First Sunday in Lent – Tuesday

Abide in me. – John 15:4.

Jesus is “the true Vine;” God the “Father is the Husbandman [Vine-dresser]” (John 15:1). The believers, the Christians “are the branches” (v. 5a).  Every branch in Jesus that bears no fruit, that ceases to live and to walk in faith, God shall take away from Jesus.  But every branch that bears fruit, God will purge [prune], “that it may bring forth more fruit” (v. 2).

Dear Christian, now you “are clean through the Word” (v. 3) of Jesus which you, by God’s grace alone, have held in faith.  Thereby you have been united with Jesus as a branch with the vine, and you have the salvation, which is in Jesus, His righteousness, His life, and His strength.  But continue to “abide” (v. 4a) in Jesus, and Jesus and His salvation will abide in you.  “As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine” (v. 4b), so you cannot bear fruit unless you abide in Jesus, through faith in His Word.  Jesus is the Vine; you are the branch.  You can and will bring “forth much fruit” (v. 5b) only if you abide in Him and He in you.  For without Him, of yourself, you “can do nothing” (v. 5c) good, nothing right, nothing pleasing to God (Hebrews 11:6).

Whoever does not abide in Jesus “is cast forth as a branch and is withered” (v. 6a).  And the withered branches are gathered and cast into the fire and are burned.  If, however, you abide in Jesus, if His Word abides with you and guides your life, all that you ask and desire, according to His will, will be given to you (v. 7).  For when you bear much fruit, as a true disciple of Jesus, the Father is “glorified” (v. 8).  Listen!  As the Father has loved the Son, so has Jesus Christ, your Savior, “loved you” (v. 9a).  “Continue” (v. 9b) in this His love!  Listen! If you keep and hold fast to His Word, including His commandments, you will abide in His love, even as He kept His Father’s commandments and abode in His Father’s love (v. 10).

Bear this in mind and hide it in your heart, as a word spoken to you by Jesus Himself.  These things He says to you, in order that His “joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full” (v. 11) and never end. Thus Jesus spoke to His disciples in that night. Thus He also speaks to you for your great good and for your lasting comfort.

PRAYER – O Father in heaven, great heavenly Vine-dresser, I thank Thee that, through Thy Word, the Holy Spirit has ingrafted me in Thy Son, Jesus Christ, and has made me a partaker of the entire salvation wrought by Him.  O merciful God, graciously grant that I may always embrace my Savior in His Word and abide in Him, thus being His true disciple and bringing forth much fruit because of my attachment, by faith, to Him, that I may continue in His love for me, that He may rejoice in me, and that my joy may be full eternally.  Amen.

Chief of sinners though I be, Jesus shed His blood for me;

died that I might live on high, lived that I might never die.

As the branch is to the vine, I am His, and He is mine.

–

O my Savior, help afford, by Thy Spirit and Thy Word!

When my wayward heart would stray, keep me in the narrow way;

grace in time of need supply, while I live and when I die.

                                                                                     (Hymn 342, st. 1 and 5; TLH)