Episode 292: The Life Source You're Looking For

Welcome to Harbor West. My name is Tyler. Today's our last Sunday in our sermon series that we've been.

It's called What You're Looking For. And so for the past five Sundays now, we've been going through the I Am statements of Jesus in John.

And it's been said, He's the bread of life. He's the light of the world. He's the door. He's the good shepherd.

He's the way, the truth, and the life.

And this morning, we're going to be looking at the very last I am statement of Jesus in the book of John.

So if you have a Bible, go ahead and turn to John 15.

If you're using one of the Bibles underneath the chair in front of you,

John 15 is going to be on page 958.

All right.

Before we get into today's text, I have a question.

Who's ready for winter in Hawaii?

Who's ready for winter?

By show of hands.

all right if you're if you're expectantly waiting for for winter uh just like me maybe you're a

surfer i don't know or maybe you're just you just like being hot i i don't know whatever the case is

but um it's actually uh this season with it being at the the end of august and about to be in

september uh it's put me in this weird funk because i know holidays are right around the corner

like Christmas is so close

but it's still a little too early

to break out the tree

and I think

I think part of the reason why I've been feeling

just okay

like I'm not, nothing's wrong

but nothing has been that

great either and I think the

reason why I'm feeling that way is because

I'm ready to experience the joy

of the holiday seasons

and some of you might know

exactly what that feels like

catching little moments of joy here and there,

almost like a little snack that you munch on,

but it doesn't really fully satisfy you

like a good steak and potato meal normally does.

And I wonder if maybe the reason why we're not feeling that joy

a lot of the times is because we're convinced

that there's something better.

If you're honest, feeling Jesus kind of feels more like a duty

and an obligation than your delight.

Maybe it's something your parents did, you did now,

but now you're just coasting,

waiting to experience that type of joy.

Maybe you do believe it.

Maybe you're just tired of waiting for that joy to show up.

You're tired of hearing about this joy,

but not feeling it.

And so in the meantime, you've decided to just coast.

You decided to chase other things that give you results right now,

even if they only last for a moment.

But what if following Jesus and making him our delight

is how we experience humongous, large amounts of joy

and to pursue anything or anyone else apart from Jesus

is how we deny ourselves the opportunity to experience the most joyful life possible.

That's how Jesus sees it.

If you look at verse 11 of the text that we're reading today,

Jesus finishes giving all of us all of these I am statements.

He gives all of the I am statements and then he finishes off with,

I have told you these things so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.

And so that is what Jesus is offering you this morning.

The most joyful life possible.

The type of joy that you don't have to wait on until Christmas.

The type of joy that you can experience this morning.

and so I'm going to pray that this would be true for us.

Father, we thank you that you don't keep it a secret

how to experience joy in this life.

But Lord, we know that if we don't find our joy through you

and we try to find our joy through other things,

that we are never going to experience the full abundant amount of joy

that we were always meant to experience.

And so Lord, would you open our eyes

and our hearts this morning

so that we would be able to see you clearly

and so that we could be filled with your joy.

We ask all of this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

All right, here's the last I am statement in John.

Again, we're looking at John 15, verse one.

So let's read together.

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

Now, remember, Jesus is saying all of these things.

I am the bread of life.

I'm the good shepherd.

I'm the way, the truth, and the life.

I am the true vine because he wants his joy to be in us.

He wants our joy to be complete.

And that's why he wants us to know that he's the true vine,

because that's how we receive large amounts, unlimited amounts of joy.

But the question is, what does Jesus actually mean by this?

Now, a lot of us might be quick to assume that he's talking about his relationship with us,

the type of relationship that Jesus has with his followers.

And that's certainly part of it.

But to properly understand and appreciate what Jesus is saying,

we have to have a solid understanding of the Old Testament scriptures.

The symbol of a vine is deeply rooted in the Old Testament.

It's used to represent God's people, Israel.

Whenever you read through Psalm 80, you see that God calls Israel the vine.

It says that he brought a vine out of Egypt.

That's how Israel came into being.

Out of a harsh and desolate, hostile environment,

God establishes life.

He establishes his vine.

That's what he did, right?

He rescued them.

He redeemed them from slavery.

He led them through the wilderness.

He gave them a land to call their own.

Out of nothing, God planted a vine.

