JESUS PARTING WORDS THE CHALLENGES. 1. Love a. Love one another as I have loved you John 13:34-35 & 15:12

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1 Blackhawk Church Encounter Bible Study John Lesson 16 March 6, 2013 Bonnie Chester JESUS PARTING WORDS THE CHALLENGES I. The Setting II. Obedience 14:15: If you love me, you will obey what I command 14:23: If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. 1 John 2:3-6 Ephesians 2:8-10 Good work and good works are to grace what a pail is to water: a container to get it from the well to the supper table. God s grace is the content. Our work (after the manner of Jesus) is the container. -- Eugene Peterson A. What does Christ command? 1. Love a. Love one another as I have loved you John 13:34-35 & 15:12 b. Love God, love others Matthew 22: What is love? a. Jesus is our example 1. Serving others 2. Loving even our enemies 3. Turning the other cheek 4. Forgiving others 5. Sacrificing for others b. 1 Corinthians 13 B. How do we do this? 1. Love is the motivation for our obedience We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4:19 Love provokes love. J. M. Boice

2 2. The Holy Spirit the Helper called in to help in times of trouble or need 3. Remain in Jesus III. The Vine (15:1-17) A. Jesus says I am the true vine 1. Israel had always been referred to as the vine a. The vine represented Israel, the covenant people of God b. Planted and tended by God so Israel would produce fruit Psalm 80:8, Isaiah 5:1-7, Jeremiah 2:21 c. The vine was an important symbol in Jewish culture: on coins, featured in artwork at the Temple 2. Jesus is taking the place of Israel as the true vine a. You can t be saved by your Jewish heritage b. You can only be saved by faith in Jesus those connected to Jesus are also part of the vine 3. Remain in me, and I will remain in you must be intimately attached to Jesus a.. For bearing fruit 1. 15:16 I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit 2. 15:5 If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. The command is to remain in Christ 3. Bearing fruit is the inevitable result of close relationship with Jesus b. Ultimately what he wants is YOU c. How do we remain in Christ? 1. Spiritual Disciplines a. Solitude b. Bible study c. Prayer d. Community with other believers 2. Grace and the Gospel

3 B. Cuts off branches that don t bear fruit 1. The Jews who didn t accept him 2. Those who are not truly believers Fruit-bearing is not a test; that is, a branch does not have to demonstrate a level of productivity to be safe from destruction. Rather, fruit-bearing is a byproduct To be connected to the vine means that the life of Jesus is flowing through us, and this leads to fruitfulness. Fruitfulness will be the inevitable outcome of an interior spiritual life with Jesus. -- Gary Burge C. Branches that do bear fruit are pruned required for bearing more fruit 1. Pain is an invitation for growth a. Romans 5:3-4-- We also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. (NIV) b. James 1: Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way. (Msg) 2. Cling to Jesus, the vine IV. Persecution (15:18-16:4) A. A history of being persecuted 1. First-century Christians 2. Throughout history and now B. Why? 1. The world is suspicious of nonconformity 2. We claim exclusivity I am the way and the truth and the life. 3. We claim absolute truth in a post-modern world 4. Our primary allegiance is to Christ instead of anything in this world

4 R & R: Reflect on God s immense love for you (see the following pages). What difference does this make to you, especially when you face these challenges Jesus puts forth (such as obedience, suffering, persecution)? Bibliography: Barclay, William. The Daily Study Bible Series: The Gospel of John, Volume 2. Philadelphia, PA: The Westminster Press, Boice, James M. The Gospel of John, Volume 4. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, Burge, Gary. The NIV Application Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, Keller, Timothy. I am the Vine : sermon on John 15:1-17. December 6, Willard, Dallas. The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives. New York, NY: HarperCollins, Wright, N. T. John for Everyone, Part 2. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, ESV Study Bible. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, Website:

5 The extravagance of God s love for you: Romans 8: For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (NIV) Ephesians 3: I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (NIV) 1 John 3:1 How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! (NIV) 1 John 4: This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. (NIV) Grace & obedience: Ephesians 2: It wasn t so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. You let the world, which doesn t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience. We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat. It s a wonder God didn t lose his temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, he embraced us. He took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. He did all this on his own, with no help from us! Then he picked us up and set us down in highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It s God s gift from start to finish! We don t play the major role. If we did, we d probably go around bragging that we d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing. (The Message)

6 Encouragement during suffering: Psalm 34:18 18 If your heart is broken, you ll find God right there; if you re kicked in the gut, he ll help you catch your breath. (The Message) Isaiah 41:10 10 So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (NIV) 2 Corinthians 4: So we re not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without his unfolding grace. These hard times are small potatoes compared to the coming good times, the lavish celebration prepared for us. There s far more here than meets the eye. The things we see now are here today, gone tomorrow. But the things we can t see now will last forever. (The Message) 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 [The Lord] said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (NIV) 2 Corinthians 12:9 My grace is enough; it s all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness. (The Message) Dearest Jesus, Teach us to be generous to serve you as you deserve to give and not to count the cost to fight and not to heed the wounds to labor and not to seek for any reward except to know that we are doing your holy will. -- St. Ignatius