Abiding in Christ - John 15

Abiding in Christ - John 15

Marissa Namirr and Joy Dudley

Youtube video by the same title is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RB9ozmdNAVk&ab_channel=GospelGal 

Many times when we think of what it means to abide, we think that we need to do everything we can to stay close to Christ. We think that our relationship with Christ is so one-sided that it is up to us to continue to keep it alive. Unless we abide in Him, we are cut away and thrown into the fire. What comes to mind is an image of a hamster running on a wheel with no rest, motivated by the threat and terror of the law. However, our aim with this post is to show that the famous passage in John 15 is rich with comfort and mercy and that our abiding in the Vine is actually saving faith that connects us to Christ and all of His benefits.

I. Our prior perceptions of abiding in Christ

The teachings I’ve heard in the past seemed to place a supposition of synergism on the text. Abiding is something we do, and although it is said that it is Christ who gives the power to do so, somehow it is suggested that we are able to do things that Scripture contradicts, such as engrafting and pruning. There was no connection made that abiding is actually believing or faith in Christ’s finished and ongoing work for us and in us. This frame created anxiety until I began to think through the analogy of Vine to branches. But the teaching seemed to indicate that we are responsible to maintain our lives in Christ and to produce fruit/growth in a way that is devoid of our understanding of salvation. It disturbed my conscience, but at the same time caused me to question the incongruity of their teaching. ~Marissa

From my experience, abiding in Christ was linked to spiritual disciplines. You were successfully abiding when you were having a consistent time in prayer, bible study, and serving in church. Here is an example from a popular evangelical pastor: “Jack Hibbs (Calvary Chapel Chino Hills): https://jackhibbs.com/a-little-big-word/ : “Believer, none of this happens by chance. It takes a daily discipline of dependence upon God. Abiding means you pray but wait to hear what the Lord has to say. Abiding allows your thoughts to be saturated by your Bible reading. Abiding in Him and He in you is to be empowered by the fruit-producing Spirit. And to this you were called, “By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.” John 15:8”

The fruits of abiding in Christ were also used as a means to prove your salvation. You can hear a notable example of this perception in Steve Lawson’s devotion called “Unfruitful Branches”. The presupposition of abiding was one of suspicion, not comfort. ~Joy

II. What popular evangelicals are teaching on abiding

Evangelicals too often reinforce teachings that direct us back to our navels rather than to the Source of our life and salvation. Joy and I have taken note of a couple of influential teachers in the current Calvinistic world.

Lawson:

Unfruitful Branches Steve Lawson ( Starting at the 4:33 mark) https://youtu.be/DNzVv981CFU  - Lawson asks the following: “Is there evidence of a transformed life?” In this video Lawson advocates for everyone to examine their lives in light of this verse to see if there is any evidence that their faith is genuine. Lawson communicates that there are many in church that profess faith but don't have a personal relationship with Christ. Lawson further clarifies that the focus of this passage was on someone who is involved in Christian ministry but has never been born again.

MacArthur:

This cooperative view of abiding is picked up by John MacArthur as well.

“Jesus pleads with people who are superficial branches. He says in verse 4, "Abide in Me." He is saying to those who are like Judas, "Be genuine; abide in Me and show that your faith is real; bear fruit and remain on the vine." It is like saying, "You superficial branches: be saved; have a genuine relation to Christ."

…Abiding in Christ is a mark of true salvation. Sometimes a person who is active in the church leaves suddenly and never goes back to church again. Or a leader in the church may become apostate. People in the church wonder what happened. The explanation is in 1 John 2:19 "They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us.

…Christians who think they are bearing fruit apart from the Vine are only tying on artificial fruit. They run around grunting and groaning to produce fruit but accomplish nothing. Fruit is borne not by trying, but by abiding.

To bear genuine fruit, *you must take your place on the Vine and *get as close to Jesus as you can. *Strip away all the things of the world. Put aside the sins that distract you and sap your energy. *Put aside everything that robs you of a deep, personal, loving relationship with Jesus. Stay apart from sin and be in God's Word. [*Emphasis mine.]

Having done all that, don't worry about bearing fruit. It is not your concern. The Vine will merely use you to bear fruit. Get close to Jesus Christ and His energy in you will bear fruit.” “Abiding in Christ”: Grace to You website. 

