John 15: Union With Christ, Everything You Need

Introduction

When everything seems to change overnight, Michael Dente feels that a soothing word is needed, “something constant.” In prayer, he felt led to speak about God’s faithfulness and the union we have in Christ.

Union with Christ, he says, is a doctrine “par excellence,” because it covers so many other things. Everything connects to this reality: Christ is in us, and we are in Christ. It is this that can calm us and steady us “in a world that is so unbalanced.”

To talk about it, he opens John 15:1-17, the passage where Jesus himself describes this union. His conviction fits in one sentence: Jesus is everything we need, and his disciples have the immense privilege of remaining in him, learning to pray, to love, to live in joy and to follow him in a life that pleases God.

Message Outline

1. The Last Night Before the Cross

Jesus is gathered with his disciples. He knows where he came from and where he is going, and he takes off his outer garments, takes the position of a servant and washes everyone’s feet.
He shares the meal, giving it a new meaning, and then announces something strange: “I am going away.” But it is for their sake that he is going, because he will give them a comforter.
For the disciples, this is D-Day. The next day, their lives will be turned upside down forever, and Jesus will change history for eternity.
As he goes down from the room toward the Kidron, surrounded by vines on the hillside, on his way to the olive trees where he would pray, he says: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the farmer.”

2. “I Am”: God Himself Speaks to Us

John’s Gospel is written a little differently from the others: the references to the Old Testament flow into one another there “like a river.”
“I am” seems to be nothing more than grammar. But these are two Greek words, “ego eimi,” taken straight from the Greek Bible, in Exodus 3.
Moses sees a burning bush in the desert. We know what a burning bush leads to, “as we know all too well this summer”: wildfires. But this one is not consumed. The LORD reveals himself in it, and when Moses asks for his name, he answers: “I AM WHO I AM” (Exodus 3:14).
Every time Jesus says “I am,” it is as if that scene were carried into John: “I am the bread of life,” “I am the resurrection and the life.” And we find ourselves face to face with God.
“I am the true vine” is the last time he says it in the Gospel.

3. The True Vine: Jesus Fulfills Israel

In the Old Testament, the vine does not refer to God, but to Israel. And it is never favorable. In Isaiah 5:1-4, the beloved did everything for his vineyard, he expected good grapes, and it produced bad ones. In Psalm 80 too, there is “always a problem with this vine.”
When Jesus says “I am the true vine,” it is a revolution for the disciples. He identifies himself with Israel: he fulfills the law, he fulfills what the prophets said, he is the light of the nations.
The Father is the farmer. The disciple is in direct relationship with God the Father, while remaining attached to God the Son: the Father works on those who are attached to the Son.
The word cleanses: “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you” (verse 3). The preacher testifies that he still sometimes reads a passage that shows him that a path he was on was not the right one. Thanks to this word, he understands that he needs to change. This is the cleansing work Jesus speaks of.

4. A Disciple Is Not Passive

“Disciple” is not a common word. Michael Dente has never heard it from his non-Christian friends. The idea is the student, the apprentice, the trainee: we are pupils of the great Master until the end of our days.
His love makes us grow “like good fertilizer,” and his limitless strength holds us up on the vine.
Despite the agricultural image, this is not a passive relationship. Christians are sometimes accused of praying without doing anything, and the preacher admits that we sometimes stay idle when the Lord wants to steer us. But praying and acting do not contradict each other.
Jesus does not say: “Relax, you have nothing to do.” “Remain” is a command. If he has to say it, it is because it is not natural. He expects a fruitful life that gives him glory: “apart from me you can do nothing” (verse 5).
So many things want to distract us from this one goal: staying attached to him. This attachment is nourishing because of the richness of his grace, and in it we find everything we need to live the life he wants to see in us.

5. Dying and Living Again With Christ

Paul describes the same union in Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.”
Union with Christ begins with death. He took our sins upon himself, and we die spiritually with him. But it does not stop there: he is risen, and we are raised with him in the heavenly places. His life now lives in us.
The preacher’s picture: someone loves his diesel car but wants to switch to electric. He does not throw away the body, he changes the engine. He removes everything diesel and puts in an electric motor. “The car dies to its diesel, but it is reborn as an electric.” That is what you are in Christ if you are united to him.
This union transforms prayer. His word begins to change us, little by little, and we have different desires, to the point of praying for strangers on the other side of the world who suffer for the same faith.
“If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, you will ask whatever you desire, and it will be done for you” (verse 7). This is not a blank check: you are so changed that you begin to pray as he prays, and to want what he wants.
Jesus never said: “Come and be a Christian.” He said: “Follow me.” The preacher quotes John Mark Comer: it is not a call to become a Christian, but “a call to an active and committed life.”

