I have a very somber message for us
this evening, friends.
It deals with our usefulness to God while
we are still in this world.
We're gonna be camped out in John chapter
15, which I call the pruning chapter, because
if you desire further usefulness to God, you
will be pruned with a very sharp knife
that cuts deep.
Before we begin, let me pray.
Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my
cry come unto thee.
Great is your mercy toward them that fear
you, great God in heaven.
You are a dynamite God who does super
duper things.
Lord Jesus, you are altogether lovely.
You are chief among 10,000.
There's no one like you, Jesus.
You are utterly singular and spectacular and preeminent
above all things.
You are the most faithful friend I've ever
known.
You're always there for me.
Give me the grace now, I pray, to
deliver this message that is burning on my
heart for your people.
Saturate me with your Holy Spirit, Lord, I
pray, and use this time to bring us
to the very verge of eternity where we
are confronted with the God of that eternity.
Come among us by your Spirit and disturb,
folks.
I pray these things in the strong name
of Jesus.
Amen.
Years ago, I was teaching the Wednesday evening
revival class at the Stephen Olford Institute for
Biblical Preaching in Memphis, Tennessee.
My homiletical mentor was Dr. Stephen F.
Olford, and I had been the first part
of that graduating class of his school of
preachers.
In that particular Wednesday evening at the Olford
Center, I was addressing a group of pastors
on the subject of revival.
There were about 20 men there that night,
and I brought with me that evening to
that revival lecture two men whom I had
been discipling.
Their orders were that evening to sit at
the back of the room and pay no
nevermind to me what I said, but just
to focus and to pray, to pray for
those men during that evening.
Their objective was to be entirely engaged in
prayer.
While Finney had Abel Clary and Father Nash,
who were his prayer warriors during his early
revivals, so I stationed those men at the
back of the room because I needed help
that evening as I walked up to the
podium.
My text was John chapter 15, which I
called the pruning chapter.
As I brought out my text, I told
those men, I said, John 15, 1, in
the Greek states, I, in contradistinction to anyone
else, am the genuine vine, and my father
is the tiller of the soil, meaning Jesus
was declaring that he alone was the true
vine.
He alone was the genuine vine.
All others were frauds and fakes.
There was no one like him.
He stood alone with no competition or comparison,
and he makes a remarkable comment about God
the Father.
He says, my father is the tiller of
the soil.
Well, this whole aspect, friends, of the Father
as the vinedresser, as the tiller of the
soil, is rich as it is deep, and
I don't think we can fully grasp the
depth of John chapter 15 without a proper
understanding of Isaiah chapter 5.
Let's take a look at Isaiah chapter 5,
where we find the parable of the vineyard
and a detailed description of God as the
vinedresser.
We read in chapter 5, beginning in verse
1.
Now will I sing to my well-beloved
a song of my beloved touching his vineyard,
my well-beloved at the vineyard in a
very fruitful hill?
And he fenced it, and gathered out the
stones thereof, and planted with the choicest vine,
and built a tower in the midst of
it, and also made a winepress therein.
And he looked that it should bring forth
grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
This vineyard that God planted had the most
fertile ground, and choicest vine, and the most
favorable conditions for growth.
The fallow ground was broken up, and the
stones were removed, all obstructions were taken away.
With loving care the vinedresser plants this vineyard.
He planted it.
He maintained it.
He watched over it from a nearby watchtower.
He pruned it.
He watered it.
Just look, friends, at the Father's care over
that vineyard.
He planted it.
He watched over it.
He had great expectations for it.
This whole aspect of God the Father exercising
great care over his children with only their
best interests at heart, this is the imagery
and the thoughts that must be brought to
bear on John chapter 15 if we are
to understand this aspect of God the Father
as a vinedresser, as a tiller of the
soil.
Jesus is declaring that he is the true
vine, and we are the branches.
Anyone that has ever tried to live the
Christian life knows what failure is like.
The Christian life is an impossible life to
live in the flesh.
It's often like an elevator.
One day you're in the penthouse sweet, enjoying
sweet fellowship with God, and then incredibly the
next day you're down in the basement of
defeat.
The average Christian has an up-and-down
walk with God.
There's little consistency there.
Well, that's why Jesus took the time here
to teach his disciples about the abiding principle
of the vine and the branches.
There is victory here, friends.
In John chapter 15, we not only have
the key to a consistent walk with God
by abiding in him, but we have great
usefulness to God as we abide and live
and serve him.
John 15.2 states, Every branch in me
that beareth not fruit, he taketh away, and
every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it,
that it may bring forth more fruit.
This is the central theme of John chapter
15, which I term the pruning chapter, where
God, as the tiller of the soil, takes
his divine pruning knife to the life of
a believer.
