The True Vine (John 15:1-17)

The True Vine
John 15:1-17
Jesus shows that believers are connected to Christ himself,
who is the true vine.

Introduction

      One of the great themes of the Bible that runs all the way from out of the Psalms
into the prophets and on in to the New Testament is the idea that the people of God are
referred to as the vineyard of the Lord, the vine. Isaiah talked about it. Jeremiah talked
about it. Hosea, Ezekiel, and some of the prophetic songs talk about Israel, the people of
God, as the vine.
      We have seen in our studies in the Gospel of John that the entire institution that is
represented by Judaism, the religion of the Jews, was fulfilled by Jesus. He came,
fulfilled it all and in fact, took the place of it. When the Temple was destroyed Jesus
became the center of worldwide worship.
      We have watched Jesus as He purged the Temple and cleansed it. Then the curse
of God was against it like the curse against the fig tree. We have seen Him as He
interrupted their solemn ceremonies. During the water libation He cries out and says, "If
any man thirst, let him come to me and drink and out of his life shall flow rivers of living
water." We watched Him again as He interrupted the ceremony of lights, and said, "If any
man follow me, he shall not walk in darkness because I am the light of the world."
      These great "I am's" of Jesus reached out to challenge the entire doctrine of the
system of the Jews religion. Here again in much the same fashion, Jesus is about to say,
"I am the vine, the true vine"--Just as He has said, "I am the Good Shepherd," and just as
He has said, "I am the door to the sheep," letting the Jews know that they had no
monopoly upon religion in the world. But really the way to truth was through Himself,
Jesus Christ--the door, the Good Shepherd and now the true vine.

Scripture Text – John 15:1-8

      "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that
      beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth
      it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I
      have spoken unto you. 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. I am
      the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same
      bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in
      me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered, and men gather them, and cast
      them into the fire, and they are burned. If ye abide in me, and my words abide in
      you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father
      glorified, that ye bear much fruit, so shall ye be my disciples."

A. The Vine and the Branches

1. Jesus Is the True Vine; We Are the Branches
      First of all, He is that true vine. He was saying to the Jews of His day and to His
disciples that the other doctrines of the vineyard and of the vine are somewhat set aside
because, "I am the true vine."
      Then He said, "Ye are the branches." That is the combination that we must never
forget. Never do we forget that we are individual branches in the vine. We do not stand
alone. We cannot stand by ourselves. We have no life by ourselves. We receive no
substance unless we stay connected into that true vine and receive from it, from Him life
giving nourishment and substance that keeps us living that keeps us producing that keeps
us bearing fruit for without Him there is no life.

2. The Branch Must Remain in the Vine
      Without Him, there is no power. Without Him, there is no ability to bear fruit and
to be a blessing in this world. But through Him as long as we abide, as long as we remain
branches, then we receive divine strength. Divine life that comes from above flows
through our being so that we become like Him and we produce what He wants us to
produce.
B. The Three Stages of Fruit Bearing

1. Stage One – Bearing Some Fruit
      There are three stages of fruit bearing that John deals with here in the words of
Jesus. First of all, just simply bearing some fruit. Jesus said, "Every branch that bears
some fruit, it undergoes purging and pruning." That word "purging" really is the word for
pruning.
      One of the most difficult tasks I've ever had in gardening is to convince my wife
of this principle. She is not a country girl, and she didn't kno w about a lot of these things
that I learned the rough way being raised on a farm. She doesn't understand the process of
thinning out so as to have better fruit. She doesn't understand the process of pruning. So
when I start to thin out a row of peas so they'll do better she stands there and almost
hurts. She cringes and thinks I'm destroying part of the life of the garden. She doesn't
quite understand pruning.
      But there is a process here in God's word that is in nature. It is in the universe. It
is everywhere. In order to get the best you have to cut away a lot of things that just take
up space and take up nourishment. Jesus talked about that when He saw the barren fig
tree. The curse of God is against barrenness.

2. Stage Two – Bearing More Fruit
      I want to tell you that God will hold it against us if we never reproduce the life
that comes to us, if we never bear the fruit. God gives the strength. God gives the power.
God gives the source of life. He expects us to allow it to work through us for
reproduction and bearing fruit. So He says, "My Father is in charge of the vine. He, the
husbandman watches it and every branch that bears fruit, and then He comes and tends to
it. He purges it that it will bear more fruit."
      You see, there is a process by which we grow and by which we are made stronger
and our life is made more beautiful. It means sometimes pruning and digging and cutting
away but it produces real good results.
      Where I used to live in Louisville, I used to drive often by a man's house who
raised a vineyard in his yard. I watched him late in the fall after frost had come and after
he'd gathered the fruit from those vines and I watched him as he trimmed them back to
the very nub it seemed. I thought, "My, that seems to be a little bit drastic." But every
spring those vines returned and they grew with such luxuriant abundance. The fruit was
just loaded in beauty and luscious goodness. I saw the principle at work and I understood
what Jesus meant.
      I want to tell you, whatever it takes friend, whatever it takes, allow the divine
husbandman to touch your life and to cut away anything that just takes up space, anything
that just wastes divine grace and power, anything that just wastes the Holy Spirit. We as
Pentecostal often frustrate the grace of God. We waste divine power. God would turn us
in to reproducing agents of His glory and power and beauty and grace if only we would
stand up under His pruning and purging and cleansing.
      There is a process of purging and cleansing that has to go on constantly. Oh, I
know and I wouldn't dare take away from that glorious experience of sanctification you
received on one Memorial Day or night and I wouldn't minimize that experience for
nothing in the world because I realize that is a great and wonderful reality. But hear me!
It doesn't stop there. There is a process of purging and cleansing through the word and the
power of the Holy Spirit that will purge and sanctify so as to produce God in this world.
When we are pruned and purged so that God life flows through us then we bear the fruit
of God's own love and power and the world sees it and knows there's God living in that
life.

