SPEAKER_00: Well, this past week, uh thinking about this passage at the same time, uh, we went to Blue Skies Camp.
SPEAKER_00: So Blue Skies is a a camp for uh families with children uh with cancer.
SPEAKER_00: And so uh families with children cancer can apply, and if they get accepted, then they can go for free to this this uh it's a a week at the beach where they are pampered.
SPEAKER_00: They are absolutely just loved on.
SPEAKER_00: It it is something they they cannot buy this with money.
SPEAKER_00: You cannot buy this with money.
SPEAKER_00: I mean you're getting the four seasons treatment, but you're getting loved.
SPEAKER_00: Um, you're getting handwritten notes, uh, you're getting uh devotionals, you're getting friends, you're getting community, you're you're getting family.
SPEAKER_00: And so we went as a volunteer family, and I preached uh four times and did some devotionals for the volunteers.
SPEAKER_00: And uh so we were there, so we drove down, it's at Port St.
SPEAKER_00: Joe.
SPEAKER_00: So we drove down there and we get there, and so in our condo we shared with another family, teenagers, and so our our our side of the condo is two bedrooms, and we got there and you know, pack and play in the bathroom.
SPEAKER_00: You know, we always make Greta sleep in the bathroom, and so she's in the bathroom, and the bigger girls are in one bedroom, and Christy and I are in the other bedroom, and then the other family's on the other side.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're unpacking, and we put some of the clothes away, and we do some of that, but I mean, all of y'all know this.
SPEAKER_00: You you go on vacation somewhere and you sort of unpack, right?
SPEAKER_00: So like the food still kind of stays on the counter.
SPEAKER_00: You don't you don't take the trouble to like put it up in the cupboard, and Christy sort of unpacks, gets her clothes up.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like kind of a hybrid, um, because you're not settling in.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you you know this is this is not your it's not your home.
SPEAKER_00: This is this isn't really the place you live out of.
SPEAKER_00: Um it's definitely not the place you abide and you you you remain.
SPEAKER_00: So Saturday morning comes and what do we do?
SPEAKER_00: We put everything back in the bags, put everything back in the car.
SPEAKER_00: Um, we drive back home, and now now when you get home, it's totally different because it's your home.
SPEAKER_00: This is the place you settle in.
SPEAKER_00: So you're fully unpacking.
SPEAKER_00: You're on the suitcase is totally empty, and the suitcase goes like up in the attic or in the closet or whatever, because this is this is the place you settle in.
SPEAKER_00: It is the place you make your home.
SPEAKER_00: And and so we unpacked everything, and by late afternoon yesterday, I get up into my my study to kind of look over the sermon after not looking at it for a few days.
SPEAKER_00: And and the thing, reading this passage in John 15 that we're gonna read here in a second, the the thing that just kind of kept kept coming, I kept hearing um in my heart was was, you know, don't, you know, kind of the Lord saying, not an audible voice, nothing, nothing like totally weird or anything.
SPEAKER_00: Just in my heart, don't make me a condo at the beach where you don't settle in.
SPEAKER_00: You know, so don't like don't make me and my grace and my love to you something you sort of stop in, and that's like the entry point to your faith, and now you're gonna go back to living somewhere else.
SPEAKER_00: Usually for somebody who comes to Christian faith, kind of like enter by grace, and then I'll maintain by my own self-reliance and just sort of return to a non-gracious relationship.
SPEAKER_00: But really, at the end of the day, I have faith in myself.
SPEAKER_00: And it's like the Lord said, don't do that.
SPEAKER_00: You know, settle in, settle into me.
SPEAKER_00: Um I'm I'm your home, the incarnate love of God.
SPEAKER_00: Not service, not disciplines, not coming to church, not giving money, not all your good deeds, not not your fruit.
SPEAKER_00: Not your fruit, but but me.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're gonna read John 15, 1 through 11, work our way through this passage.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus talking to his disciples.
SPEAKER_00: We're still at the we're still at the table in the upper room, been there a while, long conversation.
SPEAKER_00: Pretty, pretty strong conversation we've been having here.
SPEAKER_00: Um probably took the disciples the rest of their lives to kind of unpack this and figure out what he was talking about.
SPEAKER_00: Uh here, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: I am the true vine.
SPEAKER_00: This is Jesus talking to his disciples, and my father is the gardener.
SPEAKER_00: And what we're gonna see is we think he's talking about a garden, and he is sort of, but he's really talking about home.
SPEAKER_00: The father's the gardener.
SPEAKER_00: He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes.
SPEAKER_00: So that it will be even more fruitful.
SPEAKER_00: You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.
