Fruit Bearing

John chapter 15 is a part of what we call the Upper Room Discourse. Imagine that you're one of the twelve apostles. Of course, Judas skipped out.

But imagine you're one of the apostles. Jesus is going to leave you, go back to heaven, and now what are we supposed to do? And our Lord in this discourse tells his disciples what they're going to do. As long as he's up in heaven, this is what we do.

And in chapter 13, he tells them how to relate to one another. And of course, the answer there is love one another. Wash one another's feet, which means help to keep others clean.

Be a servant to others. In chapter 14, he tells them how to relate to the Father. Chapter 15, our lesson today, how to relate to the Son.

Chapter 16, how to relate to the Holy Spirit. So if you and I will just get our hands on John 13 to 16, we will be rightly related to one another, to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, and woven into these chapters, he tells us how to be rightly related to the world, that world around us that wants to drag us down. John chapter 15, I am the true vine, says Jesus, and my Father is the vinedresser.

I think as most of you know, there are three vines in the Bible. What's the first one? Anybody? Israel, all right? Israel is the first vine. Isaiah chapter 5, I will sing of my beloved.

My beloved has a vineyard on a very fruitful hill. He planted a vine there, and he looked for good fruit, and all he got was rotten fruit. That was Israel.

Psalm 80, God came and planted a vine, and nurtured it, and didn't get the fruit he wanted. That's Israel. And God, instead of destroying Israel, just set Israel aside and said, your day is coming, we'll take care of that.

And now he's got another vine. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the vine, and we are the branches. It's a picture of the church.

Jesus is the head of the church, we are the members of the body. Jesus is the vine, we are the branches. But there's a third vine.

Most people don't know it's there. Keep your place in John chapter 15, turn to Revelation, book of Revelation, last book of the Bible, chapter 14, verse 18. The past vine was Israel, the present vine is Christ and his people.

The future vine is what John calls the vine of the earth. And another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire. And he cried with a loud cry to him who had the sharpsicle, saying, thrust in your sharpsicle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe.

This world system that everybody in the world thinks is so wonderful, this world system is ripening for judgment. It's the vine of the earth. Now, if you're not a Christian, you are a part of the vine of the earth, you're linked to the earth, and you're going to end up where the earth ends up, judged, if you're a Christian.

Jesus Christ is the vine, and you're one of the branches, and that vine is rooted not downward, but upward. Everything about the Christian is heavenly. Except our conduct sometimes.

We don't always live like heavenly people. But our home is in heaven. Our Father is in heaven.

Our treasures are in heaven. Our name is written down in heaven. Our Savior is in heaven.

More and more, my friends are in heaven. My, oh, my, people are dying that never died before. Just a couple of weeks ago, Stephen Olford went to be with the Lord.

My, we've shared conferences together. And one by one, my friends are going off to glory. I don't know why our Christmas card list keeps getting longer, but that's something you can't figure out.

Probably one of the mysteries of life. Now, if you're not a Christian, you belong to the vine of the earth, and watch out. Because when that angel comes with that sickle to reap the vine of the earth, it's not going to be a Sunday school picnic.

But thank God we're a part of the vine from heaven. You get up in the morning and say, I'm a branch. Here I am.

Here's your branch. And Jesus compares us to branches. Now, the best way, I think, or one of the best ways to look at this allegory Jesus gives us is to notice that he shares with us what I would like to call five spiritual secrets.

I don't like the word secrets. A secret is something you tell one person at a time. But I'm using the word secrets because many people don't know this is what it says.

And Jesus says, I'm going to lay down five principles or five secrets, and if you'll get a hold of these while you're waiting for me to come back, and while the world is trying to wreck you, you'll keep going. You'll make it. Let's begin.

I am the true vine, and my father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away. And every branch that bears fruit, he prunes that it may bear more fruit.

Here's secret number one. The secret of living is fruit bearing. That's obvious.

Here's a branch in the vine. That branch is no good for building. You can't build with a branch from a vineyard.

It's not strong enough. A branch is good for only two things, bearing or burning. Now, my Lord says that if I am truly a branch in the vine but I'm not bearing fruit, I'm in the way.

