John chapter 15, reading from verse one down to verse eight. The Lord Jesus Christ is speaking, and he says, I am the true vine, and my father is the husbandman. 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. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. 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. 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. 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. If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit, so shall ye be my disciples. Amen. The principle lesson taught to the Lord's people in this final I am saying from John's gospel is concerning our union or the church's union with the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the principle lesson taught in this I am saying. the church's union with the Lord Jesus Christ. Because the Lord Jesus Christ joined himself to our flesh in the incarnation when he came into the world, because the Lord Jesus Christ joined himself to our flesh, came as a man into this world, took our place on the cross as our substitute and representative, and there bore our sin, we have been joined to him spiritually. Because he took our nature, we have been joined to him spiritually. We have become his spiritual body, and he is our spiritual head. Now, I hope you understand that when I speak about Christ's church, I don't mean the building across the street or the big building that sits at the corner or on the edge of town. I'm not even talking about the people who attend those buildings. There are plenty of so-called church buildings in our cities and our towns and in our villages, and there are many people who attend them. But that's not what I mean by the Church of God or the Church of Jesus Christ. Those two terms are synonymous. They mean the same thing. Nor am I speaking about denominations. such as Presbyterians or Anglicans or American friends call them Episcopalians or Methodists or Baptists or Pentecostals. I'm sure there are hundreds of denominations. But I'm not speaking of any of these when I speak of God's church or Christ's church and people. When I speak of God's church, when I speak of Christ's church, I am using a definite New Testament description. I mean by that phrase, Christ's church, the whole number, the whole body of the faithful of which Christ is the head. Now, these people, some of them are already in heaven and some of them are already, are still here on earth. The writer to the Hebrews calls these people the general assembly and church of the firstborn written in heaven. So that is a New Testament definition of the church of Christ. The general assembly and church of the firstborn which are written in heaven. John, who is the writer of this gospel from which we've read today, he speaks of those whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life. So that the Church of God, the Church of Christ, the people of Christ are those whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life. The Lord himself calls them those whose names are written in heaven. By the church, then, I mean the whole body of Christ, both in heaven and on earth. The elect of God, the chosen in Christ, those who have been given, by the Father to the Son in the covenant of grace, who have been redeemed by the Son, who have been sanctified by God the Holy Spirit, and who are called in time to faith in Christ through the preaching of the gospel. Now you might say, that's a fairly precise definition. And you might continue and say, it's a lot narrower than I imagined. And then you might say, I assumed if you went to church and believed in God, you became part of the church of God and part of the people of Christ. Well, it's a common assumption and it's wrong. According to God's Word, the Bible, it is fearfully wrong. Many who go to church assume that they are part of God's true church. They assume that they are going to be with the Lord in heaven when they die. But they are gravely mistaken. The Lord Jesus told Nicodemus, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And he explained what he meant by that. He said, you must be born again by the pure gospel and the Holy Spirit. There is a need for the knowledge of the truth. and the application of that knowledge by God the Holy Spirit in regeneration and quickening. You have to be born again. You have to be made alive by God the Holy Spirit. Now I know that some of these terms can be a bit of a puzzle and indeed a bit ambiguous. For example, when I say God's people in the Old Testament, I'm often speaking about the Jews, and we call them God's people in the Old Testament, the nation of Israel. But many of these Jews were not God's spiritual people. They were never born again from above. Equally, many who were not Jews in the Old Testament were truly saved, even in those Old Testament days, by God's grace, because they possessed faith in the promised Messiah. So too, in the New Testament, we find that Paul writes to the church at Philippi or the church at Rome or the church at Ephesus. And we cannot assume that everyone who gathered with those believers in those cities were truly saved. Nor can I assume that all who are listening here today are saved. Some of the most solemn words in the whole Bible are spoken by the Lord in Matthew chapter seven, where he says, not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. He then says, many, many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied? That means preached. So this is talking about ministers of the gospel here or so-called ministers of the gospel. He's talking about clergy people. Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? Have we not preached in thy name? And in thy name cast out devils? And in thy name done many wonderful works? And then, says the Lord Jesus Christ, will I profess unto them, I never knew you. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity. Only those who do the will of the Father shall enter into heaven. What is the will of the Father? Well, again, as the Lord, when he spoke to Nicodemus, said, ye must be born again, so the Lord leaves us in no doubt. He says, this is the will of the Father. This is the Father's will, which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me, that is in the covenant of grace, all that he has given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day. It is being born again by Christ's gospel and the Holy Spirit. It is the work of God's grace and mercy in a dead sinner's soul to bring us to life in Christ. Now you might be wondering, why has he spent so long speaking about the true church of God when the subject today is I am the vine? Well, it's because that is what the Lord Jesus is speaking about in our passage today. When the Saviour said, I am the vine, He was speaking about the church's spiritual union with Him and His union with us. Christ was using the metaphor of the vine and its branches as a picture of the union that exists between Christ and his people. following the Passover because this is the time at which these words were spoken. The Lord had just celebrated a Passover meal with his disciples and then he left and headed towards, on the night before he was betrayed, he left and he went with his disciples to the Garden of Gethsemane and it was there that he was arrested by the high priest's servants and soldiers who came to take Jesus to be tried and then ultimately to be crucified. And it was following that Passover supper that the Lord had spoken to his disciples about the fruit of the vine and instituted what we now call our communion service or our remembrance service. It was at that meal that the Lord instituted this remembrance service. He said, this do in remembrance of me. And we still continue to observe that service today in obedience to the Lord's words. And Christ likened bread and wine to his own broken body and his own shed blood. Some people speak of communion as God communicating grace to the participants in the meal. But I prefer to think of it as Christ's people sharing fellowship in a joint memory of what the Lord has done for us on the cross and the union that we have with him and with each other because of that sacrifice. And now as the Lord and his disciples were leaving Jerusalem to head towards the Mount of Olives, now as the time was fast approaching when the Lord would be parted from his people, when he would be taken to the cross and there made a sacrifice for the sins of his people, now as this little party journeyed to the garden of Gethsemane, the Lord drew his followers' attention to the spiritual union that they have with him, that he has with his church, using this picture of the vine and its branches. And again, we note the Lord's emphatic expression, I am. He tells us, I am the true vine, or I am the vine of truth. And he continues, I am the vine and ye are the branches. I mentioned yesterday in the little note, this is the seventh and final example of this form of speech in John's gospel. Now we've thought at some length about the allusions and references that are contained in this phrase as far as the Lord's divinity is concerned, and none of those things are absent from this phrase also, but having spoken about them we won't go there again today. It is nevertheless recognising that this is the eternal God and the person of the man Christ Jesus who is making this declaration about the union that he has with his people using the similitude of the vine and the branches. And the parallel that the Saviour is drawing here between a vine and its branches and himself and his church is a very powerful likeness. Indeed, there can hardly be a clearer or more suitable example in nature that the Lord might have drawn upon of essential union and consequential fruitfulness. When the Lord returned to heaven, the disciples, the apostles, would assume the role of his ministers to the world. That was the great commission, going into all the world and preach the gospel. Their fruitfulness in terms of their personal spiritual graces and the enlargement of the church by the preaching of the gospel, would all flow from their union with Christ, just as the fruit of individual branches in a vine is derived from their life-giving connection to the main vine stalk. The branch springs from the vine and derives all of its life and liveliness from the vine. Out of the vine, it withers and dies. So the Lord Jesus Christ is all our spiritual life. He's the source of every grace and all our fruitfulness. The church draws grace from Christ's divine nature. and the divine attributes of his own self-existence in common with the Father and the Holy Ghost. Wisdom, holiness, love, these