6. The Mark of the Disciple: Love and Joy

“Even as the Father has loved me, I also have loved you. Remain in my love” (verse 9). The love between the Father and the Son exists before the foundation of the world. It is so strong that Jesus submits to the Father’s will, takes on our humanity with all its limits, except sin, and goes as far as giving his life to set us free.
This love is the example in which the disciple’s life finds its coherence. It is not a love meant to show that we love better than others, nor a box to tick. “I am going to love this neighborhood like no one has ever loved it” would amount to saying: glory to me.
The picture of a life in contradiction: a fast-food employee who is actually a Michelin-starred chef, vegan and communist, and who comes to the fast-food restaurant every day to cook there. Living to be seen is falling into the same contradiction.
The disciple’s life is not sad. There are sufferings and trials, as for everyone. But Jesus says: “I have spoken these things to you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be made full” (verse 11).
This joy does not come from you. You do not have to manufacture it or look for it in entertainment: it is his joy in you. And every life has constraints. Whoever lives as if there were none ends up reaping the consequences.
The disciple walks with the one who wipes away his tears along the way. And on the last day, face to face, he will wipe every tear from our eyes.

7. Friends of Jesus, Chosen to Bear Fruit

“No longer do I call you servants … But I have called you friends, for everything that I heard from my Father, I have made known to you” (verse 15).
Some will object that Jesus was speaking to eleven specific men, two thousand years ago (Judas had already left). But what sets us apart from them? Are we not loved too? Do we not follow him? Do we not know his will through the Scriptures?
In the Old Testament, two men are called friends of God: Abraham and Moses. They had trials, but did they not live a beautiful life with God? This raises the question: what is your definition of the good life?
Jesus, who died for our sins and rose again to give us life, presents himself as the guarantee that all his promises are true.
“You didn’t choose me, but I chose you and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit” (verse 16). God did not save you for a mediocre life, but for a life that is “revolutionary for this world,” anchored in eternity.
Not everything happens at the moment of conversion. Think of two elderly people: one filled with love and gentleness, the other bitter. The first has become more and more like Christ thanks to the Holy Spirit within: they spent thirty years with Christ so that he could work on their soul. The other spent the same thirty years chasing their dreams, and is reaping the consequences.
The final call is simple: if you are not united to Christ, everything begins with acknowledging him. Ask forgiveness, confess, you hide nothing from God. And if you have been attached to him for a long time but tend to wander left and right, the preacher’s prayer is yours too: “Lord, reattach us.”

Key Takeaways

When Jesus says “I am,” he takes up the name revealed to Moses: it is God himself who presents himself as the true vine.
Where Israel’s vine disappointed, Jesus is the true vine: everything we need is found in him.
“Remain” is a command: union with Christ is not passive, it bears fruit for the glory of the Father.
United to Christ, we die and live again with him: our prayer changes and we begin to want what he wants.
The disciple lives on the Father’s love and Jesus’ joy, and is called his friend.

Personal Reflection

What distracts you today from this one goal: staying attached to Christ?
When did a passage of the Bible recently show you that a path you were on was not the right one?
Does your prayer mostly sound like “I’d like this, I’d like that,” or is it beginning to reflect what Jesus wants?
In what area do you try to love in order to be seen, rather than out of love for God?
When you look at the next thirty years, which elderly person do you want to resemble, and what do you need to let Christ work on in you starting now?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

What does “I am” mean in the Gospel of John?

Michael Dente explains that these words translate the Greek “ego eimi,” the formula of the Greek Bible in Exodus 3:14, when the LORD reveals his name to Moses in front of the burning bush. Every time Jesus says “I am,” John carries that scene into the Gospel: we are face to face with God. In John 15, it is the last time he says it.

Is remaining in Christ a passive life?

No. Despite the agricultural image, the preacher stresses that “Remain” is a command. If Jesus has to say it, it is because it is not natural. He expects a fruitful life that glorifies the Father. The disciple is an apprentice, a lifelong trainee of Jesus, called to an active and committed life.

Why does Jesus call his disciples his friends?

In John 15:15, Jesus says he no longer calls them servants, because he has made known to them everything he heard from his Father. For Michael Dente, this is not reserved for the eleven: we too are loved, we follow him and we know his will through the Scriptures. Like Abraham and Moses, we enter into a friendship with God.