A few things stood out as odd to me in this post. First, MacArthur talks about church membership twice: once, as quoted above, and once at the end of the post. Both times he gives the impression that church membership should not be viewed as evidence of true faith or true abiding. The Reformed tradition puts a lot of weight on membership in the visible church. By consistently hearing the Word, receiving the sacraments, and having all of our senses moved by the Gospel, we obtain assurance of pardon and a nourished faith. With a renewed understanding of God’s immeasurable love for us, we move forward in confidence and hope as well-nourished branches who abide in the Vine. Abiding in the Vine means being fed and sheltered within the visible body as He abides in us. The promise is made by the risen Christ in Matthew 28. “19…baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always…” How better to abide in Him than to be persistently nourished by Word and Sacrament, receiving all the appointed means of grace.

Second, MacArthur further creates cognitive dissonance when he says, “To bear genuine fruit, you must take your place on the Vine and get as close to Jesus as you can. Strip away all the things of the world. Put aside the sins that distract you and sap your energy. Put aside everything that robs you of a deep, personal, loving relationship with Jesus. Stay apart from sin and be in God's Word…Having done all that, don't worry about bearing fruit.” But how can one take his place on the Vine? Either he is a branch naturally or he is grafted in by someone else. A branch does not attach itself to a tree. It grows there organically.

Finally, He goes on to exhort the reader to strip away all the things of the world but does not connect this exhortation to being nourished and fed by the Vine. Listen to how Reformation theologians describe abiding.

III. What Reformation thinkers emphasize instead

Where MacArthur exhorts the reader to strip away all the things of the world in an unclear synergistic way, the Reformers describe abiding in Christ as an outflow of the monergistic work of God.

Belgic Confession

Joy added this from the Belgic Confession - Article 22 - “We Believe that for us to acquire the true knowledge of this great mystery the Holy Spirit kindles in our hearts a true faith that embraces Jesus Christ with all his merits, and makes him its own, and no longer looks for anything apart from him. For it must necessarily follow that either all that is required for our salvation is not in Christ, or if all is in him, then he who has Christ by faith has his salvation entirely.”

“But Jesus Christ is our righteousness crediting to us all his merits and all the holy works he has done for us and in our place. And faith is the instrument that keeps us in communion with him and all his benefits. When those benefits are made ours they are more than enough to absolve us of our sins”

That article also states that to add our own performance to the work of Christ for us, outside of us is to make Christ a “half-savior” which is “too great a blasphemy”. I believe that synergistic teachers should take heed to the Reformed Confessions. 

Westminster Confession

I also think of the Westminster Confession which makes it abundantly clear that our justification has nothing to do with anything within us. “Those whom God effectually calleth he also freely justifieth; not by infusing into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; *not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience, to them as their righteousness; but by imputing the obedience and satisfaction of Christ unto them, they receiving and resting on him and his righteousness by faith; which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.” ~WCF

To be clear, we do not deny that there is life produced in the believer, but we are only branches that receive that life from the Vine. It is the Vine that brings forth fruit. It is not the fruit that produces life. None of it, not one iota, is brought forth by our efforts. I often wish that these teachers would make it more clear that abiding is more organic than synergistic. It is not humanly or naturally possible to attach oneself to the Vine and abide there. We must have life from a Source outside of ourselves and a direct connection from the start in order to abide and be fruitful. This is not a discussion of unfruitful vines which are hewn down, but of the true branches that are in the Vine.

Luther

“‘You now have my Word’,” Christ says, ‘whereby you are clean; through it also your fruit is good, and everything pleases God. But if you want to retain this cleanness and to keep on bearing fruit, see that you remain in Me through faith and do not prize your own deeds presumptuously or falsely rely on them. Nor dare you let any trials alienate and tear you from the faith..” Luther's Works Vol 24 : Sermons on the Gospel of St John Chapters 14-16

Calvin

Calvin’s Commentary on John 15 says:
“...he (John) commends to them the doctrine of the gospel from the fruit which it produces, that they may be more powerfully excited to meditate on it continually, since it resembles the vine-dresser's knife to take away what is useless.” So it is the vinedressers knife that takes away what is useless, not the poor soul with no power to purge his own dross.