He may prune me right out. It doesn't mean you lose your salvation. You don't build your theology on parables.

They illustrate truth. The secret of living is fruit bearing. That's why we're here.

Now, the vine has branches to bear fruit. The life comes from the vine into the branches. That's the secret of living.

If we depend on ourselves, we won't bear any fruit. If we're leaning on somebody else, some TV preacher, some radio preacher, I've done both. I have a perfect face for radio, so I stay off of TV.

But if you're depending and leaning on yourself or somebody else and not depending on Jesus, that life is not coming into you. And if the life doesn't come in, you can't produce fruit. See, you can manufacture golf balls, but you can't grow golf balls.

You plant a golf ball, you just get a dirty golf ball. That's all. But fruit has in it the seed for more fruit.

And so if God is working in our lives through the Holy Spirit and we're bearing fruit, that fruit will produce more fruit, and that more fruit will produce much fruit, and you'll accomplish things you never will know about until you get to heaven. The secret of living is fruit bearing. Now, what is this fruit? What kind of results does the Father, who is the vinedresser, want from my life? Well, of course, it's the fruit of the Spirit.

What's the first one of those? The fruit of the Spirit is love. All right. Look it up at verse 9. Verse 9. Abide in my love.

What's the second fruit of the Spirit? Joy. Look at verse 11. These things I have spoken to you that my joy might remain in you.

What's the third one? Peace. All right. Look over in chapter 14 and in verse 27.

Peace I leave with you, my peace. In other words, if I'm a branch in the vine and the life of Jesus is flowing through me by His Holy Spirit, the fruit I ought to produce is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, faithfulness, and self-control. Now, the branch doesn't eat the fruit.

Somebody else comes along to eat the fruit. Don't ever say to yourself, well, what are they going to do for me? You know, Charlie Brown asked Lucy one day, why are we here? And Lucy, being omniscient, said, we're here to help others. He thought for a moment and said, why are the others here? Now, God may be calling upon you to feed other people.

And they may never do one thing for you. That's all right. You're not doing it.

It is more blessed to give than to receive. We say that. We don't believe it.

The secret of living is fruit bearing. Now, if I'm not bearing fruit, I'm not living. I'm just here.

I'm just a branch. I'm hanging there. But if I'm bearing fruit, that's real life.

If you want to be miserable, be selfish. Think of yourself. Work for yourself.

Expect others to do for you, but you don't do for them. You're privileged. But if you want to really live, just let Jesus work through you.

Here's a situation where they need some love, and here's a situation where they need some joy, and they need some peace. Now, that's not the only kind of fruit. Many kinds of fruit listed in the Bible.

Paul said, I'm going to come to Rome and have some fruit among you. That means winning souls. Paul said, I'm taking up an offering from the Gentiles to give to the Jews because the Gentiles owe so much to the Jewish people, and after I have taken up this fruit.

So, when an offering is taken, or you write a check for the church or a mission ministry, that's fruit, not loot. Fruit. And if they have to wring it out of you, there's something wrong because the Christian who's abiding is bearing fruit.

The secret of living is fruit-bearing. We must go on now. The secret of fruit-bearing, aha, is abiding.

Verse 4. Abide in me, and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine. You are the branches.

Don't get them mixed up now. He who abides in me, and I in him, bears much fruit, for without me you can do nothing. That's a great verse.

Without me you can do nothing. He doesn't say without me you're handicapped. Without me you'll stumble a little bit.

He says without me, zero. Did you know that God doesn't bless talent unless the talented person is abiding? It takes more than talent to teach a Sunday school class. It takes more than talent to sing a song.

It takes more than talent to be a good usher or a good engineer. Robert Murray McShane wrote, it is not great talent that God blesses, but great likeness to Jesus. And I know people in Christian work who are depending on their gifts, their talent, but not depending on the life of Jesus working in them.

So the secret of living is fruit bearing. The secret of fruit bearing is abiding. What does it mean to abide? Are there couples here whom I married when I was your pastor? Stand up, would you? There's a few of them here.

All right. Yeah, okay. A few of them here.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you.

