Abiding and Total Dependence - part 15

We have a tendency to come up with these varied excuses because we misunderstand the basis of fruit-bearing, thinking we are responsible for developing the fruit.  So we say to ourselves, "I am going to work on patience as a fruit.  "I'm going to work on love.  "I'm going to love this person even if it kills me."  Can you develop these fruits?  It's ridiculous!  Yet the devil convinces us of this, and we become determined to do it.  How many times have I talked with husbands and wives who say, "Well, I'm going to love her even if it's the last thing I ever do!"  And that is totally ridiculous.

But what happens if we are aiding in the Vine?  Love just comes out.   If we take all, we will give all. If we give all, we'll have to take it--you can't do it without Him.  No matter how much determination you muster on your own, it will still be utterly impossible to develop these fruits.  What is a severed branch fit for?  Burning, and it is good for nothing else.  The branch lasts a minute, generates a little heat, and then it will be gone--that's the end of it, and that's exactly what  Jesus intended to communicate.  This illustration is so completely true and so completely simple that it's very, very difficult for us to believe it.

So the very things I want you to remember and put down in your notes from these verses of Scripture is the lesson of the branch's total and absolute dependence.  The branch cannot live, it cannot exist, it cannot produce, it cannot do anything without abiding in the Vine.  And it must continually abide, 24 hours a day, 365 days out of the year.  It isn't a matter of abiding only on Sabbath or at the midweek service; it means abiding every day, it means abiding continually!  And if the branch abides in the Vine, it cannot help but bear the fruit!  That's right it can't help but bear the fruit, for it has to; it's the natural thing and it can't help but do so.  This is what righteousness by faith is really all about.

I think I mentioned before my experience of loving people, and I am still learning to love people no matter who they are.  I was just asking God to help me be like Him and a few days later, I realized how much He had changed me.  From a critic to someone who loves people and really wants to.  So there is hope for us all, don't give up just keep surrendering your life to God and He will take care of all the fruits that you need.  He really does do it, it is so very true.  Grandma Joan

Abiding, Trials, and Fruit Bearing - Part 14

The branch only does what comes naturally.  Do blossoms put any effort into pollinating?  No, they wait for the God of Heaven to also take care of the pollinating.  There's not any effort.  They simply bear the blossoms, and the pollination takes place through God's working upon that flower---through His Own way, whether it means the pollination being carried by bees, the wind, or something else.  The plant still grows perfectly normal, and doesn't put any effort into the process.  We must accept God's simple lesson, and get over the notion that environment affects our ability to bear fruit.

One person asked, "What if wind, a storm, cold, or some other abnormal situation comes along?  How would that affect fruit-bearing?  Fruit-bearing would undoubtedly be affected to some degree, but I don't exactly know how to relate to that, nor do I think we have to factor in all abnormalities in order to use it as a practical illustration, because the illustration is still true:  God is still responsible for the fruit-bearing!

Please note that the abiding here is more than sitting down and doing nothing physiologically.  Don't get the idea that you can only sit in a pew at church, and then go home and sit in a rocker before the fireplace.

Waiting--abiding, trusting--is a condition of the emotions.  Intellectually I accept Christ, but to abide there is all about the emotions--which is where the real problem actually takes place.

The Lord doesn't prune until there is fruit.  Let me repeat that"  The Lord doesn't prune until there is fruit!  If He were to start pruning before there were any fruit, it would hurt. And we might react and say, "I'm through with this!"  But when there is fruit, He prunes, and then there is more fruit.  And then He prunes more.  I can hear someone saying, "But that's not what I wanted.  I don't want any more of this stuff that hurts!"  But God keeps pruning, and finally there is much fruit.  And all of it comes while I am abiding.  So the individual who abides is not only abiding in moments of ease, but also abiding through trials and perplexities.

So we come back to the same thing: Our environment has nothing to do with our fruit-bearing or with our abiding. We abide simply and completely and wholly in spite of the environment.  We get back to this fact repeatedly, because  we make so many excuses for lack of fruit on account of the environment we live in or because of the particular situations we find ourselves in.  Even in the case of tornado-like trials, God takes responsibility for the perplexities and trials that seem to come from outside factors.  We come up with these excuses for not bearing fruit.  And remember, when we talk of bearing fruit we are talking about the fruit of the Spirit" love, joy and peace, etc.  (Galatians 5:22,23), and therefore are coming up with excuses for not bearing the character of Christ; excuses for why you don't see Christ' character in my life, and excuses for why I don't see His character in your life.

