The True Vine — John 15

0:00 Turn in your Bibles to John chapter 15. I'd like to go through the first eight verses. We'll see how that goes. So Jesus begins this this chapter by saying, I am the true vine. Now when Jesus qualifies something with an adjective like I am the true vine, ask yourself why he's saying that because there's a vine that's not true somewhere along the line.

0:36 And if you look in the Old Testament, hold your finger here and go to for example Isaiah chapter five. Israel was tasked with the purpose of revealing the one true God to the world. And in Isaiah five, the Lord presents Israel as the choice vine. So in verse one, he says, 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.

1:19 He dug it all around, removed the stones, planted it with the choicest vine. He built a tower in the middle of it and hewed out a wine vat and so on and so forth. Verse four or verse three. Oh, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it?

1:47 Why when I expected it to produce good grapes, did it produce worthless ones? So now let me tell you what I'm going to do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge and it will be consumed. I will break down its wall. It will become trampled ground.

2:06 I will lay it waste. It will not be pruned or hoed. Briars and thorns will come up. I will also charge the clouds to rain no more... No rain on it.

2:15 For the vineyard of the lord of the hosts is the house of Israel. And the men of Judah, his delightful plant. So in the old testament where he's talking about, I'm going to remove its hedge and it'll be consumed, the Assyrians came along, took care of the Northern Kingdom. Babylonians came along, took care of the Southern Kingdom. God brought the Southern Kingdom back, gave them the same task, you need to make me known to the world.

3:13 Lord gave them their land back, but spiritually speaking and fulfilling their purpose in revealing the one true God, they are still failing miserably. So the Lord Jesus here is saying, I'm the true vine, my father is the vinedresser and you, you're the branches. I'm the vine that's going to reveal the one true God and I'm gonna do it through you, the branches. Which is what he's gonna get at in in verse eight. By bearing fruit as the branches you're gonna prove to be my disciples.

3:53 You're going to prove to whom you belong. Okay? Now there's lots of other passages in the Old Testament. If you're taking notes, can just give you some references. Hosea 10, Psalm 80, Jeremiah two, Jeremiah 12, they're dealing with Israel as the the vine.

4:58 The moment we place our faith in Christ, we're saved. We have a relationship with the Father. A relationship that cannot, under any circumstance, change. We also have the idea of fellowship with God. Our fellowship can change, our relationship cannot.

5:29 And I'm gonna get into more details on that in a moment, but you have to make those distinctions. Salvation versus fruit bearing, relationship versus fellowship. This chapter is about fruit bearing. This chapter is about fellowship. This chapter is not about your relationship.

5:56 It is not about salvation. If it were, then we've got some serious problems. It's not. Keep in mind this is a fruit bearing passage, not a salvation passage. This is a passage dealing with fellowship, not relationship.

6:40 These branches are believers. They're in Christ And when you look at, for example, Paul's writings, Paul talks about this a lot and especially, for example, in Ephesians one. He says, we were chosen in him. In him we have redemption. In him we have an inheritance.

7:06 In him we've been sealed. That's a relationship. We are talking about individuals in Christ. Falling asleep in Jesus, the dead in Christ. Those are all believers.

7:25 So this passage is dealing with those who are believers and it's gonna talk about their fellowship as believers. Okay? So he says, every branch in me that does not bear fruit. So we're dealing with fruit bearing. So here's a believer who is unfruitful.

7:54 And that unfortunately is very possible. Peter talks about this in second Peter one where he mentions this list of qualities. And he says, if these qualities are yours and are increasing, It's not enough for us to simply have the qualities that Peter's talking about, they have to be increasing. Otherwise, we're just stagnant and if I had a choice of drinking out of a stagnant puddle or a nice flowing stream, I'd choose the flowing stream. But if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful.

8:44 If they're not yours, if they're not increasing, then it is possible to be a useless unfruitful Christian. You're still saved, but you're not very useful. In fact, he goes on and he says, you're blind and shortsighted. So we're dealing with believers here. Believers who are not bearing fruit.

