JOYFUL DISCIPLES

(PART 2)

JOHN 15:7-11

FEBRUARY 4, 1996

 

How do we walk in joy as Christians?  Jesus Christ tells us that abiding in Him is essential to knowing and experiencing true joy.  The relationship of abiding involves living in dependence upon Jesus Christ for both our salvation and our daily walk.  For the Christian, all of life is affected by his relationship to Christ.  To know Him, to trust Him, to rest daily in Him is to also know His joy in its fulness.

 

Joy adorns the Gospel of Jesus Christ, so that the unbelieving world recognizes the uniqueness of our relationship to Christ.  Professing Christians who do not walk in the joy of the Lord represent a poor testimony to the Christ who has atoned for our sins and redeemed us from the hand of the enemy.  Joyful disciples glorify the Father and provide a striking testimony to the unbeliever of God's grace in our lives.

 

Professor John Murray shows the heart of true joy by asking some pointed questions:  

When we suffer reverse, calamity, affliction, do we behave as if the bottom had fallen out of the universe?  Do we show composure, tranquility, resignation, gratitude, thanksgiving; patience in adversity, gratitude in prosperity, confident assurance respecting the future?...Do we believe in the living God? that the very hairs of our head are all numbered?  Let us express this in the day of adversity, not by forced hypocritical smiles which belie our inmost attitude, but by the confident assurance that God reigns and that not a sparrow falls to the ground without his knowledge.  Fretful, gnawing, distrusting, unbelieving anxiety is a denial of faith (The Collected Writings of John Murray, vol. 1, The Claims of Truth, p. 185).


John 15:11 shows us that joy is both (1) the present position or reality of the believer and (2) a growing process in his walk as a disciple.  Joy is a divine gift within every believer.  It is the Spirit's fruit in our character.  It is the radiant out-shining of redemptive life.  How can someone who knows the full pardon of the weight of his sins and the gracious forgiveness wrought through Christ not be joyful?

 

Yet this joy can increase!  Jesus told His disciples of these truths of abiding that their "joy may be made full."  The construction of this phrase in the Greek places fulness of joy in the realm of possibility for every Christian.  This joy does not grow by laziness, lethargy, and undiscipline.  It grows as we practice the truths of abiding in Christ.  In the activity of discipleship we discover increasing joy in our lives as Christians.

 

Four truths of abiding are spelled out by our Lord in these verses.  The first, joy in praying, encompassed the whole of last week's sermon.  Now we see in today's study of this text, joy in being, joy in resting, and joy in doing.  There is nothing complicated about any of these four truths of abiding.  But each of them challenges us to live as joyful disciples of Jesus Christ.

 

II.  Joy in being

 

The idea of "being" refers to the condition of your life.  "Being" is who you are, what you are about, what you are known for.  It is the real "you," the essence of your life.  I say all of this without in any way trying to be philosophical.  The problem we face in our day is that very few people are "real."  They are always trying to impress the crowd or be something they are not.  What the Bible calls for is that we simply be Christian disciples, nothing more--nothing less.  The clear way our Lord put it is that the Father is glorified by our bearing much fruit and so "be My disciples" (lit. Greek rendering).

 

What does this involve?

 

1.  Christian discipleship is not neutral

 

There is a weak view of discipleship in our day.  The period of the 1970s was a popular time to talk about discipleship.  It carried on into the 80s and 90s to some degree, but that former period was biggest on discipleship.  Book after book was written on the subject; Bible studies on discipleship were produced by every Christian publishing agency; seminars on discipleship were promoted.  But when all was said and done, we had reduced discipleship to a neat, packaged program, complete with steps to follow, only we had very few true disciples.

 

The biblical emphasis on discipleship is not that of following a particular program (though, I would add that some of those were quite good), but rather on a continuing relationship of abiding in Jesus Christ.  Many unbelievers have gone through discipleship programs and have only hardened themselves to the truth of the gospel by thinking that 'discipleship doesn't work'.  They went through grand notions of an Americanized idea of a disciple, but never had an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ.  They were not true disciples.  We must have etched in our minds the fact that discipleship is not a program, but an abiding relationship with Jesus Christ.

 

We cannot divorce this verse on being a disciple from that of abiding in Christ.  It is when we come to that place of being genuine in our faith, so that we live in dependence upon Jesus Christ day-in and day-out, that we begin to understand what it is to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.