Wow! that was a long lesson to digest.  It's better to go over it again and again until we can grasp it.  Don't forget to pray and ask God to lead in your thoughts and study.  It is most important that we have His help in all Spiritual things.  Please be blessed as you read these lessons.  Like I have.  I did not understand the Vine and the branch verses until I took the time to read about it and ask God to help me to abide in Him.  Grandma Joan

Abiding and Total Dependence - Part 13

We have a tendency to come up with these varied excuses because we misunderstand the basis of fruit-bearing, thinking we are responsible for developing the fruit.  So we say to ourselves, "I am going to work on patience as a fruit." "I am going to work on love."  "I'm going to love this person even if it kills me."  Can you develop these fruits?  It's ridiculous!  Yet the Devil convinces us of this, and we become determined to do it.  How many times have I talked with husbands and wives who say, "well, I'm going to love her even if it's the last thing I ever do!"  And that is totally ridiculous.

But what happens if we are abiding in the Vine?  Love just comes out.  If we take all, we will give all.  If we give all, we'll have to take it--you can't do it without Him.  No matter how much determination you muster on your own it will still be utterly impossible to develop these fruits.  What is a severed branch fit for?  Burning, and it is good for nothing else.  The branch lasts a minute, generates a little heat, and then it will be gone--that's the end of it, and that's exactly what Jesus intended to communicate.  This illustration is so completely true and so completely simple that it's very, very difficult for us to believe it.

Wo the very things I want you to remember and put down in your notes from these verses of Scripture is the lesson of the branch's total and absolute dependence.  The branch cannot live, it cannot exist, it cannot produce, it cannot do anything without abiding in the Vine.  And it must continually abide, 24 hours a day, 365 days out of the year.  It isn't a matter of abiding only on Sabbath or at the midweek service; it means abiding every day, it means abiding continually!  And if the branch abides in the Vine, it cannot help but bear the fruit!  That's right, it can't help but bear the fruit, for it has to; it's the natural thing and it can't help but do so.  This is what righteousness by faith is really all about.

This lesson became one of the most astounding things that have happened in my life, long before I read this little book.  I was praying a lot about having the character of Jesus and sometime later I was thinking about this and I was thinking about how much I was loving everyone, or nearly everyone and how fulfilling it was and how much my life had changed from one of criticizing others to one of loving everyone that would allow me to love them.  There are some people that it takes time to break through the barrier.  So don't get discouraged!  I can only think of a very few that are like that and for some reason, some people don't like me and I suspect it has to do with jealousy, since I don't really know them and they don't know me but they see how much I am loved by others.  It is such a fulfilling life, I would never want it any other way.  We have new members in our church now, 16 to be exact and I am going to love them too.  Everyone needs loved, I have found that out and I just tell them I love them and they respond beautifully.  Ask God to fill you with His love and you will be so filled yourself that it is absolutely amazing. This all happened as an answer to a prayer that I asked God to make me more like Him. Grandma Joan

Lack of Abiding and Withered Branches - Part 12

Staying with the illustration, Jesus said, "I am the True Vine, you are the branches, and My Father is the Husbandman."  We must constantly keep these three elements in mind;  if we forget, we will get completely lost.  Now remember, this is the simplest type of illustration; you could not it in any simpler illustration than the branch and the Vine.  John 15:6 tells us, "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."  The branch that is not an abiding branch is only fit to be burned; it is worthless--totally and completely worthless!

Now someone asks, How do you correlate being worthless with the fact that if you don't abide, you do other works?  Remember, you are dealing with the fruit of the Spirit, which is an unnatural thing.  The natural thing is to do what Satan naturally does in us.  So, we are either bearing the fruit Satan gives us or bearing the fruit God gives us.

Now turn with me to Galatians5:17.  We find there the contrast between the fruit and the works that we have been talking about.  In this verse the matter of "works" comes up.  It says in Galatians 5:17:
"For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so ye cannot do the things that ye would."  It's entirely impossible!  There's only one way it can be done, and that is to rest, completely abiding in Christ.

Let each days study sink deep into our heart and stay abiding in Him and we will bear the fruit of the Spirit and not Satan's fruit of the flesh.  Tomorrow we will see what the fruit if the flesh is and we won't want any part of the works or fruit of the flesh.  I am sure you will agree with me.  Grandma Joan.

Abiding and the Spirit's Fruit - Part 11

How then does the branch produce perfect fruit?  What is our work?  It is always--and I emphasize this again--it is always to abide and let the Vine do the work.  Now this is absolutely difficult for us to understand.  If we abide and let God do the work, then it is done right, and we become channels through whom He can flow.  If we put ourselves into it, we mess things up; and we've been messing things up for 6,000 years which is why it is taking us so long.

We are talking about fruit bearing, but what kind of fruit are we talking about?  Fruit bearing is actually a matter of bearing the fruit of the Spirit described in the book of Galatians: love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance.

