John 15, and if you will, turn
back to Exodus 3. I had emailed out the sermon
audio report. I don't look at it. I try to
look at it quarterly, and it's been two months past that. It's
almost bi-annually now. But I hope that's an encouragement
to you. Your sacrifice of getting up
every morning and working hard and giving all you got and going
to bed late and by the sweat of your brow to support this
work. Lord's using it. He's blessing it. I hope you
remember that. A lot of brethren in Florida,
about thousands tuned in since the first of the year or listen
to messages, thousand message plays in Florida. And I always
get so excited. I see a phone number come up
from Florida. I'm like, is this somebody that doesn't never heard
the gospel? Boy, I got good news for you. There's a fellow right
smack dab in the middle of the state. He's will tell you the
same thing I will. And then, uh, almost about the
same in Singapore. Lord may be getting ready to
light half this world on fire. I don't know what he's doing.
That's encouraging to me. Your, your labors are not going. He's making it fruitful. All
right. Here in Exodus chapter three,
I want us to see this as old brother Henry said, we need to
look at this with our eyes. I need to read it. I can make
you read it. I can make you hear my voice.
I can't make you experience it. We learn by experiencing things,
by hearing things, by seeing things. I can make you see it,
I can make you hear something, but he has to make you experience
it. But I pray the Lord will make us see this today. Exodus
3, verse 7. The Lord talked to Moses, said
what he's gonna do. Exodus 3, 7, the Lord said, I
have surely seen the affliction of my people, which are in Egypt.
I've heard their cry. How did he hear their cry? By
reason of their taskmasters. Do you want to cuss a taskmaster?
God may be using a mean old taskmaster to make you cry unto him so he
can hear you. Well, that's not, that doesn't
sound like grace. That's very gracious. Very gracious. a reason
of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows." And he says what
he's going to do for them. He says, I'm going to bring them
out of here. Verse 10, Exodus 3, 10. Now, come now therefore,
and I will send thee unto Pharaoh. Exodus 3, verse 10. Come now therefore, and I will
send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people,
the children of Israel, out of Egypt. And Moses said unto God,
who am I that I should go unto Pharaoh? king of Egypt, and that
I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt. Why would
you send me?" And he said, certainly I'll be with
thee, the Lord said to Moses, and this shall be a token unto
thee that I have sent thee, and I have brought forth the people
out of Egypt, you shall serve God upon this mountain. Right
here while I'm talking to you, y'all gonna come back right here,
and I'm gonna prove to you that I wanna do it, because I'm with
you. I'm sending you. And Moses said unto God, behold,
When I come unto the children of Israel, and say unto them,
The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you, and they shall
say to me, What's his name? What shall I say to them? They're
going to ask me who it was told me this. That's one of the most
blessed things, odd for me to say it, so one of the most blessed
things God can do is send a man after his own heart to a nation
or a city or a town or a living room. So one of the most cursed
things is to have a man that thinks he's sent from God, or
for God to take his man away. He said, whenever I get there,
what am I going to say sent me? What's your name? Exodus 3, 14. And God said unto Moses, I am
that I am. And he said, thus shalt thou
say unto the children of Israel, I am hath sent me unto you. You boys remember that, underline
it and put a star next to it. He is, I am. He's not, I was,
I used to be, has been. He's not, I'm trying to be. He's
not, I might be someday if you'll let me. I am. Well, that's too
simple. Boy, we do us good to get simple.
Get off our theological high horses. Come down from that with
my Zacchaeus come down. We get brought down, come off
them camels when they learn something. That's his name. I am. The great
I am. Now in our text, we're in John
15. You know, if we could truly spend some time learning something
of the Lord, if we could truly spend time not going to church,
not singing and waving our hands and not committing our spiritual
time or our devotion time and all this hogwash ritualism religion,
if we could truly spend some time getting to know who God
is, that'd be time well spent. He said, I am. And I've preached
on the names of Jehovah, and I've preached on more than seven.
