《Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary – John (Vol. 3)》(Various Authors)
15 Chapter 15
Introduction
PART V. (C.)
THE UNION OF CHRIST AND HIS DISCIPLES, WITH THE RESULTS OF THIS UNION
1. The relation of the disciples to Christ is one of living union as branches in the vine (Joh ).
2. The result of this union in the lives of the disciples (Joh ), and in the unbelieving world (Joh 15:18-27).
Verses 1-17
EXPLANATORY AND CRITICAL NOTES
Joh . True vine.—Christ and the disciples were now on the way to Gethsemane. Their passing through the vineyards, etc., surrounding the city may have suggested this image: others think it may have been called up by a vine in the courtyard, or on the roof, of the house where the supper was instituted; others, by the golden vine which adorned one of the temple gates; and others still, by the fires of the vine-prunings along the valley of the Kidron. The first seems the most likely origin of the figure, combined perhaps with the last. I am the true (ideal, veritable) vine, etc.—Israel was the vine of Jehovah; but they failed to bring about that living unity and fellowship between God and men that has been effected in Christ. Christ is the true centre of unity, the source of true vine-life, uniting the branches to Himself as one complete whole. The husbandman.—Christ is the true vine as the incarnate Son. It is as the Son of man that He enters into this close relationship with humanity. Christ is the life of the complex organism, and over this living whole the Father watches with providential care. The husbandman is the owner and cultivator.
Joh . Every branch in Me, etc.—There is a being in Christ which is yet not a living, vital union (Mat 3:10; Mat 21:19, etc.). These fruitless branches the divine husbandman "takes away." The mode itself is not stated. "Death breaks the connection between the unfaithful Christian and Christ" (Westcott). Purgeth.—Cleanses or prunes. The word καθαίρει has here a spiritual significance. Everything that would retard fruit-bearing is removed. Bring forth.—Bear. This is the end of disciplinary training, as it is the end of pruning.
Joh . Now ye are clean, etc.—Pruned or cleansed. The Word is the whole revelation of Himself—the λόγος. This Word has a cleansing power (Heb 4:12). When it is believed it exercises this power in the soul (see Joh 5:24; Joh 8:31-32; Joh 12:48; Joh 17:6; Joh 17:17).
Joh . Abide in Me, and let Me abide in you.—Both clauses are imperative. The indwelling is mutual; but the let Me abide, etc., signifies the source of the gracious spiritual life for the dependent branches.
Joh . Without Me.—Apart from or severed from Me, etc. All the branch's fruitfulness depends on its living union with Christ. Let any seek to live apart from Him, without His divine strength, and the result will be speedily apparent.
Joh . He is cast forth, etc.—Whenever the vital connection ceases then separation has in reality begun. The branch Is already "cast forth," though it may remain for a time in outward union apparently with the stem. And is withered.—The reality of the separation will show itself. And men gather, etc.—And their ultimate fate is to be destroyed. This image may have been suggested by the fires of vine-prunings (see Joh 15:1). Judgment now and hereafter.
Joh . The end of answered prayer, as of every Christian grace and blessing, is spiritual fruit-bearing.
Joh . Even as the Father hath loved Me, I also have loved you.—In these words our Lord recalls the disciples to that which is the source and foundation of this union—the eternal love of God. As the Father loves Him with this perfect eternal love, so He loves His disciples (Joh 17:24; Joh 17:26). My love ( ἡ ἀγάπη ἡ ἐμή) is that love which is His very nature. "Thy nature and Thy name is love." Abiding in that love means in its deepest sense to abide in the Spirit and life of Christ.
Joh . If ye keep, etc. (Joh 14:15).—"Let no one deceive himself by saying that he loves Christ, when he does not obey Christ. We love Christ exactly in the proportion in which we keep His commandments" (Augustine in Wordsworth's Greek Testament).
Joh . My joy.—The joy that is Mine. Just as He gives them His peace (Joh 14:27), He gives them His joy, the joy of self-sacrificing love.
Joh . Greater love, etc.—This shows the contents of the conception, "As I have loved you." This is the loftiest ideal of love. Here He is speaking to His disciples, and of His self-sacrificing love in reference to them (Joh 10:11). In Rom 5:6-8 St. Paul is viewing that love from the point of view of perishing humanity.
Joh . Command you, etc.—This friendship is not, of course, on a footing of equality. Our friends do not command us. Our heavenly Friend must do so in virtue of His position.
Joh . I call you no longer servants, etc.—Servants = δούλους, slaves. But the apostles rejoiced in His service (Rom 1:1; 2Pe 1:1, etc.). It was, however, a free service, not that of a slave. The slave's position admits but of one mode of action, unthinking obedience. It is far otherwise with Christ's disciples and friends. He takes them into confidence, reveals Himself and His work to them, makes them fellow-labourers in His vineyard. There were truths still to be revealed, but the Comforter would make these known unto them also.
