40 Days of Praise - Day 24
Day 24
“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
John 15:5
A few days ago, the devotional was on John 1:4, “In him was life, and the life was the light of men.“ That idea, that in Jesus is life, is the basis of what Jesus is saying here: He is the vine, we are the branches. Life flows from Him into us. When it does we bear fruit. In fact, Jesus says we bear much fruit.
The one requirement to bearing much fruit is that we abide in Him and He in us.
This conversation in John 14-16 that Jesus is having with his disciples came right after Judas had left the room in order to betray Jesus. He did not abide in the vine. He looked like a believer. He sounded like a believer. He even healed like a believer and preached like a believer. And yet, when it came down to it, he had not truly believed, and so, he didn’t abide.
Jesus said that to everyone who received Him, He gave the right to become children of God. Children of God abide in the vine. But not everyone who hangs around Jesus and speaks His name is truly His. When He talked about the four soils, Jesus let us know then that there are some who receive the Word with joy initially, but then fall away when problems come. And there are others who receive the Word, but then turn their attention to the cares of this life, and the Word gets choked out. Not everyone who hangs around Jesus and speaks his name is really his.
But when we are genuinely His, we abide in the vine. And those who abide in the vine produce much fruit. It’s not because they are so good or proficient or diligent. It’s because the life of the vine flows in them.
We sometimes get confused about what is fruit. But Jesus connects fruit with prayer; whatever results from effective prayer in Jesus' name is fruit. So fruit covers a wide range of examples. But fruit only happens because the life of the vine is flowing in us.
Jesus is life. We are in him as the branch is in the vine. His life flowing through us produces fruit. That fruit can be a change life, it can be someone who believes the gospel. Fruit can be a healed marriage or a person who takes one step closer to Jesus because of us. Fruit can be our pastor’s effective ministry because we prayed for him, or it can be our church’s recovery from a crisis. When Jesus life flows in the believer, there’s always fruit.
Perhaps, if we looked for fruit differently, if we noticed how He’s working through us, our passion for Him might burn a little more brightly.
Charles M. Butler
“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
John 15:5
A few days ago, the devotional was on John 1:4, “In him was life, and the life was the light of men.“ That idea, that in Jesus is life, is the basis of what Jesus is saying here: He is the vine, we are the branches. Life flows from Him into us. When it does we bear fruit. In fact, Jesus says we bear much fruit.
The one requirement to bearing much fruit is that we abide in Him and He in us.
This conversation in John 14-16 that Jesus is having with his disciples came right after Judas had left the room in order to betray Jesus. He did not abide in the vine. He looked like a believer. He sounded like a believer. He even healed like a believer and preached like a believer. And yet, when it came down to it, he had not truly believed, and so, he didn’t abide.
Jesus said that to everyone who received Him, He gave the right to become children of God. Children of God abide in the vine. But not everyone who hangs around Jesus and speaks His name is truly His. When He talked about the four soils, Jesus let us know then that there are some who receive the Word with joy initially, but then fall away when problems come. And there are others who receive the Word, but then turn their attention to the cares of this life, and the Word gets choked out. Not everyone who hangs around Jesus and speaks his name is really his.
But when we are genuinely His, we abide in the vine. And those who abide in the vine produce much fruit. It’s not because they are so good or proficient or diligent. It’s because the life of the vine flows in them.
We sometimes get confused about what is fruit. But Jesus connects fruit with prayer; whatever results from effective prayer in Jesus' name is fruit. So fruit covers a wide range of examples. But fruit only happens because the life of the vine is flowing in us.
Jesus is life. We are in him as the branch is in the vine. His life flowing through us produces fruit. That fruit can be a change life, it can be someone who believes the gospel. Fruit can be a healed marriage or a person who takes one step closer to Jesus because of us. Fruit can be our pastor’s effective ministry because we prayed for him, or it can be our church’s recovery from a crisis. When Jesus life flows in the believer, there’s always fruit.
Perhaps, if we looked for fruit differently, if we noticed how He’s working through us, our passion for Him might burn a little more brightly.
Charles M. Butler
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