Light of Togo

If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.

This is the culmination of all that Jesus has been talking about up to this point.  When a true follower of Jesus abides in Him, walks in Him, and depends upon Him, he will also seek to obey Him.  It is only natural to do so.  But, the question that inevitably comes up is, “What if we don’t keep Him commandments?  Does this verse teach that God won’t love us anymore?”

It must be understood that Jesus is not trying to make a point of God’s love being conditional towards His children.  What He is saying is that in this abiding relationship, we are expected to obey Him, and that when we do we fully experience His love manifested in our lives.  Jesus gives us the example of His own life.  He fully experienced the love of the Father because of His obedience to Him.  As Warren Wiersbe says, “Because we love Him, we keep His commandments; and, as we keep His commandments, we abide in His love and experience it in a deeper way.” (The Bible Exposition Commentary)

Usually when we think of keeping the commandments we automatically think of the “Big 10,” right?  We might have the mental image of a Pharisee in ancient Jerusalem whose life is consumed with following each and every law, commandment, and ordinance in a precise and detailed fashion.  The problem with the Pharisees, both ancient and modern, is that they lack one very important thing: love.  Without a genuine love for the Savior, which is developed from an abiding relationship with Him, one can only merely obey commandments on the outside like a lifeless robot while having a love-lacking heart of hypocrisy on the inside.

What is very interesting is to clarify what Jesus is talking about when He speaks of His commandments. Is He saying that we should be like a Pharisee, one who “just obeys” and nothing more?  Well, let’s think about what Jesus’ response was to the question that was asked of Him about the commandments.  In Matthew 22, He was asked what the greatest commandment is.  Jesus’ response was simple, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all they heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind…and the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”  Then notice that in John 14:15 Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.”  This to me is one of the great paradoxes of Christianity.  In all other religions, followers are expected to obey mostly out of fear of what will happen to them if they don’t.  Christians, however, are told by Jesus to obey Him not because of what horrible thing He will do to us if we don’t, but because of the great and glorious things He has done for us already!  We love Him because of who He is and what He has done for us, and because of that we should want to and seek to obey Him.  And what commandment does He most want us to obey?  To love Him with all of our being! And this, as we will see in the coming verses, is the foundation on which God can develop a love within us for other people.

As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love.

The love of God is unfathomable.  There is no sin, no error, no mistakes in God.  He is entirely perfect and therefore so is His love.  Jesus brought directly to this earth the perfect love of God.  The love between He and His Father was unselfish, untainted, and perfect in every way.  It is with this love that Jesus loves us.  Jesus was reminding His discples here that His relationship of abiding in the love of the Father was being shared with them, and that they could be partakers of the perfect love of Christ.

He exhorts them to “continue in His love.”  This is not to say, “Make sure that you behave yourselves so that I will continue to love you.”  His love doesn’t work this way.  Romans 5:8 tells us that, “…God commendeth (demontrated) his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”  If His love for us was based upon our performance or something special within us, we would never receive His love!  He loves us even though we are completely unworthy of love. Continuing in His love is more like saying, “Keep walking in my love; keep partaking of my love; keep enjoying and sharing my love with others.”  In the following few verses, we will see how Jesus explains what continuing in His love looks like.

Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.

We exist to glorify God. Period.

If you have not come to the point yet where you realize that the sole purpose for your existence on this planet is to glorify God, you must not have ever read the Bible. There are countless ways in which a follower of Christ can bring glory to God, but here in this passage Jesus tells us that one way is in bearing fruit.  Again, let’s not forget what Jesus is referring to when He talks about fruit.  God is glorified when we show His love through our lives, when we express the joy of knowing Christ, when we exercise faith in the unfailing nature of God.  As John Piper says in his excellent book on missions, Let the Nations Be Glad, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”  When He is everything to us, He is most glorified.

As the branch abides in the vine, the fruit producing process is simply a natural outflow of the life of the vine.  Imagine yourself at a local farm, where you are strolling through the rows of trees and plants, taking in all the sights and smells of non-city life.  Suddenly, as you pass by the grape vines, you hear a familiar but out-of-place sound.  It is the sound of struggle.  You bend your ear to distinguish the source, but you see no one.  Then something catches your eye.  It is a vine, to which is attached a small branch, on which is no fruit.  This comes as no surprise to you since it is not yet the season for grapes.  However, you see and hear that this little branch is grunting and groaning, struggling and squirming with all it’s might, trying to push out some fruit.  You say to the branch, “Hey buddy, what are you doing?”  He stops his efforts briefly and responds, “I’m making fruit!”  You try explaining to him that he can’t do it by all that struggling, and that it’s not even the season for it, but he turns a deaf ear and continues his travail.

