Pruned, but abiding in the Vine

Life in the Lord’s Vineyard – 4 Sermons

Part 1: “Jesus – The Fruitful Vine”

(John 15:1-8, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, November 1, 2009)

John 15:1-8 "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. ² Every branch of mine that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. ³ Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. ⁴ Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. ⁵ I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶ If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. ⁷ If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. ⁸ By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.

What does Jesus teach us concerning His place and our place in the Lord’s vineyard?

A: “I am the vine; you are the branches.” (John 15:5)

The Father’s Vineyard (1-2)

The Lord has a vineyard. It’s not all about grapes. We know that He is talking about people. Throughout the Old Testament God called His people Israel His vineyard. Especially in Isaiah 5 He reviews His great work in planting Israel and caring for her. Then He says in Isaiah 5:4, “What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes?” It is obvious that the failure of Israel as a vineyard was not a new fact that just came forward in the days of Jesus. It was spoken of throughout the Old Testament. God was the owner of the vineyard, the vinedresser, and the problem was that Israel did not produce the kind of spiritual fruit that should have come from those who loved God and His Word.

God had plans for a new vineyard that He talks about throughout the Old Testament. That new vineyard would start with something of a new beginning that might seem very small, but eventually that vineyard would be much larger than Israel. Jesus, on His way to the cross says, “I am the true vine,” meaning He is the fruitful vine. When we are in Jesus, we are a part of a new vineyard, and we want to be fruitful there. The key to being fruitful is not staying out of trouble, but staying in the vine, Jesus Christ. It is only in Him, that we can bear the fruit that God desires.

The work of making the vineyard fruitful is divine work, and it involves cutting and pruning. Some branches do not bear fruit at all, and they are cut off of the vine. Even those branches that bear good fruit need to be pruned, because that is the way that more fruit will come forth. This pruning work is suffering work. The ultimate vine, Jesus Christ, was cut for our sake. If He refused that pruning work, there would have been no fruit at all. Without the cross, we could not have life in Him. Our sin stood against us, and we needed to be counted as right before God. This could not happen without Christ and without the horrifying cut of the cross that He willingly took for us.

This is not the end of the story of the Father’s pruning. In each life that is in Christ, the Father continues this work of pruning, and this is especially why Jesus is warning the disciples here. Yes, He is warning them about the cross, as He has done before, but He wants them to see that the suffering that they face has divine purpose. God is after fruitfulness, and fruitfulness usually requires some measure of suffering. How much do you want to be fruitful in the Lord’s service? Your continued connection to Jesus the vine through times of suffering granted to You by the Father’s love, this is a key to fruitfulness in a fallen world. If you are suffering as a Christian, you have been given a special trust and gift from God. Do not be shocked by pruning. Use it fruitfully in the Lord’s service.

Our Place in the Vineyard (3)

It may help you to understand that the word for being cleansed is the same word as the word for pruning. If you are talking about vines, then it means pruned. If you are talking about people, or about other things that could become ceremonially unclean, it means cleansed. There were many things that could make people unclean in the Old Testament world; leprosy, contact with a dead body, eating the wrong kind of food. All of that was symbolic for what really makes a person unclean; that is, sin.

Sin made Israel very unclean, and there was no amount of ritual purification that could change that. Something had to come from God in order to cleanse Israel. Even the best among the people of God had become unclean, not only through one’s own sin, but in association with others. In Isaiah 6:5, in the calling of the prophet, we read of Isaiah’s reaction to the sight of God in heaven. He says, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” He had a sense of His desperate need. We all need to have a sense of that. From the depths of our souls we have an unclean problem. But Jesus is able to cleanse people, and He can forgive sin. For Isaiah, this was displayed through something that took place in heaven. In His vision He saw an altar, a place of sacrifice, a place where sin is dealt with or atoned for. An angel flew to him with a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the heavenly altar, and the angel touched him on the mouth with that burning coal, and he said, “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” That is a pretty impressive coal that can atone for a man’s sin. Who do you suppose that coal was all about? There is only one sacrifice for sin that really works. The burning coal that takes away sin must be the same man who said to His disciples before His death, “I am the vine.”

The way that we can be judged to be clean is through the Word that Jesus has spoken to us. This is the only way for anyone to be cleansed. A Word comes from our King, normally through His ambassadors who are charged to bring a message about Him to those who will believe. It is message calling us to be reconciled to our Maker through Jesus Christ. He is the only vine. He is the only burning coal. He is the one who died for our sins. In Him we are already clean. The pruning that God does is not to make us clean, but to make us more fruitful. The cut that Christ received is the source of every good gift for us. We hear of His dying love, received His word, and our sins are forgiven. If you are not in Jesus, the way before you is clear. You need to be in that one vine. You need to see Him as your provision for eternal life. He is the promised One who stands in the way of God’s judgment on behalf of the many. Believe in Him. Believe in His cross. Believe in His resurrection. Believe in His Word.