9:10 They're unfruitful. They're not manifesting the fruit of the spirit. They're not manifesting any fruit for that matter that would identify them as a believer. He takes away. Now here's where we get into all sorts of problems.

10:01 Sometimes it's used with a negative connotation. Let me give you some for instances. In John chapter eight verse 59, they picked up stones to throw at him. The words pick up is the word I wrote. In other words, they took up, they lifted up stones.

10:27 That's a positive thing. Not not that they were going to stone him, but the the the pack of the fact of lifting something up is a positive thing. In John chapter five verse 10, they they talked to the man who was carrying his palate. The word carry there is the word iro. He was carrying something.

10:50 In John ten twenty four, it's translated to keep. In John eleven forty one, Jesus raised his eyes. That's the same word. Iroh in positive sense means to pick up, to carry, to keep, to raise. And when we when we use that translation here, so you've got these unfruitful believers.

11:25 He's not throwing them away. The first thing he does is he picks them up. He carries them. He keeps them. He raises them.

11:36 Think of a vine. I don't know if you've ever seen grapevines, but sometimes those branches get pretty long and the fruit hangs on the ground. And then it gets rotted and moldy and the vine dresser comes up and he picks up the branch and he ties it to the vine so that it can bear fruit. When I plant tomatoes, sometimes my tomato bushes, they're enormous. And if I didn't put a cage around them, everything would be on the ground.

12:09 So, I have to pick up my tomato branches and I have to tie them off so that they bear fruit and that fruit doesn't rot on the ground. That is exactly what John is getting at here. The Lord is taking these fruitless, unfruitful branches and he's picking them up. He's tying them up. He's raising them up off the ground in order to help them to bear fruit.

12:39 Passage in in Psalm 37. The Psalmist says, the steps of a man are established by the Lord. He delights in his way when he falls. And and I like that he uses when and not if because it's gonna happen. When he falls, he will not be hurled headlong because the Lord is the one who holds his hand.

13:09 When a believer is unfruitful, the first thing the Lord does is not throw him away. The first thing the Lord does is pick the believer up. He's holding his hand. Now, like I said, Iroh also has some negative connotations. In John one twenty nine, behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

13:37 In John eleven thirty nine, remove the stone. Iroh has both a positive and a negative connotation and one of the interesting things about the Gospel of John, John has a tendency of using words that have multiple meanings and can be ambiguous. And in most of those cases, both of the meanings are true. You just have to put them in the right order. And the order here is first positive and then negative.

14:15 In other words, when there is an unfruitful believer, the first thing the Lord does is pick that believer up. Carries him, raises him up, keeps him, ties him to the vine so that he can bear fruit. Doing whatever he possibly can to help that believer bear fruit. Now, what happens if the believer continues in defiance, continues in rebellion? Well, eventually, the Lord is gonna say, okay, enough.

14:51 And he might remove that believer. Remove that believer taken out of the picture in this life. You wanna live an unfruitful life? Alright. But then, I'm not gonna let you soil my testimony.

15:04 And there are cases in the New Testament where the believer is actually taken out of this life. For example, remember Ananias and Sapphira? Yeah. They they got, removed. First Corinthians eleven twenty, those Corinthians that were messing around with the Lord's Supper and dishonoring the Lord in the process, Paul says, many among you are weak and sick and in number sleep.

15:36 And he doesn't mean they're sleeping in the back row. They're they're dead. They they were taken away. But, not after, not until the Lord spurred them on, encouraged them, rebuked them. And, that's the first thing the Lord does.

16:30 He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. And and again, I'll go go back to my tomatoes. I'm brutal with my tomatoes. Brutal. When when they start putting out flowers, I will go in with a scissors and I will cut off every branch that is not...