 

Frankly, we are hard-pressed to search the pages of Scripture to find a true Christian who is not also a faithful disciple of Jesus Christ.  The terms "Christian" and "disciple" are synonymous in the teaching of Scripture.  Discipleship is never an option for the redeemed.  So what is implied by being a disciple?

 

The Greek term means 'one who is a learner or follower of another'.  In this case, a disciple is one who has submitted himself in glad obedience to Jesus Christ, who trusts Him, who depends upon Him, who learns from Him, who seeks to understand all He teaches, who seeks to know Him more intimately, who pursues following Him in all things.  It is not a neutral Christianity, but a life that is positively bent on following Jesus Christ in all things.

 

2.  Christian discipleship has an aim

 

"By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples."  The essential aim of all Christian disciples is the glory of God.  This does not mean that we are adding to God's glory, for God's glory is so complete, so infinite, so measureless that we cannot in any way add to it.  We are not giving God something that He does not possess by glorifying Him.  Glory is an essential part of the being of God.  He does not simply have glory, but He is full of glory in Himself.  This expresses God's radiance in His divine character.

 

The Puritan preacher, Thomas Vincent, wrote:

...To glorify God, is not to give any additional glory to God: it is not to make God more glorious than he is; for God is incapable of receiving the least addition to his essential glory, he being eternally and infinitely perfect and glorious.  (The Shorter Catechism Explained from Scripture, p. 14)


So, what are we doing when we glorify the Father, as our Lord tells us to do both here and in other passages of God's Word?

 

Jesus tells us that it is in bearing much fruit that the Father is glorified.  We have already seen that bearing fruit is natural for a true branch abiding in the Vine.  We have noticed that fruitfulness involves the issues (1) of character (Galatians 5:22-23) and (2) of  obedient service (Ephesians 2:10).

 

(1) The Father gets glory when the beautiful character of Christ increasingly grows in our lives.  Are you growing in love?...in holiness?...in patience?...in righteousness?  Do you seek to so discipline your life that the development of godly character has priority?

 

Let me show you what I mean by this.  As a Christian, I must continually hold my life up to the divine standard of God's law and ultimately, to the Person of Christ.  When I recognize that I am failing or lacking in some area when compared with the divine standard, then I must not resign myself to my imperfections, shrug my shoulders, and let the issue fall by the wayside.  Instead, I must confess as sin against the Lord my character failures.  I must seek to repent of those things that hinder Christ's character from being evident in me.  Then I must seek the Lord, asking Him to work in me whatever grace is necessary for this area of godly character to be improved.  I must apply the promises of Scripture and meditate upon the doctrines related to it, so that the truth of God concerning that aspect of character fills my mind.  I must depend upon the work of the Spirit to cut away the trappings of the flesh which remain in me and form Christ in me.  (A good study of Hebrews 12 bears out this process of sanctification for which we are commanded to pursue--cf. especially v. 14).

 

The Father is glorified as He sees the character of His Son blossoming in us!  For that is His grand purpose in saving us.  As Paul put it in Romans 8:29, "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren."  As a master sculptor, the Father shapes and forms us to be a reflection of His Son.  As we develop in character the Father is glorified.

 

(2) He also finds glory in our acts of obedient service.  He has saved us by grace, making us His work of art so that we might do those things He has prepared beforehand for us (cf. Ephesians 2:10).  This can involve everything from our personal witnessing, to the exercising of our spiritual gifts for the Body's benefit, to our ministries in the Body, to our acts of kindness to the poor and needy, to our faithfulness in being a servant to others, to our involvement in mission work across the globe.  

 

Do you live with a consciousness of glorifying the Father?  Oh my friend, He is honored by you bearing much fruit for Him!

 

3.  Christian discipleship has assurance through fruitfulness

 

There is a marvelous indicator of salvation here that we need to see.  The Bible gives us a number of "grounds of assurance" by which we might be confident of our relationship to Christ.  One of these is "fruitfulness."  Notice the flow of this verse:  "By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples."

 

Without the fruit of a disciple there is no reason for assurance.  We see this demonstrated by what Paul prayed for the Philippian Christians as recorded in Philippians 1:9-11, that they might rest confidently in their salvation.

And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ; having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.


