Connected To The Vine.

So what's up, guys. I'm Pastor Isaiah. I preached this morning also, so I'm a little on the tired side. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to overcompensate with a bunch of jokes. And this is how it goes, okay. Laying some ground rules down, some boundaries. If I tell a joke and you don't laugh, I'm going five minutes longer every time.

All right, we're good. We got it. We're catching on right away. I appreciate that. That's the stuff. So we get out a little bit early today, you know, get to watch the game. Also, when I got here, I was made aware that there is a possibility that there's a stool. So I'm gonna use it. I'm gonna sit down. I'm gonna be one of the cool ones.

So I just wanna talk to you guys a little bit about your pastor. She's. I can say this because like I don't go here. She's like the coolest pastor in the whole city. So you guys, you guys are really really blessed to have Abbie as your pastor. To have Pastor Abbie leading you guys. She's so cool. Yeah, she got on the screen and I was like okay flex. Okay light flex. Cambodia, wait Thailand, about to go to Cambodia. See I get them all mixed up. You know, she's just world traveler, the coolest. So treat her well. I know you guys do, but treat her super well, because yeah, she's dope.

We'll take her if you don't want her. Yeah, that's not a joke. Like I wasn't. I mean, it seemed like that part wasn't a joke. We will take her if you don't want her. So appreciate your pastor.

Okay. Can you guys, you guys can promise me that, you know. All right. Awesome. So speaking of how awesome your pastor is, she gave me some stuff to preach about. She said, you guys are in a deeply formed series right now. So I said, bet. All right. Yeah. Let me whip up a little sermon, you know, and come to find out she preached exactly the same message four weeks ago. Yeah. She's four weeks ahead of me. So I'm going to still preach it. And if you have not yet heard the sermon, it was the first sermon of the year. We're going to be out of John 15, verses 5 through 8.

Y'all are on it. That's what's up. Y'all pulled out your Bibles right away. There was no transition into like, serious, you guys are on it. That's what's up. So John chapter 15, verses 5 through 8. And if you did not, if you were not here and or you did not hear that sermon, go and listen to it. It is a powerful sermon. I was tremendously blessed by it. Abbie gave me some notes and some pointers through her sermon on how to preach mine better today. So we're going to do that. I'm going to say a quick prayer and then we're going to get right into it. That cool. All right.

God, I just thank you so much for today. God, I thank you so much for the opportunity to be in a room full of like-minded individuals who want to get closer to you, God. I thank you for Pastor Abbie and just pray for her over all of her travels, God. And I know that your will is being done through her, God. So we just thank you for that, God. And I thank you for today's service and the sermon today that once again, just that your will be done, God. I just ask that your word penetrate the hearts of everyone who is listening, God, in the way that you need them. God, I just pray that whoever people are praying to win the Super Bowl, that their team wins. In Jesus' name, amen.

Yeah, so I'm going to read this verse, and we're going to get going. So John 15, verses 5 through 8.

I am the vine. You are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit. Apart from me, you can do nothing. If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers. Such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. This is to my father's glory that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

John 15:5-8

The great resignation and spiritual fulfillment

So the year of 2021 was coined, a lot of years get coined with phrases, but one of them was the great resignation, the great resignation. Folks were leaving and quitting their jobs left and right. I remember reading an article that was attempting to be like a resource to bosses and managers to help them try to figure out how to keep their employees there at their jobs. Most of them were extremely unsuccessful. I find it no coincidence that the great resignation directly followed the pandemic and the quarantine. You guys remember that.

I was there. Yeah, it was a lot. The quarantine gave everybody an opportunity to sit down and really take account of their life. I believe a lot of people were displeased with what they found. That they had lived a whole lot of life doing a whole bunch of stuff and completed a whole bunch of nothing. You guys heard of midlife crisis. What's the average age in here. Like 24. So y'all having like quarter life crises now. Yeah, we know about those.

So we coined a new phrase, the mid-life crisis. So we all understand. I believe that people were quitting their jobs at record numbers because they didn't feel fulfilled at their job and they didn't feel fulfilled in their life. And I believe that they believed another job would bring them that fulfillment and peace that they were lacking. I'm sure for some people finding another job will be the exact thing that you need to kind of kick start on the right track.

But a lot of people, that wasn't the case. In 2023, people were staying at their jobs, but job satisfaction only rose by 2%. Folks were staying at their jobs a little longer, but still, one study said that 60% of workers were emotionally detached. 60% emotionally detached from their jobs and 19% said it was miserable. Mental health clinics today in this city are so requested they no longer have waiting lists. It can be months before you can get an appointment.

All of this to say, I believe that in 2021 people said, I'm not happy. I think the reason is my job. And in 2022 and 2023, they said, maybe it's not my job. Maybe it's something else. And I think today we're still looking. I would argue it's the lack of a close connection and being connected to Jesus Christ. So my message to you this evening is very simple. It is that we must remain connected to the vine and must remain connected to Jesus.

