"Remain in me"

7^th August 2010

It's remarkable how many people pray for God's salvation in Jesus Christ, and join a church, and pray, and sing songs of worship, and appear to be genuinely born again into God's kingdom, and then fall away. Jesus warned us about this, saying:

John 15v1-4
"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. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me."

Jesus is describing our relationship with Him with an analogy in which He is "the true vine" and every Christian is a branch of that vine. We are joined to Him, and have become part of Him (Paul describes Christians as "in Christ", see for example Romans 8v1). And if a branch is removed from the vine, the vine will survive but the branch will die.

Jesus says even more than this, though. First, He says that God "cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit". I believe He means that there are some people who appear to have been joined to Jesus but haven't really entered into relationship with Him, and so bear no fruit. These will leave the church sooner or later, because they were never genuinely part of the church.

Jesus then says that "every branch that does bear fruit [God] prunes so that it will be even more fruitful". Every true Christian has felt the sharpness of God's pruning knife. He wants us to be perfect, the best branches we can be. And he wants us to be even more fruitful than we are. Sometimes the process of pruning us can be painful, but it's worth it. For every true Christian, the pruning process has already started, so Jesus says "You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you" but the process will continue as the divine Gardener does His work.

Jesus urges us "Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me." And then He reminds us (so we know it's important):

John 15v5
"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.

And he continues:

John 15v6-8
If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

Whether a true Christian remains in genuine relationship with our Saviour is a matter of that Christian's choice. We choose whether to pray, to read the Bible, to meet regularly with our local church, or we choose not to. If we do, we will bear much fruit and bring glory to God. If we do not, we will lose our sense of God's presence, our awareness of His love and power, and our ability to make a difference in the world.