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Then if you will, turn with me in your Bibles to John chapter 15.

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We're going to be reading verses 1 through 8 and verse 16.

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Now we're looking at the I am statements of Jesus Christ.

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For some of these statements, you will notice they focus in on our human need.

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Last week I am the good shepherd.

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As Christians we need Jesus Christ as our shepherd.

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This week another one.

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The vine.

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And what this passage of Scripture is going to show us is your need to be connected to

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Christ to make it in this world.

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You need Christ just as much as you need food, water, companionship to make it.

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Now let's see what Jesus says to his disciples as he leads them before he goes to the cross.

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I am the true vine and my father is the gardener.

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He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit.

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While every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.

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You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

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Remain in me as I also remain in you.

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No branch can bear fruit by itself.

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It must remain in the vine.

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Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

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I am the vine.

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You are the branches.

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If you remain in me and I in you you will bear much fruit.

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Apart from me you can do nothing.

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If you do not remain in me you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers.

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Such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.

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If you remain in me and my words remain in you ask whatever you wish and it will be done

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for you.

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This is to my father's glory that you bear much fruit.

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Showing yourself to be my disciples.

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And then verse 16, you did not chose me but I chose you and appointed you so that you

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might go and bear fruit.

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Fruit that will last and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.

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Let's pray and ask God to illuminate our hearts with what Jesus has said.

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Holy Spirit open our hearts so that we can see today how much we need Jesus.

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Not only on Sundays but the rest of the week as well and throughout our lives.

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Hear our prayer and grant to us a spirit that is willing to claim to Jesus.

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I make this prayer in his name.

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Amen.

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To endure.

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You look up that definition in a dictionary it will say to experience and deal with something

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that is painful or unpleasant especially without complaining.

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To remain firm under suffering.

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This also means to put up with.

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Now here's what surprised me when I was looking at those definitions.

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They all have to do not only with our ability to persevere but also to put up with difficulties.

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Now that's the really hard part.

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I mean it's one thing to just go on and exist.

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It's another thing to put up with difficulties.

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And that word endure it's also can mean as a synonym to bear up.

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To be patient.

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To hold on.

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To persist.

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And there is a very good reason that the Bible compares your Christian life to a race.

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Not just a sprint but more of a marathon because marathons are very painful and there is a

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lot of discomfort but the runner continues to go forward.

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Now I remember when I was at Covenant College and a professor asked me about running and

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he said well don't you just love to run and I said well it hurts a lot.

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It hurts to go to practice.

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It hurts to get out there and run a race.

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Don't ask me why I do it.

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But it hurts.

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And that's the way running is.

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Now you can achieve a lot of good things.

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It can help your health.

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But running hurts.

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Remember the first person who ran a marathon died because of the struggles that your body

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goes through.

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And I know that when we come to the Christian life it is not glamorous to talk about endurance.

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So we would like to talk about other things.

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It seems so much more glamorous in today's world.

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The big events of the Christian faith.

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But do you realize this that when the Bible talks about what a Christian must do to make

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it in this world.

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It often says that we must endure and overcome.

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Now that doesn't seem very dramatic.

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And it's not.

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But it's the way life really is.

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And what you and I have to face in this life is that we have to endure and we have to overcome.

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And that is true because as Christians you will face temptations.

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You will face trials.

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You will face struggles.

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It happens when you are tempted to sin.

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Whether it is theft, covetousness or adultery.

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But it is also true that it is a struggle in the Christian life as we deal with health

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that starts the decline.

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Our bodies do not function the way they do.

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And we start thinking to ourselves why should I go on?

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Maybe all this Christianity stuff is just a myth.

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And that is the temptation.

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When I was reading Scripture this week in the morning, one of the Psalms I read was

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Psalm 90.

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And listen to the truthfulness about the Christian life.

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Our days may come to 70 years or 80 if our strength endures.

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Yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow.

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True statement from David.

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So the question is how do we go on and endure?

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That is the question really for us and I'm sure all of you have had to struggle as well

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to try to endure in the Christian faith not to give up and pack it in.

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Well here Jesus tells us here how we are to endure.

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And it is the last, the seventh of the I am statements and here he tells us if you are

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going to endure, you've got to stay connected to me.

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Connected to Christ.

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That is what all of us must achieve as we go forward in our lives.

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Now let me start out here.

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We need to be honest about the situation we're in because it's also the situation that occurred

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in the Bible as well.

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We've got to ask ourselves first of all what's going on here in this passage that Jesus would

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utter such words as I am the true vine.

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Well it is during the farewell discourse.

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And Jesus is there with his disciples in the upper room.

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He washes their feet to show that he is a true servant and they must also be servants

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as well.

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He tells them he's going to be betrayed.