He planted an entire nation of people.

But here's the catch.

Every single time God calls Israel the vine,

it's always a rebuke.

Israel was supposed to be a vine.

He told them multiple times.

He told them to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

But they failed to be that blessing.

They worshiped idols.

and failed to be the life-given source,

the source of life that they were created to be.

And in Jeremiah, God rebukes them.

He calls them, he calls his entire nation of people wild and corrupt vines.

And so this language of the vine continues all throughout the Bible,

but it's always used in a negative sense.

It's always used to highlight the worthlessness of his people.

And so now in John 15, Jesus picks up using the same language and the same metaphor,

only now the symbol that was previously used to rebuke his people,

he's using to represent his nature, who he is.

He's saying that life is found through me now.

It was supposed to be you, it was supposed to be Israel,

but you can't bring life to yourself.

And so look no further.

I'm here.

I'm the true vine.

I'm the source of life.

If you come to me and find life through me,

you're going to find everything that you're looking for.

But if you try to find life through anything or anyone else,

you're going to wither away.

And Jesus, he says that to them, but he's also saying that to all of us here.

Life is found through Jesus.

Joy, complete joy is found through Jesus.

But by calling himself the true vine, he's also telling us something extremely practical about who he is.

He's telling us that if you stay connected to me,

you're gonna experience the most abundant joy.

And it's not just a metaphor that we can think about.

He actually gives us practical instructions

on how to live this out

so that we can continue to stay connected to Jesus

in a way that's actually life-giving.

You can be connected to Jesus.

in a way that actually doesn't bring you life,

doesn't bring you joy or happiness or love or patience or kindness.

And so to stay connected to Jesus in a way that actually brings us life,

he gives us the instructions right in front of us in the text of how to actually do this.

And so the first way that we stay connected to Jesus is through dependent.

on Jesus.

He's showing us something

really important.

He's showing us the type of relationship

that we should be having with him.

A relationship of complete

dependence.

He wants us to depend

on him and depend on his

resources every single day.

not just when we need him,

not just when we call out and cry out for his help.

And so that can be hard for a lot of us to accept

because we live in a country where independence is valued,

but admitting that you need help is viewed as weakness.

That's not how Jesus sees it.

He's actually telling us to depend on him

because he's the only one that can actually supply us with what we need.

And so dependent on Jesus and his resources, it's not weakness.

It's wisdom.

Because our tendency is to do the exact opposite.

We like to attach ourselves to weaker and lesser vines

instead of attaching ourselves fully to Jesus.

We attach ourselves to money and the bank account, to our relationships, our reputation, and we turn to God as a last-ditch effort.

That type of connection to Jesus isn't actually life-giving.

We need to be connected to Jesus in a way that gives us life.

in a real practical and tangible way that we can experience love, patience, joy, kindness,

all the fruits of the Spirit. He's saying that if you attach yourself to me, that can be yours too.

And so that's why Jesus talks a lot about money and he talks about possessions and not loving your

family more than you love him. It's not because any of those things are bad, but it's that

sometimes we depend on those things more than we depend on Jesus. We depend on Jesus maybe here and

there, but not on some things. We rather place our trust in other vines instead of dependent on him.

And what Jesus is saying, depend on me always. And God actually warns us that any other vine that

we attach ourselves, whether that's money, whether it's our marriages or our jobs or our careers,

anything that it may be that we attach ourselves to, and it does not produce fruit because it's

coming apart from Jesus, he's saying that those things will be removed from our lives.

He's saying that we're going to get cut. That's what verse 2 says. Jesus says,

See, gardeners sometimes have to remove damaged and diseased branches

so that their plants, their crop can be healthy.

That's what pruning is.

And God sometimes does that for us too.

And it's extremely painful.

he removes things out of our life he cuts them out like bad habits

excessive comfort things that we idolize and attach ourselves to and that we place more trust

and stock in them instead of placing our trust and dependence in him that hurts sometimes but

he removes those things so that we can trust him more, so that we can depend on him more

and grow us more into the image of Christ.

Does that because he loves you and he knows what's best for you. Because when all you have

is him to depend on, you're positioning yourself to receive the resources that only an all-powerful

God can give. He wants you to ask for them. Look at verse 7. If you remain in me, my words remain

in you, ask whatever you want and it will be done for you. And so family, Jesus's resources are

infinitely better than anything that the rest of the world can give you because when he tells us

to ask him for anything, he's given us the full green light to the resources that only he can give.