As silly as this illustration is, it is a mirror of many Christians who have their focus on the wrong things.  Here is a question: is bearing fruit a good thing?  Yes, of course.  But does it mean that it should be the focus of all our attention?  We must realize that fruit in the Christian life is the result of our attention being fully on our abiding in Jesus and on the glorifying of God.  It is much like the sinner who tries to “be saved” by living a pseudo Christian life, without first going to the source of this life which is Jesus.

The last part of this verse can be a bit tricky.  At first glance, it appears to be telling us that discipleship is conditional and based upon the fruit that we produce.  If this is the case, how much is “much fruit?”  How can we ever be sure if we are disciples of Christ or not?  This dangerous thinking leads to many errors, such as putting all kinds of external stipulations on determining whether or not somebody is “right with God” or not.  I have seen and experimented this kind of Christianity, and in it there are many extra-biblical man-made rules that many times take priority over simple Bible truth.

In a situation like this, it is helpful to consult the original language of the text.  From the study that I have done, it appears that the idea is this: Fruitfulness in the Christian life is not a condition which is required to become a disciple of Christ, but rather it is the proof that one already is a disciple.  Jesus once said that you can tell whether a tree is good or bad by its fruit.  A vibrant, healthy tree will produce good fruit, but a dead or dying tree will produce undesirable fruit or no fruit at all.  The point of this parable was to show that what the tree is, it will produce.  It would be silly to say that the good fruit on the limbs is what makes the tree good.  But it is perfectly acceptable to say that the fruit on the limbs is good because the tree is good.  We must be careful not to reverse this order.  We bear fruit because we are disciples of Christ.  All Christians bear fruit.  It’s not always the exact same kind or quantity of fruit for everyone, but all Christians bear fruit because all Christians are disciples of Jesus Christ.  There is no such thing as a “non-discipleship Christianity.”

So where are your priorities, your focus?  On struggling and straining to push out fruit on your own?  On the glory of God?  Maybe on neither of these things.  The Word of God challenges us to abide in Jesus, rest in His life as our sufficiency, and to do all things for the purpose of glorifying God.  And through this God will bring forth fruit in us, showing that we are followers of Christ.

If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

Hmm, let’s see here, what do I really want?  A professional Canon or Nikon SLR camera would be nice.  Oh, and all the lenses too.  An iPhone could really come in handy.  A tennis racket that could make me play like Rafael Nadal would be awesome.  Let’s see, what else?  Oh yes, the biggest, fastest Mac computer on the market.  All the best, super lightweight backpacking gear and a high clearance 4WD vehicle to get to all the best hiking spots.  Well, I guess that’s enough for now.  So alright, Lord, I ask for all of these things, in your name of course.  Well, I’m waiting!

Do you ever feel like your prayers aren’t getting answered?  God gives us the promise that He will answer our prayers, but sometimes we are just ignorant to the fact that His answer may be a definite and certain “NO!”  Our problem most of the time is that we are praying for the wrong person, and I am just as guilty of this as anyone else, although not quite as bad as the exaggerated example above.  We pray most often for the one who we are most concerned about pleasing - ourselves.

James 4:3 tells us about praying for our needs, for our desires, for our “things” that we think make us happy.  It says, Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

The key to John 15:7 is the phrase and my words abide in you. I truly believe there is a great difference between knowing the Word of God, and the Word abiding in us.  The words of Christ abiding in us produces a change of mentality, a change of focus, and a change of our desires.  Instead of dwelling on what we need, want, and crave for, we begin to pray according to God’s plans, His purposes, and His desires.  God never intended prayer to be a service bell for our every whim in the cushy mansion of luxury that we like to call our life.  It is intended to be the line of communication between commander and soldier as He carries out His plans through you.

Perhaps you, like me, need to begin praying more biblically.  As Jesus did, we ought to pray, “I don’t seek my will, Father, but let yours be done through me.”  God desires to give us what we ask for, but are we asking for what God desires?  I encourage you to know Jesus more through His Word.  Let it abide and take root in you, that you might begin praying more for God and His desires and a lot less for ours.