Our Fruitfulness in the Vineyard (4-8)

And then what? Stay in Jesus, and let Him stay in you, especially when the Father is pruning you through suffering. That is the only way to have fruit for heaven. Jesus is the fruitful vine; and His works remain forever. Our charge from the Lord here is to remain in Jesus.

If we will not remain in Him, we will not be able to have a fruitful Christian life. This is not to say that people won’t like us and even love us; it is not to say that our gifts will not be useful in many ways. (Example of the delicious dinner that I enjoyed in Manchester the other night and some simple act that is done by someone in the vine of Christ) It is to say that our fruit that we have if we are not in the fruitful vine of Christ will only be fruit for this life, can we say that we will have the wrong kind of grapes. It will not be the kind of fruit that remains for heaven. Only that which is done in Christ will be heavenly fruit. The rest is simply a part of this present age.

How to have good grapes: Let His Word have the highest seat of authority in you, and then ask whatever you wish, and consider it done for you as a part of your service of Christ. When God’s Word abides in you by the Holy Spirit, you begin to think about things God’s way. The person who stays with God for a few years, and who stays with others who stay with God, naturally begins to think more like God. This is only normal. Bad company corrupts good morals, but it is also the case that good company has an impact on a person. God’s company is good company.

If you are going to spend a lot of time with God, you are going to have to recognize that there are certain things that interest Him. He is very interested in His own glory. He is very interested in everything having to do with Jesus Christ. He is interested in His own plans of what He is accomplishing in Christ. He is interested in the cross and what Christ accomplished for us there. He is always talking about that. He is very interested in what His Son did after being in the tomb, that He rose again from the dead. He is interested in what that means for you. Here’s something else: He is interested in you. If you are abiding in the vine, He considers you in your heavenly state to be a rich present for His Son. He is interested in all the twists and turns in your life that will make you more like His Son, and will prepare you for the life that He has for you beyond this life. He is interested in pruning you for Jesus sake, and He is sorry that His pruning may hurt you for a time. He needs you to trust Him on this.

What you can do now is to remain in Jesus, trusting that He is the true vine. What you can do in the world of Jesus is what God told the first man to do in Adam’s world. “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and subdue it.” You know what that would mean for Adam. Do that now for Jesus. Stay around Him so much through His Word and His people that doing things for Jesus’ world becomes more and more of a normal way for you to live. There are certain things that make no particular sense in Adam’s world, but they make plenty of sense in Jesus’ world. To pay attention to what someone is saying to you who can do absolutely nothing for you makes little sense in Adam’s world, but it makes good sense in Jesus’ world. To give an anonymous gift makes little sense in Adam’s world, but it makes perfect sense in Jesus’ world. To quietly give yourself in love for the powerless and the poor makes little sense in Adam’s world, but it is just what Jesus does. To die on a cross for the unworthy makes no sense in Adam’s world, but there is nothing that makes more sense than that in Jesus’ world. Enjoy the Lord. Let Him talk about the things He likes to talk about, and allow yourself to be changed by His Word, and when you see an opportunity to be fruitful, go for it. Let your light shine. Stay in the vine. That is part of the way to live in the Lord’s vineyard.

1. What is the Old Testament concept of the Lord’s vineyard?

2. How can the unclean come into the Israel of God?

3. What is the difference between the vine and the branches?

4. What does it mean to abide in Jesus?

The Spirit of Peace

Let Not Your Hearts Be Troubled – 3 Sermons

Part 3: “The Gift of a New Peace”

(John 14:22-31, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, October 25, 2009)

²² Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, "Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?" ²³ Jesus answered him, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. ²⁴ Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me. ²⁵ "These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. ²⁶ But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. ²⁷ Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. ²⁸ You heard me say to you, 'I am going away, and I will come to you.' If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. ²⁹ And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe. ³⁰ I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, ³¹ but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here.

What does Jesus promise the church in her anxiety and fear?

A: “My peace I give to you.” (John 14:27)

The Display of God through the Church (22-24)

One of the songs of ascent, Psalm 122, talks about how the thrones of the house of David were in Jerusalem. The pilgrim on his way to Jerusalem could keep such a thought in the eye of his soul in order to help him to persevere. We are not travelling to the Jerusalem below, but to the one which is above. We are told to set our minds on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father (Colossians 3:1-2). It would be delightful if we could see into that heavenly Jerusalem now and look upon the throne of the great Son of David who lives and reigns forever at the right hand of the Father on high. That would help us to keep on going. That would give us peace.

The challenges of anxiety and fear in the Christian community have always been formidable. We are reminded that we need help in this area by the words of Jesus both at the beginning and at the end of this chapter, “Let not your hearts be troubled.” But our hearts are troubled, and we need to find some way to a new gift of peace that Christ promises His disciples. We need that peace that Isaiah spoke of so long ago, “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you” (Isaiah 26:3). The disciples are facing the loss of their best friend. He promises them a new home, a new love of their lives, and the gift of a new peace, and all of that was somehow personal. Jesus says He will be seen by His disciples, but that somehow the world will not see Him. This prompts a question by one of them. How will the world not see Him if the disciples are able to see Him?