3. Stage Three – Bearing Much Fruit
      After that purging process continues finally there's the stage of bearing much
fruit. Jesus said, "Now when you get to that stage that's when my Father is really
glorified." Oh, you want to do something great for God? You want to do something
spectacular and what God calls great? You want to do something to add glory to His
name? Then, let Him purge you. Let Him touch you. Let Him develop you. Grow in His
grace and spirit and power and bear the fruit and that will glorify God. Hallelujah!

C. Cutting off the Branch That Bears No Fruit

1. The Negative Side of the Vine Message
      But there at the same time in all the vine passages through out the scripture, and
in this one here in John as well, there is a negative as well as a positive side to the
message about the vine. I want to dwell on that negative side just for a moment. Jesus
said, "Every branch in me that beareth no fruit He, the husbandman, takes it away."

2. What We Receive, We Must Give
      That brings on a solemn thought. You see, you can't receive God's blessings
without receiving Christ. You can't have Him as your Saviour without having Him also as
your Lord and Master. You can't receive from God and always just receive. You have to
let it flow through you or the God life dies. The moment you become selfish and self
centered and you turn your mind and life inward just to contemplate your own self and
your own selfish desires, that's when the God life starts to die.
      God is saying through the words of the Son of God, "I have no place in my
vineyard for any branch that wants to stay attached to the vine but who refuses to bear
fruit."

3. God's Demand for Fruitfulness and Faithfulness
      You see, if you stay attached to God, you're going to show it or you will get cut
off. If you stay attached to God, you will bear fruit or else He moves in judgment.
There are two descriptions of the judgment of God in these verses. The first one is, "If
you don't bear fruit," He says, "The husbandman just simply cuts it away." If there is
unfruitfulness, take it away!
      Then the second aspect of judgment has to do with unfaithfulness. He said, "If
any man abide not in me." This brings on whole doctrine of unconditional eternal
security. A lot of people like to turn to this passage to talk about it. Yet some people want
to shun this particular verse. God is saying here that if you don't abide, if you don't stay
attached, if you don't remain faithful, you will be cut off.
      You can't just have God's blessings and then do as you please. If you're going to
stay attached to the vine, you're going to let the nourishing "Godlife" flow through you
and produce fruit or else you will be cut off. On the other hand, if you don't abide in the
vine--if you're unfaithful – then you wither and die and you're cast forth to be burnt.
      One of the greatest troubles the church ever has in the world now is those
branches that want to go their own way. They let their own life show instead of God life.
As a result they become withered lives, barren and empty losing their beauty, losing their
luster, losing their life, losing their power and in the words of Jesus, "then men gather
them and cast them in the fire and they are burned."
      So here's a message of judgment – of being cut off if you don't bear fruit; and
withering up and dying and being cast away and burned as a branch if you're unfaithful.

4. The Song of the Vineyard (Isaiah 5:1-7)
      The message that God demands fr uitfulness and faithfulness sinks deep roots back
into the Old Testament. I'd like us to take just a moment to go back at least one reference.
Psalms eighty talks about it. Isaiah five verses one through seven, that has been called the
song of the vineyard, talks about it.

a. The Farmer's Efforts to Have a Good Vineyard
      Note all the things that the farmer did to secure a good harvest of fruit and grapes.
He prepared a field. He fenced it. He put a hedge about it. He dug the earth, took out
rocks, chose the choicest vine, established it, built a watch tower in the midst so it could
be guarded, and hued out a wine vat to collect the harvest. All these things the
husbandman did with Israel, that vine, Isaiah said, to insure a good harvest. But he said,
"I looked for grapes and there were wild grapes"-- meaning, "I looked for the good fruit
and there was nothing but shriveled, stinking, bitter fruit from which you could make no
wine."