Mankind says, oh, there's seven, because that's perfection. Well,
you just got God in a little box. You can carry him around,
can't you? Look at you. Ain't you something? I don't
think so. What's his name? Here in John
alone, just in John, he says in John 6, 35, he said, I am
the bread of life. John 8, I am the light of the
world. I am the door. of the sheep. Modern translations
say, I'm the door for the sheep. That ain't right. That translation's
bad. Throw it away. Get you King James
Version that says, I'm the door of the sheep. He says, I am,
the great I am. I am the good shepherd. John
11, I am the resurrection. What's your post-millennial position?
I believe that Christ is a resurrection. How's that fit in your seminary?
Does that get up in your craw pretty good? I want one down
everybody. You know what I'm talking about,
Bob. He said, I am the way, the truth, and the lie. I am the
true vine. How many names does he have?
More than seven. More than seven. I'm the door.
He's the seed. He's the lamb. He's everything,
and it's gonna take us an eternity to get a glimpse at Him. Take
a long time. He gives us the key to the illustration
He's gonna give us here, the vine and the branches. He gives
us the key to this illustration in verse 1 of chapter 15. We'll
see how far we get. We might get to verse 8. We might
just stay here in verse 1. This is just not a complex sentence. It's all small words. You kids
can understand. It's easy. It's a sentence and
it gets bigger to me and bigger to me and bigger to me every
day. I'm alive. I Can't apply a systematic
theology and extract the idea of Christ out of this text He's
huge. Yes This person and his word
is amazing. It's my hope. It's still amazing
to those. I that are in him. Here in John 15 verse 1, he says,
I am the true vine, and my father is the husbandman, period. You got 14,000 years, I might
get tired of talking. How can we exhaust that? I am
the true vine. I am the true vine. Why do you
say he's the true vine? Does your Bible say he's the
true vine? Why do you say that? All of us, me and you, faithful
preachers, right? We remember quickly. I'm the
vine, you're the branches. He's the vine, we're the branches.
We know that, don't we? But every word our master says is important.
I read the Bible in a year, that's too fast. I read the Bible 45
times. You didn't learn nothing. You
didn't, I'm telling you, you didn't. We need to have somebody
teach us these things and let us soak this in and make it vital
to us. Why do you say I'm the true vine?
Let's look at these quickly elsewhere here, what the Lord said, and
we'll see why. John 1. Look here where he says in John 1, what's
said about him. John 1, verse 9. He said in our text, I'm the
true vine, here in John 1 verse 9, that was the true light, which
lighteth every man that cometh in the world. He said, I am the
light of the world. John says he's the true light,
the true light. Look here in John 6. In Pharisees
was talking about what all they're going to do and what they observe.
Here in John 6 verse 32. And Pharisees said, our fathers,
they ate manna in the desert. We know what that is. Here in
John 6, 32. Then Jesus said unto them, concerning
that manna, he fed Israel in the wilderness. Verily, verily,
truly, truly, of a truth, of a truth, I say unto you, Moses
gave you not that bread from heaven, but my father giveth
you the true bread from heaven. Does that say true in your Bible?
Hold your horses, we're about to learn something. Remember
Hebrews chapter eight. Here in Hebrews 8 verse 1, now
of the things which we have spoken, this is the sum, we'll sum it
up. We have such a high priest who is set on the right hand
of the throne of the majesty in the heavens, a minister of
the sanctuary and of the, pause for effect, true, Tabernacle,
which the Lord pitched, who pitched that true place of worship. Place
of worship is a person who pitched it. The Lord pitched and not
man. I hear a lot about people planting
churches. Oh, he was used to plant 45 churches
and we planted churches. And I hear a lot of people about
being founders. We founded a church. Hello. I'm a founder. You better
not be. You better not be. If there's
a place where Christ is worshiped, let me tell you something. That's
God's house. He pitched the tent. If it's a true tabernacle, there's
false tents all over his place. God brought you out of one of
them and said, Christ is that true tabernacle. Oh, it ain't
a building we get wrapped up in. It's a person. He's the true
tabernacle. But why? Why would the Lord say
that? Why would he say I'm the true light, and he's the true
bread, and he's the true vine, and I'm the true tabernacle?
Here's the answer. Do you want the answer to it?
Turn over to Hebrews 9, verse 24. One page over. Hebrews 9,
24. It says, for Christ has not entered
into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures
of the true. All those things, all those tops,
all those pictures, all those tabernacles, all those sacrifices,
all those everything, the feast and the Passover, that's a figure. It's a picture of the true. He didn't enter into those things.