Jesus says that He will be seen and known in the people who love Him and thus keep His Word. (Think of the end of the 2nd commandment.) These are the ones who are loved by the Father, and Father, Son, and Holy Spirit will come to these ones, and they will make their home with them (lit. make a room with them). The world will not have this experience. That is how the Triune God will be known to people of faith, but not generally to the world. This gift of God making a room in you as you yield yourself to Him and to His Word surely has something to do with the well-being, the peace, that we come to experience as we focus on the Lord, and not on our circumstances.

In terms of the things you want from God right now, where on that list does this experience of having the triune God living with you and in you fit? Are your hearts captivated by the circumstances around you, or by the Lord who lives within you? Will you have peace if and only if certain things you want are given to you, or if and only if you have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? The display of God through the church will not be by our outstanding success rate in gaining the best of all circumstances instantly, but in having God in and among us permanently.

The Helper, The Teacher, The Holy Spirit (25-26)

Where is God? Where is the Father now? Where is the Son of God now? Where is the Holy Spirit? When we think of God in terms of place, we are reminded that God is somehow everywhere. Yet we often see God in the Bible as being in some place in a special, powerful, or comforting way. God inhabited the tabernacle, and later the temple. God also occasionally appeared as the One who wrestled with a man, spoke a needed word, or received the worship of one of His servants. But God also seemed to actually live within a few people, especially His prophets, in the person of His Spirit. It is most frequently the case that we think of the Father as inhabiting the highest heaven. The Son of God, Jesus Christ, after making atonement for our sins on the cross, eventually sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high as one who is forever fully God and fully man. But where is the Holy Spirit?

When Jesus prepares to leave, and speaks to His disciples of the peace that He will send them, He talks specifically about this Spirit, the third person of the Godhead. Where is the Spirit of God? This is a matter of great concern to the Lord when He speaks the words of comfort contained in this chapter. It is the intention of Jesus together with the Father, upon the ascension of the Son on high, to send forth the promised gift of the Holy Spirit to the church. This pouring out of the Holy Spirit is the beginning of the fulfillment of the Lord’s promise through the prophet Joel (Joel 2:28), “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.” The grand finale of this promise will only be experienced in the heavenly Jerusalem, but we have a true taste of this now according to Peter who cites Joel at Pentecost and says in Acts 2:16-17, “This is what was uttered through the prophet Joel: ‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.’ ”

Before He goes to the Father, Jesus wants His disciples to know that when He ascends on high, His Father will send the Holy Spirit to them. How does the Holy Spirit come to people? He is given by the sovereign will of God. Beyond that, we are told to ask for the gift of the Holy Spirit, and for the graces that are associated with His work among His people. In Luke 11:13 we read these words of Jesus, “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” To have one of the three persons of the one Triune God is to have the true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit with you and in you. If them Spirit makes a room in you, somehow the Father and the Son are in that room, and you are a temple.

Jesus says here that the Holy Spirit is a great Helper to us. We need help in many ways. We need a comforter and an advocate for us. We need help in the spiritual battle before us in life. We also need an internal teacher from God, and the Holy Spirit is this teacher, assuring our souls of the truth of God’s Word, and fighting the power of lies that would confuse and destroy us. The Holy Spirit had a special role of teaching the apostles, teaching them again of the things of Christ, and helping them to remember the words of their Master. This teaching role of the Holy Spirit is at work now in us, as the Scriptures come to life in our hearts when we hear the truth of Christ presented to us.

The Peace of God and the Love of Jesus (27-31)

What we must especially see here for our help in faith and life is that the Holy Spirit is a great gift of peace for the church. Do you want peace in the midst of a world that does much to make you anxious and afraid? Your very best ally in the fight of fear is the positive presence of the Holy Spirit, the Bearer and guarantee of the peace of God within you. It is as if the blessing of the Holy Spirit is the gift of Peace Himself to you from heaven. When Jesus leaves the Holy Spirit with you, He leaves Peace with you. When Jesus gives the Holy Spirit to you, He gives Peace to you.

What does it mean to have the peace of God in you? To have the Spirit is to have a permanent, powerful, and effectual gift of peace, regardless of how we feel. By the Spirit we are assured that the obedience of Jesus was for us, and that the death that He died, He died for us. We have the fact of peace with God as a certified reality, since the certificate of the Lord’s ownership of us as His own has been planted within our awakened hearts. This fact of peace is our most profitable reflection in time of anxiety and fear, especially when it seems that we are not able to have what we would like. There may be much missing in your life, but is there something missing in the goodness of Jesus in His life? Is there anything lacking in the power of His blood? If there is nothing wrong with His righteousness and death, then we are assured that we really do have peace with God as a most important fact of spiritual reflection and life. Flowing from this great fact of peace will come some good measure of the comforting gift of a peaceful heart, driving away from us the wrenching oppression of our disappointments as our mind is resting on the Lord, and not on our circumstances.

