I am the true vine (John 15:1-11)

Jesus and the disciples had left the upper room where they had their Passover gathering and were making their way to the Garden of Gethsemane, the place where they usually spent the Passover evening in the city. It is possible that on their way there they passed a vine that Jesus used as an illustration of spiritual fruitbearing. Passover occurred during the spring, and springtime was when good branches were pruned and dead branches removed. The owner may have cut off unfruitful branches and they were lying on the ground. Either the owner or his servants would gather them for burning. The owner had also pruned fruitful branches, and passers-by would not see any unwelcome growths on them.

Jesus, however, was not merely using an illustration from the natural world. When he called himself the true vine, he showed that there was a false one as well. The Old Testament calls Israel a vine several times, but as Isaiah 5 emphasises, it had failed to produce fruit for God and was not a true vine. It had been unfaithful many times. In contrast to Israel, Jesus was the faithful vine who would produce continual fruit. Astonishingly, the fruit appears in his people, likened here to the branches of the vine.

The Saviour first draws the attention of the disciples to the unfruitful branches now removed from the vine by the owner. I suspect he had Judas and others like him in mind here. Judas’ unusual departure from them earlier that evening would have bothered them. Previously, when Judas had been present, Jesus had told the group that they were not all clean, but now he says that they are clean, Judas having left them. The basic problem with Judas as a disciple of Jesus was that he had become one for wrong reasons. He had not trusted in Jesus as a Saviour from sin but as an imagined political deliverer. Because he made a false start, he did not undergo the normal experiences of a disciple, even although he was with genuine disciples for about three years. For a good while, he hid his mistake, but eventually the Father in his providence revealed the real state of Judas.

The obvious application from this detail is that those responding to the gospel should make sure they come to Jesus for the correct reasons. He is a Saviour from sin, including from its penalty which he paid when on the cross and from its practice by sanctifying them from conversion onwards, and ultimately from its presence in his people when their lives here end.

There are three details from this passage that we can consider. The first is the role of the Father in pruning his people, the second is responsibility of each disciple to abide in Christ, and the third is the outcome of those experiences.

The role of the Father

The heavenly vinedresser will prune fruitful branches. An obvious point to make is that the Father prunes fruitful believers and not disciples with no fruit. This means two things: every believer has some fruit and even the most fruitful believer can have more fruit. So the Father prunes the branches that are already bearing fruit because a believer never gets to the stage where he has sufficient fruit. There will always be scope for more. What is the fruit? Later references in the parable say that the fruit is communion with Christ and loving obedience to Christ’s commandments.

Another detail to note is that the Father prunes the branches and not isolated bits of fruit on a branch. Since a believer is a branch, this is a reminder that any defects are personal and not detached features of our lives. Sometimes we can speak about sin in a way that suggests it is distinct from us, such as when some blame their old nature for wrong actions. But they as individuals are to blame for their sins.

One way in which the Father does this is by chastising his people for their sins. Chastisement can involve a withdrawal of his comforting presence in the various means of grace. Yet he does this for their spiritual growth. The author of Hebrews writes concerning chastisement: ‘For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness’ (Heb. 12:10).

Another way by which this happens is by the Father reminding us of his promises. Peter encouraged his fellow believers by telling them that the Father ‘has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire’ (2 Pet. 1:4). God uses his Word in other ways as well in the pruning process. Sermons challenge believers about aspects of their lives, or about worldliness or unhelpful practices they engage in.

Sometimes, the Father sends an experience that prevents sin from increasing its influence in our lives. An example of this is when Paul mentions that he received a thorn in the flesh to keep him from pride. We miss the point when all we do is try and guess what the thorn was. The point is always that we under the Father’s care, but he uses various experiences to make us holy, with some of those experiences being unpleasant. We are to bear in mind the image used by Jeremiah when he likened God to a potter or the image in Malachi that likens God to a metalworker purifying his material.

One suggestion taken from the image of a vine is to consider a branch with a lot of fruit. Does it stretch up the way or down the way? A healthy branch hangs downwards and is a good picture of humility. Humility is a beautiful grace, one that goes with all other graces in our soul.