If you recall over in Isaiah chapter 5,
the vinedresser was looking with great expectation on
the vineyard to produce fruit, to produce luscious
grapes, but in the case of Israel, it
brought forth wild grapes.
In John chapter 15, in verse 2, the
meaning in the Greek language is, and he
cleanses and repeatedly prunes every branch that continues
to bear fruit to make it bear more
and richer and more excellent fruit.
When the text says he cleanses it, that
means by his spirit he sanctifies us, sanctifies
us for further fruitfulness, sanctifies us for wider
usefulness.
Do you desire wider usefulness, friend?
Then you must submit to the divine pruning
knife.
God must take a knife to your life
and cut away all that stands between you
and him in all further fruitfulness for God.
You cannot expect to go further with God
without giving him the whole of your life,
lock, stock, and barrel.
How can we hold anything back from him
who gave his all on Calvary?
In John 15, 5, we read the words
of Jesus, I am the vine, ye are
the branches, he that abideth in me and
I in him, the same bringeth forth much
fruit, for without me ye can do nothing.
We feel we're not a success unless we're
running 3,000 on Sunday, but Jesus poured
his time and life into 12 men and
one of them was a devil.
Jesus is saying we can't move one skinny
inch apart from him and our utter reliance
is on him.
Oh friends, a self-reliant church is a
Laodicean church in need of nothing and a
self-sufficient Christian is an oxymoron and you're
a moron if you try to live the
Christian life in your own strength.
It can't be done.
The only way to live the Christian life
from God's perspective is to remain in a
vital love relationship with Jesus.
A young Billy Graham who was saved under
the preaching of Mordecai Ham came to him
as a mentor.
He asked Mordecai Ham, he said, Brother Ham,
do you have any words for this young
preacher?
Some advice for this young preacher?
And Mordecai Ham looked him in the eye
and he said, Billy, don't ever lose your
sweetheart love for Jesus.
Friends, it's our objective to stay in a
vital love relationship with Jesus and that means
he must have preeminence in our daily living
and to get that you'll have to submit
to the divine pruning knife in your life
to cut away all obstructions that inhibit that
intimacy with him.
The great truth of John chapter 15 is
we were never ever meant to be fruit
producers but fruit bearers.
If we are a bearer then the fruit
is not ours.
It is of the Spirit and this is
how we bring glory to the Father by
being fruit bearers that he can flow through
as a means of blessings to others.
We see this as so, friends, in verse
8 that states, Herein is my Father glorified
that ye bear much fruit.
But if you are bearing fruit then it
is apparent that you are being pruned for
it is the prune branch that bears the
fruit.
So we must ask ourselves the following two
burning questions.
Do we want to go deeper with God
and are we prepared to submit to the
divine pruning knife?
I recall years ago I was standing on
Round Top at D.L. Moody's grave in
Northfield, Massachusetts and as I stood there I
was reflecting on Moody's large life for Christ
in the gospel and I recalled the story
Moody told of one day he was sitting
next to a British minister who remarked to
him, The world has yet to see what
God can do with the man wholly consecrated
to him.
And Moody walked away muttering under his breath,
Oh God make me that man.
And God answered that prayer and Moody did
more for God than all of us put
together.
Well that's the story I was thinking of
as I stood atop Round Top that sunny
day and as I slowly made my way
down the hill toward the little birthplace home
of Moody tears streamed down my face as
I said with Moody, Oh God make me
that man.
Sometimes it takes 20 years for prayer to
be answered but God does not forget our
desperate prayers.
That day God began to get out his
pruning knife out on me and he's never
put it away since.
It's been an ongoing painful process I can
assure you friends and as I related these
stories in this passage from John 15 about
God's divine pruning knife to that group of
pastors their faces suddenly became altered.
Those men were disturbed.
In Job we read, Therefore I am troubled
at his presence when I consider I am
afraid of him for God maketh my heart
soft and the almighty troubleth me.
Well those pastors were confronted with the felt
presence of a disturbing Christ.
Christ in his earthly ministry was disturbing.
The spiritual world was disturbed by him.
Devils cried out in Bethesda to possess a
herd of swine that ran violently into the
sea and because of that the citizens of
that coast were so disturbed they came to
Christ begging him to leave them.
Everywhere Christ went there was a disturbance.
The complacency of towns and villages were disturbed
by him to where the multitude thronged him.
He disturbed hearts and consciences.
He disturbed the woman at the well until
she felt her sinfulness.
He disturbed religious traditions.
He disturbed the religious leaders of his day
to where they wanted to destroy him.
He disturbed lives.
Christ disturbed physical nature in healing the lame,
the sick and the blind.
He disturbed death in raising the dead to
life.
He disturbed one's entire course of life.
He disturbed Saul of Tarsus by confronting him
smack dab in the middle of the road
and blinding him, changing his life's entire direction
and purpose.
God can do that to any man.