When there is the fruit of godly character, a love of holiness, a love for God's truth, a heart to serve Christ by good works, a desire to increase in the knowledge of God, then the believer has an "indicator light" pulsating with a renewed confidence of his salvation.

 

Quite often, while visiting in people's homes, as I approach a family's driveway or sidewalk, a floodlight comes on.  It works on the principle of motion.  If there is no motion, there is no light.  But if someone moves around, the light comes on.

 

When there is the motion of fruitfulness in our lives, then the floodlight of assurance comes on.  There is no true assurance for those who are unfruitful!

 

Joy is found in being a disciple of Jesus Christ.  J.C. Ryle drives the point home like this:

Would we know why so many professing Christians have little comfort in their religion and go fearing and doubting along the road to heaven?  The question receives a solution in the saying of our Lord we are now considering.  Men are content with a little Christianity and a little fruit of the Spirit and do not labor to be holy in all manner of conversation.  They must not wonder if they enjoy little peace, feel little hope and leave behind them little evidence.  The fault lies with themselves.  God has linked together holiness and happiness and what God has joined together we must not think to put asunder.  (Expository Thoughts on the Gospels, 199)


III.  Joy in resting

 

By resting, I'm not referring to slumber or sleep.  This term is synonymous with "trusting" or "waiting upon."  I believe the sense of abiding in verse 9 carries this idea of resting.  It is a resting in the love which Jesus Christ has for you.  "Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love."

 

1.  Demands of discipleship are high

 

When you take up your cross and follow Jesus Christ, then the reproach of Jesus Christ falls upon you.  The opposition, hatred, and animosity the world had for Christ transfers itself to you.  The disciple is not greater than his master.  If the world opposed Christ, then the world will surely oppose those who follow Him.  Jesus reminds us of this a little later in John 15, "Remember the word that I said to you, 'A slave is not greater than his master.'  If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also" (15:20).

 

Jesus told His disciples, "You will be hated by all on account of My name" (Luke 21:17).  The message of the gospel goes headlong against the spirit of this age.  "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you" (John 15:18).  The opposition of the world is so strong and persistent that our Lord went so far as to say, "For he who is not against you is for you" (Luke 9:50).

 

This high demand of discipleship can be seen in the words of our Lord in Luke 9:23-26.

And He was saying to them all, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.  "For whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it.  "For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?  "For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.


Now, this reproach of Christ does not set well with the multitudes of "Dr. Feel-goods" who claim to be preaching the gospel.  Jesus does not tell us to follow Him and consequently, we will be healthy, wealthy, and giddy.  He bids us to take up His cross and die to our selfish desires and follow Him, gladly bearing His reproach.

 

In light of this, how do we go on with the Lord?  How do we persevere knowing that we will face opposition for our faith in Christ?

 

2.  Assurance of Christ's love motivates us

 

None of us will deny that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, faced the worst cruelties of humanity.  He knew what it was to have family and friends ridicule Him.  He knew what it was to be taunted and pursued as if He was an animal of prey.  He knew what it was to hear cheers turning into jeers.  He knew what it was to be falsely accused and sentenced to a death He did not deserve.  More than any of us can fathom, as He bore our sins on the cross, He knew the weight of the Father's awful wrath against sinful man.

 

How did Jesus keep going on?  The Son of God knew the Father's love for Him.  This love of the Father conquered every cruelty, taunt, and opposition in the mind of our Lord.  He was satisfied to have the smile of the Father upon Him.  It was the great consciousness of the Father's unwavering affection for His Son that constantly motivated our Lord upon this earth.

Father, I desire that they also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am, in order that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me; for Thou didst love Me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, although the world has not known Thee, yet I have known Thee; and these have known that Thou didst send Me; and I have made Thy name known to them, and will make it known; that the love wherewith Thou didst love Me may be in them, and I in them. (John 17:24-26)


It is this same love in all its fulness, quality, and faithfulness that Jesus promises to those abiding in Him.  When He tells us to "abide in My love," He is calling on us to find rest, security, and confidence in the constancy of His love toward us. 

 

That phrase, "Just as," conveys all the richness of divine love.  Just as the Father loved Him He loves us.  Remember that love is an action, not simply a feeling.  So think of it like this, in Christ's love He actively displays the depths of divine affection and activity for you.

