Guest speaker Jeremy Jernigan takes us through the text in John 15 and describes what it means to remain in the vine and experience the vibrant life that Jesus desires us to have. The more we remain in the vine, the more closely we get to Jesus, and the more vibrantly we’ll experience life.
Jeremy’s message covered a lot of territory, however, there are some thoughts that crossed my mind.
While one of the main focusses was the believer in Christ (as a branch) as noted from John 15:1-2,
“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.”
These passages also have an element of fatherhood/sonship that indicates a reward in verse 8,
“This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”
As God the Father is not a father as one among many but is the Father from who all fatherhood is derived just as Jesus is not a son but the Son that shows true sonship, so when Jesus says He is ‘the true vine’, He is differentiating Himself from the visible (created) vine but points to it as a similitude or likeness to His situation (and, of course, covers Jeremy’s Old Testament observations). This vine and branch relationship between Christ and the believer(s) is a mystery and is echoed by Paul in Col 1:27,
“To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
In this verse ‘the hope of glory’ through Christ in us, ties back to verse 8 above ‘This is to my Father’s glory’…our ultimate glorification through Christ in us, reflects the Father’s glory, and is also reflective of His Fatherhood through many sons.
While John 15:1 indicates the Father to be the gardener or vinedresser, when we look for examples in the Bible, perhaps we see Judas (who, presumably, was not ‘made clean’ and had departed in John chapter 13) and Peter being ‘pruned’ through several rebukes from Jesus and became fruitful, however, we find in Revelation, Jesus walking among the lampstands in Rev 1:12-13,
“Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest.”
And later in verse 20,
“As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.”
As Christ observes the churches, we then have the letters to the seven churches pointing out their strengths and weaknesses and rewards and punishments (namely a ‘pruning’ regime?). However, this is done at the hand of Christ and not the Father. The presumption here may be that John 15 is applicable prior to the Cross whereas after Christ’s victory through the Cross we have in Matthew 28:18,
“And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”
At the 30:40 mark, it literally made my mouth drop open.
This is the first time I have ever heard aloud such a message.
Thank you!!!
Message good until he said if you can’t sacrifice money you don’t care about God. Tell that to ppl on the poverty line who can only pay rent and food. Not cool. Let him give all his rent money, get evicted and become homeless, then come talk to me