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.

Here we have probably the most controversial and misunderstood verse in this passage.  Some common interpretations are: 1. that these non-abiding branches are true Christians who somehow completely separate themselves from Christ, loose their salvation, and are sent to hell; 2. that these are Christians who stop abiding (what this means is debated), and are therefore relegateed to a state of complete uselessness; 3. that those who do not abide in Christ have never been a partaker of His life.  They may be attached to the vine in a purely physical sense, but they have never received the life of the vine and therefore have never produced any fruit.

In verse 2, Jesus referred to, “every branch in me that beareth not fruit.”  It is suggested by many experts who are much more “Greeky” than me that in the original language the reference to “in me” doesn’t convey the same idea as other places in the Bible, for instance when Paul uses the term “in Christ,” meaning all who are saved.  They say that it has a much broader scope here in John 15, likely referring to all people.

The Bible tells us that we are all products of Jesus Christ, whether we are followers of His or not.  He has created us and we all receive our life from Him and thus are physically “in Him,” but not all people are receiving His life and therefore are not bearing fruit.

This verse is serves as a simple reminder to believers in Christ, and as a warning to those who reject Him.  For Christians, it is impossible for us to disconnect ourselves from the vine.  We may struggle, we may not bear as much fruit as Jesus desires, but we can never loose that life of the vine which abides in us.  God will prune and clip our lives in His work of bearing fruit through us.  But for those who reject the life of the vine, there is a day coming when you will stand before the righteous and perfect judge of the world, and He will declare that you never received the forgiveness of sins and the life of Jesus Christ, which is the only thing that can save you from eternal judgment.  It is an eternity in hell that awaits those who do not believe on Jesus Christ by faith and receive His life.  If that describes you, don’t hesistate to come to Him to receive freely the forgiveness of sin, the life of Christ, and an assurance of spending eternity in Heaven.

Do you have any thoughts about this verse?  If so, feel free to post a comment.

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.

It just doesn’t get much clearer than this, does it?  Jesus says in very clear terms that He, and He alone, is the vine: the source, the life-giver, the root; and that we are the branches: the result of the vine, the conduit of its life, and the bearer of its fruits.  He again gives the assurance that all those who abide in Him will produce fruit.

As I mentioned with verse two, it is necessary to ask ourselves what this fruit is.  I have heard numerous times, and believed until recently, that the fruit of a Christian is leading another person to Christ.  However, after combing through every reference to “fruit” in the Bible, and after reading these passages in their contexts, I cannot say that the Bible teaches this idea.  Certainly, that does not in any way diminish the importance or the role of evangelism; nothing about it is changed just because “fruit” does not mean evangelism. What is most important is not to make commonly held ideas fit conveniently into biblical texts, but to interpret the Word correctly.

The Bible is very clear, however, in another passage as to what the fruit of the Christian life is.  In Galatians 5:22-26 we read:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.  And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.  If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.  Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another.

The Bible assures us that all of Christ’s true followers have the Holy Spirit within them.  The natural product, or should we say fruit, of the Spirit in a believer’s life are these things mentioned in Galatians.  The desire of Jesus is to produce much of this fruit through your life as you abide in Him and He in you.  Ouch!  That is quite convicting as I think, “How often do I exhibit much love, much peace, much longsuffering, and much of these other things, in my home, with my friends, and with other people that I come in contact with?  Is my branch full of the fruit which Jesus wants to grow through me?”

It does no good to ask these kind of questions for the purpose of self-condemnation, but like me maybe you think that at times your life does not exhibit this fruit as it should.  If so, it is essential to remember the last part of this verse, for without me ye can do nothing. It is silly to imagine grapes or the branches which they grow on existing without the vine, or detached from it.  It is God, the loving and gracious vine dresser, who keeps you attached to the vine of Jesus Christ.  It is not your job to “keep holding on to Jesus,” because He has a hold of you and will never let go.  Without the work of God, we would not even exist, and without His allowing us to do so, we could not even take our next breath.  Without Him, salvation would be impossible and we would have no part of it.  It is this all-powerful God who is patiently pruning and purging your life so that He can produce the fruit which He desires through you.

The branch is nothing and does nothing on its own.  It is helpless and useless by itself.  It is only in the vine that they fulfill their purpose.  Their position is this: complete and absolute dependence upon the vine.  That is exactly our greatest responsibility, to rest upon the work of Christ and to live in complete and absolute dependence upon what only He can do in us and through us for His glory.

