John 15:1-17
Jesus gave this parable as an illustration of how His Father would separate the Church from the world. Jesus is the true vine; that is, the life giver, and His Father is the husbandman; that is, the One who planted the Vine in the world.
The branches represent the people of the world. The fruit represents the life and good works of the Church. Those branches that symbolize the people of the world who will not allow the life of Christ to flow into them to give them life and fruit, the Father cuts them off, and they die and are burned. The life of Christ flows into the branches that represents the Church and supplies the Church with life and fruit. God even purges the sins of the Church so that it can produce even more fruit.
In verse 3, Jesus informed His disciples that they were clean because they had received His Word. Jesus meant that these members of His Church would be washed clean of sin by His blood through the power of the Holy Spirit, the Living Word. Since God is eternal, He often spoke in His Word of works He would do as if He had already done them, and in a sense, He has already accomplished all of His eternal purposes. John 17:4 provides a perfect example of the eternal sense of God's Word.
In verses 4 and 5, our Lord taught that His life was absolutely essential to the life and fruit bearing powers of the Church. In verse 3, Christ alludes to His shed blood which is essential for the cleansing of His Church. In verses 4 and 5, Christ alludes to His resurrection which is essential to the eternal life of the Church.
Our Lord does not teach in verse 6 that a saved person can lose his salvation. By the phrase, "If a man abide not in me...," Jesus simply meant those branches that never received life from Him in the first place.
In verse 7, Jesus did not mean that a believer could ask God for whatever he wanted, such as riches, and get it. Verse 8 clarifies verse 7. Jesus meant that the Church could ask God for whatever it needed to bear fruit and spread the gospel, and God would supply that need. But these verses also mean that sometimes God will give an individual believer something for which he has asked.
Verses 9-14 do not mean that those who fail to keep Christ's commandments will lose God's love. God absolutely loves everyone. Christ meant, as verse 11 shows, that Church members who separate themselves from the world, obey Him, and live for Him will be certain to experience constant fellowship with Him, feeling that special love and joy that comes only from the Holy Spirit. Believers who backslide into sin do not feel God's love except at times when God rebukes them and chastises them.
In verses 15 through 17, our Lord teaches that He considers the members of His Church to be His friends and not His servants. However, the friends of the Lord will serve Him because they love Him.
The phrase in verse 16, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you...," does not mean that God has predestined those who will be saved and those who will be lost. Both John 6:37 and 1:12 deny this Calvinistic interpretation. This phrase simply means that no one can get saved except by the sacrifice of Christ and through the power of the Holy Spirit. For example, it is possible that a person could sincerely repent and call on God for Christ's salvation, but if God chose not to save him, he would not be saved. But according to John 6:37, God never does that. God has promised that whosoever sincerely repents and puts his faith in Christ will never be denied salvation. John 6:37 and 1:12, as well as other scriptures, guarantee the freedom of the individual to obtain Christ's salvation through sincere repentance and faith.
Jesus ends His parable with a commandment that His followers love each other. Jesus bases His commandment on verses 9 and 12 where our Lord provides His Church with the awesome assurance that He loves His Church to the same degree that His Father loves Him. The grace of God is truly amazing.
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