He entered into the truth, but into heaven itself now to appear
in the presence of God for us. All those things pointed to him.
You see that a figure of a picture. He's the true. He's going to
tell us about a vine so we can get our heads wrapped around
it. And he's going to tell us about doors so we can understand. Because he knows our frame and
he pitieth us. And he speaks to us in a language
we can understand. But all those things, that's
a figure. It's a token. It's a picture
of him who is true. He's the truth. You see that?
A picture cannot save you. Only the person can. A systematic
dissection of the scriptures, a systematic theology, will not
help you. Christ is the true. He's the
true vine. A systematic theology will never
comfort the heart of a person. Only the person that is peace
can bring true comfort. He's the only true vine. That's
him. Over Matthew 12, it talks about
bad trees bearing bad fruit. You know, he's talking to a generation
of vipers in that. Who's he talking to here? It's nighttime. He said,
we're going for a walk, boys, let's go. Judas had already left.
This is an intimate time before our Lord goes and hangs on a
cross because of us. Because of the wretched, vile
sin that's all we are. And he says, let me tell you
something. I'm the true vine. I'm going to talk to you a little
bit about vines. He's giving the key up front, isn't that
kind of him? All these figures, all these pictures throughout
the scriptures, all of it, it all points to a person. And let
me give you a bit of instruction. Let me tell you something from
my heart to your heart. The Lord's laid this on my heart this week.
When we take the Lord's table, don't you dare make it out to
be more than it is. That bread's just bread, you
understand? It reminds us, it's not a sacrament, it's not a conveyance
of grace. It doesn't do nothing for you.
It makes you, it reminds you of the true bread. You get that? That true blood that was shed,
that true water we was washed in. It's a figure of his body
broken for you. Don't make it more than it is.
It's tempting to put weight on things. Did you know that? Uh,
well, now we just, we were not respecters of part. No, God's
not a respecter of person. You are. I am. We need to learn
this now. Stay with me. There's some preachers
I had to get up and preach after. I didn't want to do this. Are
you kidding me? Why? I'm putting respect on a man.
Is his gospel more important than my gospel? Absolutely not.
It's the same. It's the same. There's pulpits
people respect. Oh man, what if we could go to
the Metropolitan Tabernacle and I could stand behind that hunk
of wood that Spurgeon stood behind? Woo! It's a hunk of wood. We respect those things, don't
we? Don't do it. It's just all these things here we're given,
it's just the top. This building, there's buildings that's respected. We ought to come in here with
reverence, I'll tell you that. We ought not make more out of
it than what it is. This place keep rains off our head when
we hear about Christ. That's it. Symbolism and ritual. Tradition, because that's how
we've always done it. You ever said that? Tradition
and routine are dangerous and they are enemies of true worship.
They are. They are. It makes us look something
other than Christ. It ain't good. If you are dying of hunger, And
you've been without food for four days. You missed a bunch
of meals. 12 meals gone, and you're hungry. You're hungry. You come to us,
Kevin, I'm hungry. Oh, please feed me. I'm starving. And I
sat down, and I got my computer up, and I pulled up YouTube,
and I showed you an ad of a beautiful Burger King Whopper with cheese. My children, that cheeseburger
is not paradise, right? You'll starve to death. You can't
eat it. That's sinking home yet? This
generation needs to hear that. You'll starve to death. It's
a picture. It's not there. There's no connection.
You can't put it in your mouth and consume it. You get that?
We're thankful for those things that point us to Christ, but
we're thankful for Him. We look to Him because they led
us to it. Read on, verse 25, Hebrews 9, 25. Nor yet that ye
should offer himself often, As the high priest enters into the
holy place every year with the blood of others, for then he
must, for then must he often have suffered since the foundation
of the world. But now, once in the end of the world, hath he
appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. All these
things pointed to that hour, this hour. That's what he's talking
about, and he did it. And, here's how we quote scripture. You ready
to read this one? Might wanna change where we got underlined.
