The Gospel of John

The Vine and the Branches

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Conversations, Panels and Sermons

Lesson: 49- 70

Genre:

Track: 049

Dictation Name: RR197AB51

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Year:

Let us worship God. Serve the Lord with gladness, come before His presence with singing. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise. Be thankful unto Him and bless His name for the Lord is good, His mercy is everlasting and His truth endureth to all generations. Let us pray.

Oh Lord our God we give thanks unto Thee that Thou art the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. We give thanks unto Thee that Thy word is the same and Thy promises unchanging so that we can eternally rest secure in Thy word for all Thy promises to us in Jesus Christ are yea and Amen. Thou knowest our Father the need, the burden, the hopes of all of us present. Do Thou in Thy grace and mercy minister to us, heal us, strengthen us, prosper us and make us effectual in Jesus Christ. In His name we pray, Amen.

Our scripture is John 15:1-8. The Vine and the Branches. John 15:1-8.

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.

6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

8 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.”

In these verses we have a comparison of Jesus to a vine and His disciples and us to branches. Israel was often compared to a tree an olive tree or a fig tree. The olive tree was regarded as the king of trees as we see in Judges 9:8 because its fruit and oil were so basic to life and health. Israel is in the Old Testament often compared to a vine but the references are normally negative they speak of a degenerate Israel. However the [unknown] represented Israel as a vine, it was the symbol of the nation. The vine produces grapes, raisins and wine, the true vine, Jesus Christ is here shown as the new Israel of God. The youth of the vine by our Lord points to both its productivity and its relationship to the vine and the vineyard. For a small tree the vine is very fertile and its grapes can be so plentiful that their bulk in comparison to the size of the vine is amazing. Moreover the productivity of the vine is maintained by the vineyard’s annual pruning. The vine that grows wild produces little or nothing whereas it is the pruned vine that is productive. This means that the continual discipline of pruning is essential to a producing vine, an essential to our lives therefore. Jesus identifies Himself as the true vine and His Father as the husbandman or vineyardess, the dead branches are cut down and every healthy productive branch is pruned back in order to bear more fruit.

We are close right now to pruning time which is normally here in California in December and January. The disciples are clean through Christ’s work which separates them from evil and from apostasy. The disciples may not have understood all that Jesus taught and they did not but they would understand it later. The branch is nothing and dead apart from the vine and so they too are helpless unless they abide in Him as verse four makes clear. Churches and Christian which separate themselves from Jesus Christ are soon dead. This is because Christ is the vine, our source of life as John 14:6 tells us and only if we abide in Him can we bear fruit. In verse five we are told without me ye can do nothing. Dead branches can bear no fruit. All men and all churches that separate themselves from Christ are dead. They are fit only for burning, for destruction as verse six tells us. As against this our Lord says if ye abide in me and my words abide in you ye shall ask what ye will and it shall be done unto you, this is verse seven. This is a remarkable statement. The first conditional clause is if ye abide in me. It means that we must live in Christ as a member of His new human race and as His life bearing fruit giving branch. The second conditional clause is if my words abide in you. Three living powers are cited in these two clauses, Christ, us and His words. His words are presented as life giving forces of divine power. If we meet these conditions then ye shall ask what you will and it shall be done unto you. At this point too much thinking in the church has seen as central the believer and his wishes as though the believer were the vine and not the branch.

There are particular promises to the believer, promises of answered prayers, but at this point too much thinking in the church has seen as central the believer and his wishes, as though the believer were the vine and not a branch. It is the promise to bear fruit in Christ for His purpose, we cannot at this particular point although later on there will be personal promises, we cannot generalize unduly because it dissipates the meaning of the text at this point. Then in verse eight our Lord says:

“ Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.”

