Abiding in Jesus, Living in Him (5)

 

“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the Vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.” John 15:4 – 5.

 

We are to live in Jesus Christ, the Vine, even as Jesus Christ lives in the Father (acknowledging the mystery of the Incarnation and also the mystery of the Trinity). If Jesus is telling us the truth when He says, “…for apart from Me you can do nothing,” then we cannot live the Christian life, only the Vine can live the Christian life. This means that we can give up trying to live the Christian life, and that we can abide in the Vine and allow Him to live His life through us.

 

Radical? Of course it is radical – not only is it radical, it is Divine. It is our Father’s purpose from eternity past to have a family of sons and daughters in His Beloved Son – and therefore Paul can write, “For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many are one body, so also is Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12).

 

Can we hear Jesus praying? “I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one…” (John 17:23a).

 

Consider the dynamic of Philippians 2:12 – 13:

 

“So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.”

 

We are called to surrender and to submit to the will of God, the working of God, as we abide in the Vine, as the Vine’s Life lives in us and flows through us to others. I suppose the clearest and most succinct statement of this glorious Way of Life is found in Galatians 2:20:

 

“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” (See also Romans Chapter 6:1 – 7:4).

 

Sadly, we have pretty much become a Galatian church, thinking that having “begun with the Spirit” that we must now seek maturity “by the flesh” [our own efforts] (Gal. 3:1 – 3). We simply do not believe what Jesus says in John 15:4 – 5. We must be in control. We must be pragmatic, even though our pragmatism is opposed to the Cross and the wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:17 – 2:16).

 

We are so good at doing things on our own, both in our individual lives and in our church lives, that we don’t need the Holy Spirit, we don’t need to abide in the Vine – we dare not trust Jesus Christ to be the Head of His Church, His Bride, His Body. Sadly, we are on artificial life support and don’t know it. We would rather engage in culture wars than to be the Presence of Christ in our generation.

 

You see, dear friends, Christianity is about Jesus Christ, it about living in Christ Jesus and Christ Jesus living in us. It is about making disciples of all people groups, wherever they may be, whatever their current beliefs and backgrounds. Christianity is about the Person of Jesus Christ, it is not about a worldview, it is not about a particular nation, it is not about a political system, it is not even about a “Christian” religious tradition – it is about Jesus Christ and His People, and reaching people for Jesus, bringing them into the Ark of Jesus Christ.

 

When Jesus speaks to us of the Vine and the branches, He is drawing us into the koinonia of the Trinity – as we’ll see explicitly in John 17, and as we’ve already seen in John 14:17, 21 – 23. How foolish we are to trade our birthright as daughters and sons of the Living God for the things of earth. Did not Jesus say, “My kingdom is not of this world”? (John 18:37).

 

As Jesus came to reveal the Father, so we are called to reveal the Father and the Son, for Jesus sends us into the world even as the Father sent Him into the world (John 17:18; 20:21).

 

We cannot live the Christian life – but the Vine can, and the Vine will…as we abide in Him.

 

As a friend of mine likes to say, “We are becoming who we already are in Christ.”