Calvin goes on. As opposed to MacArthur he says,

“Abide in me. He again exhorts them to be earnest and careful in keeping the grace which they had received, …Abide in me, says he; for I am ready to abide in you And again, He who abideth in me beareth much fruit. By these words he declares that all who have a living root in him are fruit-bearing branches…Without me you can do nothing. This is the conclusion and application of the whole parable. So long as we are separate from him, we bear no fruit that is good and acceptable to God, for we are unable to do anything good. The Papists not only extenuate this statement, but destroy its substance, and, indeed, they altogether evade it; for, though in words they acknowledge that we can do nothing without Christ, yet they foolishly imagine that they possess some power, which is not sufficient in itself, but, being aided by the grace of God, co-operates (as they say,) that is, works along with it; [80] for they cannot endure that man should be so much annihilated as to do nothing of himself. But these words of Christ are too plain to be evaded so easily as they suppose. The doctrine invented by the Papists is, that we can do nothing without Christ, but that, aided by him, we have something of ourselves in addition to his grace. But Christ, on the other hand, declares that we can do nothing of ourselves. The branch, he says, beareth not fruit of itself; and, therefore, he not only extols the aid of his co-operating grace, but deprives us entirely of all power but what he imparts to us.”

His emphasis is not on cooperation, but on the work of Christ for us.

The Prayer Book

And the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, as opposed to MacArthur, places a heavy emphasis on the local church and the means of grace in union with Christ. Listen to the union language in this post-Communion Prayer. There is unmistakable union language here and where else do we receive this kind of feeding but as a part of the visible church:

“Almighty and everliving God,
we thank you for feeding us with the spiritual food
of the most precious Body and Blood
of your Son our Savior Jesus Christ;
and for *assuring us in these holy mysteries
that *we are living members of the Body of your Son,
and heirs of your eternal kingdom.
And now, Father, send us out
to do the work you have given us to do,
to love and serve you
as faithful witnesses of Christ our Lord.
To him, to you, and to the Holy Spirit,
be honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen.”
[*Emphasis mine.]

Michael Horton

Additionally, Horton, a Reformation scholar and author, provides great insight into abiding. 

“Through the centuries many have emphasized the Christian life as the imitation of Christ. There are certainly calls to imitate Christ’s humility and service in the New Testament. However, even these imperatives are based on the indicative fact of union. In other words, Jesus Christ is not simply a great man, even a divine man, who calls us to become like him. The gospel proclaims something far more wonderful than the law of moral striving. It announces that all who are in Christ are actually coheirs with him of his estate, members of his body. Grafted by the Spirit onto the Vine, we bear fruit that is not just like his own, as if he were merely a model to imitate, but is in fact the fruit that ripens from the sap of his own eschatological life, because he is our covenant head” - Michael Horton Pilgrim Theology Kindle pg. 273

“The legal or forensic aspect of this union remains the basis for the mystical and organic effects. As in marriage, the legal transfer of identity and possessions secures the relationship of growing trust and mutual communion. Every subjective blessing that we experience within us is the result of Christ’s objective work for us, outside of us, in history. We are not declared righteous legally nor caused to abide in Christ forensically because we bear the fruit of the Spirit, but vice versa. We do not base our assurance of God’s favor on our experience of growth in godliness; rather, we experience and grow in godliness because we are assured of God’s favor” - Michael Horton Pilgrim Theology Kindle pg.278

IV. Abiding in Christ brings rest

This passage is comforting because the imperative to abide and to remain attached to the vine by faith is grounded in the great indicative truths of the person and work of Christ as described in the White Horse Inn Episode - “I Am The Vine”. At around the 11 minute mark, great emphasis is placed on Christ referring to His declarative work. “The source of our purity is not found in ourselves at all, but rather in Christ’s declarative announcement ‘ Already you are clean because of the word I have spoken to you’”. The podcast episode goes on to mention that this declarative work ought to determine the tone one takes with the entire passage. It is not a threatening or menacing tone, but one of comfort. “Our righteousness is in Christ. He is our righteousness - be it His passive or active obedience - all of it is credited to us on account of Christ..” (Min 15)

Consider how the Gospel Transformation ESV Study Bible draws the reader to the comfort found in this passage:

John 15:1-11 - “The metaphor of vine and branches underscores how our salvation, from beginning to end, is all of grace. Jesus is the faithful remnant of Israel - the true Vine and fruitful Vineyard. By the Spirit’s presence in our lives, we have entered into an organic union with him - a union of branches to Vine. We are engrafted into the true Israel. Our lives are hidden with Christ in God. Here Jesus says that he chose his disciples to be his branches; they did not choose him. This reminds us that our calling, as Christ’s present disciples, is not to trumpet our wise decisions but simply to abide - to dwell, to marinate, to go “deeper still” into Jesus. For apart from Jesus, we can do nothing and will bear no fruit. Failing to abide in Jesus does not suggest the possibility of losing one’s salvation; rather it underscores that salvation can be found nowhere else. Continuance in Christ is a test of reality. The Bible teaches both the perseverance of the saints and that true saints will persevere. We strive ahead, yet even that striving is a gift of grace.”

