LET…. MY…. PEOPLE…. GO !!

Chapter nine

John chapter 15, verse 5, if heeded, will bring improvement to every aspect of your life. I repeat…. every segment of your life, every issue, every concern, including….

Including the welfare of your congregations, including your desire and ability to do good works, including “the fruit of the Spirit”, including increased knowledge and understanding of spiritual matters, including increased physical and mental and emotional well-being, including a better account at the upcoming judgement seat of Christ. Also your respective marriages could be enhanced, your children’s future less problematic, and unsaved friends and relatives more likely to become born-again citizens of God’s wondrous kingdom. Jesus: “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

John 15:5: “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.” Within this verse is a powerful promise that can revolutionize your christianity. I highlight this promise by withdrawing inapplicable words. First….

Let’s set aside Christ’s beautiful metaphor, “I am the vine, you are the branches.” This is what we are left with….

“He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.” Next we can remove “for without Me you can do nothing.” (Without being relationally attached to Jesus you can do nothing. Nothing means nothing.) Now we are left with….

“He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit.” Now let’s consider “and I in him”. If you abide in Jesus, Jesus abides in you. It’s automatic. (“He who loves Me. I will love him.”) To the degree you abide in Him, He abides in you. So let’s set aside those words “and I in him”. This is the awesome promise we are left with….

“He who abides in Me. bears much fruit.” To bear much fruit you simply abide in Jesus. That’s a promise from Christ Jesus to you. Said another way….

“He who abides in [Jesus] bears much fruit.” “[She] who abides in [Jesus] bears much fruit.”

There are degrees of abiding, just as there are degrees of loving and believing. I conclude that only those abiding primarily in Jesus will bear “much fruit” and those having a feeble relationship will bear little fruit. So Christ’s promise to you is: “He who abides in Me [primarily] bears much fruit!” Are you impacted by this astounding promise?

There are two terms you must comprehend to get the full impact of this promise given to you by none other than Jesus Christ: 1) “much fruit” and 2) “abide”. First, “much fruit”….

“Much fruit” is good fruit. Good fruit is everything that is good. Love, joy, peace are good fruit, as are kindness, goodness, faithfulness. The rescuing of people from eternal damnation is very good fruit. Treasures in heaven, a good account at the judgement seat of Christ, inclusion at “the marriage supper of the Lamb” – these are all consequences of abiding primarily in Christ.

Next we look at the word abide. To abide means to dwell, to occupy, to take up residence. To abide does not mean an occasional visit. To abide in Jesus means to live in constant awareness that He is ‘here’ (present, wherever you are at any moment).

Now let us consider what Lord Jesus did not say…..

Jesus did not say, “If you preach from My Bible every sunday you will bear much fruit.”

Jesus did not say, “If you are submissive to denominational lords you will bear much fruit.”

Jesus did not say, “If your people live uprightly they will bear much fruit.”

Jesus did not say, “If your people faithfully attend church they will bear much fruit.”

Implying your congregations have need of you (or your colleagues) and the religion you represent is declaring, “He who abides in Me bears much fruit” is not true. John 15:5 tells them they don’t need Christ-plus (you being the plus); they need Christ alone. Your responsibility (and my responsibility) is to tell them that. A faithful disciple of Christ points christians to Christ. If you don’t emphasize that Christ alone is their sufficiency it is because you are not His disciple and He is not your Lord.

Psalm 91 confirms the promise within John 15:5: (“He who abides in Me…. bears much fruit”)….

Psalm 91:1: “He who dwells [abides] in the secret place of the Most High.” Jesus is “the secret place of the Most High”.

Psalm 91:9: “Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, even the Most High, your dwelling place.” Making Jesus “your dwelling place” equates to “He who abides in Me”.

Psalm 91:14: “Because he has set his love upon Me.” Love is something that can be set (placed, planted). Loving Jesus is abiding in Jesus.

Loving Jesus primarily is abiding in Jesus primarily.

There are many promises throughout Psalm 91 for those who “dwell [abide] in the secret place of the Most High” including “no evil will befall you”, “He will give His angels charge over you”, “I will be with him in trouble”, “with long life will I satisfy him”. All these promises are good fruit, “much fruit”.

Still not convinced that “He who abides in” Jesus is all that is required to “bear much fruit”? In addition to Psalm 91, Scripture validates this many times in many ways….

Dozens of times the Bible admonishes us to trust in the Lord. One example of many: “Blessed is the man who trusts in Him.” Trusting in the Lord is abiding in the Lord and the christian who does so is “blessed”. Being blessed is being fruitful (bearing much fruit).

My brothers-in-Christ, in your here-and-now you are bearing scant fruit. (Religionists are simply unable to bear “much fruit”.) Your meager fruit is evidence of a weak connection of the branch to the vine, christian to Christ. To move from scant fruit to much fruit (from weak connection to strong connection), religion must go. You must cease being a religionist (one who lives by and propagates “commandments of men”).

Before you is a better life than that which you are now living. Not just better but much better. This better life is attainable. Sadly, few achieve the achievable. An exchange is required, and few have the courage to exchange soothing life-as-is for an uncertain and challenging Christ- centered life.

So there you have it. Jesus’ promise to you – the entire evangelical leadership, every pastor throughout evangelicalism – is “He who abides in Me (primarily) bears much fruit”. Understand that abiding in Christ is obeying Christ. Obeying another is abiding in another. So. where will you go from here? Who will you serve. Jesus or another?

Fifty plus years of christianity has taught me that most of you will not repent and return to “first love”. Power has corrupted you. Access to and control of the mighty pulpit, your salary, the appellations, the attention – these Bible-plus perks have scraped away most of your humility. No longer are you just one of the guys; your evangelical credentials give you status and status has empowered you. Your company is cherished, your wisdom sought.

And how can you betray the denomination that stationed you, the seminary that schooled you, the religion that credentialed you? And how can you care for your family without that beloved bi-weekly paycheck? And how could you endure the persecution from ardent religionists that will certainly ensue?

For most, the cost of returning to the lordship of Jesus Christ is more than they are willing to pay. For them, evangelicalism will remain “first love”; “commandments of men” will continue to dominate their christianity. This is not just sad, but sad times a thousand.

***************************** Another story….

When very young in the Lord Jesus I was surprised and delighted to discover a gathering of fellow born-again catholics. While singing onto Jesus, “Though none go with me still I will follow, no turning back, no turning back”, the Holy Spirit dropped in me a strong and certain impression: There will be a day I will be able to prove the words I just sang. (“Though none go with me still I will follow.”) In other words, there would be a time when all the people in my circle of acquaintances would cease following Jesus! This included a number of born-again catholics and evangelicals. Would I continue to follow Jesus “though none go with me”?

This experience really scared me. All christians I knew will cease following Jesus? Does that include the tv preachers I listened to? Would they also stop following Him? How could it be? So I shelved the whole matter. What else could I do?

It took me about five years to (finally!) get the understanding. It became obvious that christians were not following Christ but following christians (who were following christians, who were following christians). None were following our Lord Jesus. Even today, about forty-five years later, I could count on one hand (even if I had a few missing fingers) the christians who I could define as genuine followers of Jesus Christ.