Through the Holy Spirit you have a fear-removing gift of peace, a gift that you need to live the Christian life now, a gift that you need to believe in God, and a gift that you need to believe God’s Word. Through the Peace of God given to you in the person of the Holy Spirit, you have what you need to live a life of love in this world, the gift that you need to experience healing of your own troubled heart in a world that has been deeply troubled for many people a very long time. Through the gift of Peace in Person, you are made a pilgrim who is now content with the end of the journey, and thus is ready to rise up and walk to the Jerusalem above.

Will you travel on this road that leads to perfect peace? Will you experience the love that Jesus has for the Father, an outward-faced love, somehow abiding personally in you? Will you allow God to evict the hostile tenants of anxiety and fear living in your heart, as His Peace more and takes up residence in the room that God owns?

Jesus is going to the Father. He is telling His disciples what will happen. His circumstances that He will face are not peaceful at all, but He has the fullness of peace somehow in Him. An adversary will come against Him, yet no adversary can have any hold on Him. This Jesus is righteousness, and He is your peace. This peace he gives to you.

1. How does God show Himself today to the church and to those who are becoming disciples of Jesus Christ?

2. What is the role of the Holy Spirit in this process?

3. What is the peace of God and why do we need this gift?

4. What does peace have to do with believing in God and believing God’s Word?

Need a New Love of Your Life?

Let Not Your Hearts Be Troubled – 3 Sermons

Part 2: “The Gift of a New Love”

(John 14:11-21, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, October 18, 2009)

¹¹ Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves. ¹² Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. ¹³ Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. ¹⁴ If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. ¹⁵ If you love me, you will keep my commandments. ¹⁶ And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, ¹⁷ even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. ¹⁸ I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. ¹⁹ Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. ²⁰ In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. ²¹ Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him."

In My Name (11-14)
It is very difficult for a person to feel as if he has been left alone in life. We know that when God created Adam, He said, “It is not good for the man to be alone.” That is also true of women. That is not to say that there are not some good things about being alone, but we were made to be with other people who are not strangers, people who know us, and who we know.

It was not good for Adam to be alone, but it is a different kind of “not good” to love deeply and then to lose someone. One of the reasons this can be such a debilitating challenge is that our minds were created to make connections with people. We rightly connect major portions of our current experiences and our past memories with the reality of people who were with us in earlier days. When those people are gone in some way, it feels as if damage has been done to our souls. We lose people, but in the process we seem to lose something of ourselves, as if a new jagged brokenness has entered into so many experiences and so many memories, so that too large a percentage of our hearts has been pained by the new loss.

There is a sense in which this is the way it is supposed to be, and it confirms that we were created for relationships. Mortality and broken ties of civility and love have brought us much pain. When you feel this, it is actually a sign that you have a heart that can still hurt. This is better than deciding to not feel in order to avoid the feeling of pain.

Jesus is about to leave His disciples. If there were ever a man that we thought might have been able to fix this problem of brokenness and loss, here He is. Now He is leaving, and this looks like nothing other than the biggest loss of all. To lose Jesus is to lose every lesser hope. How will He encourage His disciples? The One who is in the Father, the One who has the Father in Him, the One who has done these great works of the Father fixing all kinds of brokenness, this One and only Son of God is going back to heaven, back to the Father. What are His disciples to do? What can they do without Jesus?

This is not just a first century problem. In our lives we expect God to fix our brokenness. Many of the things that we have wanted the most in the past are not even possible right now. We want our hearts to be whole again, and they are torn by this loss of relationship that we have been describing. But now Jesus is speaking here of Himself as still being Himself, still being alive, even after He has gone away. Not only that, He tells His disciples that they will do greater works that what He has done, and the reason is that He will still be Jesus when He has returned to the Father. From the Father’s throne in heaven He will do more, and not less. He encourages us to ask the Father, and He says that He, Jesus, will do what we ask. He claims that this answering of our prayers will be one of the ways that His Father will be shown to be the great God that He is, because of way that His Son will work through His church. He tells us that when we ask for anything in His Name, He will do it.

We have at least three problems with this: 1) We are pretty sure that we have asked God for things that He has not done. Back to the brokenness of loss: My sister died about fifty years ago when I was under two years old. My grandparents died, one before I was born. All of my aunts and uncles are gone. My parents are both deceased. More recently I have experienced other losses that you know very well. There are many disappointments that you and I have faced, things about which we earnestly prayed, and we have not yet seen how these things have been given to us. 2) We are quite sure that the works that Jesus did were spectacular, including raising people from the dead, and we do not seem to be able to do these things, certainly not on command. He says that His disciples will do greater works than Him, and we cannot imagine how that could ever be, even if He is just speaking of the apostles. 3) We hear that we are supposed to ask for things “in Jesus’ Name,” and we are certain that our Lord is not introducing a new magical incantation. We do not know what these words could possibly mean.”