And, he's talking about Christ going to hang on a cross, isn't
he? And as it is, after the same manner, this is something everybody
knows. And as it is appointed unto men
once to die, but after that, the judgment, colon, don't miss
Christ by memorizing verses. If y'all want a list of stuff
to have your children memorize, I'll help you out. It's what
God sent me here for. I'll earn my paycheck. colon, Christ is
the context. So after the same way, so Christ
was once offered to bear the sins of many and unto them that
look for him, shall he appear the second time without sin unto
salvation. And so just the same after the
same manners as appointed man wants to die in a judgment, Christ
died for us. He was judged. And the next time
we see him, we're going to be without sin. Well, that's better than memorizing
some verses. That means a person's coming. You get that? That's good news. Who's coming? The true vinyl. The true one. Not an idea. Not something somebody else said.
Something he, someone he said. He's coming. You get that? That's
the difference between eternal life and eternal damnation. God
has to make you get it. I can write it on a dry erase
board, I can shake you, and I can get a funnel and put it down
your throat and fill your belly full of water and it ain't gonna
do nothing unless He's pleased to move on you and wake you up
and give you life and breathe in you. So I'm gonna keep doing
what I'm doing. Back in our text, John 15. I
am the true vine, verse 1, John 15, 1. I am the true vine, that's
Christ, and my Father is the husbandman A husbandman. Boys, that's a farmer. That's
somebody that grows crops, isn't it? He works the land. He does
what he wants to with his land and he grows things. That's a
husbandman. Nowadays, if you have a farm and you get you some
animals, you go to school and you can major in animal husbandry. Still to this day. He's the husbandman. He's one that tends to the farm.
He tends to the vine. Christ is the true vine, and
God the Father, he's the farmer. He planned all of this. He performed
all this. He wanted to put the vine where
he wanted it, and that's where the vine went. You see on his
hillside, y'all see them all the time, them vineyards, right?
Are they just haphazard? Do you think they just bought
that property and started weed eating and said, well, look,
there's perfectly straight lines. Is that a coincidence, Mike?
No, it's not. They did it on purpose. What
about Christ the vine? Is this haphazard? The Father
purposed it, just as he willed it. He plants that vine where
he wants it, he waters it, he prunes it, he fertilizes it,
and that farmer gives the fruit to whoever he feels like giving
fruit to. I got chickens. So somebody came in and said,
Kevin, we're going to, the county is going to make you give eggs
to that person over there. I ain't got no eggs. That chicken
operation just ended. Tell you that right now. I'll
give him eggs who I want to. I can do with my own as I see
fit. He's like Lord Cain. He's the
farmer. He's the husband. He does the zones he sees fit.
He puts the branches on the vine. Do you know that? What Paul said
in 1 Corinthians 1, he said, but of him, of the Father, are
ye in Christ Jesus. He did it. He did it, and he
planned it all. I won't have you turn there for
time's sake, but Ephesians 1 says, blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the husband, who hath
blessed us with all spiritual blessings and heavenly places
in Christ. according as he hath chosen us
in him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according
to the good pleasure of his will. He did exactly however he felt
like. But what's he doing? Who are you to ask God what he's
doing? I want to say, who do you think you are? Thank him. That'd be a good place
to start. We're in him. To the praise. All that's to
the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us
accepted in the beloved. A farmer knows that. You go to
a farmer and say, boy, I like him. Man, them tomatoes are looking
good. You did a good job. It's to his glory, in whom we
have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness according to
the riches of his grace. That's the magnitude of it. All that for us. That's the purpose. He purposed
it. What about the purchase? Christ performed all that. We
read that as we go on in Ephesians 1, don't we? But the father purposed
the purchase too. He said, son, you're going to
do it. He looked at his only begotten son, his darling son.
He was, I'm going to make a bride for you. I ain't going to just
find one or buy one or wish for one. I'm going to make one just
like you. Make a whole mess of them just like you. That Him
laying down His life, Him purchasing us. It says in Acts 2, Him being
delivered by the determinate counsel and the foreknowledge
of God. That husbandman purposed that vine to go through exactly
what it went through. And His foreknowledge, His love is why
He did it. There in verse 1, John 15, what will the Father
do in us through Christ? I am the true vine, and my father
is the husbandman. He's the farm. 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. Let's work this backwards, okay?