He disturbed Herod's rotten heart.
He disturbed the physical laws of nature by
walking on the water.
He disturbed reality by multiplying the loaves and
the fishes and feeding 5,000.
In truth, when Jesus passed through towns and
villages he disturbed things.
He disturbs consciences.
He disturbed religious pandering by overturning the tables
of the money changers in the temple.
He disturbed the Philippian jailer who cried out,
What must I do to be saved?
He disturbed the Roman centurion who cried, Truly,
this was the Son of God.
He disturbed his first hearers, bestirbing, stirring animosity
in their hearts to want to hurl them
headlong down a hillside.
He disturbed the devil wherever he went for
demons cried out, Son of God, don't torment
us before the time.
He disturbed the religious crowd who said he
was possessed by a devil.
He taught by parables because bare, naked truth
would have been too disturbing for his hearers.
He disturbed all things from the touch of
a woman's hand to his garment that disturbed
the flow of her plague and healed it.
He disturbed the touch of his hand on
Jairus's daughter which disturbed death by raising her
from death to life.
He disturbed the very atmosphere on the Mount
of Transfiguration where he spoke with Moses and
Elijah.
He disturbed reliance upon material possessions by disturbing
the rich man's priorities.
He disturbed blind Bartimaeus who cried out, Jesus,
thou Son of God, have mercy on me.
And he disturbed the darkness of his sight
and made him see light on the cross.
On the cross, Christ was disturbing.
It was disturbing to look at him hanging
there in the shame and pain of the
cross, writhing beneath the burden of sin.
It was disturbing to his friends to see
him bleeding and suffering so.
On Calvary, he disturbed the very elements of
nature.
The sky darkened.
The earth trembled.
Rocks were torn asunder.
In the veil in the temple, which was
sixty feet high and four inches thick, was
torn right in two like it was made
of papier-mâché.
Christ disturbed things that day.
He disturbed hell itself by reconciling sinners back
to a holy God.
He even disturbed the dead in the graves
for reading Matthew.
And the graves were opened and many bodies
of the saints which slept arose and came
out of the graves after his resurrection and
appeared unto many.
There is nothing like the disturbing presence of
Christ in a day as fast approaching, friends,
where Christ will come again with his mighty
angels and disturb heaven and earth with a
shout.
In times of revival, there is a disturbing
presence of Christ.
When Jonathan Edwards preached his sermon, Sinners in
the Hands of an Angry God, in Enfield,
Connecticut, on July 8, 1741, an eyewitness recorded
in his diary, We went over to Enfield,
where we met dear Mr. Edwards of Northampton,
who preached a most awakening sermon from these
words in Deuteronomy.
To me belongeth vengeance and recompense.
Their foot shall slide in due time, for
the day their calamity is at hand, and
the things that shall come upon them make
haste.
And before sermon was done, there was a
great moaning and crying out through ye whole
house, What shall I do to be saved?
O, I am going to hell!
O, what shall I do for Christ?
To where the minister was obliged to desist
from preaching, ye shakes and cries were piercing
and amazing.
Well, that's the report of that revival, friends.
The disturbing presence of Christ in revival is
a reality.
And that night, as I was speaking to
that group of pastors, I looked around that
room and those pastors were visibly disturbed.
God was dealing with them one on one.
They were squirming in their chairs like they
were sitting on a hot seat.
God, in his disturbing presence, was at work
that night.
And when I was through speaking, I closed
my Bible and I stood there while those
men got up and lined up to speak
to me.
One by one, they grabbed my hands and
hugged me and thanked me for the message
that night.
But at the end of the line stood
one man, an old elderly black pastor who
patiently waited his turn to speak to me.
And as he faced me, I noticed he
had tears in his eyes.
And in a determined voice, he said, I've
been a pastor for 30 years, but tonight
when I get home, I'm going to get
down on my knees beside my bed and
I'm going to ask the Lord to get
out his pruning knife on me and my
ministry.
Well, that man was getting serious with God.
And do you know what, friends?
God gets serious with those who get serious
with him.
Let me ask you, friend, are you ready
to get serious with God?
Brother pastor, are you ready to ask God
to get his pruning knife out on you
and your ministry?
Are you willing to submit to the divine
pruning knife on you?
What cost counts and what counts costs?
Go dig up a biography on a George
Whitefield or D.L. Moody or Sam Jones
and read it and see what God did
with men who were wholly consecrated to him.
How God shook entire cities in revival under
the ministries with the disturbing presence of Christ
Jesus.
And ask God to do that in your
life.
Get down on your face before God and
ask him to make you a fruit bearer
where the power of God flows through you
as a means of blessing to others, bearing
fruit and bringing glory to God.
And let your prayer be, here I am,
Lord, prune me, use me, fill me, and
let revival begin with me.
Let us pray.