16:51 That doesn't have a flower on it. So that all the energy from that that's going into the plant goes to the fruit. And sometimes my tomato plants in the early summer look rather naked. But by the fall, I've got so many tomatoes, I don't know what to do with them. I actually put them in bags and leave them by people's stores.

17:15 Here, have some tomatoes. And that's what's going on here. You've got a fruitful believer and the Lord prunes that believer so that he can bear more fruit. Now the word prune here is the verb of the adjective in verse three, clean. So prune and clean are essentially the same word And there's a difference between what's going on in verse two and what's going on in verse three.

18:26 From a fellowship perspective, we need daily cleansing. First John chapter one. He says, first John verse nine, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But, we're already clean. So again, you have to make this distinction between are we talking relationship here or are we talking fellowship here.

19:13 If it's in the past tense, it's a relationship thing. You are already clean. If it's in the present tense, it's a fellowship thing. Remember when Jesus was talking to the disciples in John 13, he's washing their feet. And Peter, who really needs to learn to be quiet sometimes and just sit there and accept it.

19:41 Said, no, give me a bath, wash my hands and my feet and my head. Jesus said, no, no, no, no. You've already you've already bathed. You only need to wash your feet. You're already clean.

19:58 But, you've gone outside and now your feet are dirty. You need to wash your feet. From a salvation perspective, we are already clean. We have been forgiven. From a fellowship perspective, we go about in the world.

20:18 We get our feet dirty. We fall into sin. We succumb to temptation. We need to deal with it. Our sins have been taken away but now when I do it, I'm out of fellowship.

20:35 My relationship's intact but I'm out of fellowship. And that's what John is getting at in first John one nine. That's what Jesus is getting at in John 13. You're already clean, but your feet are dirty. So the branches that bear fruit, he keeps on pruning them.

20:55 He keeps on cleansing them so that they can keep on bearing fruit. And then he says, you're already clean from a relationship perspective, from a salvation perspective. And then he says, oh the reason they're clean is because of the word I've spoken to you. Abide in me in I in you. And here again, you have to make this distinction.

21:38 Turn to John chapter six. There are three verses that... I should have brought my PowerPoint, but Timothy would have mocked me. Three verses that you should look at. Verse 40, verse 54, and verse 56.

22:16 Okay. Verse 40, everyone who beholds the son and believes in him, what are the results? He will have eternal life and I myself will raise him up on the last day. Okay. So keep the statement, everyone who beholds the son and believes in him, then the results, eternal life, resurrection.

22:43 Verse 54, he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood, the result, eternal life, resurrection. Which means that beholding the son and believing in him is the same as eating his flesh and drinking his blood. Now, the Jews thought that was rather gross and they were thinking, cannibalism? And then they stopped following him. Well, look at verse 56.

23:15 He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood, he adds one more thing at the end, abides in me and I in him. So the one who beholds the son and believes in him is the same one who eats his flesh and drinks his blood. Those are synonymous statements. Three fold result, eternal life, resurrection and abiding in Christ. Those are all statements of fact.

23:47 The abiding in verse 56 is a statement of fact. Every believer abides in Christ in terms of their relationship. They remain in him. He's not telling them to remain, he's saying you do remain. John 10, my sheep will never perish.

24:16 No one can snatch them out of my hand. No one can snatch them out of my father's hand. We remain in him. Peter says, we're protected by the power of God for salvation ready to be revealed. We abide in Christ.

24:34 Chapter six is talking about salvation. It's talking about our relationship with Christ. It's a statement of fact when he says, they abide in me. Chapter 15 is not a statement of fact. Chapter 15 is a command because we're not talking about salvation here, We're not talking about our relationship here.

25:07 We're talking about fellowship. We're told to abide. We're told to stay in fellowship. We're told to bear fruit. So you have to keep those two concepts separate.

25:24 Just because Jesus uses the same word abide in six and in 15, doesn't mean he's talking about the same thing. You have to keep them in their contexts. So in chapter six, we abide because we are saved because we have a relationship with him. Chapter 15, we're told to abide in terms of fellowship. Think of the prodigal son.