Think about all the amazing things we can ask Jesus for. His strength, the same strength

that allowed him to carry our sin and our brokenness. He carried that all the way to the cross

Because he was strong.

And so he's inviting us to be able to experience that same type of strength.

Think about his resurrection power.

The same power that allowed him to perform miracles and defeat death.

He invites us into that too.

Jesus was the happiest person, the most joyful person to live on this earth.

And what he's saying, if you look back at verse 11, he's saying, that's yours too, if you ask for it.

And so that's the condition.

We have to continue to pray and to continue asking.

Because we don't have access to any of these things if we don't ask and we don't remain in Jesus.

And so we have to continue dependent on him for everything through prayer.

That is how you experience a true connection, a real authentic connection to Jesus.

One of my favorite authors, Paul David Tripp, he says this about prayer.

Prayer is surrender to the reality that you need help.

Prayer is surrender to the reality that you need help.

When you pray, you're trusting in God and his ability

more than you're trusting in your ability

and other weaker vines to provide you what only he can provide.

And so that's how we stay connected to him in a life-given way.

And so the second way that we stay connected is actually quite simple.

We stay connected by remaining.

We stay connected by remaining in Jesus.

Look at the first three words of verse four.

Remain in me.

If you translate this from the original Greek,

the instructions that were given by Jesus is actually quite simple.

It's clear.

He's saying, continue with me.

Remain in me.

And it's so simple, but it's so important

because that's what we forget.

Right?

Jesus literally in this short amount of words in this passage,

he says the word remain 10 times.

10 times he says, remain in me, depend on me, trust in me, continue with me.

And so he's trying to show us that that's the most important part of following Jesus,

remaining in Jesus.

Being able to receive the life-given gifts from Jesus

is completely dependent on us staying attached to him.

Look at verse five.

I am the vine, you are the branches.

The one who remains in me and I in him

produces much fruit because you can do nothing without me.

If anyone does not remain in me, he is thrown aside like a branch and he withers.

They gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned.

Family, remaining in Jesus is how we continue to stay healthy.

It's how we continue to thrive.

If you're disconnected from Jesus this morning, that's an emergency.

Because being connected to him is the only way that you can actually receive life and joy.

How many of you are good at keeping plants alive by show of hands?

Yeah, I know, Amy, you're really good at it.

Yeah, a handful.

All right, so I'm not alone.

There's people out there that have no problems murdering their plants, right?

thank God for my wife.

She's the only one that actually remembers to water them.

And so if it was up to me, they'd be completely dead.

But the point is, not once have I seen my wife

go up to one of the plants and say,

hey, don't go anywhere.

Why?

Because plants don't have a problem

with remaining attached to the plant.

branches, sorry, don't have a problem remaining attached to the plant.

But that's not us.

We're a special kind of branch.

We're the kind of branch that moves around and likes to go for a walk and wander off.

And that's the issue.

We wander away from Jesus and we forget that we can't live without the vine.

That's why he uses the word remain 10 times.

And that's a daily reminder for all of us.

Remaining attached to Jesus

is not something that just happens passively.

You have to fight for it every single day.

And so there are two things that we can do

to fight to remain in Jesus.

And the first is this,

We have to remain in his word.

Look at verse seven.

If you remain in me and my words remain in you,

ask whatever you want.

And what Jesus is saying here is that

this goes way beyond just simply flipping through your Bible.

He wants his words to live inside of you.

But here's the challenge.

A lot of people open their Bible just to study it like a textbook,

to gain more academic knowledge and know more things about God,

or maybe open their Bibles to seek inspiration and motivation,

but never really give God's word the space to take root in their hearts,

to make a room, to make a home within their hearts.

And that's what Jesus wants.

He wants his words to actually live inside of you

and become a part of who you are.

That's how you stay connected to Jesus in a life-given way.

You stay connected by remaining in his words

and allowing them to become a part of who you are.

And so that's how we stay attached.

In Psalm 119, the reason why David was able to say,

the law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces,

because that was true for him.

God's words lived inside of him.

