Jesus Is The Vine

The other day, it felt awkward, but I hadnt seen this person since last year. I said Happy
New Year — it was January 12. And then, is it new to say Happy New Year? Is it still
appropriate then to say Happy New Year if you hadnt seen them since last year? Happy New
Year, Happy New Year.

Not last week, but the week before, I did a sermon on the Wine Skins, do you remember
that, those of you who were here? We gave the sermon and it talked about how you cannot pour
new wine in old wine skins. And what happened is its going to burst. And the premise of it is,
during new year you might have your resolutions and youve done this over and over again last
year, maybe the same resolution, and the same resolution. You cannot change yourself with just
ideas or will power. I want to quit eating Dunkin donuts. With that idea, that mindset, that will
power, its just pouring new ideas, new wine into your old self and it cannot happen. So the
illustration of the wine skins was that you need to die of yourself, come to Christ and he will
change you and therefore you have new wine skins and then you can pour new wine, new ideas,
new inspirations, a new life in you.

Its January 12 and I dont know if you made your resolutions and Im wondering how youre
doing with them. Usually its this time where people quit going to the gym, go back to Dunkin
donuts, go back to doing the things that theyre normally doing. So today were talking about
Jesus as the vine, because it can be a struggle. How do we become new wine skins. How do we
stay with Jesus. How do we truly become changed? So were gonna talk about that today.

Lets pray:

Dear heavenly Father, thank you Lord so much for this beautiful day. Thank you
for the Sabbath. Thank you for just leading us in live and thank you for giving us
life, new experiences and new opportunities for revival, for change in our lives,
forgiveness, for mercy, for just a restored experience in the way we live our lives.
We pray for that Lord, right now and guide us now. We pray all these things in
Jesus name. Amen!

Jesus is the vine. And he starts this: “I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener.”
John 15:1. We have this vine in our backyard and I cant kill it. I tried to get rid of it. I pulled it
out and it keeps growing. When I pull it, I thought I got all the roots out, but these little white
tentacles that go to it, if theres one of them there, eventually it will start growing back. Im done,
forget it, I just let it grow. The vine of a tree is the source. You have the vine and you have the
roots and it is the source, life comes through it and you have leaves coming from it and fruit from
there. As Jesus describes, I am the true vine and what hes saying, I am the source of life, the
source of life.

John 15:4 says: Remain in me as I also 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. So here is the rub of
this situation. In our lives we want to be changed. We want to be new people. We want to never
sin again and never fall short of the glory of God. Were gonna fall short. Were gonna make our
mistakes, but the trick here, the connection here is that for us, we need to remain in Jesus; remain
in him because no branch can bear fruit by itself. So we go, we have our experience with the
Lord and praise God were having that moment and then we get home and life happens. You
know life, right? Life happens. You have the same old tensions that existed, maybe from
relationships or from financial concerns, or from health issues; life hits. And then all of a sudden,
were letting go of the vine. We let go of that and then we hold on to life. What happens to the
fruit falling off a tree, is eventually its gonna wither away and die, which is the story of most of us
in our spiritual journey, spiritual walk.

The idea is, we need to always remain in him because no branch can bear fruit of itself.
First things is to recognize that in ourselves there is nothing good that come from us. The only
good that comes from us is through Jesus working in our lives. In our way of doing, you have
your way of doing things. I get stubborn about my way. This is my way, but my way always has
the same results when I do it my way. I keep doing the same things over and over again, doing it
my way. And how has it worked out? For some of us good, or not so good. Certainly, we would
like more for our lives, but we continue to do it our way, my way. Christ has his way and the
solution is to always remain in him and allow his way to work in your life.

John 15:5-6 — I am the vine [Jesus], you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in
you, you will bear much fruit. Apart from me you can do nothing. If you do not remain in me
you are like branches that are thrown away and withers; such branches are thrown into the fire
and burned. Those are strong words. Even if you have good intentions to try to do what is right
and without Christ, you are doing nothing. You are doing more harm than good in your life.

What does it mean to remain in Christ? The beauty of this is have you ever opened up a
vine or something and you see the juices come out of it? You know that its a healthy plant if you
cut it and there is the juice just flowing out of it. God has life constantly flowing and if you stay
connected to the vine, its just flowing in your life. And its just such a beautiful thought and
concept that Jesus wants for us to stay to connected to him, he being the vine. But we ourselves
again get disconnected, we go out own way and after a while we realize where its taking us and
we fall down and all of our fruit just withers away. God wants us to remain in him.

If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be
done for you. This is my Fathers glory that you will bear much fruit, showing yourself to be my
disciples. What is the Fathers desire for us according to this verse? To bear much fruit. His
desire for you is to bear much fruit. What does that mean? He wants you to be successful. He
wants you to be happy. He wants you to have joy. He wants you to have fulfillment. He wants
you to have purpose. Thats the life God wants from you and for you. Amen! Thats what he
wants for you. So if we remain in him, if we trust in him and stay connected to him, his purpose,
his glory for you is to for you to bear fruit. How is your branch? Are you bearing much fruit in
your life? If not, maybe we need to continue to remain in him.

