TO BEAR FRUIT
This is not a teaching. It originated from meditation and is meant for meditation. The following page is made up of the verses of scripture that are quoted or inferred as I was made aware of them during meditation. I trust that some of you will get much more from this than I did.
John 15:4-7 (NKJV)
4“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. 5“I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. 6“If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. 7“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.”
To bear fruit we must live in Jesus and He in us. That means we eat in Him; we sleep in Him; we move when He moves; we sit when He sits; we listen when He listens and we listen when He speaks. We speak what He says when He says it and we do nothing without Him. When you are in Christ, whatever He is doing, you are involved. When this is the case we suffer no loss, but rather whatever we ask it is done for us. We bear much fruit and come into fullness of joy in the love of God.
John 15:8-11 (NKJV)
8“By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.
9“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. 10“If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. 11“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full.
This is living in Him. But that is only half of the equation.
His word must abide (live) in us. We get it in us by eating it as our necessary food. We come to His table and eat freely because the bread belongs to us (Mark 7:27). He is the bread from Heaven. It is life to us because Jesus is our bread and He is life. He is the word of God and every word He speaks is Spirit and life. Man does not live by bread alone but by every word (Jesus) which proceeds from the mouth of God.
Jesus said we must eat His flesh and drink His blood. Eat His flesh? The word became flesh (John 1:14). We are to eat His word. Man lives by every word God speaks. The Father speaks and Jesus is that word. To eat it is to meditate on it. To get the life substance from the word we must wait on the Spirit of God to help us understand it because His word is Spirit and life. The Holy Spirit is our digestive agent.
To eat His flesh and drink His blood reminds us that the Lord’s Table of Communion is more than a ritual. It is in fact communion with Him and with one another. He is in us, we are in Him and together we are in the Father (John 17:21-23). He is the word of God. His word is flesh to us and His Spirit is drink to us (1 Corinthians 12:13).
Remember this is about bearing fruit.
TO BEAR FRUIT
John 15:4-7 (NKJV)
4“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. 5“I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. 6“If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. 7“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.”
John 15:8-11 (NKJV)
8“By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.
9“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. 10“If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. 11“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full.
Acts 17:28 (NKJV) “for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’
Job 23:12 (NKJV)I have not departed from the commandment of His lips;
I have treasured the words of His mouth
More than my necessary food.
Mark 7:27 (NKJV) But Jesus said to her, “Let the children be filled first, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”
John 6:32, 33, 35 (NKJV)
32Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33“For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
35And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.
John 6:51 (NKJV) “I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.”
John 1:1 (NKJV) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 6:63 (NKJV) “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.
Deuteronomy 8:3 (NKJV) “So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.”
John 6:53 (NKJV) Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.
John 1:14 (NKJV) And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
Jeremiah 15:16 (NKJV) Your words were found, and I ate them,
And Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart;
For I am called by Your name, O Lord God of hosts.
John 16:13 (NKJV) “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.
1 Corinthians 11:23-26 (NKJV)
23For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; 24and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” 25In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.” 26For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes.
John 17:21-23 (NKJV)
21“that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. 22“And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: 23“I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.
1 Corinthians 12:13 (NKJV) For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit.