Notes on the Gospel of John: Chapter 15

Using the metaphor of the vine, Jesus lets His disciples know that they should bear fruit. If they don’t, then God will cut them away. If they do, then they will be pruned so that they can bear more fruit. The idea here is that by bearing fruit, there will be times when our faith is tested and this is an opportunity for us to show even more fruit of the spirit.

This vine metaphor always reminds me of one of opening lines of the old radio show, The Shadow – “The weed of crime bears bitter fruit. . .” Indeed.

This metaphor leads into a beautiful series of verses. . .verses 9-17. Remember Jesus’ exhortation that we are called to obey His commands and that those who do obey His commands will reside in Him. Will reside in the Father. And they will reside in us. Verse 17: “This is my command: Love each other.”

Unfortunately, this is probably one of the hardest commands to obey. How often do we follow this command?

Verses 18-27 should be required reading for any new Christian. Among the newest converts, there tends to be this belief that by converting, suddenly their lives will become much easier. Not so. If anything, it becomes harder because now you are more aware of your brokenness and you are aware of the need to turn everything over to Christ – no easy task.

In particular here, I find verse 22 interesting: “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. Now, however, they have no excuse for their sin.”
By His appearance, Jesus has raised the stakes. He has pointed out our brokenness. We are fully aware of our nakedness and we must turn to Him for grace, mercy and forgiveness. We see some of this theology in Paul’s writings. Take a look at 1 Corinthians 5:12. Essentially, he is more critical of people in the church versus those outside the church because those in the church or in the body of Christ should know better.

Amen.