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.

Jesus here lays down a very simple and unchanging truth: that all fruit, all success, all labor, all of our very being is completely dependent on one thing - Jesus!  Without Jesus we can do nothing of eternal importance, and have nothing of eternal value.

When we attempt to live our lives independent of Jesus Christ, we are like a branch which is connected to a vine but strenuously trying to grow a cluster of grapes.  We push and strain and exert all our effort in doing something that is impossible.  Physically it is impossible for a branch to make fruit without the vine, and spiritually it is impossible for us to live the Christian life without Christ.

Many people appear to have the idea that the ultimate goal in the Christian life is found in striving to “be like Jesus” in every area.  While the Bible does talk about  being conformed into His image, I would have to say that I disagree with this idea as the fundamental way of the Christian walk.  I believe that the Bible indicates that God is much more concerned with our depending upon Him than with our mimicking Him.  I do not mean to sound like I am criticizing anybody, but the problem I see (and that I have had many times) is that many Christians attempt to analyze and improve every compartment of their lives for the ultimate goal of being like Jesus.  But what happens many times is that we end up doing all of this in our own effort, independent from the one who we’re trying to be like!  When we are entirely reliant and dependent upon Him, however, He grows us and matures us as He desires and in His perfect timing.  He will produce fruit through us as His life flows through us.  We are simply the conduit through which the vine produces its fruit to the glory of the God.

Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. 

After reading this verse several times in the context of the passage, and after reading several commentaries on it, I must admit that I’m really not entirely sure what this verse means.  Gasp!  Shock!  How can this be?!

I’m very sorry to disappoint you, but I’m going to let you in on a little secret: even people who go to Bible college and are in the ministry don’t have an answer to every verse in the Bible.  Shortly after becoming a Christian I was erroneously led to believe that Christians, and especially pastors, missionaries, etc., must have a response to every biblical question and an interpretation for every verse.  Therefore, I strived to acheive this mysterious omniscience which always seemed to avoid me.  I would adopt the answers of those around me and tenaciously defend them, even though I knew that they didn’t make sense.  Isn’t it sad how young Christians can be misled so easily?  «rabbit trail warning»  By the way, this is one reason why proper discipleship is so important and why we desire to have a large emphasis upon it in our ministry.

OK, I have now tracked down the rabbit, shot it, barbequed it, and served it to some dinner guests after telling them it was chicken.  So, back to the verse.

Here’s my best guess.  In chapter 13, when Jesus was washing the disciples’ feet, He told Peter in verse 10: Jesus saith to him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not all.  Then the next verse says: For he knew who should betray him; therefore said he, Ye are not all clean.

It’s extremely clear what Jesus meant here.  He was indicating that His group of disciples was not entirely clean because of Judas.  John 15:3 could be a reference to Jesus’ “cleansing” of the group by exposing Judas as the unclean one in 13:21-27.

Other than that interpretation, or in addition to it, the other possibility is that Jesus simply meant that He had already begun that purging and cleansing process through His word (teaching and instruction) which He had recently given them.

So what do you think?  Do you think that it means something different from what I’ve mentioned?  If so, I’d love to hear it and tell you why you are wrong.  I hope you know that I’m just kidding!  The good news is that it doesn’t appear to me that a perfect understanding of this verse really has a great effect on the entire passage.  So on to verse four we go!

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.

Jesus here clearly classifies all people into two categories: those who abide in Him and produce fruit and those who don’t and have no fruit.  There have been many false doctrines which site this verse as a “proof text,” the most common of which being that Christians can loose their salvation if they do not produce fruit.  We’ll come across this thought again when we get to verse six, but for now I think it’s important to establish a vital truth from the very beginning of this passage: those who lack fruit do so because they do not have the life of the vine within them!  Fruit can only come from receiving the life of the vine.  A branch with no fruit is a dead branch!  The Bible is very clear on this: “He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.” (I John 5:12)

Remember, Jesus was not speaking these words directly to all people of all time, although they certainly apply to all people.  He was speaking to his disciples, so it should be obvious that the immediate context and application refers to Judas, who of course was not bearing fruit because he was not receiving the life of the vine, because he was not abiding in Jesus.  The wider application is to all of those, who like Judas, appear to follow Christ; they hang out with His followers, talk like His followers, act like His followers, but never have the spiritual fruit of His followers.

