A Shift to Intentional Growth (John 15:1-5)

Sermon

Key Passage

John 15:1–5 NIV

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

Testimony

Jeff Bowman

Introduction

Vision- We exist to reach the world for Jesus, one person at at time

Mission- We do this by creating Biblical disciples in relational environments

Series- If You Want to Change the World

God created His church to be a world changing agent

Light in darkness

Hope in hopelessness

Salt in a bland world

We have seen more than ever that the world need change. The world needs hope.

God gave this world Jesus. He sent His Son into the world to save it and bring it salvation.

This is our mission. To live as disciples of Jesus and allow Him to change us and through us God will impact and reach the world around us.

We all have a part of changing the world. That is our part as His church.

Week 1- Drop Your Nets

You cannot stay where you are and go with Jesus

Week 2- A Shift to Truth

We must maintain a Biblical foundation in our lives

The truth is external to us.

Our world will say look within yourself. That is where you will find truth.

But as people who follow Jesus, we know that what is within ourselves is a sinful nature. That is what we leave to follow Jesus.

The Bible is the inspired Word of God and it is the tool that guides us into all truth.

Without the Bible there is no direction for growth and maturity

Week 3- A Shift to Relationship

We do not singularly live on a Biblical foundation. We are called to love God and also Love others.

The command to love others is not secondary, it is only second.

We saw last week that from creation, we were designed for relationship with others.

Everything from creation, to the law, to Jesus teachings, and the early church demonstrate the importance of growing relationally as we mature.

We cannot, nor will we mature as believers until our relational growth and Biblical foundation grow and apply together.

Biblical foundation without relationship

Pride, answer guy, not good

Relational without a Biblical foundation

No point of truth, no transformation, no discipleship

These two work together for our maturity and growth.

Week 4- Today, we will look at a shift to intentional growth.

We will uncover what it means to engage in this journey of discipleship. What we need to see as followers of Jesus, and what we need to do as disciple-makers.

This world needs hope, light and Jesus.

God called His church to be this in the world

This is a personal invitation for us to engage.

Matthew 7:21–23 NIV

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

Verse 21- “Everyone” Singular

Verse 22- The phrases “prophesy”, “drive out”, and “perform miracles” are all plural

Verse 23- “I never knew you” Singular

People will go to Jesus at the Judgment day as a singular person, then claim the activity of the group. But Jesus will say, “I’m not judging the group. I’m judging you.”

We will all individually stand before God and give account of our lives.

We are called to do life together relationally, but we also have responsibility for the opportunities that God has given us.

I want to talk about that authentic journey we have following God.

Sermon

The Matthew 4-28 Principle

I want to talk about something that I call the Matthew 4-28 principle.

It is an understanding of what the journey of discipleship will involve.

When we have our minds set to change the world, we want to do that today.

Look at all of the fitness fads that are out there.

I remember when P90X came out. Does anyone remember that?

I paid the $150 for the DVD’s and I was excited to look like the guys on the TV commercials.

I ate the food, I did the workouts, and I worked hard for 90 days.

But after a few weeks of ardent devotion, was Christmas.

I didn’t want to go to Christmas at my parents house and miss out on apple pie, and the homemade candy, and cookies, and you know what all.

Then, we were sent home with leftovers.

When I was on track, it was going great. I was seeing results. But when life started throwing temptations at me, I started to slip.

I finished P90X. There was definite growth. But I didn’t look like the guys in the TV ads.

Those guys got that way by changing their lifestyle for years. They didn’t look like that after 90 days. They look like that because they have done this the right way for years.

This is what we are talking about today. It is the journey of discipleship.

We see Jesus’ command to Matthew 28:19

Matthew 28:19 NIV

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

We hear sermons and testimonies and get excited. I want to get there and do that!

We might start well, but soon, the temptations of life, our circumstances and other priorities creep into our lives and we find ourselves going through the motions and remaining unchanged as followers of Jesus.

Here is where the Matthew 4-28 principle fits.

“Come follow” THEN “Go make”

In Matthew 4:19 we see Jesus’ invitation to His disciples.

