Devotional Studies Course 3 Abiding in the Vine Now that we have established the essential framework for your relationship with the Lord, we will start exploring the finer details of how you can relate to the Lord on a daily basis. Read John 15:1-8 Just prior to going to the Cross, Jesus gave these final instructions to his disciples, part of a speech spanning four chapters (John 13-16). This speech often called the Farewell Discourse was their graduation lecture, the last class before their relationship with their Master changed forever. Jesus knew his disciples would soon constitute a distinct community with a definite function, and he wished to prepare them for the change his departure would make in their manner of living. 1 What would Jesus reveal about the secret to life The Amazing Secret in the post-resurrection period? What lifestyle would characterize this distinct community with The Bond of Covenant a definite function? Let s look at what Jesus has Abiding in the Vine to say through the lens of various Bible translations: The Intimacy of Prayer The Intimacy of Worship New International Version I am the The Intimacy of God s Word true vine...remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must The Intimacy of Obedience remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit The Voice of the Shepherd unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you Deep Calls to Deep are the branches. If a man remains in me and A Day Called Today I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. New King James Version I am the true vine...abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. Page 1
New Living Translation I am the true vine...remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful apart from me. Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. Contemporary English Version...I am the true vine...stay joined to me, and I will stay joined to you. Just as a branch cannot produce fruit unless it stays joined to the vine, you cannot produce fruit unless you stay joined to me. I am the vine, and you are the branches. If you stay joined to me, and I stay joined to you, then you will produce lots of fruit. But you cannot do anything without me. Worldwide English Bible I am the real fruit tree...you must be in me and I will be in you. The branch cannot bear fruit by itself. It must be joined to the tree. And you cannot do any good thing if you are not joined to me. I am the fruit tree and you are the branches. I will be in the person who is in me. That person will have a fruitful life. But you can do nothing without me. Good News Bible I am the real vine...remain united to me, and I will remain united to you. A branch cannot bear fruit by itself; it can only do so if it remains in the vine. In the same way you cannot bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine, and you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, and I in him, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me. William Barclay s Translation I am the real vine...it is essential that you should remain in me, and I in you. No branch can bear fruit in isolation by itself; it must remain in the vine. Just so, neither can you, unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If anyone remains in me, and I in him, he bears much fruit, because apart from me it is impossible for you to do anything. The Jerusalem Bible I am the true vine...make your home in me, as I make mine in you. As a branch cannot bear fruit all by itself, but must remain part of the vine, neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, and me in him, bears fruit in plenty; for cut off from me you can do nothing. The New Testament in the Language of the People I am the real vine...you must remain in union with me and I will remain in union with you. Just as no branch by itself can bear fruit unless it remains united to the vine, so you cannot unless you remain in union with me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in union with me and I in union with him will bear abundant fruit, because you cannot do anything cut off from union with me. The Amplified Bible I AM the True Vine...Dwell in Me, and I will dwell in you. [Live in Me, and I will live in you.] Just as no branch can bear fruit of itself without abiding in (being vitally united to) the vine, neither can you bear fruit unless you abide in Me. I am the Vine; you are the branches. Whoever Page 2
lives in Me and I in him bears much (abundant) fruit. However, apart from Me [cut off from vital union with Me] you can do nothing. Wuest Expanded Translation I, in contradistinction to anyone else, am the vine, the genuine vine...maintain a living communion with me, and I with you. Just as the branch is unable to be bearing fruit from itself as a force unless it remains in a living union with the vine, so neither you, unless you maintain a living communion with me. As for myself, I am the vine. As for you, you are the branches. He who maintains a living communion with me and I with him, this one is bearing much fruit, because apart from me you are not able to be doing anything. The Message I am the real vine...live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can t bear grapes by itself but only by being joined to the vine, you can t bear fruit unless you are joined with me. I am the vine, you are the branches. When you re joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can t produce a thing. Take a deep breath and try to absorb the impact of what you have just read, for we have just seen from various angles one vital truth: that the Christian life has been designed by God to be empowered through a vital union with Christ that is intimate and organic. Just as a vine branch can neither sustain itself nor produce fruit by itself, so too the Christian can do nothing without [Christ]. And just as the vine branch must be joined in union with the vine stock in order to have life, so you too must maintain a living communion with Christ in order to live the Christian life. The Meaning of Abiding In order to grasp what Jesus meant when he said, Abide in me, and I in you, we need to understand the original Greek word that is translated, as we have seen, in so many different ways by different Bible versions: remain, abide, joined and dwell, to name just a few. The reason there are so many ways of saying the same thing is that the original Greek word meno means all of this and much more. In fact, there is no single English word that fully captures the meaning of the original Greek. Meno can have these various shades of meaning: To remain, abide, live in To sojourn, tarry, wait Not to depart, not to be moved, to stay in a given state or relationship To be held, kept continually, fixed immovably, stuck steadfastly To continue to be, to last, to endure, to survive To remain united, not to become separated or cut off To give you an idea of the richness of the meaning of meno, let s look at how it is used in other parts of the New Testament: Page 3