divine attributes of the eternal God are experienced, are received, are communicated from Christ's divine nature to his church. And we also gain the Lord's attributes of his human nature, his patience, his kindness, his goodness. From both natures, Christ is the source of all the fruitfulness of his church in time and to all eternity. All that we have of a spiritual nature comes from the Lord Jesus Christ. And I trust that we will be able to show something of the aptness of this metaphor, the vine and the branches, as we think about these things together. Christ is the source of all the church's spiritual usefulness, all the church's spiritual fruitfulness, and all the church's spiritual good. Here's one area in which we might think about this. We think about the life of the branch. So the Lord says, I am the vine, ye are the branches. Think about the life of the branch. Christ is the source of that life. Christ is the enabler and the giver of God's grace and mercy to the church. He gives those Blessings in what we call the new birth. Prior to our conversion, sinners are spiritually dead in sin and incapable of pleasing God. We are by nature children of wrath, even as others. Our lives are corrupt. Our works are tainted. They're spoiled by evil intentions and selfish motives. Our highest righteousnesses, says the Bible, are filthy rags in God's sight. We're spiritually barren. We're dead towards our Creator. That's our state in our natural condition. But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ. By grace ye are saved. The new birth, which is essential to spiritual life, is Christ's life implanted in us. Christ the vine, we the branches. We are joined to him. We experience his life and a new relationship with God through him. The apostle speaks of it like this. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. Our new birth, our new life flowing from this new creation. is all grace and all of and by Christ. We are born again from above. Not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. We are born again from above, nor of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. We are born again from above, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Lord. The spiritual life of every child of God comes wholly and exclusively from our union with Jesus Christ, who is the source of life to us and in us. So we might think about this from the point of view of the initial life of the branch in the vine. We can also think about it like this. in the growth and development of the branch in Christ. Our growth, having had that new birth implanted, having that new creation made, our growth and maturity in the Christian life is also a product of grace. Drawing grace from Christ, we grow in grace and the knowledge of the truth as a branch grows to maturity and strength in the stem or from the stem of the vine. Not independently. How could the branch grow independently of the vine? But totally dependent on the sap, the moisture, the nourishment that is supplied from the rootstock. And Christ is the source. He is the enabler. He is the giver of God's continuing grace and mercy to the church throughout his people's spiritual growth and development. As Christ is the way to God for men, so Christ is the way for God's blessings to come to men. God gives the Holy Spirit. He gives life and peace and joy and all these good gifts from above, which he delights to bestow, they come to us freely in Christ according to his own good pleasure. Paul tells the Philippians, he that hath begun the good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. And then he tells the Corinthians that following the new birth, Christ is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. People tell us that well Christ saves us and then we've got to work on our holiness and work on our righteousness and work on our sanctification in order to please God. That's not what the Bible says. Christ has made unto us these gifts of God's grace and our good works which were before noxious to God are acceptable to him as offerings of gratitude and praise for all that he has done for us by his grace through his son. But our spiritual growth and development will not come easy. Spiritual growth is hard won. And in Christ's analogy, this is likened to the pruning or purging hand of the master husbandman who tends the branches that are fixed to the vine to encourage and ensure their fruitfulness. As we saw before in the young people's address, Elijah, was in a depressed state. We've previously noted in our studies in Jonah how the Lord's prophets often wrestled with God as he taught them his ways and brought them through hardship to understand him better. And so too for the Lord's apostles. Trials and hardships are a key part of growing in grace and it will be so for us. And we often will be in a place where we have to ask, why is this happening? Why have I to go through this? Why is this trouble being given to me? And we learn in time to interpret the Lord's dealings with us, and to rest in the wisdom and goodness of God's dealings with us, despite the roughness of the path and the way in which we go, learning that these things too are done for our profit. They yield, says the scripture, the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. And here I've got a little caveat. I just