25:59 When the prodigal son went and left his father's house to go and feed pigs, In terms of his relationship, was he still his father's son? Of course he was, nothing can change that. He certainly was not in fellowship with his father and that's the difference between chapter six and chapter 15. Chapter six, he is a son of his father. He wasn't living with his father, in fact, when he left and he demanded his inheritance, essentially what he was saying to his father is, I wish you were dead so I could get my inheritance.

26:48 And then he left, father gave it to him and he left. But he was still his father's son. He still had a relationship with his father even though he was out of fellowship with his father. And, we have to keep those distinctions in mind because if we insert relationship into chapter 15 and we talk about being taken away, what, we can lose our relationship? If that's true, then his sheep can perish and somebody can pluck them out of his hand and somebody can pluck them out of the father's hand and we are not protected by the power of God.

27:33 But chapter 15 isn't about relationship, it's about fellowship, it's about fruit bearing. So he tells them, abide in me in terms of your fellowship. You already have a relationship, now stay in fellowship. And I in you, that would never change. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, which makes perfect sense.

28:02 I mean, if I were to cut off my tomato branches and leave them sitting on the ground, well, they're certainly not gonna bear any tomatoes. So neither can you unless you abide in me. If we are not in fellowship, we cannot bear fruit. It it it's it simply isn't possible. A believer out of fellowship, a believer not abiding in Christ in terms of fellowship cannot bear fruit.

28:36 I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit. Not just fruit, he bears much fruit. And that's what he's gonna get at again in verse eight. For apart from me, you can do nothing.

28:56 We we really can't. I mean we we can try and we might convince ourselves that we're doing a lot for Christ even though we're not in fellowship with him, but we're really not. At least we're not doing anything that's going to be of eternal value. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away as a branch. So here here, if if we bring our relationship and salvation into this, then we got some huge problems.

29:32 We're not talking relationship, we're talking fellowship. So any believer, anyone that is not in fellowship with me is thrown away as a branch and dries up. The believer who is out of fellowship is useless. They, now here's where your translation, what translation you use is going to help you understand this. New American Standard says, they gather them and cast them into the fire and they're burned.

30:10 King James hits the nail right on the head. Men gather them and cast them into the fire and they're burned. God isn't casting the believer away, Men are. So here's a believer who is out of fellowship, he's unfruitful, he's talking the talk but he is not walking the walk. And those in the world, they see this.

30:59 You Christians. You know, I I've I've heard it. You know, people especially believers that are high profile, very public, and then they fall into some sin and all believers are lumped into the same category. Mocked, ridiculed, scorned. An unfruitful, out of fellowship believer, for all practical purposes, is useless to those around him.

31:33 And the world has no use for that. You know, not that the world has a use for Christians, but you know, when things get bad, who do who do they turn to? Take a look at Philippians chapter three. Here's the type of person we're talking about here. Verse verse 18.

32:01 Many walk, of whom I often told you and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ. Out of fellowship believers can actually be enemies of the cross. Whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things. The world has no use for that. These individuals are useless to those around them and the world just casts them aside.

32:37 The world burns them. They should be like Colossians three. Keep seeking the things above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things of the earth. Remember in the Old Testament in second Samuel 12, David commits adultery, tries to cover it up by murdering Uriah, He gets confronted.

33:14 Second Samuel twelve fourteen, because of this deed you have given occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. Titus chapter two verses four and five, Paul encourages the young women, be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, subject to their own husbands, why? So that the word of God will not be dishonored. Sometimes we as believers are useless to those around us because we're not in fellowship, and they just cast us aside. They they burn us.

33:59 Take a look at Matthew chapter five verse 13. You are the salt of the earth. If the salt has become tasteless, now here you have to put yourself back into that setting. Salt, our salt and their salt are two very different things. Our salt is never not salty, because we get it out of a little Morton container.