You know, the pastor says, I now pronounce you husband and wife. And he goes to his office and fills out the papers, and he signed the papers, and they are married. That's union.

Two become one. You could be on the honeymoon and get mad at each other. That's communion.

And there are many couples that they have union. They're married. One, yeah.

But there's no communion. Now, Jesus said, when you trusted me, we're joined together. I and you, you and me, that's union.

But are we having communion? Did you spend time this morning with Jesus before you came to church? That's abiding. The secret of fruit bearing is abiding. Now, how do you know if you're abiding? Well, you feel good.

Not always. No. Well, you're wealthy.

No, no, no, no. No. You're healthy, really.

How do you know if you're abiding? When you read this, you find out. When you are abiding, God just produces fruit. You don't have to, ooh, God just produces fruit when you're abiding.

The life comes through, and it's not something we do. When you're abiding and producing fruit, God gets the glory. When we're abiding, the Father prunes us.

He says, my father is the vine dresser. Did you know that out in California, where they have all of these luxurious vineyards, they spend three years teaching the men and women how to prune the vines. Three years.

You know why? I'm kind of an ignorant person about anything that has to do with gardens, farms. I used to think that the vine dressers came along and cut away the bad wood. They cut away the good wood to make better.

It takes them three years to learn how to do it. And, you know, my fathers had to cut things out of my life, good things. Not bad things, good things.

He said, look, I want you to produce a better quality of fruit. And some of your life is running off into this wood over here, so that's it. But, Lord, I enjoyed that.

That's good. That's fine. Remember that I want you to produce fruit.

I know I'm abiding when God is cutting away at my life and removing things that are hindering me from being fruitful. I know I'm abiding when I'm not complaining to the Lord about what's going on. Lord, why me? Never mind.

This is your calling now. You do this, and just trust me. My life, says Jesus, will come through you, and together we'll produce the fruit.

The secret of living is fruit-bearing. The secret of fruit-bearing is abiding. And we can't abide in Him without this book.

Are you wearing out your Bible? You spend time every day in the Word, abiding. If my wife and I stopped talking to each other, there'd be no communion. Two friends stop speaking together, no communion.

How does Jesus talk to me? When I open my Bible, God talks to me. When I open my mouth in prayer, I talk to Him. The combination is good, and there's that abiding.

If you've been ignoring your Bible lately, shame on you. Get back to the Word of God and start abiding. Secret number three.

The secret of living is fruit-bearing. The secret of fruit-bearing is abiding. The secret of abiding is obeying.

Where were we? Verse six, if anyone does not abide in me, no communion. He is cast out as a mere branch, is withered, and they gather them up and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. He's not saying that non-abiding saints go to hell.

No, no, no. What he's saying is the uniqueness that we have as God's people, as branches, is lost if we're not communing, abiding, and bearing fruit. We're just like any other branch.

And what does the vinedresser do with any other branch? Just cuts it off. Remember what Samson said? Samson said, if you shave off my hair, I'll become like any other man. But God doesn't want me to be like any other man.

He wants me to be myself. He doesn't want you to be like any other woman. He wants us to be uniquely his branches, bearing fruit.

And to abide in him means to obey him. Verse seven, if you abide in me and my words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, it shall be done to you. By this my Father is glorified that you should bear much fruit, so will you be my disciples.

As the Father loved me, I also have loved you. Abide in my love. Watch this now.

If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. Look down at verse 14. You are my friends if you do what I command you.

The secret of living is fruit bearing. The secret of fruit bearing is abiding. The secret of abiding is obeying.

Now this is true in every area of life. The laws of thermodynamics are followed in the flight of an airplane. I don't know how many airplanes I've been on, but I just trust the pilot to know what's going on.

If he obeys the law of thermodynamics, they fly. If he doesn't, they crash. Whether it's agriculture, planting seed, whether it's surgery, whatever it may be in this world, there are certain principles you have to follow.

Chemistry. If you don't follow the basic laws of chemistry in the laboratory, you'll blow the whole place up or kill yourself. Now in the Christian life, there are certain laws.

Oh, you say you're getting to be a legalist. No, no, no, no. Dan Eastep drove us to church today, and you know why we were able to do it? He obeyed the law.