And I think you'll get comfort at the end of it, still being
scared out of your boots. Ought to scare you out of boots.
Let's work it backwards. I think you'll see us play out
in order that we experience it. He says there at the end of verse
two, that it may bring forth more fruit. Does that say fruits? It doesn't say fruit. It says
fruit, singular, doesn't it? Turn over to Galatians five.
Let's find out first of all, with all this pruning and this
purging, what's the fruit? Galatians chapter five. Paul says here in Galatians 5,
18, But if you be led of the spirit, Galatians 5.18, if you
be led by the spirit, you're not under the law. And he describes
what this flesh does, verse 19. Now the works of the flesh are
manifest, which are these, adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath,
strife, seditions, heresies, envying, murders, drunkenness,
reviling, and such like, anything like it. of the which I tell
you before, as I have also told you in the past, they that which
do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God." Not that
fruit. But the fruit, verse 22, but
the fruit singular, singular, the fruit of the Spirit, capital
S Spirit. This is the fruit of God. Well,
what's that fruit gonna have? Well, he's the vine, right? Where's
that fruit come from? You ever seen a branch on an
apple tree just reach down and pick up an old apple and go,
I'm gonna make it new? Not once, never. Where'd that
come from? From the vine, isn't it? Started
way down at the root of Jesse, isn't it? He comes up that trunk
and it goes out the branches through it and the branch just
bears it, just holds it. Here's the fruit of God, capital
S Spirit. Here's the fruit. Fruit of the
Spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness,
faith, meekness, temperaments. Against such, there's no law.
There's no limitations. Do it all you want. Knock yourself
out. Start right now. Do extra. Put
away all that other junk. You know, that's instinct. Fruit
of the Spirit. Just as it's much an instinct
from an apple tree to make apples, as an orange tree to make oranges,
it can't keep from it, it's going to do it. When a light shines
on it and you give it water and fertilizer, it's going to grow.
It's instinct. A child of God. You can't make
yourself have any of these inward things. You can't make yourself
love. You can't make yourself have
joy and peace. You can't make yourself long-suffering. You're
just mean. That's why we're born. Can't make yourself meek. I tell
you what, if God does it in you, if that vine works it in that
branch to make fruit, you can't keep from it. You can't help
it. You can't help it. Why? Turn back to our text. Look here
at the second part of verse two. John 15, verse two. It says,
and every branch that beareth fruit, the husband and the father,
he purges it, he prunes it, that it may bring forth more fruit. How are we going to bear fruit?
Paul talks over in Galatians 6, 2. He said, bear ye one another's
burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. Bear one another's
burdens. Well, I thought we was talking
about mangoes or something. Maybe it was peaches, something
delicious. Nah, you're going to bear some burdens. It's going
to be fruitful. Fruitful, isn't it? Believer,
you are the fruit of the vine. You're the fruit of Christ. And
us other branches, we bear you. and you bear us, and we have
peace with you, and you have peace with us, and I'm gonna
suffer a long time for you, and you're gonna suffer a long time
for me. You get that? Ephesians 4, let all bitterness
and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away
from you with all malice. That means take malice with it,
and with a vengeance, get it out of you. And be ye kind one
to another. Not kind to yourself, I gotta
be kind to me. I have to be true to me. But
that's not what it says. Be kind one to another, tender
heart to one another, forgiving one another, even as God for
Christ's sake has forgiven you. How are we gonna be able to bear? How are we gonna be able to suffer
long and love and be tender hearted? Because the Lord's gonna prune
us. He's gonna take some of this flesh that we just love so much
and cut it off. Well, that's my darling fill-in-the-blank. That's the thing I love. That's
the person I love. That's the thing I like doing.
Whatever it is, he's gonna trim it down. Show us what we are. Expose us. Prune us. Cut some of our flesh off through
chastening, and we experience the true vine. So as we think,
oh, I'm a branch, boy, look at all the fruit I'm making. We're
gonna get pruned. Cut way back, and we're gonna realize the faithfulness
and the life is all in the vine. not of ourselves. That's the
vine. We're going to get turned right back to looking at that
vine. If that don't happen, you ain't going to bear no fruit.