The disciple’s responsibility to abide in Christ

First, note two details that explain how we can abide in Christ. The first is in verse 3 and is the aspect of sanctification that they had experienced at conversion: ‘Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.’ Each believer experiences this cleansing at conversion, and it enables them from then on to abide in Jesus.

The other detail comes from the illustration of the vine and branches: it shows the fact that believers have life from Christ. This life is shared by all believers, it is sufficient for all of them, it is suitable for all of them, and it is conveyed to each believer by the Spirit. They have eternal life now, although the fullness of the experience will be in the future when all of them will be with Jesus in the new heavens and new earth.

Jesus also mentions two crucial features of this abiding in him. The first is that it is his desire for fruit to appear in their lives. He says that without him they can do nothing, but the implication is that he will enable them to produce fruit that pleases God. The second is that this abiding is effective: all who abide in him will bear much fruit, but it is the only way for fruitfulness to occur.

Abiding in Christ is illustrated by the branches still attached to the vine. It is the Holy Spirit who brings Jesus and his people together. Therefore, there is a living union between Jesus and them, a union that has definite consequences. What are the consequences of this union as far as his people are concerned? Jesus mentions several in the passage.

First, those united to Jesus recognise that without him they cannot do anything for him (v. 5). They move from a false concept of self-sufficiency to a true concept of divine sufficiency. They confess their complete lack of spiritual resources, but that is not a confession of pointlessness. Rather, they are pleased that they know about this lack because they also have the remedy for their emptiness, which is the life found in Christ’s fullness. With Paul, they say that they can do all things through Christ strengthening them. It is good to know our emptiness, but those united to Jesus do not stop with that negative confession. They make it in the knowledge that they are united to Jesus and his strength is at work within them.

Second, those united to Jesus have the words of Christ in an internal sense. They say with the psalmist that they hide God’s words in their hearts. They follow Paul’s instruction to let the word of Christ dwell in them richly. They become like John Bunyan of whom it was said that if one pricked him a Bible verse would flow out of him. Like Jeremiah they say to God, ‘Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by your name, O LORD, God of hosts’ (Jer. 15:16). Again, with the psalmist, they rejoice in God’s Word as those who have found great spoil (Ps. 119:162). God’s word is living, and when the Spirit uses it within them they sense its delights and power.

Third, those united to Christ not only recognise their emptiness and Christ’s fullness, and not only do they delight in God’s Word, but they also want to respond to him in prayer (v. 7). George Muller said on one occasion that when anticipating engaging in prayer he usually read the Bible first until it brought him into a spirit of prayer. In God’s Word they will find directions about what things they can pray for. Such requests will not be denied them by God. The promise of answered prayer does not refer to petitions about which there are no specific promises in the Bible, although God may answer them as well. Jesus pointed to his Word as the guideline about what to pray for and those who abide in him pray for the matters detailed in his Word. There are so many things promised in the Bible, and it is not possible to ask for them all at one time. But they discover that they can ask for what they wish from that range of promises, and in the context of fruitbearing there can be many petitions connected to it. Jesus says to his disciples that this process is the way how bearing much fruit happens (v. 8). At one level, it is straightforward, but it is also spiritual.

Fourth, those who are united to Christ obey the commandments revealed in his Word. Obedience in this sense is about responsive love for the Master. He describes his love for them in an extraordinary way: ‘As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you’ (v. 9). The Father loved his Son eternally without beginning, and the Son loved his people eternally without beginning. The love of the Father for his Son is without end, and so is the love of Jesus for his people. Jesus loves them personally and fully (as Spurgeon put it, ‘All the heart of Christ goes out to each one’ of his people).

The Saviour wants them to live in his love by their obedience, and he told his disciples that was how he abided in his Father’s love. It is not as if their obedience merits his love, but it is the path where they can experience and enjoy his love in their souls. Surely obedience must have a motive, and what greater motive could they have than to live in Christ’s love! Is this not a reason for Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3 that Christians would know the love of Christ that passes knowledge?

The outcome

What will be the outcome for believers if they respond aright to the Father’s pruning and abide in Christ? The outcome is joy, but not earthly joy. The joy of Jesus over us becomes the source of our joy in him. He has joy when he sees his people abiding in him, and something of that joy becomes theirs.