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He also tells them he is going to be killed.

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And I'm sure his disciples are scratching their heads and saying to each other what's

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going on.

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Betrayed?

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Turned over?

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Jesus says to his disciples, and notice what he says, my children, I will be with you only

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a little longer.

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You will look for me and just as I told the Jews, so I will tell you now where I am going

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you cannot come.

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And oh my, can you imagine those disciples saying, Jesus, we've always been with you.

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What are you saying?

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You're going to leave us?

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You're the master, you're the teacher, you're the Christ.

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How can you say you are going to leave us?

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How can you say you are going to die?

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Say it ain't so, Jesus.

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And I imagine if they fully understood it, they would be confused, disheartened.

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And then I also want you to think about what they would face later after the death of Jesus.

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Many of them would face persecution.

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Many would be martyred because they believed in Jesus Christ.

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Many would lose friends and family.

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Not to mention the calm and aches and pains of living in this world.

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And you would think of all that and you'd say, why would they hang on to this Christian

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faith?

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How are they going to make it if Jesus is not there to guide them through all this?

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Now I want you to fast forward to the 21st century.

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And I want you to think about some events that Christians have to face.

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There is the woman who is caught in an unhappy marriage whose husband is abusive.

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There is the woman who is abandoned.

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Those things happen even to Christians.

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There is the man who works for a very domineering employee who does stupid things and then blames

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him.

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There's lousy marriages, lousy working situations.

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And if it's not those things that Christian has to deal with, think about those who had

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to go through concentration camps like Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

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If I was in that situation and had to endure the suffering that they did, I don't know

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if I would make it.

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And I think today in Africa about Christian schoolgirls who were kidnapped and then raped

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by terrorists.

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And you wonder, how did they make it?

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How are they going to go on and not give up the faith?

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How are they going to do it?

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Well you will never understand how they're going to do it and how you're going to do

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it unless you are honest.

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And we need to look into our souls to realize that on our own we can't make it by ourselves

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because there are too many problems.

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We may want heaven on earth now, but we must endure and overcome this world.

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So the question is how?

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Because the situation is not pleasant.

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It is a fallen world.

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Our Christians are rejected and good people do suffer.

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So how?

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Well he tells us, you need to stay connected to Christ.

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And what you need to focus in on at first is the image that he gives us.

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And that is of a vine.

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But if you go back to the Old Testament, Israel was considered the vine of the Lord.

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It was Israel who was supposed to be a fruitful vine.

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And let's look at what the Bible says for a moment about what Israel was supposed to

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be like.

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If we go in our Bibles to the book of Psalm 80, we read the following about what Israel

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was to be like.

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You transplanted a vine from Egypt.

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You drove out the nations and planted it.

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You cleared the ground for it and it took root and filled the land.

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The mountains were covered with its shade.

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The mighty branch is with its cedars.

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That was supposed to be Israel, a fruitful branch.

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You read Isaiah chapter five.

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What does it say about Israel in the first two verses?

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I will sing for the one I love, a song about his vineyard.

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My loved one has a vineyard on a fertile hillside.

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He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choices of vines.

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And then in verse seven, the vineyard of the Lord Almighty is the nation of Israel.

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That's what Israel was supposed to be, fruitful, showing the world who the God of the Bible

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was.

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But do you know what?

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Israel was a lousy vine.

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In fact, Isaiah goes on and says this, the Lord built a watchtower in it and cut out

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a wine press as well.

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Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit.

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Now you dwellers in Jerusalem and people of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard.

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What more could have been done for my vineyard than I have done for it when I look for good

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grapes?

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Why did it yield only bad?

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And what we know from the history of Israel, it yielded grapes of idolatry and prostitution,

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not the fruit of righteousness.

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But then Jesus comes along and says, no, not Israel is the true vine.

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I am the true vine.

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I am genuine.

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I will produce fruit.

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And then look at what it says about Christians and your relationship to that vine in verse

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4 and several times.

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Remain in me as I also remain in you.

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No branch can bear fruit by itself.

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It must remain in the vine.

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Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

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Just what he also says, if you do not bear fruit, he cuts off every branch in me that

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bears no fruit.

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While every branch that does bear fruit, he proves so that you'll even be more fruitful.

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Why did God choose you?

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Well it tells us in the last verse, verse 16 that we read, you did not choose me, but

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I chose you and appointed you so that you may go and bear fruit that will last.

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If you're going to be a fruitful Christian, if you're going to make it, if you're going

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to survive, then you've got to stay connected to Christ.

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That is your knee.

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You may be saying to yourself, I want to grow as a Christian, right?

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Probably that's what you're saying.

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Well if you do, then you've got to stay connected to Christ.

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And here's what we've got to start getting through our head, because here's what the

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average evangelical thinks.

