Lasting Change
Sermon Audio
Sermon Notes
Intro:
Hey everybody my name’s Louis, I’m the lead teaching pastor here at City Awakening, it’s great to be with you this morning. Happy New Year to all of you, I hope your 2020’s off to a great start! Last year we spent a lot of time in a book of the bible called the Gospel of John, and we’re taking a little break from that to start the new year off with a 6 week teaching series called Grow. It’s called Grow, and it’s about how to experience true life change, that’ll last longer than a new year’s resolution. So many of us tend to view new year’s like it’s a reset button. We view it as a chance to reboot our lives and have a fresh start. Some of us will even make new year’s resolutions hoping to change certain things we’re not happy with in life. But the problem with most resolutions is they don’t typically last. Well this is a series about how to experience a life change that’ll last. It’s about how to experience real life transformation. In fact it’s an exciting time to be a part of City Awakening because we’re calling 2020 A Year Of Transformation, and our goal is to invest in every generation so every generation can experience transformation. Throughout the year we’ll be giving you resources and opportunities to help you grow personally and corporately as a church. Right now we have our 2020 bible reading plan and prayer guide available at our next steps table, and in a few weeks we’ll be giving you a resource to help you grow in the topics we’re studying in this series. I’m also excited to announce we’re officially starting our first middle and high school student ministry next month which is a sign our church is growing! So let’s praise God for that!...We set a goal to invest in every generation and we’re doing it. It’s an exciting time to be a part of City Awakening, we’re expecting great things in 2020.
Now as for today, we’ll be talking about where the power to change and transform your life comes from, and it’s not within you...The power to change and transform your life doesn’t come from within you...Now there’s certainly some things you’ve changed by your own will power, but I’m talking about things you haven’t been able to change. For example some of you wrestle with anger, insecurity, addictions, things that no matter how hard you try you’ve been powerless to change. You might go strong a few days, a few months, but eventually you stumble proving your own will power isn’t enough to change some of the deep rooted issues in your life. Both Christians and non-Christians have certain things they want to change, but their will power has been powerless to change. What are some of those things for you?...What are some of those things, those deep rooted issues in your life your will power’s been powerless to change?...Today Jesus is gonna teach us where the power to change and transform our lives comes from. So let’s turn to John 15:1-11 and get into it. If you open your bible to the middle, turn a few books to the right, you’ll find John. We’ll be in John 15:1-11. The title of today’s message is Lasting Change, and here’s the big idea. Jesus teaches the power for lasting change doesn’t come from within you, it comes from abiding in him...The power for lasting change doesn’t come from within you, it comes from abiding in him. The gospel is both our starting place, and our abiding place.
Context:
Here’s your context. John the author of this book of the bible, was very good friends with Jesus, he was a part of Jesus’ inner circle. So what we’re about to study are the life and words of Jesus, as they were written by an original source, an original follower of Jesus. In the last part of this book John focuses heavily on Jesus giving his disciples, his followers some final teachings before he dies. It’s the point in history where Jesus is about to go through tremendous suffering from the Romans, he’s about to be crucified, and ch 15 is at the very heart of his final teachings. These aren’t his final words, but they are a central teaching on how he wants his followers to live after he’s crucified, and it’s to continue abiding in him and his love. Let’s check it out.
The Word:
John 15:1-11 states, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. 2 Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. 3 Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.” Jesus is using a gardening metaphor here to explain how God produces fruit in our lives. He says there’s 2 kinds of branches and 2 kinds of pruning. There’s those who don’t bear fruit which are cut off, and those who do bear fruit which are trimmed to bear more fruit. The implication is those who don’t follow Jesus will one day be fruitless and cut off from him. But those who follow Jesus will be fruitful and trimmed, pruned by God throughout their life for further growth and fruitfulness. This goes back to the sin nature we inherited from Adam and Eve. In Genesis 2:17 God commanded them to not eat a particular fruit so they wouldn’t die. But they ate the fruit, they sinned against God, and although they didn’t immediately die physically, they died spiritually...They died spiritually, creating a sin nature in them and us that desires sin over God. Our sin nature makes us spiritually dead branches unable to produce lasting spiritual fruit on our own. It’s why the urge to sin often feels so strong, stronger than our will power can resist. It’s because we’re spiritually dead branches that need God to prune our dead hearts to life. Lasting change starts when there’s an inner change of your heart. It starts with God pruning our dead hearts to life, and continually pruning us throughout our lives for further fruitfulness.