Matthew 26:38 Then [Jesus] said to them, My soul is overwhelmed with sorry to the point of death. Stay here (meno) and keep watch with me. Luke 19:5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay (meno) at your house today. Luke 24:29 But they urged him strongly, Stay (meno) with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over. So he went in to stay (meno) with them. John 6:27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures (meno) to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you... John 8:31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, If you hold to (meno) my teaching, you are really my disciples. Acts 27:31 Then Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, Unless these men stay with (meno) the ship, you cannot be saved. Acts 27:41 But the ship struck a sandbar and ran aground. The bow stuck fast and would not move (meno), and the stern was broken to pieces by the pounding of the surf. 1 Corinthians 3:14 If what he has built survives (meno), he will receive his reward. 2 Timothy 3:14 But as for you, continue (meno) in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it... Hebrews 12:27 The words once more indicate the removing of what can be shaken...so that what cannot be shaken may remain (meno). 1 John 2:24 See that what you have heard from the beginning remains (meno) in you. If it does, you also will remain (meno) in the Son and in the Father. As you can see, the word meno is rich in meaning. Taking into account its varied shades of meaning, meno, as used in John 15:4, has the sense of dwelling in Christ, remaining in Christ, staying in Christ, connecting with Christ, continuing in Christ, and experiencing and maintaining an intimate union in fellowship with Christ. And just in case we didn t quite get the point, meno is exactly the same term that the Lord Jesus uses to describe the intimate fellowship he himself experiences with his Father: John 14:10 Don t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in (meno) me, who is doing his work. And so once again we see that the quality of the union we have in Christ, and into which we are invited to participate on a regular basis, is the same quality of union that the Son himself has with the Father: no more, no less! How can this be possible? How can you ever experience and maintain the quality of intimate contact that Jesus is talking about? Well, even the act of abiding in Page 4
Christ cannot be done in your own strength! Remember what Jesus said? Without me, you can do nothing! And so he has sent into your heart the same Spirit who enables the quality of meno abiding that is experienced between the Father and the Son! You now have the same Holy Spirit dwelling in (meno) you and enabling you to abide in (meno) Christ on a daily basis, just as 1 John 4:13 explains: We know that we live in (meno) him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. The Four Elements of Abiding We are on the verge of discovering the vital key that unlocks the open secret of living the Christian life: an intimate, organic union with Christ that impacts the day, from beginning to end. And in John 15:1-8 we discover that this key (called abiding in Christ ) involves four vital elements elements so essential to the Christian life that without them the Christian life simply doesn t work. These four essential elements of abiding in Christ are: Priority Purpose Process Power Let s explore each of these four elements in detail, and see how they influence your devotional experience with the Lord. The Priority of Intimacy The priority of abiding in the vine is underlined by the grammar Jesus uses in John 15:4-6. He doesn t present abiding as a casual option for you, but as an imperative, even a command. According to the translation of William Barclay, Jesus says: It is essential that you should remain in me, and I in you...because apart from me it is impossible for you to do anything. You can t get any more emphatic than that! It is not something we can think about for a while, or put off till tomorrow. It is absolutely essential no ifs or buts. The message is clear: to be in intimate, organic union with Christ means success as a Christian; to ignore this living communion means categoric and abject failure. So with such an imperative ringing in our ears, let s get down to business. What does it mean to be vitally united with Christ? It starts with the first essential element: the priority of intimacy. Jesus clearly states God s highest priority in John 15:4. As the Contemporary English Version puts it: Stay joined to me, and I will stay joined to you... How do we place abiding in Christ as a priority? Practically explained, meno means two things for you: The daily action of abiding spending unhurried, daily time in fellowship with Christ, drawing one s life from him. This is a discipline which we will be exploring in depth in the coming lessons. Page 5
