John 15
15
The Vine and the Branches
1-3“I am the Real Vine and my Father is the Farmer. He cuts off every branch of me that doesn’t bear grapes. And every branch that is grape-bearing he prunes back so it will bear even more. You are already pruned back by the message I have spoken.
4“Live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can’t bear grapes by itself but only by being joined to the vine, you can’t bear fruit unless you are joined with me.
5-8“I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you’re joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can’t produce a thing. Anyone who separates from me is deadwood, gathered up and thrown on the bonfire. But if you make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you, you can be sure that whatever you ask will be listened to and acted upon. This is how my Father shows who he is—when you produce grapes, when you mature as my disciples.
9-10“I’ve loved you the way my Father has loved me. Make yourselves at home in my love. If you keep my commands, you’ll remain intimately at home in my love. That’s what I’ve done—kept my Father’s commands and made myself at home in his love.
11-15“I’ve told you these things for a purpose: that my joy might be your joy, and your joy wholly mature. This is my command: Love one another the way I loved you. This is the very best way to love. Put your life on the line for your friends. You are my friends when you do the things I command you. I’m no longer calling you servants because servants don’t understand what their master is thinking and planning. No, I’ve named you friends because I’ve let you in on everything I’ve heard from the Father.
16“You didn’t choose me, remember; I chose you, and put you in the world to bear fruit, fruit that won’t spoil. As fruit bearers, whatever you ask the Father in relation to me, he gives you.
17“But remember the root command: Love one another.
Hated by the World
18-19“If you find the godless world is hating you, remember it got its start hating me. If you lived on the world’s terms, the world would love you as one of its own. But since I picked you to live on God’s terms and no longer on the world’s terms, the world is going to hate you.
20“When that happens, remember this: Servants don’t get better treatment than their masters. If they beat on me, they will certainly beat on you. If they did what I told them, they will do what you tell them.
21-25“They are going to do all these things to you because of the way they treated me, because they don’t know the One who sent me. If I hadn’t come and told them all this in plain language, it wouldn’t be so bad. As it is, they have no excuse. Hate me, hate my Father—it’s all the same. If I hadn’t done what I have done among them, works no one has ever done, they wouldn’t be to blame. But they saw the God-signs and hated anyway, both me and my Father. Interesting—they have verified the truth of their own Scriptures where it is written, ‘They hated me for no good reason.’
26-27“When the Friend I plan to send you from the Father comes—the Spirit of Truth issuing from the Father—he will confirm everything about me. You, too, from your side must give your confirming evidence, since you are in this with me from the start.”
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John 15: MSG
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.
John 15
15
1‘I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman;
2every branch in me not bearing fruit, He doth take it away, and every one bearing fruit, He doth cleanse by pruning it, that it may bear more fruit;
3already ye are clean, because of the word that I have spoken to you;
4remain in me, and I in you, as the branch is not able to bear fruit of itself, if it may not remain in the vine, so neither ye, if ye may not remain in me.
5‘I am the vine, ye the branches; he who is remaining in me, and I in him, this one doth bear much fruit, because apart from me ye are not able to do anything;
6if any one may not remain in me, he was cast forth without as the branch, and was withered, and they gather them, and cast to fire, and they are burned;
7if ye may remain in me, and my sayings in you may remain, whatever ye may wish ye shall ask, and it shall be done to you.
8‘In this was my Father glorified, that ye may bear much fruit, and ye shall become my disciples.
9According as the Father did love me, I also loved you, remain in my love;
10if my commandments ye may keep, ye shall remain in my love, according as I the commands of my Father have kept, and do remain in His love;
11these things I have spoken to you, that my joy in you may remain, and your joy may be full.
12‘This is my command, that ye love one another, according as I did love you;
13greater love than this hath no one, that any one his life may lay down for his friends;
14ye are my friends, if ye may do whatever I command you;
15no more do I call you servants, because the servant hath not known what his lord doth, and you I have called friends, because all things that I heard from my Father, I did make known to you.
16‘Ye did not choose out me, but I chose out you, and did appoint you, that ye might go away, and might bear fruit, and your fruit might remain, that whatever ye may ask of the Father in my name, He may give you.
17‘These things I command you, that ye love one another;
18if the world doth hate you, ye know that it hath hated me before you;
19if of the world ye were, the world its own would have been loving, and because of the world ye are not — but I chose out of the world — because of this the world hateth you.
20‘Remember the word that I said to you, A servant is not greater than his lord; if me they did persecute, you also they will persecute; if my word they did keep, yours also they will keep;
21but all these things will they do to you, because of my name, because they have not known Him who sent me;
22if I had not come and spoken to them, they were not having sin; but now pretext they have not for their sin.
23‘He who is hating me, doth hate also my Father;
24if I did not do among them the works that no other hath done, they were not having sin, and now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father;
25but — that the word may be fulfilled that was written in their law — They hated me without a cause.
26‘And when the Comforter may come, whom I will send to you from the Father — the Spirit of truth, who from the Father doth come forth, he will testify of me;
27and ye also do testify, because from the beginning ye are with me.
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