He's got to trim you. A vineyard guy on a vineyard
one time, the guy's talking to him and he said, you got advice
for me? He said, I like these grape vines. He said, if I was
going to start one, what should I do? He said, I've been at this
40 years. I've been doing this 57 years. He said, I'm gonna give you some
advice. Whenever winter comes, after you get all your fruit,
you prune it. And prune it a lot. And whenever you get down to
where you think you've pruned too much, prune a little more. That's advice. You prune it a
little more. You wanna make a tree grow? I got a bunch of fruit
trees on my property. When I start pruning my tomato
plants too, they're about to look like they're about to die.
I'm gonna prune them up one side and down the other, get all them
suckers off of there. But when you prune it, it provides growth,
doesn't it? It provides growth. You ever
had trials like that? Where you've just been cut and
cut and cut, and you think, if I get cut anymore, I'm gonna
die. And then you get cut some more. What did that produce? You look into the vine to get
all your life, you look into the vine for everything, and
that is producing fruit. That way, the next time, another
branch, you gotta bear one another's burdens, And some brother or
some sister is going through some horrible trial, and their
sin's exposed, or their unbelief's exposed, and they're just getting
their heart ripped out of them, you go and say, let me tell you
how to get your life back on the track. Look to Christ. He's just pruning you. You're
in Him. How do I know I'm gonna stay
there? The Father put you there. You ain't going nowhere. He ain't
gonna lose one. He's just pruning you. You'll
be all right. Y'all have heard this illustration 473 times.
I'm going to tell it one more time, because my kids ain't heard
it. Your children ain't heard it. You ain't heard it. There's
a traveling salesman down in Arkansas going through years
ago and stopped at the gas station. He was a very Harvard-educated
man and big to do. He stopped to get gas and he
said, hello, sir, and looked behind the counter and there's
a bunch of blue tick hound dogs made out of wood up on a shelf.
And I said, who did those? I was just passing through. That's
beautiful. That's majestic. Those things are amazing. Someone made that? He goes, yeah.
He goes, oh, Tim over there. There by the pot-bellied stove,
he's spitting in a spittoon and drinking him a beer and whittling
on a piece of wood. And he said, can I talk to him?
I said, sure, you can talk to him. And he went over and said, sir,
you make these blue tick hounds out of wood? He said, yeah, I
do. He said, how do you do that? He goes, I never really. I really
thought about it. And he thought for a minute,
because, well, I guess, I guess I just cut off all the wood that
ain't a hound. As we go through this life, if
we are the Lords, He'll cut off everything that ain't Christ.
Not that we're some kind of perfect thing that's so ripe for the
picking at the end. We ain't the fruit, we're the
branches. He's going to trim us back to where we're totally
dependent on Him. Those that think they can cut
off their own sin, or worse off, those think they can cut the
sin of others off. How can they have hope for these believers?
Adam, morally innocent, didn't even know what sin was. He fell
in a garden and he blamed God. He said, it's that woman's fault
you gave me. That means it's your fault. Abraham, father of
the faithful, what'd he do? Gave up his wife in a whoredom
twice. Jacob, one thing after another. That's what we want
to throw on Sunday mornings. David and Bathsheba, or David
and his spittle running down his beard, acting like he's a
crazy man. Jonah went to Tarshish. And then whenever the Lord say
to all of Nineveh, he was mad about it. He was angry. I knew he was going to save all
them. The apostles, every one of them
forsook him. And now, In our generation, all
those horrible things on the news. No, the atrocities of Kevin
Thacker, of me, of I am. What I am. Christ is the great
I am. That's what we're gonna learn
through this pruning. He is the great I am, and I'm old wretched
man that I am. That's it. He's life, I'm dead. I need him forever. Fruit's always
for something else other than the branches. Isn't that right?
Fruit's not for the tree. What if you have a fruit tree
and it's all the fruit falls? Well, you gotta get it out. It's gonna stink.
It ain't gonna do no good. And you're gonna have sprouts
coming up, and it's gonna rob the nutrients from the tree.
It's gotta go. That's for somewhere else. It ain't for you. Get out
of here. The branches only live off the vine. That husband, he
allows some things to grow just to prune us so we bear more fruit.
