Abide in Christ

What tasks do you have set before you today? Perhaps you have to make an important presentation at work, the outcome of which will determine your future in the company. Or maybe you need to spend the day going through your finances to see just how you will pay those past due bills. It may be that you have to reach out to a friend or loved one to have a long and hard conversation you’ve put off for far too long. Whatever you have to face today, where are you placing your hope? What source of strength and help are you drawing from as you face that challenge? Where are you seeking life?

One of my favorite New Testament verses comes from Jesus’s Upper Room Discourse with the disciples on the night before he was betrayed. In John 15: 5, Jesus tells the disciples, “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.”

Nothing. Nada. Zero.

Not a single thing.

As believers, we often mentally ascent to this truth, but fail to live it out in our daily lives. Too often, we attempt to face challenges in our own strength and wisdom. We try to create order out of the chaos of our days without considering the One who first spoke everything into existence. We rush headfirst into our problems without stopping to pray. We trust in our own efforts and plans. We look to our own wisdom to guide us rather than the wisdom of Christ.

And we expect to bear fruit all on our own.

But in John 15, Jesus tells us that there is nothing in us that can produce good fruit. We are incapable of doing any good apart from our union with Christ. As Ephesians 2 tells us, we were once dead in our trespasses and sins; dead people can’t do anything. We need to be brought back to life. The Spirit breathed in us the breath of life so we could respond to Christ by faith and receive forgiveness of our sins. Now we are united to him. All that he has done is ours. All that he has is ours. All that he is has now become ours.

This metaphor of the vine and branches speaks to this union. Christ is the vine out of which we receive all nourishment. He is the source and wellspring of our strength. He is wisdom incarnate. As John Calvin wrote, “But Christ dwells principally on this, that the vital sap -- that is, all life and strength -- proceeds from himself alone. Hence it follows, that the nature of man is unfruitful and destitute of everything good; because no man has the nature of a vine, till he be implanted in him. But this is given to the elect alone by special grace. So then, the Father is the first Author of all blessings, who plants us with his hand; but the commencement of life is in Christ, since we begin to take root in him. When he calls himself the true vine the meaning is, I am truly the vine, and therefore men toil to no purpose in seeking strength anywhere else, for from none will useful fruit proceed but from the branches which shall be produced by me.”

And so we must abide in Christ. We must depend upon him for all things. We must draw our resources from him. We must rest in Christ’s perfect life and sacrificial death alone to save us, not in anything we have done. We must commune with him through his word, prayer, worship, and the sacraments. We must look to him for wisdom.

Then we will bear fruit.

When we find ourselves facing a challenge or difficulty in our day, or even experiencing the blessings of God’s hand, we have to remind ourselves that all is of grace. Apart from our union with Christ, we can do nothing. The more we remember and live out this truth, the more we’ll see evidence of his fruit-bearing work in our lives.

Fruit Bearing Affliction

What is your favorite verse or passage when you are going through a difficult season? When you are in a trial or are afflicted with some kind of suffering, what biblical truths to you turn to? For many believers, Romans 8:28 is a favorite verse: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”

In the midst of our heartache, we often cling to the truth that good will come from it. But what is that good we hope for? Sometimes, we think of the good in terms of the physical, earthly, here and now kind of good. As in: Maybe the job I lost will result in an even better job. Maybe this broken dream will pave the way to an even better dream. Maybe this relationship fell apart because there’s a better one waiting for me.

While there are times in our life when we look back on a trial and see how it paved the way to something better in the here and now, there are other good things that result from affliction. And they aren’t material or tangible. They aren’t things we can see with the naked eye. They are internal and spiritual. As such, they have eternal significance.

John Newton is well know for penning the much-loved hymn Amazing Grace, but he also wrote numerous letters during his lifetime. Many of these letters are still published today. His letters point to the grace of God in the life of the believer.

In one letter, he writes about the fruits of affliction in the believer’s life.[1] “Though afflictions in themselves are not joyous, but grievous, yet in due season they yield the peaceful fruits of righteousness. Various and blessed are the fruits they produce.” What are those fruits? Newton mentions a number of those fruits:

6 Fruits of Affliction

1. Prayer: “By affliction prayer is quickened, for our prayers are very apt to grow languid and formal in a time of ease.” How true is this! When we are in a season of suffering, we are more likely to turn to the Lord in prayer than we are in times when things are going well. In my own life, I find my prayer life deepens and flourishes during times of hardship, for the trial reminds me how dependent I am upon God’s grace.

2. Scripture: Newton says that afflictions help us understand the Scriptures, particularly God’s promises to us. Many of God’s promises in Scripture have to do with his help to us in times of trouble, and unless we are in a season of affliction, we will not know those promises firsthand. “We cannot so well know their fullness, sweetness, and certainty, as when we have been in the situation to which they are suited, have been enabled to trust and plead them, and found them fulfilled in our own case.” Trials show us more of who God is in his wisdom, power, and faithfulness.

3. Testimony: Our afflictions provide the opportunity to testify to others of God’s grace. When people see how God has brought us through a trial, God is glorified. Our lives then become living testimonies of God’s mercy and grace and give us an opportunity to share the reason for our hope.