Matthew 4:19 ESV

And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”

This is where we begin to put our sermon series together into a cohesive picture

Jesus invited His disciples to follow Him.

He then journeyed with them for over 3 years.

Only after three years did Jesus now say Matthew 28:19

Matthew 28:19 NIV

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

In our microwave, 90 days to fitness, all knowledge at my fingertips society, we forget that there is a process to healthy growth.

The disciples had to spend three years with Jesus before Jesus said, “Go, make disciples, change the world.”

I want to talk about the importance of those three years and what that means for us.

I am going to use a phrase and define that phrase so we can grasp what this journey looks like.

Every disciple must be an INTENTIONAL FOLLOWER of Jesus

Define intentional

As we talked about in our first sermon in this series, the disciples knew what Jesus meant when He said, “Follow me”

They didn’t follow him for an afternoon, then say, “Well Jesus, I’ve got to get to work in the morning. It’s been great!”

They knew that following Jesus as His disciple meant a lifetime that was now defined by Him.

We must be intentional as we follow Jesus.

Here is what I mean when we say the word “Intentional”. It is something of a buzzword in our culture. I don’t want to use this in a “buzzword” sense. I want to put practical definition to that phrase.

I want to use the story of my journey through P90X as the parallel.

I had to be intentional to grow in my fitness.

There were a bunch of things that I had to eliminate from my life and a bunch of things that I had to add to my life.

There are some phases in that growth process:

As I said in my introduction, I did the P90X fad.

When I started, everything was new. I couldn’t touch my toes, I couldn’t work out the whole time. I struggled eating the right foods.

But as I continued down that path, my habits changed, my strength and flexibility changed.

But it wasn’t easy. It was really hard.

The workouts were hard. Establishing the habits to do this was significantly harder.

I believe it is the same for being an intentional follower of Jesus.

There are habits and lifestyles that we hold to that Jesus wants to change.

Jesus said it this way:

Matthew 16:24–26 NIV

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

As we embark on this journey, we need to know that this is a journey that is going to be outside of our comfort zone. It will be contrary to our nature. It will require change in us that is uncomfortable, if not downright brutal.

There will be people in our lives that God uses to grow us in the Kingdom.

The funny thing about growth in the Kingdom of God is that it usually looks like destruction in this world.

The journey of following God is like a narrow path.

I love the book by John Bunyan called “Pilgrim’s Progress”.

It highlights the journey of a Christian and all of the struggles that they encounter on their way to glory.

The journey to follow Jesus is a bumpy path. We must be intentional. What does it mean to count the cost?

How can I be an intentional follower of Jesus?

How can I live the life that the disciples lived from Matthew 4- Matthew 28?

An intentional follower needs:

An intentional leader

As a disciple of Jesus, we often have the temptation that fall into the “Jesus and Me” perspective.

Last week our sermon was about the value of relationship. It isn’t just a nice add-on to our salvation.

It is a necessity of our humanity. We are called to follow Jesus with one another.

The disciples of Jesus are our example.

Who did they follow? They followed Jesus.

He was the intentional leader and they intentionally followed Him.

Paul highlighted this point with the Corinthian church:

1 Corinthians 11:1–2 NIV

Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ. I praise you for remembering me in everything and for holding to the traditions just as I passed them on to you.

Paul set himself up as the example to follow.

He knew that there were people who needed to follow Jesus, but they needed an example to follow.

We can see the balance that Paul presented to the disciples in Corinth

Was there an emphasis on relationship?

Yes! They were supposed to be around Paul enough to see his example, then model his example as he followed Jesus.

What of his example do you think they needed to see?

How he prayed

How he lived

How he showed forgiveness

How he served

All of these are personal parts of life. Paul had invited these people not just to church, but to life.

THEY HAD HEARD ABOUT JESUS, BUT PAUL WAS THERE TO SHOW THEM JESUS.

Was there an emphasis on truth?

Paul showed them the teachings that had been passed to Paul and that Paul had passed on to them.

These weren’t Paul’s opinions of the teachings. These were the teachings that Jesus gave, lived out in front of them.

We are called to follow Jesus together as a family.