He didn't get up this morning and say, I think I'll drive on the left-hand side this morning. That would be interesting. You obey the law and get a license.

You obey the law and learn the rules of the road. As long as you obey the law, you have the freedom to drive. Now in the Christian life, the same principle applies.

If I'm going to abide in Jesus, have communion with him, have his life work through me, I have to obey, because obedience is an evidence of my love. If you love me, what? Keep my commandments. Now there is a brand of teaching that's floating around these days that gives the impression you can live any way you want to, and it won't change God's love.

My experience of the love of God cannot be merited. I can't come and say, I've been a good boy for two weeks. Love me.

God loves me regardless of how I live. Sometimes he shows his love by spanking me. Sometimes he shows his love by doing some wonderful thing for me.

But I cannot enjoy his love if I'm disobedient. You've raised children, haven't you? When children are disobedient, do they want your love? No, they're like Adam and Eve, they run and hide. Jesus Christ proved God's love for me by dying on the cross.

Now, when I love him, I'll do what he wants me to do. The secret of abiding is obeying. And more than anything else, when I stand before God, I want to be able to say what Jesus said in John chapter 17.

I have glorified you on the earth. I finished the work you gave me to do. I can't do your work.

You can't do my work. We all have a specific work to do, every one of us. And if we obey God, we abide.

If we obey him, we abide. If we abide, we bear fruit. The secret of living is fruit bearing.

The secret of fruit bearing is abiding. The secret of abiding is obeying. Now, that's where it gets close to our lives.

It's hard to obey sometimes. Now, don't say it isn't. It is.

It's hard to obey sometimes. So, what's the secret of obeying? Loving. Here's the sequence now.

If I love him, I'll obey him. If I obey him, I'll abide in him. If I abide in him, I'll bear fruit.

If I bear fruit, I'll really be living. Notice what he says about love. Verse 9. As the Father loved me, I also have loved you.

Don't skip over that. This is phenomenal. Do you know that Jesus loves you as much as God the Father loves Jesus? That's phenomenal.

Now, if I am experiencing that kind of love, I should be able to give back some love. Abide in my love. Abide in my love.

This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you. Oh, oh. It's not just loving God.

It's loving one another. To live above with saints we love will certainly be glory. To live below with saints we know, that's another story.

To love one another is to love Jesus. To love Jesus should mean loving one another. So the secret of obeying is loving.

Now, you can't command love, except God can. I can't walk up to somebody and say, you've got to love me. It doesn't work that way.

But, you know, Christian love is not an act of emotion. There are people I love I don't like. I wouldn't want to spend a week's vacation with them.

We're just kinds of different kind of people. But I love them. Christian love simply means I treat you the way God treats me.

That's Christian love. God listens to me, I'll listen to you. God counsels me, I'll try to counsel you.

God sacrifices for me, if necessary I'll sacrifice for you. God forgives me, I'll forgive you. That's Christian love.

That's an act of the will. Well, I don't feel like forgiving her. That's beside the point.

God says you forgive. May I repeat it? The secret of living is fruit bearing. The secret of fruit bearing is abiding.

The secret of abiding is obeying. The secret of obeying is loving. You see, little children obey because they have to.

If they're being raised properly and they disobey, they'll have to be disciplined. Children obey because they have to. Teenagers are smart.

They obey because they need to. If they want the keys to the car, they better mow the lawn. If they want this week's allowance, they better do this or that.

But, you know, grown-up people, especially grown-up married people, obey because they want to. It's just no problem at all. And that's the way Jesus wants me to live.

The secret of obeying is loving. Love is long-suffering and kind. Love is patient.

Love doesn't keep a long list of offenses. One of the churches I pastored, there was an officer who carried a little book, a spiral-bound book, who wrote down every time somebody offended him. That man was miserable.

Love says, if you did this much for me, Lord, what more should I do for you? The secret of obeying is loving. I've noticed that in some churches a certain kind of legalism is moving in. The legalist is not motivated by love.

He's motivated by fear. And my Bible says perfect love does what? Casts out fear. So if you wake up in the morning and you're scared, oh, what's God going to do to me today? No, no, no.

