John 16:1-15  "These thing I have spoken to you, that you may be kept from stumbling."  Jesus and His disciples left the upper room.. but they have not gone into the garden yet.  There are things that Jesus wants to say.. things that would prepare them as best they can for what is about to happen.  

He has talked about oneness.. with the Father and with Himself. He has talked about loving one another and being hated by the world.  Jesus does not want them to "stumble"... to trip up and be trapped by the things that are coming, so He warns them ahead of time.  They will be persecuted. They will be thrown out of the synagogue.  They will be killed.  "And these things they will do because they have not known the Father, or Me."  When this happens.. "remember"..  Remember that Jesus went before us.. He suffered persecution.. He died.. but that was not the end of the story! Hallelujah!

Jesus repeated His promise to the disciples that He would send the "Helper".. the "Spirit of truth".  The disciples didn't know exactly what that meant at the time.. but they clung to that promise.  

Jesus sent the Holy Spirit who would "convict the world concerning sin, and righteousness, and judgement."  He would guide them into "all the truth".  He would hear the Word and speak the Word, disclosing to them "what is to come".   He would glorify Jesus by taking what is His.. what is the Father's  and disclose it to them. 

We also have been given the Spirit of Truth, the Helper, who comes to disclose the Word of God to us.  He is the One who convicts of sin.. so that we can turn to Jesus Christ in faith for forgiveness of all sin.  He convicts of righteousness.. "because I go to the Father, and you no longer behold Me."  Righteousness is found in Christ alone.. He is the Redeemer who died and rose again so that we can be declared righteous when we are in Him.  The Spirit also will convict of "judgement".  Judgement is certain.. "the ruler of this world has been judged".  There is no escaping from God's righteous judgement.. there is only one Hope.. and that is in the glorified Son of God.  The Spirit guides us into these truths. 

Father in Heaven, open our ears to hear the Truth that we might not stumble but walk in the Light of Your Spirit who brings us the Word.  When we see the events of this world and know the hatred that comes upon Your children, may we stand firm by remembering all that Jesus spoke.. may we be ready, covered by His righteousness, filled with Your Spirit, and living in the power of Your Name. Direct our hearts into the greatness of Your Love we pray.  In Jesus' name. Amen. 

 John 15:18-27   Hatred.. such a hard word.. such a sad word.. a word that comes all too easy to some, but a word that I find hard to even speak.  Jesus did not hold back as He spoke to His disciples about hatred.  These were hard truths that they needed to understand. We need to understand it too. 

Verse 18 " If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you."  The "world"  speaks of  the earth and its inhabitants .. all those who have not been chosen "out of the world".. the godless, those who hate Jesus and hate the Father. These would "hate" the disciples just like they hated Jesus. 

This hatred would result in persecution. The disciples of Jesus are pursued, mistreated, harassed, and pressed toward a different end. The world will always try to turn believers away from the Truth and back into the darkness that it dwells in.  The world, Jesus says, does not know the One who sent Him and so they will seek to destroy those who do. 

Jesus said that those who heard His words and saw His works were and are "without excuse for their sin." 

 He also told His disciples that the Holy Spirit who is "sent to your from the Father" would bear witness of Him and that they would also be His witnesses.  They would share His words and tell of His works.. they would give opportunities to others so that they might love Him and love the Father.  The gospel of Jesus Christ is the only way we can turn from hatred to love.  When we chose to believe and follow Jesus we find life.. a life of love and oneness.  When we turn away from the truth we remain in a world that hates.. a world that brings persecution and pain... a world without love, hope, and joy that come from fellowship with God. 

Father in heaven,  live in us and fill us with Your holy love.  We, who have believed in Jesus Christ.. who confess that He came in the flesh.. that He died on a cruel cross.. and that He rose again to victory and that He now awaits the day when He will call us to be with Him.. we love You and know that You are love.  Fill us Spirit of truth and remove all hatred and unbelief.. all sin from Your people.  Let Your Kingdom come and Your will be done, Holy Father.  Let Your love make us complete in Christ Jesus that we might show others the greatness of Your perfect love..  we pray this in Jesus' name. . Amen. 