In short, these three problems can be summarized in this way: We have a hard time believing these words, because we have not yet seen them remove from us all our misery. Still we are told to believe, and here is perhaps the biggest surprise: Somehow we do believe, but we are puzzled and pained.

I Will Come to You (15-18)
Somehow, the more we stay with Jesus, despite our questions, we find Him to be the answer to our deepest longings. The more we stay with Jesus we find that we have Him, and that He will never leave us. The more we stay with Jesus and read His Word we find that there is much more to life than what we can see with our eyes. He is definitely here with us. We are not keeping Him here with us; He is keeping us here with Him. If we love Him, it is because He first loved us. If we are desirous within our hearts for His worship and for a new obedience to Him, it is something that He has given to us as a down payment on the life to come, where we will see His promises made to be promises kept. We do not see it entirely right now, but we believe in the One who was made a little lower than the angels for us, so that He might suffer a death we deserved. He has gone to the Father, but somehow we have not lost Him.

In addition, He tells us that He has come to us in the person of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth. This great Helper is with us, and assures our doubting souls that the Lord’s promises are true and reliable, that God will be with us forever, that we know God, that He lives with us, even that He lives in us. Though our mothers and fathers may be beyond the Jordan on the other side of the river, though people who should be near us have gone far away, Jesus Himself, the most important Lover we could ever have says, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.”

In Romania, the word for orphanage is “house of children.” When I first visited a “house of children” I was perfectly composed and having a very enjoyable time. Until it was time to leave. To leave new young friends behind as orphans was wrenching. It must be difficult for a parent to face a terminal illness knowing that he will soon have to leave. It must be a very sad day for a parent when a breach in marriage means that he will not be able to see his children again. It must be extremely difficult when a child does not want to talk to a parent, or to come home again to see a parent. These things are not supposed to be easy, and it can be so deadening to the soul for someone when he prays that these sum of all parental fears would never happen, and then they do happen. I know you want answered prayers. I assure you, so do I. But I have learned that the only place to start on a journey that will lead to answered prayers is with the best answer to every prayer. You have a new gift from God. There is a new Love of your life, and this is what He says to you, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.”

Jesus comes to us and stays with us through everything. To have Him is more than anything else that can be taken away from us. Any of our requests truly in Jesus’ Name, truly in the eternal purpose and plan of God, has surely been granted. If you cannot see it now, it is answered for you many times over in Christ, and is reserved for you in the life to come. Christ has come to you. In your sadness, do not turn Him away. It is very probably the case that the things that you have asked Him for in the past are best found in Him, and He has them now in safe-keeping with Him above, where no one can take them away from you ever again.

I in You (19-21)
This is not just wishful thinking. He showed this to His disciples when He rose from the dead. He told them, “Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.” This living that He was talking about was heavenly living, resurrection living. How do you know that you will see the answers to your prayers that are in accord with the Name of Jesus, the will of the eternal Father? You know because He lived again after He died, and He showed His disciples clearly that He was alive. Yet some still doubted.

Do not doubt that Jesus died for you. Do not doubt that He rose from the dead so that you would know what was ahead of you. Do not doubt that He will hear your prayers, and that He will work all things together for your good. But do not be deceived into thinking that your name is better than His, that your will is better than His eternal plan. Take His Name, and wait patiently. He has your answered prayers at His house. Do not doubt His love for you.

He is not ashamed to speak of His love for you. “You in me, and I in you,” He says at the end of verse 20. He is perfecting your new desires, the desire to worship and to obey the new love of your life. He is perfecting your love for Him. His love for you needs nothing new. It is already perfect. The one that His Father loves, Jesus says He also will love. Let your soul be remade first with this new special relationship that will never be taken away from you by death or by any other loss. He has made Himself known to you in His Word, and He will manifest Himself to you more and more, until you see Him where He is now, with all your broken-hearted and answered prayers.

1. How could the works of the disciples be greater than the works of Jesus?
2. What is the relationship between the love of God and our obedience to God?
3. In what sense does God lovingly live in us?
4. How does God lovingly show Himself to us?

A New House

Let Not Your Hearts Be Troubled – 3 Sermons

Part 1: “The Gift of a New Home”

(John 14:1-10, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, October 11, 2009)

John 14:1-11 "Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. ² In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? ³ And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. ⁴ And you know the way to where I am going." ⁵ Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" ⁶ Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. ⁷ If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him." ⁸ Philip said to him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us." ⁹ Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'? ¹⁰ Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works.

What did Jesus teach His disciples about the way to our new home?

A: “I am the way.” (John 14:6)

My Father’s House (1-3)

This morning we begin three messages from John 14 under the general title, “Let not your hearts be troubled.” Perhaps I should begin by saying that I recognize that the advice that is inseparably included in the words of the Lord Jesus in this title are not always easy to hear. When you face a very deep trial in your life, you may first have to let your heart feel some trouble for a little while if you want to be able to feel the full comfort of what Christ is saying to His disciples here as He goes to the cross. Maybe you are in such a position now where your heart needs to feel the trouble of the moment for a while, maybe even for a few years. That is not unusual. If you need someone just to listen to you through that period, I will do that, and I know that there are others here who will be willing to do that too.