You're missing out on it. The secret of living is fruit-bearing. He's got fruit for us to bear today.

The secret of fruit-bearing is abiding. The secret of abiding is obeying. The secret of obeying is loving.

And this brings us to the very crux of the whole thing. What is the secret of loving? Peter wrote and said, whom having not seen you love. Have you ever tried to love somebody you hadn't seen? It's interesting.

We read about Jesus, his wonderful works, his wonderful words, his sacrifice, his resurrection. Now we're seated with him up in the heavenlies. He's coming again.

Our lives are all wrapped up in this wonderful person, Jesus. And we want to love him more. How do you love anybody more? Question.

Have you ever heard the statement, familiarity breeds contempt? Ever heard that? I don't believe it. Phyllis Brooks said, familiarity breeds contempt only with contemptible things and contemptible people. Betty and I have been man and wife, husband and wife, for 51 years.

She knows me better now than she ever did. She's still with me. Familiarity doesn't breed contempt when the thing with which you are familiar is wonderful, kind, loving.

I'm more familiar with my Bible today than I was when I was your pastor. I don't treat it with contempt. Some of us have been friends for 40 years.

We're not treating each other with contempt. The secret of loving is knowing. K-N-O-W-I-N-G.

Look at verse 14. You are my friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing.

But I have called you friends for all things that I heard from my father. I've made known to you. For several years while I was going to seminary, I worked for Rockwell Manufacturing Company.

In recent years, he's made rockets and all kinds of things, but the company I worked for made valves. And Colonel Rockwell was the president. And once or twice a year he'd bop in and he'd never say, where's Wiersbe? I want to talk to him.

He didn't even sign my check. A machine did it. And he didn't tell me what he was doing.

But you know, when the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit want us to do something, through their word, they reveal themselves. And the better I get to know Jesus, the more I love him. There's a brand of Christianity today that is more heat than it is light.

They go through their Christian aerobics, you know. But there's no obedience. And my Lord tells me, look, you want to love me? Get to know me better.

And the only way to get to know him better is right here. I remember when I was just a very young Christian, I thought the only place you found Jesus was in the Gospels. Then I discovered you find him in the Old Testament.

You mean to tell me Jesus is here in the Psalms? Yeah. Well, I didn't know that. And so when I open my book now and begin to read it, I look for Jesus.

We used to sing in one of the hymns, beyond the sacred page, I seek the Lord. Some people read their Bibles to find verses to hit people over the head with. I don't.

I just find Jesus. And I'm reading the book of Ruth, and Boaz comes along and says, I'll tell you what, I'll pay the money to buy you. I love you.

Boaz said, I'm not worried about my inheritance. I'm going to make Ruth a part of my inheritance. That's love.

And I just stop and say, thank you, Jesus. Because the more I get to know him, the more I love him. And the more I love him, the more I obey him.

And the more I obey him, the more fruit I bear because I abide in him. And the more I abide in him, the more I live because I'm bearing fruit. It's a great way to live, isn't it? It's a great way to live.

Now, if you're saved, you're a branch in the vine. What kind of a branch are you? Because if we are doing all that God wants us to do, we live in a spiritual chain reaction. Tomorrow morning, we get up.

Thank you, Lord, for watching over us during the night. We open the word of God, not just any place, but where we've been reading. And we keep on reading.

And we learn about Jesus. We find areas where we have to confess our sins. And as we get to know him, we get to love him.

And then we talk to him and tell him our love and receive his love. And as we love him, he tells us what he wants us to do. And so we obey him.

And as we obey him, there's that wonderful abiding in him. And as we abide in him, God produces fruit. God produces fruit.

We may not always see it, but God produces fruit. And as that fruit feeds others, God is glorified. That's what Jesus is talking about here and something we need to take to heart.

Father God, thank you for sending Jesus. Thank you for this beautiful, beautiful picture he gave to us. Forgive us when we've tried to produce fruit in our own strength.

We've tried to engineer it. Oh, Father, help us so to love Jesus, so to know him, that we'll experience all that he talked about here and be fruitful, faithful Christians for Jesus' sake. Amen.