A Disciple Abides

Today, we continue in our study on Discipleship, and we’ve set out to define what a disciple is by exploring the ways that Jesus talks about his disciples. We first saw that a disciple is chosen by God. To be a disciple is to be called out to follow. Last week, we saw that a disciple is loved by God, and as a result of that love, he loves others. So, this morning, we come to the third characteristic of a disciple: a disciple abides in Christ, from whom he receives the motivation and power to obey Christ’s commands. To see this, let’s read John 15:1-17. From this passage, let’s consider three points: the vine, the branches, and the fruit.

First, let’s consider the vine from verses 1-4. The Gospel of John records seven “I am” statements that Jesus makes during his ministry. These “I am” statements are allegories that draw a connection that help us to understand who Jesus is. In our passage, Jesus forms this allegory by declaring that he is the true vine. Immediately, we have to ask what exactly he means in calling himself the vine? Vines and grapes are rich images in Scripture. The OT prophets, Isaiah and Jeremiah, referred to Israel as the vine of God. For example, Jeremiah 2:21 says “I planted you a choice vine, wholly of pure seed. How then have you turned degenerate and become a wild vine?” Vineyards symbolized the blessings of God in the promised land. When the spies went into Canaan, they cut a single cluster of grapes that had to be carried by two men. In Deut. 6:11, God promises the people of Israel that they will inherit a land with “houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant.”  The temple itself was also associated with the vineyard. Josephus, a first century historian, recorded that the temple of Jesus’s day had a sculpture of a cluster of grapes over its entrance.

So, when Jesus declares himself to be the true vine, I believe he is drawing on all of these symbols to point to something that we cannot miss if we are to be his disciples. As the true vine, Jesus is the true Israel. He is the chosen one of God who completely obeyed God’s law and represented God to the world – something that the nation of Israel failed to do. Jesus is the true promised land from which the blessings of God flow. And, he is the true temple of God where forgiveness and restoration are found. 

You see, there has always been this vine of grace woven through the history of God’s work in the world. It is not as though Israel was the true people of God onto which God pinned all of his hopes and dreams for redemption, and then they failed, so he had to find another way through the Gentiles. No, God has always had a vine of grace into which he has grafted people. He grafted Seth, Enoch, Noah, and Abraham. As the vine grew, he added Isaac, Jacob, and Judah. The vine grew, but then it was pruned, as God judged the Korahites when they rebelled against Moses in the wilderness, or the generation that wondered in the wilderness, or the exiles that were taken into Babylon. In fact, by the first century, it would seem that the vine had been pruned back to the stump. But, God made a promise through Isaiah, that at this most dismal moment, he would prove himself gracious. Isaiah 11:1 says, “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.” Jesus Christ is that shoot, a descendent of Jesse’s son, David. In Jesus, that vine of grace would extend to include people from every race and tribe.

But, in order to be a part of this vine of grace you have to abide in it. That leads me to my second point: the branches. Jesus continues this allegory in verse 4 by restating, “I am the vine; you are the branches.” To be included in this vine of grace that is extending out into all the world, you must do two things that we find in verse 5. You must abide and bear. First, to have the grace of God, you must abide in Christ. As Christian tells Formalist and Hypocrite, in The Pilgrim’s Progress, when they climb the wall on the way to the Celestial City, “To be on this way, you must first go to the cross.” As Jesus puts it here, “apart from me, you can do nothing.” Now, that is not to say that people don’t try to make their way to God without Jesus. In fact, most people try to make their way to God without Jesus. They try the way of formality – thinking that keeping the right rules or going through the right rituals will save them. They try the way of hypocrisy – thinking that having an outward righteousness that everyone sees will save them, without having a repentant heart of faith. They may try any number of other ways, but there is no way to please God apart from faith in Jesus Christ. To be a part of this vine of grace, you have to abide in him.

Second, a branch bears fruit. In Romans 11, Paul uses this analogy of a vine and branches to explain why the Jews of his day were rejecting the Gospel while Gentiles were receiving it in mass. He said that it is as though God is grafting in wild branches (Gentiles) into the vine and cutting off the natural branches. I think Jesus means something similar here when he talks about branches that produce fruit versus those who don’t. What he pictures here is a master gardener who cuts a branch from a wild grapevine, cuts a V into the vine, gently places that wild branch into that V, then carefully wraps the joint cloth. This is what we call “grafting”, and it is an amazing process in which a branch from one type of plant will merge with the vine of another type and become one with the vine. If that graft takes, the result can be amazing, as the branch from a wild vine, which may not have produced much of anything in the way of fruit, now has the nutrients and genetics of the vine to empower it to produce abundantly more. But, grafting is tricky business. Sometimes the graft takes, but sometimes it doesn’t. And when it doesn’t the branch eventually withers.

What Jesus is saying here runs contrary to our modern view of belief in Jesus. See, abiding in Jesus isn’t something that you did one time at a revival. Abiding in Jesus isn’t just a simple knowledge of who Jesus was. Abiding in Jesus isn’t even the occasional emotional response to the story of the crucifixion. Abiding in Jesus results in fruit. The faith that endures, the faith that is truly saving, is the faith that results in a change that produces fruit.

So, what is this fruit that we produce when we abide in Christ? To answer that, consider my third point from verses 12-17. Living branches that abide in this vine of grace produce fruit. In verse 12, Jesus tells us what this fruit is – “this is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” So, the fruit that we produce when we abide in Christ is love for our brothers and sisters in Christ. Jesus says much the same thing that we saw last week – he loves us, and as a result we love others. Here, we abide in him, and as a result, we love others. Now, we have to be careful here, lest we work this problem backwards. We could make the grave mistake of thinking that, in order to abide in Christ, we have to produce fruit, and in order to produce fruit, we have to love others, so we need to work hard at loving others. But that’s the wrong way about it. Rather, we abide in Christ, we find our all in him, we repent of our sins, we trust in his sacrifice and resurrection, we rely on His Spirit and His Word – and then, as a result of our rest in him, we love others. Jesus says that very thing in two ways here. First, in v 13, he says that the greatest love is shown by the one who is willing to lay down his life for his friends, and then Jesus makes one of the most beautiful statements in all of Scripture in verse 14 – “you are my friends...” It is because of the love of Jesus that we are able to love others. It is because Jesus has made the Father known to us that we are able to obey his commandments. Jesus gave his life for his friends, and we are to love as he loves.

Second, in verse 16, Jesus proves again that bearing fruit starts with him and not with us. He reminds his disciples, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide.” Oh, how beautiful it is to realize that our membership in this vine of grace isn’t dependent on our obedience, but on God’s choosing. Jesus tells his disciples, “I chose you and appointed you to bear fruit.” If Christ did not choose us, if he did not appoint us, if he did not give us his Spirit and grace, we would be withered, useless branches that were good for nothing other than to be thrown into the fires of hell.

Friend, to receive the grace of God you must abide in Jesus. To abide in Jesus is to repent of your sins and believe in his word. To abide in Christ is to believe that he died for your sins and rose again from the grave and will one day return to judge this world. Won’t you repent and believe today?

Brothers and sisters, we cannot live in love apart from Christ. We must abide in him. We must rest in his grace. We must feed on his word. And, as a result, we will bear the fruit of love.