Those who are more mature have the responsibility to help care for those who need to grow.

At Real Life Selkirk, we want to be a church that creates environments where you can intentionally connect with intentional leaders that will walk you through to maturity.

Here is the thing about maturity: there are three parts to growing up.

My part, God’s part, their part.

Your life group leader will not mature you. They will point you to Jesus. God makes us grow.

You have a part to play. If you want to grow, you have to take the steps to get into the environments to grow.

We need to address the condition of our heart. Is following Jesus the priority?

God will always do His part.

He will not force maturity into our lives, but He will change us and grow us.

A few weeks ago, Harold shared his testimony about how he came to Jesus and started reading the Bible.

He didn’t know where or how to read the Bible until people came alongside of him and helped him grow.

Now the Bible is the foundation of Harold’s day and he is intentionally helping others do the same.

The bottom line here is that in order to be an intentional follower, we need to be around other people who are intentionally following and find an intentional leader to guide us.

An intentional follower needs:

An Intentional Leader

A Commitment to Growth

A commitment to growth

A second part counting the cost of being an intentional follower is that we must understand that our journey in Jesus will change us.

This is where we get our key passage for today: John 15:1-5

John 15:1–5 NIV

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

I don’t know if you are hearing that how I am hearing that, but if you remain in Jesus, He will either cut parts of your life that are not fruitful, or He will prune the parts of your life to make them more fruitful.

Regardless of your situation, God is going to shape you into what He wants you to be.

I have some grape vines in my back yard. Some of you have seen them. If I leave them be for a few weeks, the grape vines run crazy!

I have to constantly prune them and shape the branches.

Sometimes I have to prune really healthy strong branches because they are growing in the wrong direction.

But the smaller branches that are growing in the right directions will never have the nutrients to grow unless those bigger branches are pruned off.

In the same way, we must surrender our entire life to Jesus.

He needs to shape us and prune us.

Sometimes that is overwhelmingly difficult.

For much of my life I struggled with this.

I had one goal in my life and that was to play basketball.

After that, I wanted to be a cop.

I remember struggling through what felt like the wreckage of my life when it became evident that God had pruned them out of my life.

What good is a guy with a college degree in LE if he doesn’t want to be a cop?

How would I provide for my family? Years of my life felt wasted at that time.

But God had to prune that so other parts of my life could grow.

The object of our growth is not some journey where God is trying to make life difficult.

He is striving for each of us to bear fruit.

John 15:8 NIV

This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

Do you remember our definition of a disciple?

Matthew 4:19 ESV

And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”

Definition of a Disciple:

Following Jesus

Being changed by Jesus

Obedient to Jesus by making disciples

If He is our Lord, we must follow and surrender our lives to be shaped by Him.

An intentional follower needs:

An Intentional Leader

A Commitment to Growth

Humility and Obedience

Humility and Obedience

As we look down the road of being an intentional follower of Jesus, there are parts of life that God prunes, and forms into His likeness.

But there are also difficulties in life.

We can live in the hypothetical world of “If I follow Jesus, He will prune me and form me, but life will get better.”

But it doesn’t always get better.

Sometimes life gets worse.

People attack us

Even Christians lob grenades at us

People outside of the church lob grenades at us as well.

In fact, there are seasons where I felt completely alone in this journey of trying to be an intentional follower of Jesus.

I was reading recently about King David

There is a book that I love called A Tale of Three Kings by Gene Edwards

In it, he tells the story of David before he became king

King Saul was a mad king. He was literally insane because of his disobedience to God.

His insanity would be gentled by David’s harp playing.

However one day, David was playing his harp and King Saul, the mad king, got very angry and threw the spear at him

What do we do when someone throws a spear at us?

I know what I believe: We have to defend ourselves. We have to stand up for right. We cannot let it look like we are going to be pushed around.

This is the situation where we need to wrench the spear out of the wall and throw it back.

This becomes our routine. Anytime anyone throws a spear at us, we dodge it and throw the spear back.

Except this isn’t what David did.

David dodged the spear, but did not throw it back.

He later said that he would never do anything to harm God’s anointed.