Now as some of you know the pruning process is sometimes painful and looks disastrous. If you’ve ever seen the pruning process done it often looks disastrous to a tree. There’s branches all over the ground, the tree looks all beat up and barren, but over time it bears new life with new fruit. In a similar way the pruning process in our lives is often painful and looks disastrous as it’s happening, you might not even understand why it’s happening. But if you trust God to prune the things that need pruning in your life, over time it’ll lead to new life with new fruit. It’s like the Bonsai tree in Karate Kid. Mr. Miyagi knew exactly what to trim and keep!...But let me ask you this, who do you want doing the pruning?...Who do you want doing the pruning in your life?... Do you want to do the pruning, or do you want God to do the pruning?...Here’s why you should want God to prune your life. It’s because it takes more than will power to change your sin nature, and because God’s the only one who sees all the blind spots in your life that need pruning. You can’t see all the blind spots in your life, all the things hindering you from bearing fruit. But God sees those things, He’s willing to graciously prune those things for you to bear fruit, and He has the very power to do it. So if we really want to have lasting change for our lives, we should add this prayer to our payer guide this week: “Lord prune me, so I can be fruitful...Lord prune the things in my life that need pruning, including my blind spots, so I can be fruitful.” It’s a scary prayer because pruning sometimes hurts, but over time it’ll be fruitful. Jesus is teaching us the power for lasting change doesn’t come from within you, it comes from abiding in him.
Vs. 4, “Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. 5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” The Greek word for “abide” means to “remain in,” or to “make your home in.” Jesus is saying just like a branch needs to remain connected to its vine to bear fruit, we need to remain connected to him if we want to bear eternal lasting fruit. When he says those who aren’t abiding in him can do nothing, he’s not saying they can’t bear temporal fruit. Jesus often spoke of people who weren’t his followers and said they were doing spiritual things, even prosperous things. But he also said the things they were doing won’t have eternal lasting value. So he’s not saying they can’t bear temporal fruit, he’s saying they can’t bear eternal lasting fruit...apart from him.
Vs. 6, “If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. 7 If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. 9 As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.” There’s so much to cover in these verses, and we’ll cover a lot of it later in this series. But our focus for this sermon is on where the power for lasting change comes from, and once again Jesus is saying it doesn’t come from within you, it comes from abiding in him. He’s already used the word abide 8 times in the text, and this time he’s telling us to abide in his love, remain in his love, “make a home” in his love...He wants us to make a home in his love, to make his love our continual resting place. So part of what it means to abide in Jesus is to find rest in the eternal security of his love. It’s to enjoy his love, instead of feeling you have to earn his love. It’s a hard thing for a lot of us to grasp, because we spend much of our lives trying to earn people’s love. I mean we’re conditioned at a young age to be good kids and make good grades so we can get a reward. In high school we’re constantly changing our clothes, our swag, our identity hoping to fit in with certain tribes. As adults we try earning people’s love for marriage or proving ourselves to our boss for a raise. We spend much of our lives trying to earn people’s love, so it’s hard for us to grasp the concept of a God who wants us to simply be, to simply rest in his love. In fact our mentality to earn love, approval, favor from others is so engrained in us, we take this mentality into our spiritual life. We think we have to earn God’s love with our good works and good deeds. We think God loves us more if we’re doing good, and less if we’re doing bad.
In his book Transforming Grace, author Jerry Bridges states, “My observation of modern Christianity is that most of us tend to base our relationship with God on our performance instead of on His grace. If we’ve performed well, whatever ‘well’ is in our opinion, then we expect God to bless us. If we haven’t done so well, then our expectations for blessings are lowered. In this sense we live by works rather than by grace. We are saved by grace, we acknowledge that, yet we are living by the sweat of our own performance.” We’re living by the sweat of our own performance, when Jesus invites us to rest in the eternal security of his love. He tells us to abide in his love, not to earn his love! Its the primary gospel message of Jesus! The gospel is that Jesus is our God who came to live the perfect life we haven’t lived, and die the death we deserved to die for our sins. He literally stood in our place on the cross taking the wrath of God we deserved for our sins. Our sin nature and sins make us dead branches undeserving of his love, but he died on the cross for our sins to give us rest in the eternal security of his love. You don’t have to earn his love by the sweat of your performance, when he’s freely given you his love through his death on the cross. The gospel’s so freeing because Jesus invites us to stop performing so we can start enjoying his love! When we receive the gospel we’re grafted into him as our vine, our power source for real life change and transformation. His life giving power starts to flow in you, and that’s when your life really starts to change and bear lasting fruit. Jesus says it won’t happen by living apart from him, it’ll happen by continually abiding in him and his love. Jesus is teaching us the power for lasting change doesn’t come from within you, it comes from abiding in him.