But what about the branches which do have fruit?  It’s clear to see that God, for His own glory, desires to have a fruit-producing vine, and that He does what is necessary to acheive this.  The purging that is mentioned here is like the vital but sometimes painful pruning that God must do to our lives so that He may cause us to bear more fruit for His glory.  It really should make us stop and ponder the many “offshoots” that we follow in our lives which only serve to distract us from resting in the source of life that is in Jesus Christ.

Want to add something to this study? Leave a comment.

I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

Throughout the gospel of John, Jesus gives seven “I am” statements, this being the last of them.  What a statement it is!  Notice that He doesn’t say, “I am a true vine,” or “I am the vine,” but emphatically “I am the true vine.”  Such a declaration oozes with affirmation of His deity.  As we’ll see later in the chapter, His being the vine clearly means that He is the source of all life.  There may be many other places where men will unsuccessfully search for true life, but Jesus reminds us that He only is the true vine where it can be found.

“and my Father is the husbandman.” The husbandman is the farmer; the one who owns the land, who cultivates the ground, who plants the seeds, and grows his fruit.  God is in complete control of His work and He is doing it through the true vine, Jesus Christ.

“For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.” (Colossians 1:16-17)

Unfortunately when we read the Bible, we sometimes tend to look at each verse or each chapter as a separate and unrelated thought, principle, or event. However, when the Bible was originally written it did not contain chapters or verses and therefore was likely read in more of a contextual fashion. This is the case with John chapter 15. Many people will quickly identify this as the chapter of “abiding in Christ,” but what I did not fully realize until recently was that it is part of a much larger context.

Starting in chapter 13, Jesus sits down with his 12 disciples for the feast of the passover and afterwards begins a lengthy time of instruction, teaching, and prayer. This was all one continuous event which continued through the end of chapter 17. Some of the notable highlights are:

• Jesus washes the disciples feet, a demonstration of service and humility
• The revealing of Judas as Jesus’ betrayer
• The giving of a new commandment, for Jesus’ followers to love one another (13:34-35)
• Jesus tells the disciples that He will soon be gone, but gives them the assurance that the Holy Spirit will soon be with them
• He gives His followers the promise of a place in Heaven, answer to prayer, and peace of heart
• The metaphor/allegory of the vine and branches (15:1-17)
• Instruction as to how the world will view and treat followers of Christ
• The great prayer of Jesus for all of His followers; past, present, and future.

From this perspective, it’s easy to see that chapter 15 is only one part of a large discourse.  If you are interested in studying this chapter along with me, I would challenge you to read at least chapters 13-17 at one time, uninterrupted.

So before we get started with the first verse, I think it’s important that we put ourselves in the context, in the place of those 11 disciples (minus Judas at this point).  Can you imagine the fear, the worry, the uncertainty, and possibly even the disappointment they were feeling?  They had followed Jesus everywhere for three years, and now He was telling them that He’d be leaving, and even hinting at the fact that He would be killed.  What would you be thinking at that moment?  Jesus gives them this powerful illustration of the Christian life at just the right time, right when they needed it.  It still functions today as one of the most vivid explanations of the relationship between God, Jesus, and His believers.

The post for verse one will be coming within a day or two, so if you haven’t already make sure to sign up for our blog updates by RSS or email.

Over the past couple weeks, I have really been struck by the passage in John 15, particularly verses 1-17. The amazing thing about the Bible is that no matter how many times you read a verse, a passage, or a book, there is always something new to be learned; most importantly something more to learn about God, His character, and His grace.

I have always learned best by taking what I learn and sharing it with others, so I figured that a great way to do this would be to share some of my two cents worth (more like one and a half) with you. Rather than writing very long posts and covering the whole passage in a few shots, I’ll try to keep each post relatively short by writing one post for each verse. Keep in mind that the word relatively is very…well…relative!

The truth is that I would be doing this even if I knew that nobody was going to read it just because it will help me (sounds selfish, I know!), but my hope really is that God would use this to make the truth of His Word more known and set people free as a result. Remember that Jesus said that we would know the truth and that the truth would make us free.  True freedom in Christ does not come by truth alone, but by knowing the truth. This is why it is so important that we dig deep into the riches of the Bible as we seek its Author with all our heart, soul, and mind.

So, in the next couple days we’ll get started with the introduction and verse one, and hopefully we’ll have this thing wrapped up by the time we get to Africa.