And so we stay truly connected to Jesus when his words remain in us

and his words go deeper than just the surface level.

And the second way that we remain in Jesus is by remaining in his love.

As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you.

Remain in my love.

It's amazing.

The perfect love that the Father has for Jesus

is the type of love that Jesus has for you.

Just think about that.

Jesus has every reason to receive the Father's love.

he left this perfect relationship with his father and the holy spirit to come down into our mess

he obeyed his his all of his father's wishes he lived this perfect life he spent all of his free

time serving getting down on his knees and loving the people around him knowing that some of them

we're going to betray him, abandon him, and deny knowing him.

That's how Jesus loves us.

It's not the type of love that we show to our spouse or our children or our friends.

It's the type of love that is so sacrificial, so passionate, so deep,

that the only way Jesus could describe this type of love

is by describing it as a type of love

that the Father has for him.

We are all invited to remain in that same love.

And so now there's one more thing

that we can see in the text

that ties all of this together.

The third way we remain connected to the vine is through obeying Jesus.

We obey Jesus.

Jesus experienced perfect love from his father because he obeyed the father.

True connection to Jesus also involves obeying his words.

Jesus says in verse 10,

But notice how Jesus doesn't start with telling us to obey his commands.

Jesus says, remain in my love.

Remain in my love first.

And he does that because his love should be the motivating factor

for our obedience.

We should want to make him our delight

and to do the things in our lives

for his glory and his honor,

to make him happy.

But there's also something really important

that Jesus is trying to get at here.

Love and obedience go hand in hand.

Jesus doesn't just tell us to love his words.

He doesn't just tell us to listen to his words.

He tells us to obey his words.

Obeying his words and his commands is how we remain connected to Jesus.

Even the ones that we don't fully understand or even agree with.

For those of you that are parents, you know full and well that there are a lot of things that you tell your children

that might not make sense to them.

but they still have to obey you

because what you're telling them,

the instructions that you're giving them

is for their benefit,

is so that they can thrive

and remain healthy and safe.

And so it's the same thing with God.

We obey Jesus and his words

simply because he knows better than us

and because he loves us

and because he's trustworthy.

One of my favorite things that I've gotten to do since coming on staff at Harbor

is being able to witness one of my youth kids obey Jesus,

even though he might not have fully understood the why.

I got to witness this young man get baptized

and declare to the rest of the world that he loves Jesus

and that he might not fully understand Jesus,

but he's going to obey him anyway because he loves him.

And so that was just so beautiful.

I got to hug him and it was so powerful seeing someone his age show his love for the Lord

through one simple act of obedience.

And I love being able to witness baptisms because there's always so much joy and love.

And the message that everyone sees at the beach is that there's joy in obedience.

there's joy with being attached to the Lord.

And I am just so encouraged that so many of you

are fighting to remain in God's love

through obeying Jesus,

through your obedience,

through loving his church and sacrificing

not only your time,

but your energy and your resources

so that Jesus would be made known in Kapolei,

in West Oahu.

And so that more people could experience his love.

And so all of us today can remain connected to Jesus by making a choice.

Whatever that looks like for you, in whatever way he's calling you to obey,

you can show that you can remain in his love and depend on him

by making the choice to trust him.

simply put.

And so I want to leave you all with this.

Even while I was writing this message,

I struggled to do all of these things.

I struggled to remain.

I struggled to depend on Jesus.

I struggled to remain in Jesus,

to remain in his word and in his love

and to obey Jesus.

All of these things that

all of these practical ways that we can remain in Jesus,

they're certainly true.

But there's something so beautiful

about the Lord that we follow

is that even when we wander away,

even when we struggle to remain,

his love remains.

And maybe that's you this morning.

Maybe this morning you just feel defeated by the struggles of this week.

Maybe it's some sort of strain in your marriage.

Maybe you just don't feel that joy.

Maybe it's deteriorating health, whatever it may be.

Everything might slip away from us.

But Jesus promises us that his words and his love remain.

and so I want you to take comfort in that

because even when you don't remain,

he remains.

So I just want us to keep pressing forward together

to relentlessly pursue and love Jesus

so that all of us,

that this, we could have our own story

and so that all of us could experience

the type of joy that he wants us to experience

so that we can have the most joyful life possible.

So let's pray together.