b. The Process of Judgment Against Unfruitfulness & Unfaithfulness
      He said, "What will I do unto this vine? Here's what I'll do." And here is a picture
of the process of judgment that happens to people who want to be unfruitful and
unfaithful. He said, "First of all I'll take away the hedge." I want to tell you God has a
process of judgment that continues on and on at all times.
      Anytime you rebel against God and anytime you quit following the Lord and
anytime self rises up in your life to take charge and you don't listen to God and obey
Him, the process of wrath and judgment begins. The first thing is He took away the
hedge. Then wild beasts of the field could leap over the wall and come in and trample and
devour and eat the vine.
      Next, He took away the wall that had given protection to the vineyard and then He
said, "All other kinds of beasts, rodents, varmints, wild boars and such could come in and
destroy and devour and tear up the vine."
      Then He said, "I'll just cease to care for the vine. I won't prune it anymore. I won't
correct it anymore. I won't purge it anymore."
      Listen, I want to tell you, the saddest day in any man's life is when God
withdraws His care and His correction and His pruning and His purging power from your
life. The greatest day in any man's life is when He falls on his face and says, "Lord, not
my will but your will be done." But the saddest day in any man's life is when God says to
him, "Thy will be done."
      When God withdraws, when there's no more pruning, when there's no more
purging, when there's no more correcting, when there's no more pruning, when there's no
more purging, when there's no more cleansing, when you're left to yourself--then there's
utter desolation and the wild boars of the forest come in to root out and destroy the
vineyard.

D. The Fruitful Life of Abiding in the Vine

1. Divine Life Flowing Through You
      Let me move then and not stay on that somber note because I want to hasten to
tell you the good news. I've already touched on it but oh, here it is, when you abide in
Jesus Christ, you have divine life flowing in you and you become fruitful.. Yo u need not
worry about what can I do and what great works can I do, just stay attached to the vine
and Christ will show, He will be seen in you.
      The greatest work you will ever do is to reveal Jesus and His love to somebody in
this world, to bring Christ and His healing to some broken life, to bring Christ and His
redemption power to some life that's lost and steeped in sin. The greatest work you will
ever do is when somebody sees Jesus in you instead of seeing you, yourself, they see His
love, His life, His power, His grace, flowing through you. I say, let the church stay
attached to the vine. Let the church be connected to that life giving source. Let us never
be cut off from that Holy Spirit that flows in power from the bosom of the Son of God
and touches us all. Amen.

2. Answered Prayer
      In the second place, there is the assurance of answered prayer when you remain in
the vine. Answered prayer is based on abiding in Him, staying in Him, remaining in Him
and His word abiding in us. Hallelujah! I want to tell you, John says a lot about prayer in
these chapters we've been talking about especially fourteen and now fifteen. We've been
talking about this Gospel for troubled hearts and here's where John says the most about
prayer. Oh, he tells us of a relationship we can have with God where that our life is
attached to the Lord Jesus and we abide in Him. At the same time, His divine word and
spirit abides in us. In that process we come to a place where anything we ask in His name
He said, "I will do it."
      I want to tell you, here is the blessed assurance of answers to your prayers. I've
seen people vexed and tormented and troubled because it seems their prayer life was just
empty and barren. They didn't know how to pray. They didn't know how to wait on God.
Here is the secret. Get in Christ. Stay there. Get His Word in you. Keep it there. Grow in
your relationship to Him and grow in the Word and then you ask according to His divine
will. As a matter of fact, you can throw open the doors of your heart and throw open the
gates of your mind and as far as your mind can soar and as far as your heart can believe
and receive, God is able to do exceeding abundantly all that we ask or even think
according to His power that worketh in us. There is no limitation to God's provision when
we open up our hearts and believe Him.

3. Giving Glory to the Father
      Then there's also a process of giving glory to the Father. I want you to know when
your life has been lived and you glorify God in this world, you haven't failed. The devil
may torment you and say you haven't accomplished much. You're not a big person. You
don't seem to be important. You haven't achieved some great striking successes. But oh,
if you have lived your life and it is a testimony that gives glory to the Almighty, I want to
tell you, you have never failed.

4. The Fullness of Joy
      Remaining in the vine means having the fullness of joy. If some salesman came to
your house and said, "I have here a prescription to make you happy, you'll never see
another bad day," you'd sell part of your furniture to get it if you knew it was real, if you
knew it were true.
      Yet, there are some simple things in scripture that teach us how we can have joy.
Several of them are in John, like feet washing. Jesus said, "Happy are ye if ye do this."
Oh I know it's sort of silly in this modern age, but I've seen it work. I've seen people who
have held grudges get down on their knees in front of each other and wash each other's
feet while the other one would put his hand on his head and pray. They got up after
awhile with tears hugging each other's neck, having joy.
      But here's one, Jesus said, "I've told you this because I want your joy to be full."
A religion that the world can see and be just simply overwhelmed by is one that makes
people happy and one where they enjoy it. One of the vital ingredients of a growing
church is a people who have exciting, joyful, happy--worship who really get in the Spirit
and get touched from God and they go away soothed and blessed and healed and filled
with joy. Jesus said, "The way you keep up your source of joy and strength is to abide in
the vine."

Jesus shows that believers are connected to Christ himself, who is the true vine.
Denomination: Church of God
Author(s): F.J. May, D.Min.