A Lesson in Fruit Bearing (Part Two)- John 15:1-17

In verse 8, Jesus tells us that our bearing fruit is to the “Father’s glory”. What He means by this is the key to understanding this passage as an explanation of what bearing fruit is. Everything that exists does so for God’s glory, and things bring glory to God when they fulfill His purpose for them. This includes Jesus and His disciples. Jesus brought the Father glory by fulfilling the purpose for which He was sent, and each of us also bring God glory when we fulfill His purpose in our lives. In verse 9, Jesus tells us He remained in His Father’s love by doing nothing apart from Him and in this way fulfilled the Father’s purpose in His life. The same holds true for us. As we do nothing apart from Jesus, we will also learn and fulfill God’s purpose for our lives and what he wants us to do for His kingdom, we will “learn obedience” (Heb. 5:8), and in that process fulfill our purpose in life. This is what is meant by bearing fruit in this passage. Verse 11 speaks of Jesus joy being in us. That joy was found by Jesus through fulfilling God’s purpose for Him (Heb. 12:2), and it was made “complete” (Greek teleos- to fulfill a purpose or accomplish a goal), for Jesus fulfilled His purpose and accomplished His goal. Jesus joy will likewise be in us and be complete when we fulfill our purpose and accomplish his goal for our lives. All of this occurs as we “abide” in Him. Jesus then gives His only command, to love one another as He has loved us This also can only be done by abiding in Him, for only He truly knows how to love others, and he will do so through us as we abide in Him. He then tells us what love truly is, and it is to place our lives at another’s disposal, which is what Jesus did for the Father, and we are to do the same for Him and others. In verse 14 and 15, we learn that we obey Jesus commands as friends, not servants, for friends know (and are about) the Father’s business. We obey as those who know the heart and mind of the Master, rather than knowing the rules of the household. Jesus wants our relationship with Him to mirror His relationship with the Father. This will happen as we grow to know Jesus, and will automatically produce the fruit of joy, meaning and purpose in our lives, just as it did in Jesus life. He then closes by repeating the command to love one another, showing that part of our purpose is to help others find and fulfill their purpose, to help them grow to know Jesus Christ. So we can see from this passage that it is telling us what bearing fruit really is, and it is each of us fulfilling our unique purpose in God’s kingdom, the purpose which He chose for us, created us to fulfill and appointed for us before we were born. We all bear fruit in different ways, and each of us is responsible to our Lord for our own purpose in His kingdom and plan for our lives, for the fruit we bear.