We can listen with the confidence that you will eventually have an ear that is willing to hear better news than what you seem to be able to take in at the moment. Eventually we all do want to know something more than our own troubles. We want to hear the reasons why it is that in a world full of trouble (Job 14:1) Jesus is able to say, “Let not your hearts be troubled.” If you cannot receive all that at the moment, tuck this message away in your heart for a sunnier day. What we have in John 14 is at least three reasons for you to be full of joy. Each of these reasons is tied into a gift of something new for you from God. Next week we will look at the gift of the new love of your life. The following week we will listen to what the Lord has to say about a new peace that He has for us. But this morning, I won’t seem spiritual. This morning is like the end of the ultimate game show, where you are called forward to find out that you are the winner of a brand new beautiful home, with no taxes, no utility bills, no problem of having too much to clean, and no embarrassment from your friends hearing that you live in the most amazing place. Jesus has a new home for you in His Father’s house.

Jesus says that His death can be viewed in this extraordinary light; that He is going to prepare a place for you. I remember when the church helped our family during a time when we foolishly found ourselves to be the owners of two houses, one of which needed some work. Mike mostly wanted me to stay out of the way as the church worked together to do beautiful things in our house so that it could sell (which it did). It was such an amazing feeling to go there when everything was done, and to feel like we had just received a home through the sacrifice of others who loved us. God has a new home for you on the grounds of His heavenly estate.

This kind of declaration, that we have a new home, will not cast the trouble out of our hearts unless we believe it. The only way we will trust this announcement to us if we believe in the trustworthiness of the Father and the Son. This is why Jesus says, “Believe in God. Believe also in Me.” If you do not believe in Him then you are missing out on something that could help your heart to feel better. Let not your hearts be troubled. Jesus has a new home for you on the grounds of His Father’s estate. There is something that He is doing there now. I suppose that He would be using all the means of men and angels in heaven to do this thing that He talks about here: “I go to prepare a place for you.” Then He adds this warm-hearted encouragement: “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” He wants to be with you, and He insists that He will be the One who will come to take you Himself. When you die, Jesus will take you to heaven.

The Way There (4-6)

The idea of going to heaven, going to the Father’s house, finding our place there on His land, it is such a wonderful thought, but we get worried. We sing, “Swing low, sweet chariot, coming for to carry me home!” That’s a plea for help for the lowly. We worry with Thomas, when he hears Jesus say, “You know the way to where I am going.” We raise our hand however sheepishly and say, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Isn’t that right? We don’t know heaven. We’ve read a few verses. We’ve sung some songs. But we cannot organize a VBS and take everyone on an exposition there.

But Jesus answers in such a way that we suddenly remember that we know more about this than we realize. We just get frightened a little bit, like a person taking a test that they studied so hard for, and then they blank out for a moment and forget the obvious things. Jesus is not beyond giving us a hint here to help us out. He is whispering to You now, “Pssst. You know this one. I am the way.” At first we think, “Huh?” But then it clicks in our hearts. “That’s right! I do know this one! Jesus is the way to heaven. The answer is not spatial, but relational. Knowing Jesus is the way to the Father’s house.

This is a test that He will make sure we pass. He loves us. He has been preparing a place for us, a place that will eventually descend from heaven with angels and all the redeemed brothers and sisters. It’s not just that God’s chariot is going to swing low. The whole of the Father’s house is coming down and renewing the earth. It’s like the beginning of the Wizard of Oz in reverse. Instead of Dorothy’s house landing on Oz, the whole world of Oz is going to land on Dorothy’s house in Kansas. And she is going to say to her dog, “Toto, Kansas isn’t Kansas anymore in a way, but then again it is Kansas, just a better Kansas than I could have asked for or imagined, an earth without sin or decay. My Father’s house has arrived from heaven.”

Jesus is the way. Jesus is the truth. Jesus is the life. He is the fullness of all these things as if the whole of heaven resided in His heart, and from the fullness of truth and life and light in the heart of Jesus come blazing forth a whole new creation in the perfection of the holiness of God. The world that springs forth from the bosom of Jesus is solid, full of all that is true. Thank of the most delicious, wholesome, colorful, and fresh gifts of earth, and recognize that the heaven that pours fourth from the throne of God is far more wonderful, and eternally solid and praiseworthy. Let not your heart be troubled, brothers and sisters! You have a piece of land in that place with a new name on, and it is your name. There is home there for you.

