I Am #7: The Vine
John 15“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. Every branch in me that doesn’t bear fruit, ʜᴇ takes away. Every branch that bears fruit, ʜᴇ cleans, that it may bear more fruit. Y’all are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to y’all. Y’all are to remain in me, and I in y’all. Just as a branch can’t bear fruit by itself unless it remains in the vine, neither can y’all unless y’all remain in me.
I am the vine; y’all are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in them bears much fruit, for apart from me y’all can do nothing. If anyone doesn’t remain in me, that person is like branch that is thrown out and withered; and they gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned. If y’all remain in me, and my words remain in y’all, ask whatever y’all want, and it will be done for y’all.
“In this my Father is glorified, that y’all bear much fruit, showing that y’all are my disciples. Just as the Father has loved me, I also have loved y’all. Remain in my love, y’all. If y’all keep my commandments, y’all will remain in my love, even as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in ʜɪꜱ love. I have told y’all these things so that my joy may remain in y’all and that y’all’s joy may be filled up.
Love One Another
“This is my commandment, that y’all love one another, even as I have loved y’all. Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. Y’all are my friends if y’all do whatever I command y’all. No longer do I call y’all servants, for the servant doesn’t know what their lord does. But I have called y’all friends, for everything that I heard from my Father, I have made known to y’all. Y’all didn’t choose me, but I chose y’all and appointed y’all so that y’all would go and bear fruit, and that y’all’s fruit should remain. And so that whatever y’all ask in my name, the Father will give to y’all.
“This is my command: that y’all love one another.
The World’s Hatred
If the world hates y’all, y’all should know that it hated me before it hated y’all. If y’all were of the world, the world would love its own. But because y’all are not of the world, since I chose y’all out of the world, the world hates y’all. Remember what I told y’all: ‘A servant is not greater than his lord.’+Joh 13:16 If they persecuted me, they will persecute y’all. If they obey my word, they will obey y’all’s too. But they will do all these things to y’all for my name’s sake, because they don’t know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they wouldn’t have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me, hates my Father also. If I hadn’t done among them the works which no one else did, they wouldn’t have sin. But now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. But this happened so that the word written in their law may be fulfilled, ‘They hated me without a cause.’+Psa 35:4“When the Counselor has come, whom I will send to y’all from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, he will testify about me. Y’all will also testify, because y’all have been with me from the beginning.