The daily state of abiding living and ministering out of an ongoing experience of fellowship and union with Christ. This is the overflow of your daily time of fellowship with Christ, resulting in a close walk with the Lord throughout the day. The primary objective of the Devotional Studies Course is to learn how to experience intimacy with God and live out of the overflow of that intimacy. Our aim is not just to encourage you to establish an unhurried and meaningful time of connection with the Lord each day, but also to live in that intimate union as part of your daily walk with Jesus. For the first definition of abiding in Christ always leads to the second. But every walk begins with a first step, and the first step in learning to abide in Christ is to recognize and act upon the priority of intimacy. Once you have that priority established meaning that no other priority can threaten to supersede it you are ready for the next essential element of the Christian life. The Purpose of Intimacy Although God s priority for your life is to experience close and intimate fellowship with him, this is not the purpose for your life. The purpose of abiding in Christ is not to abide in Christ! The purpose of abiding in Christ is to bear abundant fruit. Jesus emphasized the purpose of intimacy with God in John 15:8: This is to my Father s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. As you begin to discover the thrill of fellowship with the Lord, there is the slight danger that you may become introverted and self-focused. But God does not allow this, for abiding in Christ is not designed to be the be all and end all of your fellowship with the Lord. Never confuse the priority with the purpose. In Philippians 2:1-4, we find this admonition from Paul: If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose...each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. What is Paul saying? Out of the encouragement of union with Christ (the meno experience) we should be learning to express love in the same way that God does! Our experience of being one with him in fellowship should result in our becoming one with him in purpose. From abiding comes action! From being comes doing! From priority flows purpose! Philippians 2:5-8 gives the perfect example of how priority initiates purpose: Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death even death on a cross! Page 6
What better example is there of a natural flow from priority to purpose? Jesus never discarded the priority of intimacy with his Father, but that intimacy resulted in a unity of purpose. He willingly laid aside the blessings of his intimate union with the Father in order to pursue the purpose of that intimate union. And, says Paul, your own attitude should be exactly the same as that of Christ Jesus! Let s take a quick stocktake of what God has given you. Because of your covenantal union with Christ, the Father has blessed [you] in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ (Ephesians 1:3). You are now a son and an heir of God (Galatians 4:7), seated...with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 2:6). And in order to enable you to experience the same deep meno experience the Son has with the Father, God sent the Spirit of his Son into your heart, through whom you now call out Abba, Father, an echo of the cry of Jesus own heart to his Father! (Galatians 4:6). The Father has indeed embraced you and drawn you into the closeness of the living communion between himself and his Son! No wonder John exclaims in 1 John 3:1: How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!... But having been brought into this intimate circle of fellowship, is this now the sole focus of your life? No! It is only the launching pad for the full purpose to which God has called you! For having been fully blessed in Christ, you are now to have the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus! Like Jesus, you are called to move beyond the blessing to the purpose! Like him, you are sent by the Father out of the intimate circle of fellowship within the Godhead in order to embrace a world that is outside the circle (note John 20:21). Just as Jesus extended the invitation of abiding in the fellowship of the Godhead to you, so now you too are called to extend that invitation to others! The first step is to acknowledge the priority of intimacy with God in Christ. The second step is to embrace the purpose of intimacy with God in Christ. And in order to do this, you must submit to the process of intimacy with God in Christ. The Process of Intimacy John 15:2-3 describes the process of intimacy with God: I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. Pruning sounds scary, doesn t it? Especially when Jesus talks of the Father [cutting] off every branch in me that bears no fruit. But we need to realize that Jesus is talking here of two types of branches: Branches that don t bear fruit these are branches that bear no fruit because they are not drawing one ounce of life from the vine. In other words, they are not in covenantal union with Christ at all. The pruning action of the Father in this case means lopping these branches off and casting Page 7
them into the fire. Pruning is necessary for any vine. Dead wood is worse than fruitlessness, for dead wood can harbor disease and decay. 2 Romans 11:17-24 indicates that the branches that were broken off were members of the Jewish race who rejected the New Covenant instituted by Jesus, and so the prophecy of John 15:2 was largely fulfilled in AD 70, at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem. However, there is also an implicit warning in both John 15:2 and Romans 11:20-21 that we all learn from the mistake of that first generation of Jews and avoid the same peril that results from rejecting faith in Christ. Branches that do bear fruit these are branches that are already bearing some fruit, but not much fruit as God has desired. An untrimmed vine will develop long rambling branches that produce little fruit because most of the strength of the vine is given to growing wood. 3 And so the pruning action of the Father in this case means cutting the branch back to make sure that it is drawing life from the vine, producing, in time, richer and more abundant fruit. As a believer in Christ, you have been brought into covenantal union with Christ, which means that you are already bearing fruit. That fruit may be small or large, poor or rich, but the very fact that you have expressed faith in Christ means that the fruit of the Holy Spirit has begun to grow in your life (Galatians 5:22-23). And so it is because you are producing fruit that God will prune you in order that you produce more and better fruit! This pruning process is a vital and inescapable part of your meno fellowship with Christ. And even though it may be painful at times, it is a positive, not a negative, experience. The result is much fruit, which, according to Jesus in John 15:8, will result in glory to the Father. Did the Son of God