We open our Bibles together to the book of Romans in the seventh chapter where we find our theme in the fourth verse. Romans chapter seven and verse four. Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the law through the body of Christ, that you might be joined to another, to him who was raised from the dead, that we might bear fruit for God. We've been talking about this matter of our fruit bearing.
We have turned to John chapter 15 as a key text for that, and I invite you to turn there now as we focus our attention on this text, which is perhaps the most complete in the New Testament regarding the matter of bearing fruit. The fruit is the extension of the life of the vine, and so it is with the fruit that we bear for God. We have been freed from the law with its constraint and its condemnation. We have been liberated so that we now might bear fruit for God.
This chapter spoken by Jesus the evening before he was crucified is a chapter that explains to us something about fruit bearing. The fruit is the extension of the life of the vine. The fruit that you and I bear is the extension of his life in the world. The fruit that we bear is evidence of supernatural life, something beyond the mere natural. The fruit in our lives that we talked about last week is evidence that there is something supernatural about us.
We talked about the fruit that is a prayer that is answered. Jesus speaks in this chapter of that being one kind of fruit, prayer that is answered. Secondly, joy that is full. His joy given to us is the joy really of obedience. We talked about the fruit that is love, which is sacrificial, that lays down itself for the good of another. We talked about the fruit of understanding that is intimate. Jesus said, I give you insight and understanding like that given to friends.
No longer are you mere servants, but there is a relationship between us that is close. It draws us together. We're intimate and I share with you insights and wisdom and understanding. We talked about the fruit of persecution that is unjustified. The world will hate you, said Jesus, because it hated me. If it hated me, it's only natural that it will hate you and direct toward you acts of persecution and affliction that you don't deserve. But he said, rejoice in them.
Then there is the fruit of witness that is spirit empowered, the last part of chapter 15. Now, in the midst of this chapter on fruit bearing, Jesus mentions to us several stages of fruit bearing. We'll begin reading in verse 1. I am the true vine. Time out for just a moment. Jesus is saying, I am the vine that is true, that is genuine. In contrast to the vine of the Old Testament, which was the nation of Israel, that nation did not produce fruit pleasing to God. It was rotten fruit.
So God set aside that vine. Now Jesus is saying that he himself is the true vine. He says, my father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away. Every branch that bears fruit, he prunes it that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. You abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine. So 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, he bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. Then verse 16, you did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should remain. Notice in verse 2 that Jesus talks about three stages of fruit bearing. He talks about that potential of no fruit. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, no fruit, stage number one. Number two, fruit.
Every branch that bears fruit. Number three, more fruit. Do you notice the progression? No fruit, fruit, more fruit. And then in verse 5, much fruit. God's desire is to work in us to bring us from the first stage to the last stage. That point where we may be fruitless to the point where we bear much fruit, for that is the reason that he chose us. That we might go and bear fruit and that that fruit should remain.
It is interesting to notice that the father who is the husbandman takes some action so that that might happen. God is committed to see us bear much fruit. We have a responsibility ourselves to be sure. He tells us that responsibility is to abide. We'll talk about that in a moment. That it is the purpose, it is the intent, it is the work of God that you and I might bear much fruit. God is seeking to move us in that direction. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit.
Is it possible for a Christian to have no fruit? Well, the answer to that is yes, it is possible. It is possible for a genuine Christian not to bear fruit. Keep in mind that when Jesus uses this term, every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he is not using the term in me in the same sense that Paul used that term technically in Christ. He is talking here about one who is related to him, but who because of lack of whatever is not bearing fruit in his life.
You say, can that progress over a long period of time? And not without God taking some action as it explains it here. But it is possible for you and for me to have periods of our life where there is no fruit. What does God do when there is no fruit? Well, it says that he takes away that branch. There are two possible understandings of that verb, he takes away. One is that he literally does remove it.
He is not suggesting here that we are removed out of Christ as though we were in Christ in the sense that Paul uses that term. Somehow then we are taken out of Christ so that we are no longer his, no longer belong to him. Remember the theme of chapter 15 of John is fellowship, not relationship. It seems as though Jesus could be speaking here regarding that action of God whereby he removes a believer who has no fruit in his life, that is removes him physically from this world.
In 1 Corinthians 11, the chapter where we find a clear statement of the early church's practice of this ordinance that we observe tonight, the apostle warns about those believers who have died, implication prematurely, the ones that God has removed from the world because their lives were consumed by the flesh, by the works of the flesh and not spiritual fruit.
It may be that there is a warning here in Jesus' statement about that, saying if there is no fruit, the Father may well exercise that discipline of removing us from the world. However, this word also potentially can be understood as lift up. It seems to me in the context of a grape vine, a vineyard, that that particular understanding of the word would seem to be the best. Why is it that a branch might need to be lifted up?
Well, it's because a branch sometimes of a grape vine can be down, hidden underneath the growth of the rest of the vine where it's not getting proper sunlight. And it can't even get down into the dirt so that the vine dresser, the husbandman of the vineyard, comes along and picks up that branch, gets it out of the dirt and moves it so that the sun will be able to light up on that branch, the result of that being fruit grown from it.