4. Strength: Newton says that some graces are only revealed through affliction, such as resignation, patience, meekness, and long-suffering. Just as the practice of lifting weights develops our muscles, so too does affliction develop characteristics in us that can’t grow apart from the work of affliction in our lives. “Activity and strength of grace is not ordinarily acquired by those who sit still and live at ease, but by those who frequently meet with something which requires a full exertion of what power the Lord has given them.”

5. Compassion: Newton also says that affliction helps us have compassion for others who suffer. While we can have sympathy for others in affliction without experiencing such suffering ourselves, it is not as strong as when we have experienced it ourselves. Likewise, suffering helps us know more of the sufferings of Christ.

6. Humility: Lastly, Newton says that trials and suffering help us see the true content of our hearts. Affliction awakens sins in our hearts we didn’t realize were there. “This discovery is indeed very distressing; yet till it is made, we are prone to think ourselves much less vile than we really are, and cannot so heartily abhor ourselves and repent in dust and ashes.” Seeing the truth about ourselves produces the fruit of humility.

Romans 8:28 promises good to come through our trials and afflictions. Though the trials are not good in and of themselves—far from it!—God uses them for our ultimate good. Newton’s letter points to some of those good things as the fruit of affliction’s work in our lives. Have you seen any of this fruit in your own life?

[1] Newton, John. Select Letters of John Newton (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2011), pp. 218-221.

No Such Thing as Little Sin

Drip. Drip. Drip.

I was preparing dinner one night and heard the kitchen faucet dripping. I fiddled with the handle and it stopped. It did it again the next day and I did the same thing.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Over the next few days, the faucet’s drip continued to increase. It took more and more “fiddling” with the handle before it finally stopped.

And then one morning my son heard the sound of dripping, not in the kitchen, but in the basement. He found the ceiling tiles saturated with water and a stream of water running down the walls onto the carpet below.

That little drip became a big shower which rained down and caused a huge problem.

Isn’t that a lot like sin?

We often see what we think are little sins in our life and brush them off. Overlook them. Manage them. Pretend they aren’t there. But there’s no such thing as a little sin and soon what seems like a little thing becomes a big thing in our hearts.

A little problem with binge watching a show every night might reveal a big problem with the idol of comfort.

A little sarcastic remark might hide a deeper problem of bitterness or envy or pride.

A little overspending might hide a deeper problem with materialism.

A little overworking may reflect a deeply rooted idol of success or approval.

A little comparison grows into envy and discontentment.

A little gossip grows into discord and disunity.

A little frustration grows into anger.

You get the picture.

In the eyes of God, there is no such thing as little sin. First of all, sin is sin. God is holy and righteous and nothing that is not holy and righteous can stand before him. One sin is enough to keep us from him. And when you consider the fact that we sin more than just once, but countless times a day, our problem with sin is no little thing at all. As R.C. Sproul wrote in The Holiness of God, “Sin is cosmic treason. Sin is treason against a perfectly pure Sovereign. It is an act of supreme ingratitude toward the One to whom we owe everything, to the One who has given us life itself….The slightest sin is an act of defiance against cosmic authority… It is an insult to His holiness.” (pp. 115,116)

Secondly, sin never stays little. Like a weed, it grows. It spreads and multiplies. “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?“ (1 Corinthians 5:6). It produces offspring of other sins. Like an invasive vine, it twists itself around our heart, choking out our life. And like a vine covered forest, it blocks us from the light of life. Sin left unattended or ignored destroys everything in its path.

Thankfully, we were home that day when it started raining in the basement. Had we not been, the damage would have been worse. Leaks in a house are serious, even small ones. Likewise, in our lives, there is no such thing as a small sin. As the Puritan preacher John Owen warned, “be killing sin or it will be killing you.”

The Apostle Paul referred to killing sin as “putting off” sin. He instructed the Colossian church, “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (3:1-3). Through faith in Christ we are justified. We are united to him in his perfect life, death, and resurrection. This means we died with Christ to our old life and have risen to new life in him. We are new creations. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Therefore, we are to put off the old self; we are to put to death our sin. Paul then lists some of those sins we need to “put off” or put to death (Colossians 3:5-9).

Elsewhere, Paul tells us how to put sin to death: through the Spirit (Romans 8:13). It is the Spirit who brings our dead hearts to life, giving us a heart of flesh. He works in us to put sin to death and to produce in us the fruit of righteousness. He convicts us of our sin, draws us to repentance, trains us in obedience, and teaches us to depend upon God’s grace. His weapon of choice in slaying our sin is the word of God. It is alive and active as it discerns the thoughts and intentions of our hearts (Hebrews 4:12). As we read and study the word, it sanctifies us (John 17:17). As John Owen wrote, “The Holy Spirit is our only sufficiency for the work of mortification. He is the only great power behind it and he works in us as he pleases…Those who seek to keep down sin without the aid of the Spirit, labor in vain.”

Perhaps if I had realized the significance of the little drip at my sink, I wouldn’t now have damage in my basement. How much more true is that of sin! There is no such thing as a little sin. We can’t overlook it or underestimate its destructive power in our lives. By God’s grace, we are not left to fight it on our own. May we seek the Spirit’s help to recognize sin in our life and put it to death.