Do you know why you have been granted such a happy future? Jesus is the reason. His obedient suffering in this world and his death has made Him so perfectly fit to be the way for you to heaven. You will want to thank Him forever when you see what He has done for you there. The sufferings that you face now are not worthy to be compared to the glory that you will see in the Father’s house one day. Even those sufferings have been purposeful, as trophies of something that was meant for your good, and for His glory. You will know that in the fullest way in the day that is coming. Now there is one more thing thought that you must consider when you think about Jesus being the way. Apart from Jesus there is no such world for you. If you want to get to heaven without Him, if you want to take some other bus of whatever sort of false god you may think would take you where you want to go now or forever, just remember that whatever high such idols promise, or even deliver, they have this way of crashing you down to the ground so that you have nothing left at all. That is what is before you this morning: Jesus as the way to heaven, and every other imposter as No Way. Do the only sane thing. Turn away from No Way, and come back to the only Way, the true Way, the Living Way; the only Way to that land of truth and life that springs forth from the throne of God in heaven and from the loving heart of a Savior who died for you.

Seeing our Home through the Words and Works of the Son (7-10)

Do you see Jesus today? Do you hear His words? He says, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me, and I give them eternal life.” Do you see His works? He raises the dead. He makes the blind see, and the lame man leaps for joy. If you see Jesus in His words and works in the Bible, if you see that as being for you, then have seen the Father.

This is what Philip wanted, to see the Father. He said, “Show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” That is all he wanted. “Open up heaven so that I can see my Father’s house there. Let me see the Father.” Jesus said, “Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works.” If you see Jesus in His words and works in the Bible, and if the God of heaven and earth has given you faith to believe these things, then you see God with the eyes of faith. You see Him, and He surely sees you. He sees your tears here this morning, and He loves you, and He can be trusted. He will take you through a moment that you think is more than you can take, and He will turn it into your finest hour. This you will know experientially when you enter your new home. Let not your hearts be troubled.

1. What does it mean that Jesus is preparing a place for us in His Father’s house?

2. Why is Jesus the only way to the Father?

3. How do the words of Jesus show us the Father and the Father’s house?

4. How do the works of Jesus show us the Father and the Father’s house?

The Borrowed Glory of the Cross

He Loved Them to the End – Six Sermons

Part 6: “A Costly and Glorious Love”

(John 13:31-38, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, October 4, 2009)

³¹ When he had gone out, Jesus said, "Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. ³² If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once. ³³ Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, 'Where I am going you cannot come.' ³⁴ A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ³⁵ By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." ³⁶ Simon Peter said to him, "Lord, where are you going?" Jesus answered him, "Where I am going you cannot follow me now, but you will follow afterward." ³⁷ Peter said to him, "Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you." ³⁸ Jesus answered, "Will you lay down your life for me? Truly, truly, I say to you, the rooster will not crow till you have denied me three times.

What did Jesus say regarding the glory of His suffering?

A: “Now is the Son of Man glorified.” (John 13:31)

The road to glory (31-33)

Jesus is on a road to glory. He came from glory, but then He settled here below for awhile to work out our redemption with His blood. At the end of John 13 His cross is very near, and so His return home to the land of glory is very near. Glory is God, God in His heavens, where the will of God is perfectly observed with the eye by the redeemed of men and the holy angels. Glory is the brightness of God’s holiness and the blessing of His kind care for us together in a place of perfect love. Jesus came from that place and He is returning to it.

But before He goes, He has something to accomplish. He testified to this remaining supreme act of love when He lowered Himself on the floor to wash the feet of His disciples. He would soon be led as a lamb to the slaughter, cleansing us of all sin as no one else could ever do. He will not leave us. He will not abandon His beloved children for whom He shed His blood. He is headed back to the highest mountaintop, but there is a road to travel, and that road goes through some rough terrain. It is a low road, and that is why it is symbolically represented before the disciples as a road fit only for the lowest slave. That road is the lowest and darkest valley ever known to man. What would ever make you willing to travel a road like that for someone else? Only love. Jesus must love you.

At the end of John 13 Jesus is already on that road, but He has to go lower before this will be over. His betrayer, Judas, has already left the scene in order to do his part. He has turned against his friend and master. Jesus’ road will continue through some final instruction, some prayer, some intense suffering, and a cursed death. The destination at the end of the road is finally glorious. The destination is heaven. That end is so glorious, that the road to it has become glorious for Jesus, even the very lowest point on that road, the point of His death and burial.

It takes faith for Jesus, the Son of Man, to see glory in a cross. He says, “Now is the Son of Man glorified.” He has been preparing us to see the glory of the cross by faith throughout this gospel. He has called the cross a “lifting up.” There is a double meaning here. Yes He will be lifted up above the ground. That is the most obvious meaning, but there is a more profound lifting up that He is preparing us to see. He is being lifted up to the Father as the offering that takes away our sin, and He is lifted up as our Redeemer, the focus of our worship, and the only way for us to enjoy the glory of heaven. The glory of the cross is a borrowed glory, borrowed from the destination of heavenly peace and reconciliation.

John 3:14-15 ¹⁴ And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵ that whoever believes in him may have eternal life."

John 8:28 When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am…

John 12:27-33 “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself." ³³ He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die.