Bearing fruit through connection

There's a few things that happen when we stay connected to the vine. The verse says the first thing is in the verse is that we bear much fruit. Jesus refers to us as branches and I don't know if you know this, but branches will only be able to bear the fruit of the vine or the tree that they're connected to. Have you ever seen a banana grown out of an apple tree. If you have, take a picture, you'll go viral. Take a video, sorry. That would be really strange. You've never seen that. You will never be able to produce what is not already inside of you. Appreciate that. I'm gonna say it again. You will never be able to produce what is not already inside of you.

And we know from Paul's letters in Galatians the fifth chapter that the fruit of the spirit is the antithesis of the desires of our flesh, the things that we want to do. And then what happens when we are connected to the vine, we bear this fruit. Galatians 5:22-23 says:

But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Galatians 5:22-23

So for our better understanding, we could reread the scripture as I am the vine, you are the branches. If you remain in me and I am in you, you will take on my character. Amen. Amen.

The second thing that happens that we can find here in the verse is that when we bear the fruit of the spirit, which is the nature and the character of Jesus, we show ourselves to be his disciples. Verse eight says, this is to my father's glory that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. And I don't know about you, but I would love to live my life going into a grocery store or a gas station or a bank and to have a simple conversation and for me to leave and the person wonder, am I a Christian. That guy must be a Christian. Have you ever met somebody like that. Have you ever met a stranger, maybe in a grocery store or at a restaurant, and then you're like, Eddie, yeah. That was kind of nice, like a little too nice, but not in like a fake way, you know what I'm saying.

It was genuine, but I don't know if I could trust. That kind of, you know, I might be the only one who wants to live a life like that, but I hope that when I go places, that's what it is. Matthew chapter 7, you don't have to turn to these. Matthew chapter 7, verses 15 through 16 says:

Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits.

Matthew 7:15-16

The only differentiating factor between a false prophet or the ravenous wolf and a disciple of God is their willingness and ability to bear the fruit and the character of God. They will know us by our fruit. Amen. Our words and our testimony will be validated by our fruit. Have you ever had an experience where you're talking to someone about church and you're like, you know, maybe you were inviting them to church. Maybe you were just talking about church and they kind of like, you know, maybe they had some some bad experiences. Maybe they don't view the church in a great light.

When you have those comments, most of the time when I encounter someone like that, I usually find that they have that disposition because they feel that Christians are fake or hypocrites or kind of mean. Another way to say it is we do a whole bunch of talking, but ain't a lot of fruit showing. Amen. They will know us by our fruit. So one of the benefits of abiding in Christ is that we look like Christians. We don't just say that we're Christians.

Answered prayer through abiding

The third thing that I'm going to talk about, the result that this passage points to when we remain in Christ, is that our prayers get answered. The scripture says, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. I would like to point our attention to the first half of verse seven. There it says, if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you can ask whatever you wish. When we remain in him, when we stay connected to the vine, when we abide in Christ, we begin to see God answering our prayers left and right.

And I want to be very clear. I don't want to mischaracterize God. I don't want to, God's not a vending machine, right. Sometimes we kind of believe like, okay, well, I went to church four times in the first quarter of the year. I prayed before most of my meals. I didn't cuss at that person who cut me off on the road. So like, that's like, that's got to be like two answered prayers worth. I mean, that's got to be like, that's like just kind of like, no, God is not a vending machine. But our prayers become effective not by our strength, but because we pray the prayers that God has for us.

When we read the Bible, the word of God is getting in you. If you remain in me and my word remain in you, when we read the Bible, that is a practice of us partaking in God's word remaining or abiding in us. So when we read the Bible, the more we read, the more of his words remain in us. The more of his words remain in us. Have you ever prayed a prayer and didn't know why you prayed it. Like, have you ever been praying for someone and then just like, often, you're just like, yeah, as I'm praying, I just kind of pray for their family and don't know why, but that's an example of praying the prayers that God has and that the Holy Spirit has for us. They are his prayers, his words from his desires of his heart.

It's my understanding that last week you guys talked about the desires of the heart. Am I right about that. So when we remain in Jesus, we bear much fruit. We show ourselves to be his disciples and we begin to pray and to speak the will of God.

The Greek word meno and three steps to abiding

So now I'm going to get a little bit nerdy. Your pastor is really nerdy. She's like the coolest, but like she loves the Bible. Like, yeah, she's like, it's like, okay, we get it. You know, if you were, if you were able to hear, if you were fortunate enough. That's what I was looking for. If you were fortunate enough to hear the message at the beginning of the year, Pastor Abbie talked about the words remain and abide are translated from the Greek word meno. And I actually learned this from the sermon, that the word meno is used 63 times across over 30 verses in the book of John. I don't think that that's by accident. I believe that John, the writer of this particular book, is trying to make a point here.

