Introduction
Last week, we saw that Jesus prepared his disciples for his departure
by emphasizing the role of the Holy Spirit. His ministry to them would
be so helpful that it was actually to their advantage that Jesus depart
so he can come to them (16:7). He continues this same theme in this passage
by using a metaphor of something familiar to them--read vs 1-6. Let's
see if we can identify the parts:
Jesus is the VINE. God the Father is the VINEDRESSER. We (humans) are
the BRANCHES.
What is the FRUIT? It refers to all that God wants to accomplish through
our lives. Biblical fruit centers around relational closeness with God
and character transformation (Gal. 5:22ff.), and influencing other people
for Christ (Rom. 1:13). God want to bear "much" of this fruit
in your life (vs 8), and he is able to do this regardless of your circumstances,
deficiencies, etc. But unlike BRANCHES, which have no mind or will,
we need to learn how God produces this fruit and then cooperate with
him.
Get In The Vine
Notice that Jesus speaks of three different kinds of BRANCHES, which
represent three different spiritual states: "in me & not bearing
fruit" (vs 2a), "in me & bearing fruit" (vs 2b), and
"not in me" (vs 6). We'll look at the first two in a minute,
but the first order of business is to get in the Vine.
Jesus is the "true vine"--the only source of spiritual life.
Branches laying on the ground cannot bear fruit because they have no
vital connection to the vine. In the same way, if we want to be alive
spiritually and have the opportunity to bear spiritual fruit, we need
to establish an authentic union with Jesus Christ.
This union is a personal relationship. Many people think a relationship
with God is like a relationship with the IRS: we discharge responsibilities,
maybe receive some benefits--but it is impersonal and distant. But God
is a Person, and he wants to establish a personal relationship with
each of us. Because he is infinite, he can relate to each one of us
on a deeply personal level. It isn't difficult to establish this relationship.
Jesus has paid a great price so that we may know him as a free gift.
All you have to do is receive Christ (Jn. 1:12).
"What if I decide I don't want to get into the Vine?" You have
that freedom--God isn't going to make you. But that will be a significant
choice because it will have some really negative consequences.
Read vs 5. What does Jesus mean when he says "apart from me you
can do nothing?" Certainly we can do many things apart from Christ,
but we cannot do anything of lasting positive spiritual significance,
anything of value to God. Since we were made for a love-relationship
with the true God, to miss this is to miss the whole point of life and
to build everything on a faulty foundation (JUDAS). This is what Jesus
means in another place when he says "What does it profit a person
if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?"
Read vs 6. It's bad enough that we can waste this life by not coming
to Christ. But Jesus also says this choice will result in facing the
judgment of God in the next life (see Matt. 13:41-43). This seems pretty
severe, but this is the way life is. Lots of our choices profoundly
affect our future, sometimes even when we don't realize this at the
time (MAGIC JOHNSON). In this case, God tells us in advance that this
will be an eternally significant decision.
Get in the Vine! You have everything to gain and nothing to lose (PASCAL'S
WAGER).
Understand The Vinedresser's Work
Once we are in the Vine, we come under the Vinedresser's care. God the
Father begins to intervene in our lives in various ways to make us fruitful.
Vs 2 speaks of two different spiritual states for the believer in Christ--unfruitful
and fruitful--and two different ways the Father works with us.
Read vs 2a. What does it mean that he "takes away" the branch
in Christ that is not bearing fruit? This sounds like being in Christ
is conditional to producing results for God. But this is clearly contradictory
to the rest of scripture which teaches that our union with Christ is
received by faith apart from works (Eph. 2:8,9) and permanent
(Eph. 1:13,14).
The best explanation is that the verb translated "takes away"
(airo) should be translated differently. Airo, like
most words, has a fairly wide range of meaning--from "take away"
to "take" to "lift up" (Jn. 11:41). It is used
over 100 times in the New Testament, and the majority of those times
it is used to mean "take" or "take up." It seems
to make more sense to translate it "lift up" in this case.
Pruning is covered in vs 2b, and vinedressers do indeed lift up/tie
up unfruitful branches out of the mud and shade so they get sunshine,
etc.
Jesus is describing true Christians who, for different reasons, are
not bearing fruit. When God sees this condition, he doesn't reject
us. But he does take initiative to influence us toward a fruitful
life. Maybe we're ignorant of how to grow spiritually, so he may bring
us into contact with walking Christians who can guide us to the resources
we need to grow. Maybe we're mired in an immoral habit or relationship,
so he allows us to experience the consequences of our poor choices--or
even engineers some consequences--to wake us up to our need to get
back with him. Whatever he does, we can be sure it is motivated by
his desire to see us have the true joy of being fruitful for him.