Why is the cross glorious? We have already said that the destination is glorious, but also the meaning of what is happening is glorious, because of the great glory of the Son’s obedience to the Father in atoning for our sins. There is something that is so beautiful about obedience to God. Jesus has provided that for us. In living and dying for us He glorified the Father. He was saying for everyone to hear, “My Father is so great that it is My pleasure to do His will.” And Jesus knows that His Father will glorify Him through this act of love and beyond, as if the Father is saying, “Look at My Son. There is no one like Him. Look how He has obeyed Me. Look at His love for sinners. My Son is the greatest. You should have no problem loving Him, when He loves you this much.” But all this love came at a dreadful cost. The glory of the dying love of our Savior was extremely costly.

Jesus goes toward the cross, knowing the cost, but anticipating the glory ahead of Him. He is thinking about how the Father will glorify Him, and at once. Jesus will not have to wait to the very end of the age for His resurrection glory. He lived His thirty-three years or so, He died, His body rested in the grave over the course of three days, and He rose forth in resurrection glory and walked the earth for a few weeks before His ascension into heaven. At the end of John 13, the shining wonder of the mountain of heaven is not far away. Soon He will be a glorified man, a mountaintop man, a heavenly man walking on earth, and then He’ll go to the place of supreme glory. His disciples will not be able to follow immediately. Some will come sooner than others. A deacon named Stephen joined Jesus in glory fairly soon. We read that He saw that glory even as He faced His own valley. One of the twelve, James, followed not too long behind. His brother John had to wait many years. These kinds of details are in God’s hands.

Acts 12:1-2 About that time Herod the king laid violent hands on some who belonged to the church. ² He killed James the brother of John with the sword,…

Acts 7:54-60 ⁵⁴ Now when they heard these things they were enraged, and they ground their teeth at him. ⁵⁵ But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. ⁵⁶ And he said, "Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God." ⁵⁷ But they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together at him. ⁵⁸ Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. ⁵⁹ And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." ⁶⁰ And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

A new commandment (34-35)

For now, it is enough for us to see that there is a glory in the cross of Christ, and that glory shines somehow in our suffering if we will suffer as those who believe that the Son of Man died for us and that in His death He has won glory for us. If you see the glory of Jesus’ cross then you are prepared not merely to die as a Christian but to live as a Christian. To live as a Christian is to love in a way that is empowered no longer merely by self or by instinct, but by Christ Himself. The cross gives new meaning to a very old commandment.

Leviticus 19:18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.

This very old commandment has become a new commandment in two ways. First, there is a new community of love being formed around Jesus Christ. All people have a natural instinct of love within their families however marred that good instinct may be by our rebellion and frustration. There may even be something of a willingness to lay down our lives for our communities or for our nation, again with the complication of sin making that something less than what it could be. But in the church we have a new family and a new nation centered around this one figure, Jesus Christ. In this new community of love, we are to love one another, and this is part of what makes the commandment to love our neighbor new. But a second new thing is that the love of our God has been displayed before us in Christ Himself, so that we are not only to love according to the words of a commandment, but according to the example of the perfect Son of the Father, Jesus, who calls us His brothers, His friends, and His beloved.

How has Jesus loved us? He has loved us actively, not passively. He has loved us purposefully, not accidentally, or casually. He has loved us sacrificially, not selfishly. He has loved us with the spirit of heaven, not with the bare instinct of the earth, even at its best. This gift of God is ours to receive and to give. This new love of the Christian within the family of God is the very defining mark of true Christian fellowship. There are many gifts of the Spirit of God, but this most excellent gift of love is to be sought after more than any other. To know how to pursue true Christian love is the secret to distinctive Christian living.

You will follow afterward. (36)

Jesus is going away, and Peter is very uncomfortable. He says, “Lord, where are you going?” We know the answer that Peter could not seem to accept. Jesus is going to the cross, then to the grave, then out from the tomb, then bodily into heaven to the right hand of the Father. Peter cannot entirely follow. He will have his own cross, but not the cross of an atoning Messiah. He will have suffering, prison, useful and difficult service, martyrdom, and heaven. He will follow afterward. He will follow in the suffering love to the glory destination of Jesus. He is there now.

Will you lay down your life for Me? (37-38)

Do you want to be with Jesus now? Peter thought he did, but when it came to it, He denied Him. These things are hard for us to understand, and they are in the Lord’s hands. Are you ready to die for Jesus now? Then live for Him now in sacrificial love with the strength that He provides. Believe in the truth of Jesus’ suffering love. Hope in the glory of that great destination. Love with the new love of Jesus. He is not far from you. He is with you.

John 13:1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

We are back where we started in John 13:1. Jesus loved you to the end. Love Jesus to the end, may His love for you and His call to follow be a growing presence within your soul, a new life that is expressed in increasing love.

1. What is the glorification referred to in this passage?

2. In what sense was Jesus giving a new commandment?

3. How would the apostles and the church follow Jesus afterward?

4. Will we lay down our lives for Jesus?