It seems to me that that is what Jesus is speaking about here, that when there is no fruit in my life or in your life, the vine dresser, our heavenly Father, comes to us and lifts us up. He picks us up out of that dirt that we may be in at the moment and moves us into a position where we are in the sunlight, where we can begin to bear fruit. It seems to me that what is being spoken about here is called elsewhere in the New Testament chastisement.
Hebrews chapter 12 is a lengthy statement regarding chastisement. It says there that God chastises everyone that He loves, every son that He loves, every child of His receives chastisement, His correction. And it also says He scourges the son in whom He delights. The scourging is the more serious form of chastisement. God begins by some less serious form of bringing correction to us.
Perhaps it is conviction that comes to our hearts through something that we heard preached or some verse of scripture from our devotional life that pricks us and we see immediately where we are down in the dirt as it were and it is causing us to be fruitless for that moment. And God through that process is seeking to correct us. And then God can bring circumstances into our lives.
And I think as many of us have experienced, God can make those circumstances progressively severe to the point it is as though God gets out the whip and He scourges us. That is not a very pleasant experience. We heard Pastor Kramer honestly confess this morning about a switching he got when he was a boy. He certainly needed it, trying to set the barn on fire. Well there are times when you and I need a good spanking and God is not hesitant to give that to us because He loves us.
And He is committed that we should bear fruit. And so He brings discipline to us. And doing that lifts us up. He pulls us away from that dirt, that area of our life where we are hidden and out of the sunlight and gets us out there where we can receive the sunlight and begin to bear fruit. That is the second stage. We do begin to bear fruit. Sometimes it's painful the way God pulls us, the way God lifts us up. It's uncomfortable to us. We don't like it. It hurts.
But God is doing it for our own good. Then fruit begins. We begin to bear fruit. And God is pleased with that. But notice that He is not fully pleased. What does He do when we begin to bear fruit? He says, He prunes. He prunes. Now what is the difference between being lifted up or in the analogy we're using being chastised and being pruned? Well I heard a very fine sermon this last week that really dealt with this fully.
Bruce Wilkinson who is with Walk Through the Bible if any of you are familiar with him, he's at the pastors conference where I was and beautifully explained this. Challenged us not only to understand it but to apply this to our lives. He pointed out the fact that chastisement and pruning often feel identical. On the one hand God is chastising us because of some disobedience in our lives. And we're not bearing fruit. We're down in the dirt. The pruning takes place when we are bearing fruit.
Whatever happens to us in the pruning process may feel like the chastening to us. But God's motive, God's purpose is entirely different. The situation when we're being pruned is that we are bearing fruit and God's desire is to remove from us all that excess growth that takes our strength and our energy and our resources so that we concentrate more in bearing fruit and not just growing leaves. And so he prunes us.
Dr. Wilkinson pointed out the fact that because our pruning often feels like chastening we get the two confused. And when we're being pruned we say, Lord, I don't know if sin is in my life. Why are you chastening me? And we can get upset with God even to the point of becoming angry and bitter because we misunderstand what God is doing. God is not chastening us though it feels maybe like chastening but God is pruning us.
There isn't sin there that needs to be dealt with but there is excess growth that's not needed. There are some things in our lives that hinder us from bearing the kind of fruit He wants us to bear. And so He prunes, He chops off those extra things. And as he also pointed out, God risks to do that. He risks our misunderstanding and becoming angry at Him and thus falling out of fellowship so that He can prune.
How often has God come to you and me when we have been obedient and there has been fruit in our lives and He's begun to prune? We've thought He's been chastising us for sin but we couldn't find any sin. We've misunderstood what He's doing. We've gotten angry and bitter at God and the result of that is we fall out of fellowship and then we need the chastisement.
Part of growing up spiritually is being able to discern the difference between the time when God is chastening us and when God is pruning us. They feel the same very often. But on the one hand, God is dealing with sin in our lives that is hindering us from bearing any fruit at all. He wants us to bear fruit. But on the other case, God is pruning us so that we might bear not just fruit but more fruit and we might be more fruitful to Him.
What is it that allows us to move from the stage of bearing more fruit to bearing much fruit? Well, He slips into there that response on our part of abiding in verse 4. He says, abide in me and I in you. The branch cannot bear fruit of itself. That's true, isn't it? Have you ever cut a branch off a fruit tree and pruning it, lay it over to the side and then see it bear fruit? Of course not. It's cut off from its supply of life. It withers. It's gone.
Jesus said, no more can you unless you abide in me. What is abiding? What is Jesus talking about? Well, He explains what abiding is. Abiding is obeying. Abiding is obeying. To remain or to continue or to abide in the vine simply means that you and I are obeying Him. 1 John 3 24 says, and the one who keeps His commandments abides in Him. That's 1 John 3 24. The one who keeps His commandments abides in Him. What is the secret of bearing much fruit in our lives?
