Sticks in the Pew - John 15:1-8

I was in college when I saw something I’d never seen before: a drunk.  Yes, I lived a sheltered life, but that was and still is OK with me.  The drunk stumbled into our house because he couldn’t find his.  We lived a few blocks away and his wife was a friend of the family.  I’d heard stories about him, but I’d never seen him until that night.

I remember my mother calling his wife and she came and got him.  I would imagine her humiliation knew no bounds.  We’ve never referred to the incident to this day. 

The drunk was an unbeliever; his wife was a believer and a very good friend of our family.  One day I heard that the pastor came to see the drunk to give him the gospel, which, as the story went, he believed that night.  Everyone was happy.

A few months went by and I remember hearing the teacher of the ladies’ home Bible class which met in our house say, “But he’s not showing any signs that he’s saved.”  And the teacher’s conclusion was that since he wasn’t attending church and reading his Bible, he must not have been saved that night. 

On the eve of the All Star Baseball game, I read an interesting article about St Louis Cardinal Albert Pujos, who “USA Today” quoted as saying in speaking about steroid use in baseball, “You think I’m going to ruin my relationship with God just because I want to get better in this game?”  He went on to say that they can test him everyday and if they ever find that he’s been using steroids, he’ll return all of his salary!

Wow!  We’ve never heard that before.  But let’s suppose that tomorrow the tests come back positive.  “Well,” we would cluck our tongues and say, “he must not have been a Christian after all; a believer wouldn’t do that.  Like the Bible says, ‘By their fruit, you will know them.’”  

We talked about this a while back in our table talk—someone who says they’re saved, but he has no interest in reading the Bible, going to church, or serving Christ in any way. 

The question of the night is, is that possible?  The way we phrase this is “Do we see any fruit in their lives?”  If we don’t, then no, they must not have really believed. 

In John 25, Jesus is a few hours away from being arrested, tried, and convicted.  When it’s all said and done, He’ll be gone from them for the rest of their lives on earth.  His students need information.  John 13-17 are chapters which give the details of an up close and personal discourse/dialogue with the disciples.  It’s in this chapter that so many have so many problems and for one reason or another, find it to be a troubling section, one which brings fear to them.

“"I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. ²He 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. ³You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴Remain 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.

 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. ⁶If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. ⁷If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. ⁸This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

This is the last of the “I Am” statements and it packs a punch. 

I’ve underlined the pressure points in the sentences that bother people.  There have been three interpretations of the above:

1.      If a person is unfruitful, he proves that he was never a believer in the first place. He proves that he was merely a professing believer, but not a true believer.

2.      A believer who produces no fruit loses his salvation and will go to hell.

Let’s stop and examine these two.

#1: The problem with this is that there are no professing believers in the room.  All of the men in the room are saved (see 15:3; 13:10--Jesus has said that all 11 are saved).  An unbeliever cannot “abide in Christ.”  If they are merely professors, He’s telling them to do something that’s impossible for an unbeliever to do.  The other thing to note is that the Bible never uses the term, “genuine believer,” or “true believer,” or “sincere believer.”  Another problem with this interpretation is that it holds that if you are a believer, failure being unfruitful) is impossible.  But we have the record of Solomon and Saul, Lot as well, and the sons of Jacob and we have the clear statements of I Cor. 3:3 and 11:30.

#2: If you don’t bear fruit, God will cut you off from Christ and that means you lose your salvation and go to hell.  If that’s true, then I may as well go do what I’ve always wanted to do—junk it all and join the circus because Christ lied to me when He said, “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.” (Jn. 6:37)  To hold that He’s talking about losing your salvation sets up a contradiction in the Bible, between what Christ said earlier and what He’s saying now in Jn. 15.  We have to realize that Jesus isn’t talking evangelistically here.  Evangelism is involved in Jn. 1-12, not 13-17.  These men are saved.  It makes no sense to take this as a gospel appeal.  “Abide in Me” is not the gospel.  “Believe in Me” is the gospel.  It’s nonsense for Jesus to be commanding them (“abide” is an imperative) to be saved; they already are. 

Someone wrote: “There is no fruit without faith and there is no faith without fruit.”  Is that true?  No.  Jesus says that it’s possible for a believer to produce no fruit (15:2).  Fruitfulness is conditional as we see in 15:6-7, 10, 14 because these sentences all begin with “if” and the “ifs” are third class conditions, “If . . . maybe you will and maybe you won’t.”  There is a possibility that the believer will choose not be fruitful, but to live in a state of carnality as per the Corinthian believers were “walking as men.” 

The problem is caused when the reader takes “abide” to mean “salvation.”  If “abide” = “salvation,” then this doesn’t make sense because they’re already saved.  “Abiding” isn’t the same thing as being a Christian because He’s commanding them to “abide.”  He’s not commanding them to become Christians. 

“Abide” is a call to the disciples to remain in fellowship with Him so that they can bear fruit, eternal fruit.  What does it mean to “abide?”  It doesn’t mean to “believe,” it means to “obey” Christ’s commands (15:10).  Salvation is a matter of believing (Jn. 316); discipleship is a matter of obeying. 

Then what’s going on with the “cutting off,” the “withering” and the burning?”  The word, “cutting off,” has another translation: “lift up.”  The disciples would be familiar with “lifting up” of the grape branches.  The vine tenders propped the non-productive vines up so they could get more of the sun and rain, thereby becoming productive.  This fits with the context because the context is God’s desire that the believer become productive, so He gives him special attention.  This word is translated “lift up” in John 5:8-12; 8:59; 10:18. 

Also note that He also prunes the fruitful believer (!) so he’ll produce more.  I always hear, “That guy is so faithful; yet he’s facing so many adversities; why?”  It’s part of the pruning process to make him more productive.  (James 1:2-12) 

Then, when you get to verse 6, Jesus starts talking about the believer, who, over a period of time is so out of fellowship with Christ, so disobedient, that there is no fruit and he withers and is burned.  We automatically read “hell” at this point, but that’s not the case. “Fire” and “burning don’t always refer to hell.  The context determines it. 

What he’s referring to is I Cor. 3 and the burning at the judgment seat of Christ which doesn’t result in hell for the believer. 

When it’s all said and done, this paragraph is showing us:

1.      It is possible to be a believer and produce zero.

2.      Believers can sit in church every Sunday and be withered sticks.

3.      Grace isn’t a license to sin.

4.      It is only possible to produce eternal fruit (cf. Gal. 5) as we are obedient to Christ.

5.      Jn. 15 isn’t dealing with salvation; it deals with fruitfulness

Conclusion

We all want to be productive; to have our lives count for something eternal. Jn. 15 tells us how to do that: Abide in Christ by being obedient to do what He says.

* = Free Grace Teacher or Ministry