 

"Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13).  How great is Christ's love for you?  It surpasses the depths of our comprehension to realize that our Lord faced the infinite weight of eternal justice at the cross for us.  John adds in his first Epistle, "We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us..." (I John 3:16).  This is unmeasured love!  The depths of His love for us far surpasses any difficulty we may encounter.

 

So, my friend, go on in faithfulness as a disciple with the full assurance that the smile of the Savior and the activity of His love is upon you!

 

3.  Disciples are not on their own

 

We must see one more thought concerning the disciples' joy in resting.  The assurance of Christ's love that motivates us gives us confidence that we are not facing life on our own.  We must abide in His love, rest in it, dwell in it, meditate upon every hue of it, savor it, delight in it.  A couple of hymn writers show us what this means.

 

Oh love that will not let me go,

I rest my weary soul in Thee;

I give Thee back the life I owe,

That in Thine ocean depths its flow

May richer, fuller be.  (George Matheson)

 

O the deep, deep love of Jesus,

Vast, unmeasured, boundless, free!

Rolling as a mighty ocean

In its fullness over me,

Underneath me, all around me,

Is the current of Thy love;

Leading onward, leading homeward,

To my glorious rest above.  

(Samuel Trevor Francis)

 

It is the security of abiding in Christ's love that we can keep pressing on in following Christ as joyful disciples.

 

IV. Joy in doing

 

Just how do we abide in Christ's love so that we might have the confidence to go on with God in all things as His joyful disciples?  "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."

 

1.  Obedience is a practical side of abiding

 

Can you trust Christ without obeying Him?  Obviously not!  It is our obedience that demonstrates or gives evidence of our faith in Christ (cf. James 2).

 

We can proclaim loudly and repeatedly, "Jesus loves me and I love Jesus !'  But those words mean nothing if we do not give heed to His commands.  Our Lord conditions our abiding in His love upon keeping His commandments.

 

"Keeping" translates a Greek word that means "to guard or to observe."  It conveys the idea that you take the commands of Christ seriously; you hold them to be precious; you give attention to closely following what our Lord commands.  

 

When we come to faith in Christ our whole attitude toward the commands of God's Word takes on a fresh dimension. Rather than being something we dread, His commands become our delight.  I John 2:3-5 expresses this clearly.

And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments.  The one who says, "I have come to know Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him;  but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected.


Kenneth Puls wrote a hymn (The Law That Once Was Placed by God) a few years ago that states it well:

 

The Law that once was placed by God on tablets of stone

Is now engraved on every heart whom Christ has called His own.

These Words that once condemned for sins and showed the wrath of God

Are now the Christian's great delight, made precious by the blood.

 

My brethren, we cannot get any more practical than obeying what our Lord has commanded us.  Too many people are looking for a Christianity without obligation for obedience.  But there is no such thing.  It is sheer hypocrisy to call ourselves "Christians" but have no hearts to obey.

 

Do you want to know in wondrous measure the fulness of joy and the assurance of Christ's love?  The Lord bids you to obey Him.  Don't try to get around this by 'creative interpretation'.  Just obey Him!  As you seek to obey then His glorious strength will be imparted to you.  The truth of being in union with Him becomes real to you and the joy of the Lord increases in your life.

 

Untold delights of joy await those who walk in unfeigned obedience to Jesus Christ.  The very message of abiding in Christ points us to living in trust and obedience to Jesus Christ.  There is nothing this side of heaven any more precious than trusting and obeying our Lord.

 

Is this your heartbeat?  Do you know the delights of His love as you walk in obedience?

 

2.  Christ's example points us to obedience

 

Jesus is not commanding us to do something He did not do Himself.  In the same way ("just as" in the text) He obeyed and experienced the Father's assuring love, He tells us to do the same.

 

We sing about being like Christ.  We talk about Him being our example.  We study His life and marvel at His faithfulness.  Now He tells us to take action.  Don't just observe Him, but emulate Him in His obedience to the Father.  As you abide in Him you can go on obeying Him.

 

Conclusion

 

Our joy is found in the full rounds of Christian discipleship.  Do you see this?

 

I'm afraid that some of us are blandly sitting back and waiting for the Lord to 'zap' us before we press forward in the Christian life.  Hear the Word of the Lord:  There is joy in praying, joy in being a disciple, joy in resting in Christ's love, and joy in obeying Christ's commands.  Let's walk on in His fulness of joy!

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