It's in John 15 when I am the true vine. and my father's the
husbandman, and every branch that in me, and that beareth
not fruit, he taketh away, and every branch that beareth fruit,
if he's using you, he's gonna purge you, he's gonna prune you,
and you're gonna bring forth more fruit. Now that first part,
every branch in me, that beareth not fruit, he taketh away, that's
scary. Do we just grin and go, uh, and
nod up and down, or is that shaking your boots? Oh, Lord, is it I? I mean it. I got good news for
you. Every branch in me, does that
say it's in him? Could we be in Christ and lose
hope? Absolutely not. We may have to do a little digging.
We may have to be patient. We may have to wait on the Lord
to teach us some things. We may have to have some fellow send to us and,
Lord, use that fellow, show me some things. Okay, Ethiopian
Union. Every branch in me that beareth
not fruit. Let me tell you the literal translation
of that. Ceases to bear fruit. That means it did bear fruit.
It is in him, but it stopped bearing fruit. It bears fruits
in Christ. Can he lose one? Never. It's
impossible. Every branch in me that ceases
bearing fruit, he taketh away. I don't know if it has in your
marginal reference, Bibles, but it says the husband lifts it
away. Lifts it away. You know, first
thing I thought of when I thought of that, Lot's wife. Lot's wife. Lord sent him to go get that
family out. Them angels are holding, one's
holding two children, the other one's holding Lot and his wife.
And she drifts back a few steps. And then she drifts back a few
more steps. And then she's back a few more steps. She quits going
to services just as much and kind of falling off the wagon
a little bit. And, well, I got some important
things going on. And the next thing you know,
she turns to Sodom. And right then, Lord lifted her
away and made her just like Christ. She's a salt of the earth, salt
that purifies, salt that sanctifies right then. The second we're
not used of anymore, the Lord's not going to have us to make
any more fruit to bear our brethren or to, because we're fitly framed
together. Together. You get that? Take
a branch, go stick it out 400 miles away from the vine and
all the other branches. What's going to happen to it?
It ain't going to live. We're together. The second that
fruit's gone, it's not going to bring forth any fruit anymore.
It's lifted away. Just lift it off. took up the
glory. Doris Mahan's still on this earth,
you know that? Her birthdays are real close. I always try
to wish her happy birthdays, two days off. Why is she here? Why is she still here? The Lord's
still walking in her and working in her to bear the fruits that
he feels like bearing. It's his fruit. She's his workmanship,
and she's still here and still made faithful to use her for
us, for somebody else, right? And when he's finished, she ain't
gonna bear forth any more fruit, she's gonna be lifted to the
bosom of Abraham. Just like that beggar was. Isn't
that good? Now that's not scary. Is that
comfort to you? That's not a whip. That's not
a dire warning. That's comfort. That's good news to those that
are in the true vine. The person of Christ, our salvation,
the person that is our life, not a part of our life, not the
most important thing in our life. He's my life. That's good news. Whenever he's done using me,
I'll be with him. I must have work to do. Let's get after it.
I love old Scott Richard who said, he said, if you ain't that
bright, that ain't your fault. He goes, but if you're lazy,
it's a hundred percent your fault. We ought to learn from that. Verse three says, now are you
clean through the word which I have spoken unto you? Remember,
he washed her feet. He said, Peter, you're clean
everywit. I've saved you. I won't die for you. You're mine.
I'm a lamb slain for the foundation of the world. You're mine. Like
I washed your feet, you walk in this world. You live in this
world. And you will get a little dust
on you every day. and he's gonna wash your feet, and your brethren's
gonna wash your feet. Your brethren's gonna bare that
dirt that's on you. What happens when you clean your
feet? Sometimes you scrub a little too hard, it'll scuff your feet
up, won't it? Light afflictions, is what I thought of. That don't
hurt that bad, does it? Take a scrub brush, clean dirt
off your feet. Lot of afflictions, only for a moment, just a little
scrubbing. That's all the pruning is. Oh, we think we ain't gonna
make it. Oh, we're despairing. Our God's
on the throne. He's the husbandman, Christ is
the vine, and this is going just as he planned it. Don't you worry
about that, you're fine. It's for our good, and it's for
his glory. We'll celebrate him for his purpose.