want to mention this for the sake of endeavoring to be comprehensive with this little series of verses. Every type or metaphor in scripture has its limitations. and it can be pressed only so far. And that is true in the case of the vine and its branches. The reality of our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, the relationship of Christ with his church and his church with Christ, the reality of that relationship is more glorious than the picture used to describe it. Here's what I mean by that. A husbandman will purge branches from a vine that bear no fruit. He'll separate them off. But there is no separation of the Lord's true people from the Lord. There is no breaking of that union. There is no breach in that fellowship. There is a constant union of Christ and His people. And that transcends the imagery here of the vine and its branches. Every branch in Christ will bear fruit, does bear fruit. And none of these branches will ever be completely purged or be removed. There are some who appear to be branches, but are not. There are some who identify with the true church of God. but they are in name only, they are superficially so. They have no spiritual life and they have never experienced the new birth. Christ says in verse five, I am the vine, ye are the branches. He is speaking to his church. He that abideth in me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without me ye can do nothing. Christ's disciples and followers are branches that emanate from the true vine. And only branches that are genuinely and lastingly joined to the vine can be fruitful. The evidence that their proper union to the vine exists by bearing much fruit over a period of time. And conversely, separated or purged branches, they're dry and lifeless and barren. And our Father manages the spiritual well-being of Christ's church by sending such trials as will strengthen and enhance true branches while removing false professors and exposing fruitless adherents. Here's another way in which the fruit of our faith can be understood in this similitude, this analogy. Lord says, without me ye can do nothing. And this is a fitting reminder of our constant reliance upon the Lord Jesus for all spiritual life. Don't for a moment think that spiritual existence is something to do with a conversion and then nothing to do with your daily life all the rest of your life. That could be nothing, that could not be further from the truth. If you have any sense that that is the way in which you view your Christian experience, then I urge you to reflect again on the reality of that experience. Christ tells us that day by day, week by week, year by year, without me ye can do nothing. Many who claim to be Christians are false professors who make an appearance of unity with Christ's church for a time. They may appear briefly among the true branches, but their barrenness will be revealed. for we can bear no lasting spiritual fruit except we be truly united to Christ and grafted into him by faith. The Lord's disciples and we with them as his followers are exhorted to abide in Christ, and we do. We do abide in him. Think of this not as a command, or a precept, but as a word of power and enabling. We are called to exercise faith upon Christ, and we are given that faith to exercise. We are called to dwell in Him, to cling to Him, despite all the trials of life, and we do dwell in Him and cling to Him, because we are enabled to do so by Him. Only in Christ can we maintain that spiritual life. Only in Him can we derive spiritual nourishment and no divine blessing. And our Saviour encourages our dedication by promising that He will abide in us as an enabling power and source of strength and life. Herein is God glorified. Herein is Christ honoured. Herein his church is fruitful in goodness, in righteousness, in truth, in faith, in doctrine, in practice. Herein we cherish and exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and temperance. And finally, and with this I'm done, there is the wine of eternal life. There's the new birth. There is the continuing growth in grace and the knowledge of the truth. There is the fruitfulness that flows from our faith. And all of these things come from our union with the Lord Jesus Christ. And then finally, there is the wine of eternal life. When the Lord Jesus instituted the communion service, he told his disciples, Now the Lord was not talking about wine that had been squeezed from a cluster or a bunch of grapes. He's speaking of something spiritual. This new wine that he will drink with his church in his father's kingdom. Our Lord Jesus Christ will drink with us the new wine of eternal joy, peace, glory, praise and thanksgiving in heaven. Then we will see that the best wine has been reserved to the last. This wine of faith fulfilled, this wine of hope realized, shall flow freely at the marriage feast of the Lamb, when the Church, the Bride of Christ, will rejoice evermore in her Bridegroom, and our eternal union with Christ shall be consummated, fulfilled, and experienced as the fullness of joy forevermore. May the Lord give us grace to understand something of the meaning and the depth of what it is to be united to Christ. I fear I have but scratched the surface. There is more to be said, but our time is up today. May the Lord bless these thoughts to us. Amen.