"Every branch in Me that does not produce fruit He reomves, and He prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit...I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in Me and I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without Me."
John 15:2, 5
A very frequented passage of scripture, to be sure. But what does it mean to bear fruit? We talked about this tonight at church, and I feel that for some of us the answer is not one that we would like to hear.
For the Christian, we are commanded to bear fruit! Because if we do not bear fruit, we will taken from the vine and thrown away. So we must bear fruit. But how do we bear healthy fruit?
The answer lines in our relationship with Jesus. He commands us to be connected to Him; to be connected with the Vine. Only abiding in Jesus will we ever be fruitful! Too often we try to do our own things: ministry, thoughts, passions, service, stuff. We try so hard to get our own agenda done, that we fail to rest in the very Vine that nourishes us.
But notice this...something that hit me very hard today. That in order to produce much fruit...we must be pruned! What? What does that mean? How are we to be pruned?
I am convinced more and more, that we as the Church must let go of ourself...we must let go of our own personal agenda, and strive together to be more than we are right now. We must allow the Father to take us, mold us, shape us into what we need to be. Jesus says that the Gardener will take us and prune us so that we will produce more fruit.
It is not something that God might do, or think about doing; it is something that He will do. I think that for most of us, that when we are in times of unfruitfulness, we are in times of selfishness. We are in times where we are living to please ourselves, by not allowing God control and cleanse our lives. This is the reason that it is so hard for us to be fruitful.
It is hard to allow God to take prune us. Pruning means that God might break us down a bit! He might take something away; or make us give up something that is dear to us. He might make us sacrifice...
But is it not much better to give up what we cannot keep in order get what we cannot earn?
Is it not better to stay in the essence of Christ than to dwell in the lunacy of the world?
How much better is it to stay in the glorious plans of the Father than to struggle with today?
All that has to happen, is to allow the merciful Gardener take us, prune us, and make us into something that is beautiful, and amazing; to make us into something so far beyond what we could ever dream of or expect.
That is how we produce fruit...but more importantly, that is how we produce much fruit. In a land that so desperately needs what we can give, how important is it to allow the Father to make us who we need to be, so that we can stay in connection with Christ Himself...so that we can make a difference in this world?
Dreaming...
adam
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