I want to emphasize again that I am printing out a little book that helped me so much and I though you would like the help that I have received from it.  It was written by Evangelist Frank Philips who spent the last ten years of his life sharing this message and it's all Biblical and so simple to under-stand.  May you be blessed by this message.  Grandma Joan,  more tomorrow.

Abiding: Giving and Taking - Part 10

Quoting Paul, "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him."  "The just shall live by faith." You gave yourself to God, to be His wholly, to serve and obey Him, and you took Christ as your Savior." SC 69  And there's not a person taking in these words that hasn't done that, I believe.  "You could not yourself atone for your sins or change your heart; but having given yourself to God, you believe that He for Christ's sake did all this for you."

I know you believe this; there is no question about this in your mind.  "By faith you became Christ's, and by faith you are to grow up in Him--by giving and taking."  By what?  By giving and taking."  Is that what the branch does?  Yes.  What does the branch take?  It takes the sap from the Vine; it also takes the sunshine from the same Source--from God.  It's constantly taking.  And then what does it do in turn?  'By giving and taking."  Now notice.  "You are to give all,--your heart, your will, your service,--give yourself to Him to obey all His requirements; and you must take all."

But notice, the Vine determines the amount!  And just the amount the Vine is ready to give, is the amount we are to take.  Why?  Because that's the amount the Vine knows we need in order to bear the particular kind of fruit we're supposed to bear.

Now notice; "and you must take all,--Christ, the fullness of all blessing, to abide in your heart, to be your Strength, your Righteousness, your everlasting Helper,--to give you power to obey."

Now if we abide, we are to walk even as He walked.  But we are not to walk in our own strength.  We are to walk in His strength because he abides and He gives us the power to actually walk even as He walked.  It isn't something that we can do by effort--not in any sense of the word.

Abiding is without question the most difficult state of the Christian life.  It is not difficult for me to surrender my life to Christ.  It is not difficult for me to accept Christ.  But to abide is very difficult.

Now can you think of any reason why this  is so?  Probably one of the greatest reasons is that most of us try to make this a mental act.  But notice, while the surrender that comes when I first accept Christ is a mental process, for God appeals to my thinking mind and I accept Him mentally, abiding goes deeper and affects one of the most difficult parts of our living.  Did you ever have to wait for your wife while she was shopping?  It was difficult to "abide" while she was shopping, wasn't it?  You stood there gritting your teeth and saying "why is it taking her so long to buy a pair of shoes?  And this can be just as hard for a lady as a man.  She says, "Why does it take you so long to shave, anyway?"

Waiting for the Lord, letting something rest with Him is also a very, very difficult thing.  Why?  Because it touches the emotional part of our being, not just the intellect.  It would help if we could honestly say while waiting, "Of course I would want to be particular, too, if I were in there buying a pair of shoes."  But we don't respond like that; we simply feel hurt in our emotions and get all tense.  You see, the real problem is that abiding touches the feelings.

This has been a pretty heavy study, you may want to read it over a few times to really get the meaning.   It is worth our time to understand these things as it will help us on our journey to heaven.
I pray that you will follow on with the studies to know the Lord and understand His sill in your life.  
Grandma Joan

Abiding - Constantly Accepting - Part 9

Now the Author says quoting Paul, "As you have therefore received Christ, so walk . . . "  There is nothing different about abiding than actually receiving Him.  Just as you accepted Christ initially, abiding in Him is constantly accepting!  And when we accepted Christ in the very first place, self was simply--to the very best of our knowledge at least--set side, and we accepted Him in His full Person to the point that He actually revealed Himself to us.

The problem you see, is that as we go along in life, He reveals Himself in greater measure, and therefore there are greater demands on our lives because we are actually supposed to be able to abide and conform to His  pattern.  And that's exactly what the branch does.  The branch does nothing but bear the leaves which enable the chemical processes to take place, taking the sap from the vine and producing fruit.  But the branch doesn't put any effort into it.  It doesn't because it was made to bear fruit!  You and I were made to bear fruit for God; to reflect His image--that's what He made us for from the very beginning.  Now notice, this is only possible in an effortless--and I mean exactly that--in an effortless manner!  The problem is that abiding, and fruit-bearing, and works, get all mixed up in our thinking.

I can vouch for that!  I had it all mixed up in my mind, the abiding an fruit-bearing and works and it was weighing heavily on my mind and the devil was trying to deceive me into thinking I need to bear the fruit in Galatians on my own and I didn't know how to do that and also that works was preying on my mind that I wasn't doing anything for God.  Now I know that if I abide in Him constantly that He does the fruit-bearing for me and also the works.  You can't imagine the burden that was lifted from my shoulders.  I am so grateful for this enlightenment on this subject, and we aren't through yet.  Hang in there and you will be blessed if you are sincerely seeking as I was.  Grandma Joan