This is the focus at this point, it is being Christ’s disciples by bearing much fruit for Him. We become His disciples as we are productive for Him. But we are only productive as we are fully dedicated to His word. J. Campbell Morgan translated verse seven this way: if ye abide in me and my words abide in you you shall demand as your due whatever you are inclined to and it shall be generated unto you. Now pruning is a form of discipline exercised on the vine by the vineyardess. God is our keeper, our vineyardess, continually exercising His pruning power in our lives to prepare us to bear more fruit both in time and in eternity. Westcott, a church of England bishop and scholar of a hundred and fifty years ago or to his death about a hundred and twenty perhaps, observed that while a Christian is a Christian a Christian never is simply is but always is becoming a Christian, in other words there is a continual growth and there is pruning, there is Godly discipline to further that growth.

Modern existentialism tries to give Westcott’s words a new meaning but Westcott’s meaning and the biblical meaning is the Christian’s life is one of growth. Leon Morris stated it thus:

“Always the true disciple is becoming more fully a disciple.”

These words are spoken to the disciples and they apply to all within the church. Their lives must either have results for Christ and His kingdom or they are cut off. What is here said has no reference to the world at large, it refers to us. Pruning is God’s way of dealing with us. Therefore the Christian goes through burdens and problems and disciplining such as most of the ungodly do not. They live in a non-pruning world. One of the most interesting English poets was William Blake and Blake could have been a great poet but his was a life without pruning. At one point when he moved to the country and there was a grape arbor in the back he absolutely forbade any pruning of it and could not understand when he was so good to the vine that it stopped producing. Well, that’s the way the ungodly are. They refuse to recognize that we all must be subjected to pruning. Verse four is very specific that no branch can bear fruit by itself. Separated from the vine, Jesus Christ, it is dead and worthless. Fit only for burning. The comparison of god to a vineyardess is very important. It does not allow us to think of God as an absentee landlord or someone very remote to our lives. We know we’ve been pruned, we’ve been disciplined, we’ve been put through the mill, we’ve been tried, we’ve been tested, that’s because God is very close to us and very mindful of us.

He is the very present vine keeper who carefully watches our productivity and also our need of pruning. Jesus in verse one declares I am the true or the real vine and my Father is the husband man. This means Christ is in us as our life and God over us as the one judging our productivity. This means that the person of our lives is not simply our salvation but our productivity for Christ’s kingdom. This tells us how fallacious those churches are which act as though the sum total of what God is trying to do is convince us we need to be saved, as though we are the end of everything when we are God’s instruments toward His kingdom. It means too, that we bring our area of life under the dominion and into the service of His kingdom. Just as the vineyardess prunes the vines we prune our sphere of life to serve God’s kingdom. A common and serious error here limits fruit bearing to spiritual exercises and to faithfulness of a pietistic kind. But the analogy in the text is to fruit bearing, to actual results. The branches do not simply grow and bear leaves beautifully, they produce grapes. This means that for us our faith bears fruit by commanding the way we live, what we do and the practical consequences for our sphere of life. This is why God has little regard for those who fill the churches and are full of pious gush but have no real productivity in their lives.

They do not bear fruit, they are dead branches and the vine keeper will prune all such. Let us pray.

Our Father we give thanks unto Thee for this Thy word. We thank Thee that Thy word is not only truth but it is a plain spoken truth, a practical truth, a truth that commands us to bear fruit unto Thee. We pray Lord that we may be productive for Thy kingdom, ever mindful that we have been called to exercise dominion, to establish Thy kingdom from pole to pole and from sea to sea. Bless us to this purpose, in Christ’s name, Amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson?

We live close to perhaps the world’s greatest lime growing area, the [unknown] valley, and the productivity of course is everything. Vineyards are pulled up when their productivity declines. As a result we can understand if we become aware of the practicalities of vineyard growing how intensely realistic this text is. It simply says here it is, produce or you are dead, you are worthless, and every year as productivity declines there are vineyards that are pulled up to be replanted with something else.

If there are no questions, let us conclude with prayer.

Our Father, we give thanks unto Thee that Thou hast made us Thy vineyard. That Thou hast called us to be productive, that Thou hast given us the privilege of being useful in Thy sovereign purpose. Give us grace to grow in Thee, to rejoice in Thy service and to be ever more productive in Thy kingdom. And now go in peace, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost, bless you and keep you, guide and protect you, this day and always, Amen.