So I want to present just a little deep dive in the word, short exposition in the Greek word meno. And we're going to use a few of its uses in the book of John to bring out just three practical steps. These are not the only practical steps. This is like the Bible is like really like it's like a lot, you know, double-edged sword, like, you know, the verse. And what's really cool about it is you can read the same verse over and over again and get continue to get meaning out of it. Amen.

So this is not by any means the full extent of abide and remain. But here are just three. So one of the times that this word was used is in John chapter one, verses 38 and 39. I'm just going to read it. It won't be on the screen. So it says when Jesus turned. Sorry, let me give a little background and context. Jesus is walking down the street and John the Baptist, a few of John the Baptist disciples see Jesus and they go, hey, ain't that Jesus. And the other one goes, yeah. And then they start following him. Yeah, a little sus. So I mean obviously it it was okay, but like I'd be weirded out. So when Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them what are you looking for. So they're following him and Jesus is like, y'all good. All right. They said to him, Rabbi, which is translated, which translated means teacher. Where are you staying. And he said come and see. And then they came and saw where they were staying and they remained with him that day. The word remained is right there is they abode with him that day. That's what the King James version says. So they stayed with him that night. They stayed in the same house.

That was that Greek word, meno. The disciples here understood something very, very important. They understood that there was something different about Jesus, and they wanted to get to know him. We're following. Amen. Yeah. With me. The disciples saw Jesus. They said, there's something different about that guy. They want to get to know more about him. So they literally just followed him. And then they stayed where he was staying. The disciples understood the power of proximity. There is power in proximity.

We understand this concept. Remember the popular kids at school. Everybody wanted to sit at the popular table. Y'all didn't have a popular table. Why y'all looking around like that. Why y'all act like y'all know what I'm talking about. Oh, y'all were the popular kids. I get it. I get it. I get it. Y'all were like, mm-mm, not me. I didn't want to sit at the popular table. Okay, well, I'm going to speak for myself. I'm going to speak for my own experience. I really wanted to sit at the popular table for no other reason except I thought that if I just spent time around the popular kids that I would, you know, popularity would wear off on me a little bit. And then people would start seeing me as popular.

We understand this in celebrity culture. Some of y'all spent thousands of dollars going to see Beyonce. Yeah, we're going to be quiet on that one. No judgments. But we understand the power of proximity. Twitch is something that's really interesting to me because Twitch, you know, live streaming gives us the sensation that we're like right there with them, right. That we're close in some way to people. And people, I mean, making entire careers from live streaming and giving the sensation or the impression, and not in a negative way, of that closeness. There's power in proximity. So something that we can gather from this particular use of the word meno in the book of John is to get a little closer to Jesus. Get a little closer.

You read. If the only Bible you read is right now, when the pastor says turn to the Bible, if that's the only Bible you read this week, just read a little bit more. One or two verses. It's not going to hurt you. Amen. Read a little more. If the only time you pray is at your parents' house before dinner, pray for breakfast. Pray a little bit more, just a little. Get a little closer. You only come to church three times, three, four times a year. You only came to church on Super Bowl Sunday. I don't know because I don't come. You know what I'm saying. I'm like, here, I got another church. So, you know, no judgments for me. I don't know. I'm not even looking at nobody. You only come to church on Super Bowl Sunday. Just pick another Sunday to come. Come a little bit more. Get a little bit closer. Get a little bit closer to the word of God. Get a little bit closer to the character of God. Get a little bit closer to people who are going after God with all that they have, just get a little bit closer. And the closer you get, the more you become like.

I'm sure many of us have heard the statistics that the five people you spend the most time with are who you will become, period. That's who you will become, five people you spend the most time with. Get a little bit closer to God. Amen.

Another instance of the word meno that we can see in scripture is found in John chapter 14 verses 23. And Jesus answered them. So this is Jesus talking. Those who love me will keep my word and my father will love them. And we will come to them and make our home with them. King James version says we will make our abode with him.

As a society, we be lying. We be lying. And I think a lot of y'all in this room be lying, too. I know. I'm going somewhere. Just follow me. Don't get offended. Not yet. Wait until the end. Wait until I finish. Y'all be lying. It's all I know.

Have you ever said the phrase, make yourself at home. You lie. I'll prove it. If you tell me to make myself at home and I take off my shirt and start scratching my belly and go through your refrigerator, you're probably going to be a little bit upset. That'll be the last time I come over your house, right. But we say it anyways. Make yourself at home. You don't believe that. You would be offended. I don't want my parents coming to my house and making themselves at home, right. How disrespectful of me, right. Like, you know, they raised me. I, you know, I had their home. I don't want my parents acting like they act when I'm not around. I don't want that. Y'all don't want that.