What about those of us who are already bearing fruit? Why mess with
success? Even fruitful branches have lots of extraneous growth that
looks impressive, but uses life that should go to bearing more and bigger
fruit (SUCKERS ON MY TOMATO PLANTS). God wants the greatest harvest
possible, so he "prunes" us so that we may bear more fruit.
This pruning process is a necessary part of spiritual growth, so we
need to recognize it as such.
Some of God's pruning concerns moral issues. As we grow in Christ,
he keeps showing us attitudes that obstruct a full harvest of fruit.
The sad thing is that we usually can't see these by ourselves. So
he has to open our eyes to things like pride, or autonomy, or complacency,
or self-protectiveness. This can be quite painful, but if you know
God's motivation is loving, you can really benefit from it (Heb. 12:11).
Some of God's pruning concerns issues that are not moral, but extraneous.
He may sovereignly remove cherished RELATIONSHIPS or CAREER OPPORTUNITIES
because he knows they are a distraction to your growth. He may convict
you that the amount of time you devote to HOBBIES or TALENTS is excessive,
and call on you to decrease it so you can make more time for fruit-bearing.
How do you respond to this kind of pruning?
Abide In Christ
Now we come to our part in bearing spiritual fruit. Read vs 4,5. Clearly,
the key to a fruitful life is abiding in Christ. "Abide" means
to remain. Your "abode" is where you reside. Our part is to
hang in there with Christ. What does this look like?
FIrst of all, it involves an attitude of dependence on him. Jesus contrasts
abiding in him to a self-sufficient attitude. Notice his insistence
on our helplessness to produce fruit apart from him ("the branch
cannot bear fruit of itself . . . apart from me you can do nothing").
You don't hear the vines grunting--they stay dependent on the vine and
it produces fruit through them. Maturing Christians understand that
the secret to fruitfulness is not religious self-effort, but rather
consistently depending on Christ to live his life out through them.
This sounds a little nebulous--almost like Eastern passivity ("OM").
Jesus goes on in vs 7-16 to explain definite, practical ways to abide
in him.
Read vs 7. Here are a couple of keys. Abiding him evidently involves
having his words abide in us. I like to call this living in the
environment of God's Word--as opposed to sporadic religious exposure.
As we get into God's Word on a regular basis, we learn his perspective
on all of life and it begins to change our values and priorities.
The more at home we are in God's Word, the more fruitful we will be.
"Ask whatever you wish . . . " doesn't mean turn God into
Alladin. It means regularly communicating with him on a personal level,
acknowledging your need for him in each situation, and asking him
for the resources we need to do his will.
NOTE: Getting into the Word and praying with other Christians is
a key help. Many times we have trouble doing these alone, but being
with other Christians stimulates us to think about God and talk to
him (see Col. 3:16).
Read vs 9. Here is another key--"abide in my love." When
we focus on how we view ourselves, or on how we perceive others view
us, or on what we don't have that we want, our spiritual lives become
self-absorbed and unfruitful. But when we choose instead to reflect
on God's love and acceptance, and cultivate gratitude to him for this,
this unleashes the Holy Spirit to cause growth in our lives.
Read vs 10. This sounds threatening at first--like God won't love
us unless we obey him all the time. For some of us, this dredges up
painful memories of abusive parents or authority figures whose commands
were self-centered and rejected/punished us unless we complied. Jesus'
point here is very different. The issue is not God's acceptance, but
rather our ongoing experience of his love. Relational closeness to
God involves trusting that his will is for our good (vs 11)--and trusting
God involves being willing to actually follow his leadership in our
lives. How do you respond when God prunes you--with mistrustful resistance,
or with trusting cooperation? There is a connection between your response
and your relational closeness with God and consequent fruitfulness.
Read vs 12,13. It turns out that Jesus' main commandment is loving
others. As we saw in Jn. 13, he is talking about cultivating a
lifestyle of self-giving love. True spirituality is not primarily
a matter of religious disciplines, or even character development--it
is primarily about giving myself away in love to others as a servant
of Christ. Yes, love is a result of abiding in Christ (Gal.
5:22)--but it is also a means of abiding in him. Many of us
have experienced this truth that when we choose to think about and
serve others rather than staying self-focused, this is what unleashes
the Holy Spirit to begin to transform our lives!
Read vs 16. Jesus chose these men to be his apostles, which involved
being sent out to evangelize others and start churches. The "fruit
that remains" is the people they led to him. Abiding in Christ
involves reaching out in love to lost people and telling them how
they can come to Christ.
Conclusion
As we develop a lifestyle built around this kind of authentic love-trust
relationship with Jesus, his fruit will gradually emerge and we will know
increasing joy!