In John 15:1-17 Jesus shares with us who He is and what He does, who the Father is and what He does, and who we are in relationship to Jesus and the Father. Jesus also shares with us what we are to do based on who Jesus and the Father are.
John 15:1
I am the True Vine, and My Father is the Gardener.
John 15:5
I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in Me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from Me you can do nothing.
John 15:14-15
You are My friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from My Father I have made known to you.
Jesus is the True Vine.
The Father is the Gardener.
We are the branches and friends of Jesus.
It is through Jesus that we have life and have what we need for everyday living.
John 15:3
You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.
Jesus as the True Vine cleans us.
Jesus cleans us by His Word.
In Ephesians 5:26 Paul says that Jesus desires to make the church holy by the washing with water through the word.
When we see Jesus as our life, we will surrender the authority to direct our lives to Him and, through His Word, Jesus will clean us and make us holy.
John 15:4
Remain in Me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me.
Jesus as the True Vine produces fruit through us.
Braches cannot produce fruit on their own. It is the vine that provides life and all that is needed to sustain life.
Jesus is life.
Jesus gives us life.
Jesus sustains life.
John 15:9
As the Father has loved Me, so I have loved you. Now remain in My love.
John 15:12
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.
Jesus as the True Vine loves us.
Jesus loves you.
Jesus loves you personally.
Jesus loves you intimately.
Jesus loves you unconditionally.
Jesus loves you eternally.
John 15:10
If you obey My commands, you will remain in My love, just as I have obeyed My Father’s commands and remain in His love.
The key according to Jesus to remaining in His love is to obey Him.
Does Jesus love those who don’t obey Him? - YES!
Jesus loves those who obey and those who don’t obey.
The difference is that those who obey Jesus show that they love Him and His love is then experienced by those people. Those who don’t obey Jesus never get the awesome experience of knowing His love.
John 15:11
I have told you this so that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
Jesus as the True Vine is our source of joy.
We look for joy in all the wrong places.
Any source that we look to for joy other than Jesus will:
Change
Fade
Go Away
Disappoint.
Jesus who never changes is the only stable source of joy.
John 15:13
Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
Jesus as the True Vine lays down His life for us.
The greatest show of love, the greatest act of sacrifice, and the greatest example of complete obedience is seen in Jesus’ death on the cross.
Jesus laid down His life for you!
John 15:16a
You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last.
Jesus as the True Vine has chosen us and chosen to use us for His purpose.
Jesus chose you to be His friend.
Jesus chose you to be used to take the Gospel into the world.
Jesus chose you to be one He would use to change the world.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about relating to Jesus as your True Vine.
John 15:2
He cuts off every branch in Me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit, He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.
The Father as the Gardener removes anything from your life that hinders you from being fruitful.
The Father has a plan for you and He provides all you need to fulfill His plan and removes anything that would stop His plan.
In John 15:9 Jesus says that the Father as the Gardener loves the True Vine, Jesus.
The love that the Father has for Jesus is shown in what Jesus says in the second part of John 15:16.
John 15:16b
Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in My name.
The Father as the Gardener will give us whatever we ask in Jesus’ name.
We are promised several times that whatever we request along the lines of who Jesus is and what Jesus is doing we will receive. We need to live based on this promise and ask.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is living based on the truth that the Father is the Gardener.
In John 15:5 Jesus tells us that we are the branches.
We as the branches are to produce fruit. We can only do this as we stay connected to the True Vine, Jesus, and let the Gardener, the Father, prune away all that is not what He wants in our lives.
The fruit we are to produce is the character of Jesus being formed in us and, through becoming like Jesus, then doing what Jesus did, sharing God’s love and truth with people.
In John 15:14-15 we are called the friends of Jesus.
The difference between a friend and a servant is that the servant is given no explanation of why he is told to things and the friend is told why he is asked to do something.
Jesus shares with us the how and why of what He is doing.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about being braches that, through the True Vine, produce fruit, and about being Jesus’ friends that love Him, as shown by their obedience.
Jesus ends this teaching by commanding us in verse 17 to, “Love each other.”
In Cooperation with the True Vine and the Gardener Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls
Joe
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