
A fruitless branch is not a failed Christian, but rather a false Christian! Got it? Put in another way…salvation that fizzles at the end was faulty at the beginning.
So now, logically the rest of the verse must pertain to the new subject matter!
· John shifts pronouns, from 1st to 2nd person, now to the 3rd person…”they” and “them”.
Who are the “them” and “they”? Better yet, who is gathering and what is burning? That’s the question!
· “They” = angels (not men as the KJV says)
Matthew 13:28-40
Matthew 16: 27
Nowhere in scripture do angels have anything to do with a Christian’s judgment, only Christ does! True, angels did carry the beggar to Abraham’s bosom in Luke 16…not to judgment!
Psalm 103:20 “Bless the Lord, you His angels, who excel in strength, who do His word, heeding the voice of the Lord.”
· “Them” = those in the first part of verse 6. Unsaved or the tares in the kingdom. Jesus does teach that tares and wheat would be together in this world.
Key: even if I didn’t have any other Bible verse to look at, I still could not believe this is describing a Christian. Why? Because if this verse teaches that a believer is cast into the fire, at that point there’s never a chance for that person to come back to God or repentance. You’re goose is cooked!
And think about this…if you are predestined to be like Jesus, but wait, what if the devil lures you away for Jesus? First, do you really believe that could happen? Secondly, if he could do that then why hasn’t he done that already? If he could and hasn’t, hasn’t the devil been good to you? You see, based on this, now you are going to heaven on the goodness of the devil!!!
You see how messed up our theology can get sometimes?
Take this thought with you today…the reality of our faith is marked by the quality of our fruit! No faith, no fruit, little faith, little fruit. Which one describes us today?
Who ever said that being a Christian is easy?
Chuck Colson serving a long prison sentence for his Watergate crimes was the last one to serve out his sentence because all the others were eventually pardoned. He is not a Christian yet, but he is starting to go to the Bible studies and God is beginning to soften his heart.
Several years go by, still in prison and not yet a Christian, but still going to the prison Bible studies. Chuck gets a phone call from the 5th ranking Republican and after some small talk he said to Chuck, “Hey Chuck, you know if there was a law on the books that allowed someone else to serve the time for another, you know I would do that for you.”
Right then Chuck said, “I cried like a baby because for the first time in my life I finally realized just what Jesus did for me!”