Joh . Ye have not chosen Me, etc. (Joh 6:70; Joh 13:18; Luk 6:13).—High was the honour to which those fishermen of Galilee had been called. They had not chosen Him as disciples choose a teacher, but He had called them and ordained or appointed them to His work (1Co 12:28; 1Ti 1:12, etc.), to go forth (when He had gone to the Father), still in unity with Him, to bring forth fruit, to sow and reap in the harvest field of the world (Joh 4:36-38), to labour for Him, and their labour would endure (1Co 3:11-15). To such the Father will give all needed gifts in answer to prayer in Christ's name. The true disciple will come "boldly" to the throne of grace, as Christ did whilst He was on earth (see Joh 15:7-8).
Joh . These things, etc.—I.e. all contained in His words just-recorded (Joh 15:12-16). The outcome of obedience to Me will be love one to another.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Joh
Joh . The true Vine and the Husbandman.—What guidance for the spiritual life, what calm in the midst of trial, what comfort and even cheerfulness in the hour of dissolution, have these words of our Lord given to the saints in all ages since they were spoken! It is touchingly related of the great Scottish reformer that when within an hour or two of his death he said to his wife, "Go, read where I cast my first anchor," upon which she read the seventeenth chapter of John's Gospel (McCrie's Knox, p. 276). And how many since this discourse was uttered (in which Christ speaks of that unity of Himself and His people in God which He prays for in chap. 17) have cast an anchor there!—"an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and entering into that which is within the veil" (Heb 6:19). The first truth that meets us here is Christ's declaration that He is—
I. The true Vine.—
1. The meaning of the word true here is not simply true as opposed to false, but true in an absolute sense—the ideal, the veritable Vine; the only root and stem to which the branches can be vitally united, and from which they can draw their life.
2. The vine of humanity had, through sin, withered and died away spiritually, severed from the source of true spiritual life. Even when God "brought a vine out of Egypt," etc. (Psalms 80), sin was able to interpose. It was necessary that there should be a closer bond of union with the source of all true life, ere the vine of humanity could bring forth fruit to the divine glory.
3. Thus God sent the Son, and the Son came to earth to be the true centre of union between the human and divine. The true Vine is rooted in the divine and eternal; but its stem comes forth toward men in the world—"The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." Humanity, united to Him in His incarnation through faith, becomes fruitful spiritually.
4. Men, the branches, become one with the Stem. "One life fills the plant from root through stem, and reddens and mellows each cluster. So His life pervades all His true followers; and that one life results in oneness of relation to God, of character, and of destiny" (Maclaren).
II. The Husbandman.—
1. It is the Husbandman who plants the Vine. The term includes here proprietorship. The Father is in a true sense the owner of the Vine. Christ's disciples are His as branches of the Vine. But Vine and branches are both the Father's—"Ye are Christ's, and Christ is God's" (1Co ). The Father sent the Son into the world to assume our nature, so that He might become the medium of spiritual life for men, through their union with Him.
2. But the Vine is more than a possession of the Father. Christ is the eternal Son of the Father, and is the same in nature and essence as the Father. Jesus is the true Vine because of the double relation in which He stands toward God and toward man in virtue of His having become incarnate.
3. He thus "took upon Him the form of a servant"—in infinite love and condescension willingly came to earth to stand between God and men, and to become the means of spiritual life for men, and of union between them and the Father. But the Father is not only the owner—He is the Cultivator, he is—
III. The Vine-dresser.—
1. The vine needs special attention and care. A skilful cultivator is necessary. Left to itself, a vineyard would speedily degenerate and become comparatively fruitless.
2. So God watches over and cares for the spiritual Vine. He tended carefully the vine brought out of Egypt. Much more will He specially care for this true Vine—the centre and source of life and fruitfulness for men.
3. The heavenly Vine-dresser is active in His treatment of the branches in the true Vine.
(1) He cuts off all the fruitless twigs and branches which, through some cause, have been severed already from the source of life (see on Joh ). But
(2) "Every branch that beareth fruit," etc. The vine-branches need pruning lest the sap should run to leaves only. So does the Lord deal with His "people." He cuts away what would hinder fruitfulness in the life.