John 15:12-17 - “Jesus defines the life of abiding as a life of love. Just as the Father loves Jesus, so Jesus loves us. Jesus loves us just as much as the Father loves him. We cannot earn Jesus’ love. Our obedience to Jesus merits nothing but profits greatly. Jesus’ commands are not burdensome, for they are for our best, and he has fulfilled the demands and the judgment of God’s law that could condemn us. The radical grace of the gospel transforms servanthood into friendship. Only grace can free us to obey Jesus out of friendship and worship, and no longer out of fear or self-interest”

We know that we are in Christ: dead and my life is hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3). Our identity is legally engulfed in Christ, so that when the Father sees me, all He sees is His own beloved Son in Whom He is well pleased.

Christ’s objective historical work for me on the cross provides for us the metanarrative for abiding in Christ. I know that I am united to Christ by faith alone.. My fruit bearing was effected in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. The Bible makes it very clear that we draw near to God through Christ by faith. We are to continue in Christ the same way we have received Him - by faith:

“Therefore as you received Christ Jesus, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving” - Colossians 2: 6

The presupposition for abiding is not suspicion but comfort. Consider what Martin Luther says in his sermons on The Gospel of St. John Chapters 14-16:

“You see, this is how the Lord Christ comforts Himself as He is now about to enter upon His suffering and to go to the cross. The comfort He has typifies and exemplifies our comfort: ‘I, of course, am the true Vine, a Vine unquestionably dear to my Father, and you are the vine branches dear to Me and My Father If ever a vine was carefully and faithfully fertilized, pruned, and trimmed, it is I’”.

“What more do we want? Is it not comforting and kindly enough that the Father so sincerely befriends us as His dear fine and branches? Any evil or harm that might afflict them would also afflict Him. He so governs and guides affairs that whatever happens to me rebounds both to My benefit and to yours”

Listen to Michael Horton on our identity in Christ:

“This new identity is not something we achieve by converting ourselves or by trying to enter into it. It is given to us graciously by God, apart from and outside of ourselves. … Before, righteousness made no claims on us to which we could respond favorably, but now, because we are united to Christ, new affections and new loyalties produce new service.

It is important to realize that Christ does not come to improve the old self, to guide and redirect it to a better life; he comes to kill us, in order to raise us to newness of life. He is not the friend of the old self, only too happy to be of service. He is its mortal enemy, bent on replacing it with a new self. ” ~Union with Christ by Michael Horton, Ph.D.

And on a Twitter post dated 2018 he said, “The point Jesus makes in John 15 is that we are in fact not just diseased but dead branches. We have no life in ourselves. But when grafted onto him-the true and living Vine, we come to life and bear fruit that will last.”

He reiterates what the Reformers taught. Because of Christ, we are new creations. We have been justified. We have been and are being sanctified. And we will be glorified, all based on His own good work for and in us. “He who began a good work in you is faithful to complete it.” In our new lives, we produce the obedience and good works He prepared in advance for us to do, not for merit, but as an added benefit of being in Christ. There is nothing to fear. There is only security in knowing who we are in Christ. Abiding means partaking of Him and all of His saving benefits in the context of His body of believers for a lifetime. When we receive the love of God in Christ, we abide in Him, and He abides with us.

In conclusion, we do not believe that the idea of abiding in Christ should bring the believer a sense of distrust, suspicion, or gloom. The Word of God and our Reformed doctrine provide us with this hope. It is because Jesus abides in us that we assuredly abide in Him. Abiding is an organic relationship: Vine to branches. As we are in Him, we live and remain. We abide.

I’ll close with these assuring words again from Horton: “Although we are justified by Christ’s external righteousness imputed to us, our Savior does not remain outside of us, simply leading the way to a better life; rather, we live in him and therefore in and for each other. “I am the vine; you are the branches,” says Jesus. “Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing” (v. 5). This “abiding” is not something that believers can move in and out of: one moment abiding and another moment not abiding. …Abiding is simply a synonym for faith: cleaving to Christ for all of our life. He is not simply a distant example in history, but our living head in heaven.”