Vs. 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.” Notice obedience is still an important part of what it means to abide in Jesus. Some people think since we don’t have to earn God’s love we can do whatever we want, completely ignoring God’s commands. But Jesus is saying obedience is still very much a part of what it means to abide in him. In fact one of the things that starts to happen when we receive the gospel is our sin nature gets pruned and we receive a new nature, a new heart that starts beating for God. This causes us to start trusting His commands and even start delighting in His commands. Our view of obedience changes from something we have to do, to something we want to do out of a genuine love for God. Now we’ll still wrestle with obedience sometimes because there’s things in our hearts that need pruning. We’re like a car that sometimes gets knocked out of alignment. We steer into sin and performance based approval, so we need the gospel to steer us back, to realign us by reminding us of the love Jesus poured out for us on the cross. In the words of popstar theologian Carrie Underwood, we need Jesus to “take the wheel!”...We need Jesus to constantly take the wheel forgiving us of our disobedience, and helping us with our obedience. The way to grow in our obedience is to grow in our love for Jesus more. We need to love Jesus more than we love our sin. Obedience happens not by trying harder, but by abiding in Jesus more. Our hearts won’t be changed by standing in awe of ourselves and the things we’ve done, because that only feeds our sinful self-centeredness. Instead our hearts will be changed by standing in awe of Jesus and all the things he’s done. So yes our obedience is important, but we don’t obey to earn his love. We obey because we genuinely love him, want to follow him, and trust his commands will always take us further into joy, which he says next.
Vs. 11, “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” So the things Jesus is teaching us here in John 15 are things not to rob us of joy, but to make our joy full! In fact over the next 5 weeks I’ll show you 5 specific things Jesus tells us to do in this text, to help make our joy full. But we need to remember not to view them as ways to earn his love since he’s already given us his love on the cross. Instead these 5 things can help us grow deeper in his love and remind us to stay connected to the flow of his power for lasting change. In fact this is one of the hardest challenges for those of us who are Christians. It isn’t receiving Jesus’ love, it’s remembering to abide in his love. Christians already know they received Jesus’ love through the gospel, but we so easily forget to abide in his love, to find rest in his love, to tap into the flow of his power for lasting change. Too many Christians think the gospel is only for salvation (Jesus died for my sins), but it’s also the very power source for our continual growth and transformation. That’s why one of our codes at City Awakening is the gospel is more than a way to eternal life, the gospel is our life! We want to view every aspect of our lives through the lens of the gospel, through the lens of Jesus. It’s because we know he’s the vine whose power flows in us and transforms our lives. We need to view the gospel as more than a diving board into our relationship with Jesus, it’s the very pool we’re to completely soak our lives in! The 5 things Jesus teaches us in this text will help us do that. It’ll help us to soak in Jesus’ love, it’ll help us to remember to abide in him daily, so our joy will be full like he promised.
The Big Idea:
So here’s the big idea...Jesus teaches us the power for lasting change doesn’t come from within you...The power for lasting change, for real life transformation doesn’t come from within you, it comes from abiding in him. The gospel is both our starting place, and our abiding place.
It isn’t a list of behaviors to adopt, it’s good news to believe. It isn’t good advice to live by, it’s good news to abide in. If you believe the gospel, abide in the gospel, abide in Jesus and his love, you’ll have access to all the power you need, to experience real life transformation in 2020.
COMMUNION
At this time let’s have those serving communion start passing the plates...Communion’s a reminder of the transformational hope we have in the gospel, the transformational hope we have in Jesus. Jesus told us to do this in remembrance of him, in remembrance of who he is and what he did for us on the cross. So as the plates are being passed take a few minutes to pray, to prepare your heart by asking Jesus to forgive you of any sins you’ve committed. Ask him to prune your heart from whatever needs pruning in your life. Then thank him for dying for those sins on the cross, and allowing you to read in the security of his love. Let’s pray.
On the night Jesus was betrayed he was having a meal with his friends. He took some bread, gave thanks for it, and broke it saying “This is my body which is to be broken for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. As often as you eat it, do so in remembrance of me, in remembrance of who I am and what I’ve done for you.” When supper ended he took the cup, blessed it, gave thanks for it, and said“This cup is a symbol of my blood which is to be shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. As often as you drink of it, do so in remembrance of me, in remembrance of who I am and what I’ve done.” City Awakening let’s eat, let’s drink, then let’s stand and worship Jesus for his abiding love!
In his book Transforming Grace, author Jerry Bridges states, “My observation of modern Christianity is that most of us tend to base our relationship with God on our performance instead of on His grace. If we’ve performed well, whatever ‘well’ is in our opinion, then we expect God to bless us. If we haven’t done so well, then our expectations for blessings are lowered.
In this sense we live by works rather than by grace. We are saved by grace, we acknowledge that, yet we are living by the sweat of our own performance.”