 John 15:12-17  "This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you."  Love -  is the greatest commandment.  Jesus said, - "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your mind, This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself."  (Matthew 22:37-39 and Deuteronomy 6:5)

Jesus gives us a deeper picture of the love that He commands us to have for one another.  It is a "greater love" than what the world knows.  This love would enable a man to "lay down his life for his friends."  This is the kind of love that Jesus loves us with, for He was willing to go to the cross.. to take on all our sins.. to die for us. This is the kind of love that He desires and commands His friends to have.  

Jesus told His disciples that they were no longer slaves.  They were free to choose to love Him and to love the Father. He had chosen them for this very reason.. to make known to them the great love of the Father  so that they could love others with this greater love.. bearing fruit to the glory of His Name. 

John wrote more about this love in his letters.. 1st John 3 is especially focused on this kind of love.. the abundant love that the Father gave to us, His children.. and the love that we bestow on others. "Little children, let us not love with word or with the tongue, but in deed and truth. " v18  

Love.. abiding love .. is the essence of our oneness with our Father and with our Lord Jesus.  "No one has beheld God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit." (1st John 4:13-14) And verse 16 "And we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love and the one who abides in love abides in God and God abides in him." 

Father in heaven, we thank You that we have  come to know Your great love... love  that You have manifested in us through Jesus Christ the only begotten Son who came into this world to give us life.. to reveal Your eternal Love.. to take away all fear.. By faith we receive the perfect love that You have bestowed on us.. and by faith we choose to love like You have made us able to  love.. with all our hearts and souls and minds.  Spirit of God fill us with understanding and strength that we might truly love one another as the Father and the Son have loved us.  We ask this is the Name that is above all names, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen 

 John 15:1-11  Jesus gives us one of the most powerful  illustrations of what it means to be "one" with Him and the Father.  "I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser..... I am the vine, your are the branches.. " ( v1,5)

The Father in heaven.. the Creator and Mighty God who spoke all of creation into being.. Jesus calls the "vinedresser" .. the "husbandman".. a farmer.. one who tills the soil and dresses the vines.  His "work"  is  centered around His crop... cutting off fruitless branches.. and pruning those that are bearing fruit so that they bear more. 

Jesus calls Himself the "true vine".  He is the genuine vine.. the real deal.. not counterfeit, imaginary, or pretend... but the True product of God's Hands.  He is the vine.. out of Him comes everything.  He is the root and the trunk.. Without Him there would be no branches..no leaves.. and no fruit. There can be no life without Jesus. 

Jesus calls His followers "the branches".  Jesus said that only as the branches abide in the Vine can they bear any fruit. There must be a vital connection between the Vine and the branch for fruit to be produced.  If the branch is fruitless.. then it shows that there is no connection and then the Vinedresser will cut it off and throw it into the fire.  But if the branch is connected and holding fast to the Vine, it will produce fruit. Not only that but the Vinedresser will "prune" it to allow it to bear more fruit.  

Pruning means cleansing. Purging all that is impure.. removing all that is unacceptable.. all that hinders more fruit from growing.  Jesus told His disciples that they had already been made "clean" by His Words, but they needed to keep abiding in Him.. staying present in their relationship with Him.. in order to keep bearing fruit to the glory of the Father. 

Apart from Jesus, He tells us, we can do nothing.  No fruit will grow on a dead branch.  Life flows only from the True Vine.  It is in abiding.. remaining.. continuing.. being present in this relationship with Jesus that Life continues to flow into us and we bear fruit to the glory of God.  We abide by staying in the Word of God, by asking and receiving His Life in us, by keeping His commandments, and resting in His love. 

The Father cares for the Vine and the Branches with great love. Love flows from the Vine, Jesus Christ, into us.. the branches that abide in His Love.   "These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full."  Jesus said. 

Father in heaven, cleanse us from anything that keeps us from bearing fruit to the glory of Your Name.  Keep us abiding in the Word, continually walking in the Lord Jesus, and giving our lives to do Your will. Keep us in Your Love and in the Love of Jesus the True Vine.  Help us to know the Truth of these words with all of our hearts.  May Your Will be done in us we pray .. in the Name of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen. 