34:29 But their salt wasn't like that. They would gather up the salt from wherever the Dead Sea and little dirt and gravel and whatnot. And they put it in a little pouch and they would use that, dip it in their soup a few times to season their soup and then they'd set it aside. Well after a while, all of the salt in the pouch is leached out. All you got is little gravel left.

34:56 Your your salt pouch is now saltless. Well, what are you going to do with it? Well, you can't make it salty again. You have to get an entire new pouch. It's no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.

35:17 You are the salt of the earth. If you become saltless, unfruitful, you're thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. You're you're burned by the world. That's the idea. Verse seven, If you abide in me and my words abide in you.

35:46 Now in Greek there are four ways of saying if and depending on which way you say it will determine the consequence. This particular one is what's called a third class condition. In other words, you could replace the word if with when. When you abide in me and my words abide in you. So when you're in fellowship with me and my words are abiding and in fellowship with you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done.

36:36 Both of those conditions must be true, abiding in him and his words abiding in us, which I think if the first is true, the second is also going to be true. But here we have to be careful again. This isn't a blank check. You know, usually when when Jesus says, ask whatever you wish and it will be done, there there's always a condition. Always.

37:05 He doesn't just say, oh, you're a believer, ask whatever you wish and I'll do it. There's always a condition. If you're in fellowship with me and my words are abiding in you, by all means, ask. Other conditions, down in verse 16, whatever you ask in my name. That's a condition.

37:31 He's not saying whatever you ask of the father he'll give it to you. Whatever you ask of the father in my name. That's essentially saying, you're gonna ask for something that I myself would have asked. In Matthew 21, he talks about believing. It's one thing to ask, it's another to believe that you're gonna receive it.

38:00 In first John three, because we keep his commandments. In other words, we're obedient. I think all of those go along with what he's getting at here. If we're in fellowship and his words are abiding in us, then by all means, ask and it'll be done for you. And then he says, my father is glorified in this.

38:26 You wanna glorify God? Bear much fruit. He doesn't just say bear fruit, bear much fruit. And that really goes along with what he says in verse five. You are the branches.

38:49 He who abides in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit. For apart from me, you can do nothing. That's how God will be glorified. If we wanna glorify the Father, we need to bear much fruit, not just fruit. And so prove to be my disciples.

39:10 You wanna prove to the world that you belong to me? You wanna glorify the father? Bear much fruit. And the only way we can do that is by abiding in him, by staying in fellowship with him. Apart from him, we can do nothing.

39:31 In John chapter eight verse 31, if you continue in my word or better, when you continue in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine. The thing to keep in mind when we're talking about disciples in the Gospels, especially in John, is not not every disciple was a believer. You know, we we we think every time we hear the word disciple, we're talking believer. In the Gospels, they're not synonymous terms. In chapter six, it says many of his disciples stopped following him.

40:09 The moment they stopped following him, they stopped being disciples. And in fact, he he explicitly says, some of you don't even believe. So be careful when when you're in the gospels and you see the word disciple. Doesn't always mean believer, it just means someone who's following. And in chapter six, they were following because, hey, they got a free meal out of him.

40:33 Let's do this again. I don't have to work. I just follow Jesus. He'll feed me. Chapter 13 verse 35.

40:43 All men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. You want to prove to be my disciples? You want the world to see it? Stay in fellowship with me. Love one another.

40:57 Take a look at 17, chapter 17 verse 21. That they all may be one even as you father are in me and I in you that they also may be in us. Why? So that the world may believe that you sent me. Verse 23, I in them, and you in me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that you sent me.

41:29 You want the world to know that the Father sent the Son? You want the world to know that we are disciples of Christ? Abide in him. Bear much fruit. Love one another.

41:45 Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. We thank you for the the relationship we have with you, for the salvation that we have as a result of our faith in Christ and we pray father that your spirit would move in each of us helping us to maintain fellowship with you and to bear much fruit so that we, father, can bring glory and honor to you through your son. And we pray...