How are we cleaned? By the word, he said. Now are
you cleaned through the word? What word's that? I'm going to
say this as plain as I can. It's the written word. We ought
to read it sometimes. If we were to take our final
exams out of this book, we'd study it, wouldn't we? Would
we crack it open every now and then? It's the written word and the preached
word. It's so. That ought to give us
a seriousness about gathering together. That ought to give
us a seriousness about sending this word forward out into all
the world, everywhere we can get opportunity to. That ought
to give us a seriousness about how we read. Not some ceremony,
not some routine, because my alarm on my watch went off. Oh,
it's time to read the scriptures about God, to seek him, to seek
him. We might stop there. He goes
on, verse four, says, 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. And he says down in verse
five, he said, I am the vine and you are the branches. He
that abideth in me and I in him, the same bear for much fruit,
for without me you can do nothing. All those abiding, that's different
than me and him, did you know that? It ends being one with
Christ. Abiding, look word up, get your
concordance. It means stay. Stay. We can be in Christ. We can be
a blood-bought child of God and not stay with Him. What pain
and suffering that costs. And if we're His, He'll bring
us back. And all that pruning we took out in the world, Those
people, I can look them dead in the eye, and I'll say, you
stay where the gospel is. Sell off everything you got, leave
your family, leave everything, and you be where the gospel is,
and God will bless it. How can I know that? I got pruned
a while back. Fruit popped out, I know. He ain't lying. I can
tell you the truth. Stay with him. Stay with him. What about if somebody doesn't
stay with him forever, and the Lord don't bring them back? Look
at verse six. If a man abide not in me, They went out from
us and they stayed out from us because they're not of us. They
never was in him. He didn't say if he's in me and
abide if not, they never was in him. If he doesn't stay with
him, he's cast forth as a branch and is withered. And men will
gather him and cast him in the fire and they're all burned.
Them angels will gather all them up and burn them at the last
day. They'll be cast in the pits of fire. We gotta be in him. How do we
get in him? The husbandman did that, didn't he? How do we stay
in him? The vine supports us, keeps us.
Where's a vine stop and a branch to start? Even if it's grafted,
Lord gets it from every angle, Karen, so we can't mess it up.
He gets us whether we're grafters or natural growers or whatever.
If it's grafted even, you can't, well, that's somewhere around
here, but I can't really tell. If we're in Him, we abide in
Him. We're gonna stay with Him. He'll keep us. If you abide in
me, verse 7, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye
will, and it shall be done unto you. And the only thing I come
up with is, what am I going to ask? I'm in Him. I'm standing
in Hamel right now. I think I know that. I'm married
to you. I think I know that. If I'm in Him, I reckon I ought
to know it. I'm in Him. I want to stay with Him. Ask
me anything, I'll do it. I've been looking at a new shotgun.
No! You abide in me, I wanna keep
abiding in you. You keep me, you have to do it.
I wanna stay with you. Who would get the glory if I
was to ask something like that? And it happened, and I'm with
him forever. Verse eight, herein is my father glorified. That's
how he's gonna do it. That you bear much fruit, so
shall you be my disciples. I hope that was a blessing to
you. I've heard these things preached before from just wicked
people, or at least in a wicked spirit in them. It hits mean.
It hits cutting, and they're trying to do the pruning. Lord
does the pruning, doesn't he? And I want to abide in him. He's
put me in him, and I want to stay there. I don't want to go
nowhere. Lord, keep us. He's able. He's able. He'll present
us false, won't he? All right, let's pray together. Father, forgive these branches
that we are. Prune us as you see fit. Lord,
use us in this world. What a gift we have of grace
to be in Christ. What an unspeakable gift. Lord,
it's our reasonable service, our reasonable duty to honor
him in this world. Honor his precious gospel you've
given us. Lord, make us profitable servants, make us bear fruit
for our brethren, bear it, bearing one another. And the day we can't,
the day you don't see fit to make us do it anymore, take us
home. What a comfort that'll be. Eternal
bliss. We made like Christ and be with
him and worship him. While we're here, Lord, forgive
us for what we are. Wash us. Give us the grace to wash one
another. It's in Christ's name that we ask. Amen.