It is abiding in fellowship with Him. Even through the pruning process, when it hurts and it's painful, not because God is dealing with some sin but because He's seeking to remove the excesses of our lives. Wanting us to be more disciplined. So often we're more interested in the leaves than we are in the fruit, aren't we? We want to hang on to all this green stuff we have in our lives. God is not interested so much in the leaves as He is in the fruit that remains. Leaves do not remain.
God wants fruit and fruit that remains. Eternal fruit. And He tells us that this condition of abiding is that which glorifies the Father. Tonight, each one of us is in some stage here if we belong to Jesus Christ. There's the possibility that there's no fruit in our lives at all. And I can guarantee you that if that is the case, that the heavenly husbandmen will come to you and will chase you. He does me. He does every person who belongs to Him because He loves us.
And He will seek to lift us up so that we can begin to bear fruit. If tonight you are bearing fruit, then rejoice when God comes to you with the shears, with the snippers. And He begins to cut out of your life the things that are unnecessary, that are absorbing that time, absorbing that energy, that are not really producing fruit. It's just green growth. Rejoice, because what He's trying to do is to channel that energy, that life, so that it will bear more fruit.
And as you continue and abide in fellowship with Him through that pruning process, then much fruit will be in your life. He does say in verse 6, if anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up. And they gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned. There are many interpretations of verse 6. It's not an easy verse to understand.
We know from other teaching of Scripture that the Lord cannot be saying here that one who is a branch in the vine can be cut off and then thrown away and ultimately burned in hell. But there are people who have a theology that accommodate that point of view. It is not biblical in my opinion. I don't think it can be substantiated biblically. But there are Christians who believe that. I think we have to be careful in pushing the analogy too far. That's true with parables. It's true with analogies.
We can't push them too far. The point that Jesus is simply making here, I think, is that a branch that does not bear fruit loses its purpose. Barnhouse perhaps put it the best when he said, this refers to, quote, loss of usefulness in the present life and reward in heaven. Close quote.
A week ago we looked at that verse in Revelation chapter 2, a serious verse where Jesus said, Remember therefore from where you have fallen and repent and do the deeds you did at first or else I am coming to you and I will remove your lampstand out of its place unless you repent. This is a verse similar to that. It's a severe action on the Lord's part.
The works of our lives which have not borne fruit, the mere leaves, just that greenery that may be impressive, it may be attractive, it may cause people to marvel and applaud, but is really of no eternal worth, all of that's going to burn some day at the judgment seat. It's going to go up in smoke. There's nothing left of that.
What remains is fruit that is produced through us as we abide in Jesus Christ and as His life flows through us and we have that fruit of answered prayer, the fruit of joy that is full of love, that sacrifices, of understanding of the things of God, of persecution that we don't deserve, a witness that is Spirit empowered of people coming to Christ as that fruit is produced in us and remains and the Father is glorified. So I ask the question tonight, are you abiding? Are you abiding?
Is there much fruit in your life? Or are you at the stage of more fruit? Is God pruning? Is He snipping, clipping, perhaps washing? Does it hurt? Well, if it does, remember His purpose in it. As we come to the Lord's table, it's an appropriate time for us to examine ourselves, says the apostle, just to see what kind of fruit there is in our lives.
He went out from that last supper, walked through the vineyards there on the hills on the way to the Garden of Gethsemane and from there He was taken to the Judgment Hall and from there to Calvary where He paid the ultimate sacrifice for our sins. Today the vine, the true vine, I mean the genuine one is in heaven. But His branches come out from heaven right down here to the earth and that's you and me and His desire is that we might bear much fruit.
Let's allow the Lord's table tonight to be a time when we can be lifted up and we respond to that or where we're being pruned and God is seeking to cause us to cut off some things maybe, maybe even good things. But we say, Lord, I'm going to set that aside that I might bear much fruit. That's His purpose and what a wonderful purpose it is. Would you join me in prayer? How about it my friend? What kind of fruit is there in your life? What stage are you at? Are you a branch in the vine?
Well if so, is there fruit, the kind of fruit that remains? Are you abiding? When God chastens us, I don't believe He leaves us in the dark as to what His concern is. I think one of the ways we can know the difference between chastening and pruning is that God makes it very clear to our conscience when there is something in our life that displeases Him. That's chastening. That's the process of chastening.
If there's something tonight that's displeasing the Lord, if there's conviction in your heart, perhaps it is some attitude or action or the words of your mouth. Then deal with that in confession. Don't come to the Lord's table until you do. If you do, you eat and drink judgment to yourself and you face the terrible possibility of beyond scourging being removed.
If God is snipping and clipping in your life and you are not aware of a specific sin, perhaps you need to understand that is His pruning process. You may have been complaining at God a bit because of what you're going through. It's hurt and you've griped. Maybe you've even gotten angry or bitter at God. If so, that needs to be confessed, doesn't it? Is God pruning you? Do you need to say, Father, thank you. Thank you for pruning me.
Our heavenly Father, we are so glad that you're committed that we might bear much fruit, eternal fruit. Forgive us so often for being satisfied with just leaves. I pray that you will make us desire as much as you desire, that our lives be characterized by spiritual fruit that abides just as we abide in the vine. In Jesus' name, amen.