Scripture:
John 15
Translation: John 15.1I am
the True Vine and My Father is the Gardener. 2Every branch in Me that
doesn’t produce fruit, He will take it away. And every branch that does produce
fruit, He will prune it, so that it will produce more fruit. 3Already
you are pruned because of the message that I’ve been speaking to you. 4Stay
with Me, and I will stay with you. Just as the branch can’t produce fruit from
itself unless it stays on the vine, in the same way you can’t either unless you
stay with Me. 5I am the Vine, you’re the branches. The person that stays
with Me, and I with him—this person will produce a lot of fruit, because
without Me, you can’t do anything! 6Unless someone stays with Me, he
will be thrown outside like the branch, and it will dry up, and they are
gathering them and throwing them into the fire and the dead branches will are
burning. 7If you stay with Me and My words stay with you, ask for
whatever you want, and it will happen for you. 8By the following My
Father is glorified: that you would produce a lot of fruit and become followers
for Me.
9Just as the Father loves Me, I also loved
you. Stay in My love. 10If you obey My commands, you are staying in
My love, just as I really am obeying My Father’s commands and am staying in His
love. 11I’m emphasizing these things to you, so that My joy would be
in you and that your joy would be filled up. 12This is My Command:
Love one another just like I love you. 13No one has greater love
than this kind of love: someone who gives up his life for his friends. 14You
are My friends, if you do what I’m commanding you. 15I’m no longer
calling you slaves, because the slave doesn’t know what his master is doing. So
I’m really calling you friends, because all the things that I heard from My
Father I made known to you. 16You definitely didn’t choose me; instead,
I chose you and I appointed you, so that you would go and produce fruit and so
that your fruit would last, so that whatever you ask the Father in My Name, He
would give to you! 17I’m commanding these things for you, so that
you would love one another.
18If the world is hating you, know that
first it was really hating Me. 19If you were a part of the world,
the world wound be loving its own. But because you’re not a part of the
world—instead I chose you out of the world, because of this the world is hating
you. 20Remember the message that I told you: “a slave is not greater
than his master.” If they persecute me, they will persecute you too. If they
obey My message, they will obey yours too. 21Instead, they will do
all these things to you because of My Name, because they don’t know the One Who
sent Me. 22If I didn’t come and speak to them, they wouldn’t have
sin. But now they don’t have a valid excuse for their sin. 23The
person who hates Me also hates My Father. 24If I hadn’t done the
things among them that no one else did, they wouldn’t have sin. But now they
have really been seeing and hating both
Me and My Father. 25Nevertheless, it is so that the message that was
truly written in their Law which says “they hated me for no reason” would be
fulfilled. 26Whenever the Helper that I will send to you from the
Father comes—the Spirit of Truth that proceeds from the Father—That Spirit will
testify about Me. 27And you will also testify that you were with Me
from the beginning!
Interpretation
1.
Structure
a.
The Metaphor of the Vine
Given and Applied (vv.1-17)
i.
The Metaphor of the Vine
Given and Applied (vv.1-8)
ii.
The Metaphor fleshed out
with love and obedience (vv.9-17)
b.
The Hatred of the World for
Jesus and His Father and His Disciples (vv.18-27)
i.
The world will hate
Christians as it hated Christ (vv.18-21)
ii.
The world stands guilty of
sin as the Scriptures foretold (vv.22-25)
iii.
The Spirit and Christians
will testify about Christ to the world (vv.26-27)
2.
Themes
a.
Gardening/farming motif
b.
Producing fruit
c.
Necessity of staying with
Christ
d.
Love coupled with obedience
e.
Friends vs. slaves
f.
Love vs. hate
g.
Message/speaking/talking
h.
Commanding and obedience
i.
World vs. disciples
j.
Selection by Christ
k.
Fulfillment of the
Scriptures
l.
Sin and guilt
m.
Holy Spirit coming
n.
testifying
3.
Doctrines
a.
The Holy Trinity: Father,
Son, Holy Spirit
b.
Possibly the eternal
procession of the Spirit
Applications
1.
Outline
a.
Stay Close to Christ, because
you NEED Christ
i.
We need Christ to produce
fruit (vv.1-7)
1.
We can only produce fruit
when we are connected to Christ
2.
We can only produce tons of
fruit when we are pruned by God the Father
a.
Facing problems,
difficulties, pain, suffering, and the like doesn’t mean that you can’t produce
fruit, or even that God doesn’t want you to produce fruit. No God puts us
through hard and painful situations and experiences, because He loves us and
wants us to be able to not just be fruitful, but crazy fruitful!
b.
Scarier than pain and
problems is if we fail to produce any fruit. What we as Christians should be
scared of is not whether we suffer or face opposition or experience pain or
hardship. Instead, we should be scared if we look at our lives and we can’t
find any fruit, because that means we are not really connected to Christ, and soon
we will dry up and be destroyed.
ii.
We need Christ to do
everything (v.5)
b.
Stay Close to Christ, through
love and obedience
i.
To stay close to Christ we
need to obey
1.
If you want to experience
the love of Christ, you have to obey Christ.
2.
If you want to be happy,
you have to obey Christ
ii.
To stay close to Christ we
need to love
1.
We need to love each other
a.
Emotions
b.
Actions, to the point of
self-sacrifice
2.
We need to love Christ
c.
Stay Close to Christ,
because you ARE close to Christ
i.
We are the branches of Christ
the Vine
ii.
We are friends of Christ,
assuming we obey and love Him
iii.
We are chosen by Christ; We
don’t choose Christ
iv.
We are destined by Christ,
to go out and produce lasting fruit
d.
Stay Close to Christ, through
hatred and opposition
i.
Don’t let being hated
because of Christ make you walk away from Christ
ii.
Don’t let being opposed
because of Christ make you fail to work for Christ
e.
Stay Close to Christ,
because you REP Christ
i.
You represent Christ to the
World in your Identity
ii.
You represent Christ to the
World in your Activity
iii.
You represent Christ to the
World in your Testimony
iv.
You represent Christ to the
World by the Holy Spirit
2.
Discussion Questions
a.
If Jesus was speaking today
in our culture, what metaphor do you think He would have used instead of the
Vine and Branches and Gardener? Try to come up with a metaphor that expresses
almost the same ideas Jesus’ original metaphor did.
b.
What is the biggest thing
that keeps you from staying close to Christ? Why does it have that effect? What
could you do about it?
c.
Discuss the fruit you see
in your own life and in the lives of others in our church. How much fruit do
you have? Some, a little, a lot, none?
d.
What areas of your life
need to have more obedience to Christ? What areas of your life could be
expressing more love to others?
e.
Do you feel close to
Christ? If so, how close? If not, why not? Do you think it is possible to be
close to Christ without feeling close to Christ? Why or why not?
f.
Do you ever get hated or
haters for following Christ? What about opposition to your being a Christian or
living a Christian life? If so, does it ever make you want to stop being a
Christian? Is there anything else that makes it difficult to stay close and
committed to Christ?
g.
Discuss how your personal
identity, activity, and testimony is doing at repping Christ. what about us as
a church? How does the Holy Spirit come into play in repping Christ?
No comments:
Post a Comment