4. This is a process that goes on both in the inner and outer life. In the best lives there remains some remnant of the old nature, which rebels against the "new man." Hence such exhortations as this: "Die unto sin, live unto righteousness," etc. Even a St. Paul had to struggle against the law in his members, etc., and cry, "O wretched man that I am," etc. (Rom ). But he could also thank God for victory through Christ. So Christ says to the disciples, "Now ye are clean," etc. The light of His truth penetrates to the inner recesses of our being; the Word shows us to ourselves, and leads us through grace to put away evil and "cleave to that which is good" (Joh 13:10),
5. But pruning goes on in the outward life also. There are things lying around us and connected with us that engross us too much and chain us to the world. Men set up as gods some of those gifts entrusted to them oftentimes. This tends to weaken spiritual communion, and to check fruitfulness. Therefore God in mercy and love removes such things sometimes. The pruning-knife of trial, affliction, bereavement, cuts sharply down. It is hard sometimes to have to give up this or that at the call of conscience or duty. But the heavenly Vine-dresser sees it to be good for those who thus suffer. "Before I was afflicted I went astray," etc. (Psa ; Psa 119:71). The pruning results in fruitfulness.
Application.—See to it that this is the result; for if not the knife may again require to descend, cutting even more closely than before. And there may come a time when, after repeated trials, all is found to be vain, and the branch left until it becomes profitless. Of this what shall be the end?
Joh . The living union of Christ and His people.—How precious are those words, spoken under the soft springtide Syrian sky, among the vineyards and gardens clustering around Jerusalem! The closing words of the preceding chapter are most significant. "Arise, let us go hence," the Saviour had said. And this going hence meant more than simply quitting the upper room (or the terrace) where, since the traitor's departure, there had been so much peaceful fellowship, and such deep heart-converse regarding highest realities. For the disciples it was a going hence into a new set of experiences, the continuance of their life-journey without the blessed presence of their Master and Lord. He had spoken to the disciples of His own relationship to the Father, and of all the grace for them which that relationship afforded. But now, in view of what was coming, and to comfort them and sustain them during the conflict, He spoke of their close union with Himself under this figure of the vine and the branches.
I. The vine is a fit emblem of our Lord.—
1. The prophet wrote of Christ, "He hath no form nor comeliness, and when we shall see Him there is no beauty," etc. (Isa ). And the vine has no apparent graceful beauty as, from its short, knotted stem, it sends out its branches on the terraced hillside.
2. And yet it has a beauty and nobility all its own, possessed not by the stately cedar or other wonders of the vegetable kingdom. Its fertility, its vital richness, the excellency of its products and their wide and varied usefulness, cause it to be prized worldwide.
3. Thus, as Jesus, in reference to the spiritual nourishment of men, called Himself the bread of life, so here, in special reference to Himself as the source and channel of spiritual life, He called Himself the true vine.
4. In this emblematic description of Himself He fulfills the ancient prophecy which foretold that God would raise up for His people "a plant for renown" (Eze ). And lo! there is none in excellency and preciousness like unto Him.
5. Israel had been called by God a fruitful vine—it took deep root, it filled the land, "the hills were covered with the shadow of it," etc. (Psalms 80). But the nation of Israel, the theocracy, was but a shadow of good things to come. And in Christ all that those shadows and types symbolised was found in reality and divine fulness. But there is a further truth revealed in this emblem. "I am the Vine, ye are the branches." There is here set forth—
II. The oneness of Christ and His Church.—
1. A vine is not only a stem. The branches are part of the vine and in the vine. Through them the vine sends forth its fruit. Both are mutually dependent, although the branches are far more dependent on the stem. Still the one needs the other.
2. How grand is this thought as applied to the relationship of Christ and His Church! What a clear and definite idea it gives of the oneness of believers with Him, their organic unity with Him, the centre and source of life. And how should it lead us to lively gratitude, unbounded love, and adoring praise.
3. In Christ much more fully and vitally the Church becomes one in God than it had ever been before His coming. All the incomplete, imperfect, and shadowy types of the Jewish economy found their completion in Christ. "The vineyard of the Lord of hosts was the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His pleasant plant: and He looked for judgment," etc. (Isa ). The highest natural and spiritual advantages failed to keep the vine of the ancient Church in living oneness with God. Something from the world or the power of evil ever interposed, and the branches withered, the fruit failed. And only those branches which drew through the channels of promise a true though sometimes feeble nourishment became fruitful. There could not be thus for humanity abiding oneness with God.
4. But that is made possible through Christ in His divine-human personality. His essential nature is rooted in the divine. He is one with God. "The Word was God." But through His incarnation He was revealed among men in the world as the centre and source of divine life for them. His people become one with Him, as the branches are one with the vine, as the members are one with the body. The most vital, intimate, and necessary relationship subsists between the living branches and the stem. The vine stock is essential to the vine branch; so is Christ to the believer—a close uninterrupted union must subsist between them.