A part of this is, sometimes like a bush or tree needs to be pruned, your life needs to be
pruned. You have this branch and in the branch youve got many branches. The other day I was
drawing pictures of trees and I was doing such a good job — I do say so for myself — but you
draw the trunk first and then you draw branches from the trunk and then you draw branches from
the branches and then the branches from the branches. Shall I continue? You get the point. But
some of the branches that are coming out of you as branches are all dying or theyre taking life
away from the core of who you are, therefore you need to prune those things. Simplify your life.
Take away the excess baggage, the excess stuff that is taking from good fruit being produced,
from growing in you. Staying connected with the Lord.

The devil is tricky. The devil is sneaky. The devil creates all kinds of things that keep us
from remaining in Christ, being connected into something else. And its getting worse. Its so easy
for us to be disconnected from God and connected to other things. We have our phones — thats
such an easy thing — our iPads.

We were at the Staple Center and we looked back and every single person — that maybe
an exaggeration — many people were just staring at their phones and missing some hi-fives,
slamma-jammas going on. Were just tapped into stuff that really brings no life into us, but Jesus
brings life. He says, remain in him, be connected in him and you will bear much fruit. But Satan
has — I dont want to just pick on electronics — but we have all kinds of distractions or bad
habits, our ego, or work or whatever. All these things that we think are important to us, but when
you look back at life youre gonna say all that stuff was meaningless and I wasted all this time
when I could have done something really powerful for my life.

I was with my kids watching this video — what a hypocrite, queued into a video — and I
was watching this video of this boy who was a tap dancer and he was tap dancing better than the
adult. And I was thinking about the life lesson of this. This boy is focused on tap dancing. If all
you do is this one thing and you work as hard as you can and be patient and just work and work,
you could be the best tap dancer you could ever be, or whatever your talent is. If you work hard
at whatever you do, you could be the best at whatever you do. But most people are not good tap
dancers — if you want to be a tap dancer. It is because that are lollygagging during practice, not
spending time on it and the ones that are dedicated and work hard become the best tap dancers
they can be. Whats the point? I want all of us be good tap dancers. No! But the same thing is
with Christ, if we focus and our life is dedicated, committed to him and were spending our time
with him, then truly we are going to be the best person that God wants us to be. But all these
distractions, all these things keep us from remaining in him.

As the Father has loved me so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my
commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Fathers commands and remain in
his love. John 15:9-10. His commands are his will. It doesnt just mean commandments. We do
need to keep the commands, but it means his will. And for us to understand his will, we need to
remain in him and follow his will. You hear that voice of what God wants for you in your life.
Once you shut it off, say no I dont want to do what God wants me to do, I want to do what I
want to do, that is the moment of disconnection. You guys know what Im talking about, dont
you? God is saying, okay here you go. Go hiking with the men after church. I think God is
telling you that. (I was telling you, not God.) Once you start straying from God, following your
own way, you lose that connection.

I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
John 15:11. The definition of joy is an interesting thing. This week I had one of the coolest days
ever at the Staples Center. Do you want to hear about it? It first started off with my daughter.
She plays basketball and she won her game. And then I was at the Staples Center and right after
the game I asked them for a ball so I could shoot a three pointer. One shot it went it, so one for
one at the Staples Center. Kobe Bryant doesnt have that percentage. All these good things were
happening. And then my son has a couple basketball cards and one of the cards he has — one of
the players was standing right there and I shouted the guys name and he went and autographed
the card. And it was such a good day. Then we went to watch the Clippers game and then we
were really tired, so we went home. But the joy of the day wasnt so much the game, but the joy
was spending the time with my family. And you realize what truly is important and wholesome.
And God wants us to give us true joy, what true joy really is. He wants that for us.

But sometimes we have a different definition of joy. We think joy is getting that super nice
car, even though I cant afford it. Whatever subservient the thing is, this is what I really want, but
God has a different definition of joy and he wants you to have that. And he says, I have told you
this, that my joy may be with you. The purpose of this is to remain in me, stay connected. I am
the vine, you will bear much fruit and when you do this, you will experience true joy. Thats what
God wants from you and thats the purpose of staying connected to him.

My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than
this to lay down ones life for ones friends. John 15:12-13. Understanding this is understanding
what you are connected to. Remember at school when you wanted to be the popular kid?
Remember those days? The popular group, the cool kids and you want to be like them so you go
hang out with them. And for you to hang out with them you had to leave your other friends and
you think these are your new friends. And these friends that are your new friends dont really care
about you. You help build their own coolness factor and you have to start dressing like them and
buying clothes just like them. Remember those days? Then you realize your true friends are the
ones that you had all this time, that you grew up with, that stayed at your house when you were a
little kid. These are who your true friends are.

Remembering why you want to stay connected to the vine is remembering who God is.
God loves you so much. God died for you and thats the motive of staying connected to the vine.

You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a
servant does not know his masters business. Instead I have call you friends, for everything that I
have learned from my “Father I have made known to you. John 15:14-15. The beauty of this is
that you hear these verses and you need to lose yourself for God. You need to die of self and let
God be the ruler of your life. Sometimes that kind of message can be hard to grasp.

Sometimes you think that Gods purpose is to control you to do the things that he wants
you to do. His love for us, for who he is, is hes a God, even though hes the creator of the
universe, has all the power in the world. We could be little ants to him, but the way he way he
views the relationship with you and him, is as friends. We are partners together in your life. If
you remain in me we will be together as friends. And I will lead you to where you will bear much
fruit. I will lead you to a place where you will experience the greatest joy you could ever
experience if you just remain in me.

Let us pray.