How could that be God’s anointed? God’s anointed was throwing spears at him? This doesn’t make any sense.

David had a view of God that was humble and wise.

If he picked up the spear and threw it back at the king every time he had the spear thrown at him, here is what would happen.

He would trust his judgement every time

He would get good at throwing spears.

He would turn out just like King Saul.

We are not conforming ourselves to the ways of this world.

When we choose to follow Jesus, we sign up for a battle, but it isn’t the battle we all think we are facing.

If we look at the things of this world, they are sinful and bad.

Sometimes things move in the right direction. Sometimes they move in the wrong direction.

But our marching orders are clear.

Are we humble enough to follow God’s commands as we face this battle?

Matthew 16:24–25 NIV

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.

When we humble ourselves and surrender to Jesus as Lord, it is a sacrifice.

In my life, I haven’t always looked at it as a sacrifice, until I start attaching real life situations to this.

What does it mean to take up my cross?

We usually associate that with a mindset like, “I know there will be some hardships along the way, but if Jesus doesn’t make my life easier, that is the part of my life that is my cross.”

It is a passive view of whatever comes our way, the difficulties are the cross.

I want you to know that the cross wasn’t passive to Jesus.

When Jesus says, “You must take up your cross and follow me.” He means that there is an intentional sacrifice that must be made.

What does that sacrifice look like?

What does this mean?

I began to search through the Gospels about what Jesus said is the cost of discipleship. It is everything.

The idea of taking up your cross and following Jesus, gaining your soul, but losing this world show up time and time again.

I am especially excited because it is in Matthew a ton, and we will begin teaching through Matthew is a few weeks!

So, what does this mean?

I know in my life, it is the intentional process of not looking at the world how I want to look at the world.

What is best for me?

What is best for my family?

What are my hobbies?

What are my politics?

What is my worldview?

I am not saying you should not have these things.

But there is one way of thinking about all of these that takes precedent. We look at the world through the eyes of Jesus.

We care about what He cared about.

Spend your time reading through any of the four Gospel accounts of Jesus.

Do you spend your time thinking about the things He thought about?

Or are we thinking about other things?

Jesus said...

John 12:24–26 NIV

Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.

We live lives that are laser focused on the Kingdom of God.

We must know the truth.

Not the truth that the world says. The truth of the Word of God.

I’ve said this before and I’ll continue to say it.

This world and the battles of this world continue to scream for the attention of our hearts.

There is a battle being waged, but it is not a battle of national borders and political opinions.

There is an enemy who seeks to kill, steal and destroy.

There is a King and a Kingdom that is looking to draw people from sin into salvation and be a light to the world.

What does that light look like?

Let our light shine that they may see your good deeds and glorify God.

The Spirit within us gives us lives defined by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, goodness and self-control.

The book of Philippians gives us the roadmap of where our minds ought to be

Philippians 4:8–9 NIV

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.

These are the battles to fight.

I love this. After Paul gave his teaching about the armor of God, this is the action point.

Does this sound like someone who is engaging the world’s battles? Or looking at the world through the lens of the Gospel?

And the final battle, the most important battle to conclude Ephesians 6:19-20

Ephesians 6:19–20 NIV

Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.

What words needed to be spoken?

Were they words about the battles of flesh and blood?

Or were they words of the Gospel to lost, broken and hurting people.

When the world throws spears at us, will we show them Jesus? Or will we pick up the spear and throw it back?

Conclusion

An intentional follower needs:

An Intentional Leader

A Commitment to Growth

Humility and Obedience

Romans 8:38–39 NIV

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Following Jesus is a journey.

We must find an intentional leader

We must surround ourselves with the right people

You don’t want your kids having the wrong circle of friends and voices.

We need to surround ourselves with the people that will bring us closer to Jesus.

We must commit ourselves to grow

This will be a journey of change and struggle

We will give up parts of ourselves, pruning and shaping us into His shape of what we ought to be

We are engaging in a battle

We are not the general. We must stand firm in Jesus.

The Gospel is our battle cry. We must fight as He guides us to fight and that is in a manner that reflects His love in this world.

Gospel

Directed Prayer

Communion