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I needed Jesus when I got saved, but afterwards it's all up to me.

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It's not what Jesus is saying here.

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He is telling us if you want to grow, you better stay connected.

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You better stay connected to me or you won't grow.

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And then you are saying to yourself, okay, I get the big picture.

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Christ has to sustain me, right?

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Right.

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But then how, what do I need to be doing then?

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Well, first of all, realize that when Jesus says he's remaining in you, he does remain

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in you by the Holy Spirit.

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The Spirit of Christ remains in you.

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And we can look back a few chapters to chapter 14 in verses 15 and 16 where he tells his

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disciples, I'm out of here, I'm leaving, but he says you ask me for anything in my name

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and I'll do it.

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If you love me, keep my commandments.

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And he goes on to say, and I will ask the Father and he will give you another advocate

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to help you and be with you forever, the Spirit of Truth.

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The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Christ.

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He dwells within each and every one of you.

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He has not given up on you.

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Do not only realize if you got to stay connected to Christ, you've got the Holy Spirit in you.

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Now, let's say you want even more specific instructions on what you need to be doing

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with this.

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Well I'd be the type of person who is willing to feast on the word and prayer.

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Use what it says here, he tells them, you've got to stay in my word.

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You've got to obey what I have commanded.

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That means you've got to have a love for the word.

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Now a lot of times if you go to Walmart, you see lots of Bibles in someone's seat that

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is yellowing because they never take it out of the car and they never read it.

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But if you want to grow to become more Christ-like and to have the mind of Christ, you've got

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to be Bible readers and you've got to pray.

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And when you read the Bible, just don't think, I've got to cover 20 passages today to get

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my brownie points with God.

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No, you've got to read it and you've got to think, what has this got to do with me?

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What does it tell me about God?

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What does it tell me about my sin?

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What hope am I given here in this passage?

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And not only do you need to take care of the means of grace, such as the word and reading

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it and prayer, but you've got to be part of this community.

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I tell you, you will not grow in Christ if you are a lone ranger who never has anything

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to do with church.

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Part of the reason we have a community is, yes, to worship God, but it is also to help

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each other to grow more Christ-like.

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And the average American Christian probably thinks, I don't need a church.

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Now you will never grow more like Christ if you separate yourself from God's people.

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But I also want you to know this, if you look at what verse 23 says, it also means you have

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to obey God.

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It says, in verse 23, whoever hates me, hates my Father as well.

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How do we go about hating God?

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It is by not doing what His word requires and what does Jesus say, if you love me, you

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will keep my commandments.

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To dwell in Christ means to learn from His word, to wait upon the Holy Spirit, to work

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within you and His word, to be part of a believing community.

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That helps us, but it is also obeying what Christ wants from you.

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Here's how we've got to think about our life.

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It's like the womb of a mother, and in that womb is the child.

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That child will not make it unless the mother provides for it in the womb.

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And that child should receive what is being supplied by the mother.

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If it doesn't, it will die.

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We have to be connected to Christ in the same way and receive what He gives us.

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And what is the result of all this?

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You will grow in grace.

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It tells us in verse 2 and verse 5, you will bear fruit.

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You will start to look more like Jesus in such things as love, joy, peace, patience,

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kindness.

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The Father's will for your life is to grow in the fruit of the gospel.

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And for some of you, the troubles you are going through is pruning.

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And pruning only, it is not a rejection by God, but He is pruning you and taking things

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away so that you will become more fruitful.

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Because that's what's important, not being smarter than anybody else, not being better

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looking than anybody else, not being more successful, but being more fruitful for the

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kingdom of God.

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So let me ask you, are you growing in grace?

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Is God pruning you?

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Are you bearing fruit?

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And yes, life is hard and it must be endured, but even in the deserts of this life, a rose

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can bloom.

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And I started saying, we've got to endure.

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That is what the Bible says.

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I remember back when I was in college, I ran a 15 kilometer race, the longest I'd ever

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raced.

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And I had one of the best races of my life.

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I went through the 5K mark faster than if I had run a 5K.

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I went through the 10 kilometer mark faster than I'd ever run a 10K in my life.

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And I had a very good 15K time.

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You want to know why I had those times?

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Because the coach who was a better runner than I was ran with me.

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And every step of the way, he encouraged me to keep it up.

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And when I felt like quitting.

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And I think that is a picture of the Christian life.

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We need Jesus to run the race with us.

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And if you are a Christian, he is right there with you to the end.

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Let's pray and ask God.

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To our Heavenly Father, be with us now and help us to endure in the Christian life.

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Help us, oh God, to rely on Jesus.

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And Jesus nourishes us.

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Nourish us.

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Nourish us so that we can continue to do what you would have us do.

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May we bear fruit.

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Amen.