Ye are Clean Through the Word - part 38

"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, 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"  John 5:1-8

I hope it doesn't seem repetitious that we keep reading through thee verses, for they are vitally important and should be of keen interest to us.  Remember as well that this parable comes at the beginning of the final conversation that Jesus had with His disciples, which we find in John 15,16,17.
He spoke these words after He left the upper room and headed out into the night.  This conversation, His last conversation with the disciples prior to His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane, couldn't have taken more than two hours, during which He shared some of His most important lessons.  Have you ever found yourself similarly needing to give a vast amount of instruction to a loved one?  Jesus needed to, and in a very short amount of time, and He tried to pack in as much as possible.

He started with the experience of the vine and the branches.  He said, "I am the True Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman" John 15:1.  This was the first time Jesus had ever spoken of this with His disciples, and it came as new information to them, since they were Jews and like all Jews had always looked at the vine as a symbol of themselves.  Now Jesus was in effect saying, "that's not correct!" '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'"  John 15:2.

Jesus probably spoke these words at this time for a number of reasons.  For one thing, He knew the disciples were going to soon experience important purging, and they didn't even know what needed purging!

Now recall that the agent of purging for the disciples was going to be the Word, and at this point in their spiritual journey, the disciples had not understood the Word--the teachings of their Master, Jesus--not had the Word accomplished its work yet.  There is still the same problem in our day.  We have the Scriptures--the Word--but it doesn't do us any good unless we are willing to believe it and allow it to work in us.

The disciples had listened to the Word many times and responded, "That's interesting!  That's wonderful!"  But they didn't understand the wonderful words they were hearing.  We often find ourselves in the same boat.  Thousands of people read the Word, believe they will get something from what they are reading, gain a little, but don't understand it at all.  The disciples were like this, and Jesus therefore instructed them.  As a result, they were going to be able to soon experience the gift of the Holy Spirit, which was to accomplish one thing: dwell on the Word in order to enlighten the disciples, helping them to understand and apply it.

Now He said, "Ye are clean through the word" John 15:3, and meant they were clean by believing in the lessons that He had spoken to them.  The only way to be cleansed is through the Word, which is a spiritual cleansing; that's the only way a human being can be cleansed!  Cleansing does not come by way of baptism, for baptism is only an outward symbol.

Then Jesus continued, saying, "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" John 15:4,5.

Have you found out that you can do nothing to make yourself spiritually clean?  I have.  I'm a hopeless case when it comes to my spiritual life, without Jesus.  Yes, when I was really into studying the Word and spending time in prayer every morning, my life was so much better.  Then we moved and were living in a motorhome with four people.  Really hard to find a place to study and pray and I lost my experience.  I could have found a place because we were volunteering  for a Television station and there were lots of places that I could have found to be alone and not bothered.  I guess to be truthful with you, I never thought of it.  It was a Christian station and I guess I thought I was working for God and that counted for my righteousness, but I've found out through these little studies that we cannot work our way into heaven and it doesn't count at all what we do.  We must abide with Him daily, hourly, then we will know what work He wants us to do, because He can impress our minds with what duties we can do and can't do.  It's that simple, yes, I know it sounds simple but saying it is simple but doing it after a lifetime of habits is another story, we have to have His help. If we abide in Him and He in us, we have our help all cut out for us, we just need to obey He Word when we are reading it and repent when we slip up and get up and go on in our abiding.  I pray that you are catching on to this wonderful truth.  Grandma Joan