That's how we treat God. We say God come into my life. Oh I love you so much Jesus. Just come fill my heart. Make yourself at home. Oh not that closet. Oh yeah. Not that one. No that's the one that I just kind of store a bunch of stuff in before my my friends come over. Yeah, you know, everybody's got like a junk drawer. You know I'm saying. Maybe you're maybe you're really holy and you don't. But I have a junk drawer. Don't go into the junk drawer. You know what I'm saying. Don't go into the closet that I just kind of threw stuff in before you [inaudible]. Don't go in there, God. But yeah, make yourself at home. Yeah. Anything that you see, yeah. Everything that you, you know, like the Lion King, like everything that the light touches. But we just like put stuff away in other rooms so that God doesn't see it. Don't go in there. Ooh, not that issue. So it was almost a close one. It's got me there.

We tell God to make himself at home in our lives, but we mean it just as much as you telling me that today. Be real with God. Let him all the way in. Let him see the whole house. Give God the tour. Give him the tour. I'm going to tell you in a little bit of a secret. Here's a secret, okay. Nobody else. He already knows. I know, that's insider information. You only know that when you get like, when you become a pastor, you know, I'm just an associate pastor, but like when you become like a pastor, like they let you know, like just let you know, like God knows. That was a joke, okay. Just want to make it clear. That was a joke, okay.

God knows everything that's going on. He knows all the things that you're hiding from him. But he won't touch it unless you show him. Let him in. Be honest. Make yourself, let God make himself at home for real, for real. Oh, you're going to have to do some cleaning. Oh, yeah. You're going to have to do some moving some furniture around. It's worth it. Amen.

And be honest. Be honest with your community. The message I preached this morning was on peace. And I talked about how a lot of times when you meet Christians, specifically I guess like of a certain generation or whatever, you know, like, hey, how you doing today. Oh, I'm good. Blessing, highly favored. Ain't nobody can tell me. The devil trying to stop me. He can't stop me. Hallelujah. Amen. Amen. Amen. Nothing wrong with that. I just want to. That cool. But every day. Every day. Every day be real. Be honest. Amen. Let them in. Show God the real you.

From the first, uh, uh, the first one of the practical steps that we can take from this little word study on meno is to get a little bit closer to God. The next one is show the real you. And there's just only one more.

This is actually, I don't think I've ever preached a message this short. Have I preached a message this short, Israel. That's my brother right there. God is good. To y'all, maybe God. God really loves y'all today. Y'all are blessed, that's what's up. And you guys have been laughing too, so you know, I appreciate it, I really do.

The last one we can find in John chapter 6 verse 27 says, do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. That word endure is the Greek word meno, the same word that we use for abide and remain. So we need to get a little bit closer to Jesus, show Jesus the real you, and also we need to depend on Jesus, like depend on him. Because Jesus is the only one that can give us food that lasts forever. Amen. The actual point that I wrote here was, depend on God. Let him do his thing.

Becoming like Jesus through abiding

When we remain in Jesus, we begin to think, feel, and act more and more like him every single day. We bear the fruit of the Spirit, we show ourselves to be his disciples and we begin to pray his will over our lives and the lives of everyone around us. Just a few practical ways that we can abide and remain in the love of Christ, the love that God has for us is get a little bit closer, be honest with God and and let him do his thing.

There might be somebody here that's like, yeah, yeah, cool, cool, cool. That sounds good. But like, I need to clean up my house a little bit first. Like there's some stuff I got to do first, some stuff I got to get right. This is something I say all the time at my church. And hear my heart, hear the whole thing. You don't need less of the world. You need more of Jesus. You don't need really strong, really strong statement. Please take it as I'm saying it. You don't need less sin. You need more Jesus. Amen.

As you get more and more Jesus, the pruning that Pastor Abbie talked about a few weeks ago gets a lot easier because you're close to God. You act like him. You take on some of his character. And eventually everything else just doesn't taste as good. I don't really want to do that anymore. Amen.

Closing prayer

Let's pray. Thank you, Holy Spirit. I just, I'm going to challenge everyone right now, actually. Let's just take the next few minutes and whatever area in your life, whatever area in your house that you don't, you really, really don't want God to see. Maybe it's embarrassing. Maybe you're not ready to change. Whatever it is. Just for the next few seconds, let's give those things to God. Again, He already knows. Let's just open the door.

So just over the next few minutes, let's just. And it can be in your own words. If you don't know what to pray, just talk to God like you would talk to me. I'm going to go to the next one. Doing that. I want to challenge you to take the next step and give it to God. Depend on Him to do what He's gonna do.

God, I come to you. God, we all come to you in a prayer of agreement with each and every one of us who are searching our hearts for the things in our life that's not quite like you. God, I just ask for the courage to be real with you and to depend on you for everything that we need. I don't want to do anything on my own strength, God. Let's just spend just a few more seconds.