 John 14:16-31 Jesus prepared His disciples for the coming days.  He said, "And I will ask the Father and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever."  

Jesus said that the Helper is the "Spirit of truth".  He said that they "know Him"...that He abides with them and "will be in " them.   The Helper.. the Comforter will "teach" them, Jesus said,  and He will "bring to your remembrance all that I said to you." 

Jesus speaks what the Father tells Him .. and He  is telling the disciples (and us) about this wonderful  Helper.. The Spirit will show them how the Father and the Son are going to come and dwell with them.. in them and they in Him. This deep and abiding relationship is given to all who keep His commandments.. who love Him and who abide in Him. 

".. because I live, you shall live also... .I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you."  Love and obedience are the foundation of this blessed Oneness.. The Spirit helps us to know this and to live in these truths.   This is how we can keep letting our hearts rest in His peace and not in our troubles.  The Father and the Son are greater than any enemy, any fear, any trouble,  and we have the Helper to remind us and teach us what we need to live in this Truth.  Hallelujah!  Amen!

 John 14:7-17  Jesus makes His most profound statement here in the upper room. "He who has seen Me has seen the Father; "  He tells His disciples that they know the Father because they know Him.  To believe that Jesus is in the Father and the Father is in Jesus had been proven to them over and over by His Words and by His works.  Everything that Jesus did and said came from the Father .. so to see Jesus is the same as seeing the Father. 

Just believe it.. Jesus tells them.  Believe it and let this truth work in you.  "Truly, truly I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these he shall do, because I go to the Father." 

The disciples were about to find out exactly what that means.  They would "ask" in His Name and He would do what they asked and the  Father would be glorified. They would love Him and keep His commandments.  They would join the Father and the Son.. they would receive the Spirit.. and their lives would never be the same. 

Oh how we long to see the Son and the Father in this way.. in the fulness of glory and power and holiness. Thankfully... we are not "orphans" either.. we have the same Spirit that Jesus gave His disciples.. He is with us forever.  We receive Him even though the world cannot.  We can know Him and He abides with us and in us. 

Father in heaven, help me to grasp the greatness of these Words.. help us to know You.. to know Jesus.. to receive all that Your Spirit has come to reveal to us as we abide in You. May we love You and keep Your commandments, Lord Jesus.. May we do the work of the Father through Your Spirit. We are Your servants and we desire to obey and give glory to You.  Let Your will be done in us today we pray, in Your Name.. Amen. 

 John 14:1-6  "Let not your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me."  

Jesus spoke to His disciples about leaving. He sent Judas on his way to betray Him.  He told Peter that he would deny Him.. there was a lot for them to be troubled about.  

There is a lot that we get "troubled" about in this world too.  The Thayer Lexicon defines the word "trouble" as agitated, disquieted, stirred up, anxious or distressed.. or even perplexed.  Yeah, that's easy for us to relate to.  We have all been there at one time or another.  The disciples weren't ready for what was about to happen. Just like we aren't ready when our lives are upended by "trouble".  Yet, we have the same word that Jesus gave them.. "believe". 

"Believe in God, believe in Me also". 

Believe that Jesus is preparing a place for us.  Believe that He is coming again for us. Believe that He is the "way and the truth and the life."  Believe that we come to the Father through Him.  Believe... and don't let trouble  overcome the Truth. 

Easier said than done, I know.  Yet.. it is what gets us through the troubles of life We often say, " I don't know what people do without the Lord."  To be troubled and have no Savior, no hope, no comfort, no promise of a place prepared for eternity.. No wonder there is so much anxiety, depression, agitation, and distress.  

We have a God who sees us, knows us, and loves us. Are we "troubled"?   Let us hold on to the Word.. hold on to Jesus.. cling to the Truth and BELIEVE!

Father in heaven,  You are the Giver of all things!  We believe Your word and all that You have revealed to us through Jesus Christ.  Help us to believe and keep believing especially in the times of trouble.   You are our Life, our Hope, our Help, and our God who has professed everlasting Love to all who call on You.  Thank You for such grace and mercy.  Keep us in Your perfect peace. Be in us and let us be in You through Jesus our Lord and Savior.  We ask this in His Name. Amen.