escape this pruning process? After all, he was sinless and therefore, you would think, not in need of pruning! But the Bible indicates otherwise. Even though he was indeed sinless (2 Corinthians 5:21), he still needed to [grow] in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men (Luke 2:52). And so Hebrews 5:8-9 tells us: Although [Jesus] was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him. The process of being made perfect was, for Jesus, not one of being cleansed from sin. Rather, it was the process of being pruned (learning obedience from what he suffered) in order that his life may produce the abundant fruit that his Father had planned. How much more our lives we who have been brought by Christ into the same intimate circle of fellowship with the Father? If God disciplined his Firstborn Son, won t he also discipline us? The process of intimacy with God is one of pruning and discipline. But it is important to understand how this pruning and discipline takes place. As Norman Grubb puts it, conviction of sin does not come from the inward, but the upward look. Sin is seen to be sin not by self-examination, but by the light of God. 4 Page 8
Do you notice that both the priority of intimacy with God and the purpose of intimacy with God are outward-focused? The priority is focused upon God himself. The purpose is focused upon others. The process of intimacy, however, is focused on you. But God has purposely set the order: God, others, you. This is because the last thing he wants is for you to become absorbed in an introverted, navel gazing exercise. It is not your job to identify and uproot sin in your life. This is the responsibility of the Holy Spirit! Your sole responsibility is to obey the promptings and conviction of the Holy Spirit when he does turn the spotlight on an area in your life that requires repentance and change. Remember: It is as you look upward and outward that the Holy Spirit will shine his light upon the inner recesses of your heart. How does God prune your life? According to John 15:3 (Amplified Bible), he does it through his Word. Speaking to his disciples, Jesus says, You are cleansed and pruned already, because of the word which I have given you... Ephesians 5:25-27 indicates the same thing when it says:...christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. This is the process of intimacy the washing with water through the word which will result in a radiant Christian life, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. This process, which will result in you being fully conformed to the likeness of God s Son (Romans 8:29), is conducted primarily through your exposure to the convicting and conforming power of God s Word. As you submit to the authority of God s Word and to the transforming power of the Holy Spirit, your life is pruned, resulting in more abundant fruit. This simple fact lays a vital foundation of understanding how your devotional life has been designed to work. The Word of God plays a vital role in the abiding process, for as Jesus says later in John 15:7: If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. As we have already seen, the first step is to acknowledge the priority of intimacy with God in Christ. The second step is to embrace the purpose of intimacy with God in Christ. The third step is to submit to the process of intimacy with God in Christ. Once you have taken these three steps, then and only then are you ready to exercise the power of intimacy with God. The Power of Intimacy Only now are we ready to begin exercising the awesome power of intimacy with God. For many Christians, this is their first step. They rush to take up the promise of John 15:7...ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you... without first fulfilling the conditional statement that precedes the promise If you remain in me and my words remain in you... Page 9
1 2 3 4 The Amplified Bible reveals clearly how the promise of power is always conditional to the process: If you live in Me [abide vitally united to Me] and My words remain in you and continue to live in your hearts, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you. There is an authority which emerges from true intimacy with God. Out of submission to the process of intimacy comes the power of intimacy. A pagan centurion recognized this basic principle operating in Jesus life and ministry, when he said in Luke 7:7-8:...But say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority... Jesus himself declared that his power flowed out of his intimate relationship with his Father. In John 5:19, he said: I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. Do you see the parallel between this statement and what Jesus later tells his disciples in John 15? Let s compare the two statements: John 5:19 I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. John 15:5 I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. Both the Son of God s meno experience and your meno experience are predicated by the same clear limitation: You can do nothing by yourself! Just as the Son s ministry was a product of his intimate knowledge of his Father s activity, so you too are called to learn the same intimate knowledge of the Father. And just as the power of God s Son flowed from the priority, purpose and process of intimacy with his Father, so you too are required to abide by the same meno principles. Do you want to experience the power and authority of God operating in and through your life? Then first you must acknowledge the priority of intimacy with God, embrace the purpose of intimacy with God and submit to the process of intimacy with God. This is the incredible secret of the Christian life the open secret known as abiding in the vine! NIV Bible Commentary: New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), p.350. NIV Bible Commentary: New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), p.350. NIV Bible Commentary: New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), p.350. Norman Grubb, The Liberating Secret (London: Lutterworth Press, 1962), p.125. Unless otherwise indicated, all quotations from the Bible are from the New International Version, copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers. The Online Bible College can be accessed at www.online-bible-college.com Page 10