John 15:1-17
Jesus Makes Our Joy Complete by Remaining in His LOVE
1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 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. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 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.
5 “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. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.
To love God and to love neighbor is a life that brings Joy and is the rock that keeps us grounded, like a fixed star... Jesus teaches us about Joy and Love and their closeness, and that they are connected...He says: As the Father has LOVED Me, so have I LOVED you...Now remain in My LOVE...If you keep My commands, you will remain in My LOVE, just as I have kept My Father’s commands and remain in His LOVE...I have told you this so that My Joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete...My command is this: Love each other as I have LOVED you...Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends...You are My friends if you do what I command...I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know His Master’s business...Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from My Father I have made known to you...You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in My name the Father will give you...This is My command: Love each other...
So if we remain in Jesus' LOVE our Joy, too, will be complete...Jesus' Joy is steading and abiding throughout the believer's life...
C. S. Lewis wrote a book about Joy...In Lewis' book Surprised by Joy, he believed that the shape of his early life had an impact upon his conversion to Christianity...The author and thinker set out to describe in this book the ways in which his childhood experiences, his educational experiences and being in the first World War had shaped his mind and trained his thinking to lead ultimately to his concluding that Christianity was the most complete and comprehensive answer to his inherent and unknown longing for an experience that he would call Joy...Lewis was an atheist who thought and wrote his way to God...Surprised by Joy were Spiritual experiences in shaping his early life...He believed and found a transcendence in these experiences and a Joy for God and His Son came to Him through these experiences...
In Surprised by Joy, Lewis writes, “You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet...That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me...In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England...I did not then see what is now the most shining and obvious thing; the Divine humility which will accept a convert even on such terms...The Prodigal Son at least walked home on his own feet...But who can duly adore that LOVE which will open the high gates to a prodigal who is brought in kicking, struggling, resentful, and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance of escape?...The words “compelle intrare,” compel them to come in, have been so abused be wicked men that we shudder at them; but, properly understood, they plumb the depth of the Divine mercy...The hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our liberation.”...
Lewis was Surprised by the Joy of Jesus...
Bishop Fulton Sheen wrote these statements at different times about our LORD and Joy: “Help someone in distress and you lighten your own burden; the very joy of alleviating the sorrow of another is the lessening of one's own.”...“Joy is the happiness of love - love aware of its own inner happiness...Pleasure comes from without, and joy comes from within, and it is, therefore, within reach of everyone in the world...Joy is not the same as pleasure or happiness...A wicked and evil man may have pleasure, while any ordinary mortal is capable of being happy...Pleasure generally comes from things, and always through the senses; happiness comes from humans through fellowship...Joy comes from loving God and neighbor...Pleasure is quick and violent, like a flash of lightning...Joy is steady and abiding, like a fixed star...Pleasure depends on external circumstances, such as money, food, travel, etc...Joy is independent of them, for it comes from a good conscience and love of God.”...
And Fulton on the end of our earthly life said: Every person has a destiny — a final destiny...He has lesser goals, too, such as making a living, rearing a family, but over and above all, there is his supreme goal, which is to be perfectly happy...This he can be if he has a life without end or pain or death, a truth without error or doubt, and an eternal ecstasy of love without satiety of loss...Now this Eternal Life, Universal Truth, and Heavenly LOVE is the definition of God...To refuse this final project end and to substitute a passing, incomplete, unsatisfying object, such as flesh or ambitious ego, is to create an inner unhappiness that no psychiatrist can heal...