SPEAKER_00: Remain in me as also I remain in you.
SPEAKER_00: No branch can bear fruit by itself, it must remain in the vine.
SPEAKER_00: Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
SPEAKER_00: I am the vine, you are the branches.
SPEAKER_00: If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit.
SPEAKER_00: Apart from me, you can do nothing.
SPEAKER_00: If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away in withers.
SPEAKER_00: Such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire, and burned.
SPEAKER_00: If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, it will be done for you.
SPEAKER_00: And go, okay, oh man, so I so that's like a free pass.
SPEAKER_00: I go, whatever I want.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we we know that's not true.
SPEAKER_00: We've all tried it, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we've all been trying it.
SPEAKER_00: I still try it, and it doesn't work out.
SPEAKER_00: What it means is if we're remaining in him, our concerns are becoming his concerns, and we're praying for his concerns, and those things will actually come to fruition.
SPEAKER_00: This is to my Father's glory.
SPEAKER_00: Usually we're praying for our own glory.
SPEAKER_00: If you're like me, you're praying for your own glory and your own comfort.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples, as the Father has loved me, so I have loved you.
SPEAKER_00: Now remain in my love.
SPEAKER_00: So remain in me, remain in my love.
SPEAKER_00: That's what you're remaining in.
SPEAKER_00: If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commands and remain as love in his love.
SPEAKER_00: I'm tempted to preach on that verse again.
SPEAKER_00: We did a few weeks ago.
SPEAKER_00: I just love it, but just re-listen to that sermon.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 11.
SPEAKER_00: I have told you this is so that my joy may be in you.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm not telling you to burden you, not telling it to scare you.
SPEAKER_00: I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna focus on verses one through six and work our way through them.
SPEAKER_00: But verses seven through eleven, there's a there's a lot there.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know, I he's saying, I love you, you're gonna love me in return, you're gonna bear fruit, and actually that fruit is gonna bring not glory to you, and and your little you know, peach or pear or apple and your fruit is actually gonna bring glory to the gardener, right?
SPEAKER_00: You walk into somebody's garden, you walk into somebody's garden, and you go, Man, somebody has been taking some care to this place, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I mean, why the the glory, the glory always goes to the gardener.
SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about this garden, but let's let's talk about the gardener.
SPEAKER_00: So um there's two kind of two parts to the sermon.
SPEAKER_00: The first is um the problems in this passage.
SPEAKER_00: There's a couple kind of big verses in there.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, oh, I don't, you know, I don't know what to do with that.
SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of uncomfortable with that verse.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna talk about the problems we perceive.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, the problem's not in the passage, it's our perception of the passage.
SPEAKER_00: The problems we perceive, and then the second part is the overarching promise of the passage.
SPEAKER_00: So, first, the problems.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I can remember growing up and I would read verse 2, and it would just sort of you know scare me.
SPEAKER_00: He cuts off every branch that bears no fruit.
SPEAKER_00: What?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what I mean it was kind of scared me.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I've got to do better.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've got to do more, and if I don't, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be cut off.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna get rid of me.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna pass me off.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna like unchild me.
SPEAKER_00: But that's not true.
SPEAKER_00: It's not the point of the passage where you're gonna see that.
SPEAKER_00: So what's the point?
SPEAKER_00: What's the point of Jesus saying it like this?
SPEAKER_00: The point is turn from your own merit and your own achievements and look at what he achieved for you.
SPEAKER_00: See, if you if you make your home and your own self-reliance, faith in yourself versus faith in him, if you make your home there, trying to manifest fruit of like Christian life or like good things and good deeds, if you're trying to do that, so much of that's going to be coming out of fear and pride.
SPEAKER_00: That would be driving it.
SPEAKER_00: If you do that, here's what Jesus is saying.
SPEAKER_00: If you do that, you're like a withering branch.
SPEAKER_00: And like the branch a gardener just cuts off and throws away because you're dying.
SPEAKER_00: It's death.
SPEAKER_00: That way of life is death.
SPEAKER_00: And you get verse six, another sort of scary one.
SPEAKER_00: If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers.
SPEAKER_00: Such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire, and burned.
SPEAKER_00: So he could be speaking about hell here.
SPEAKER_00: Some people think he's talking, you know, some people, you know, it's like, oh, fire, hell, you know, I mean, every time.
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't know if I definitely, you can think that.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think I think that too much.
SPEAKER_00: I more think this is just him talking about how a garden works.
SPEAKER_00: I I just think it's a little more simple than that.
SPEAKER_00: I just think it's he's talking about how the garden works.
SPEAKER_00: So a few weeks ago, uh I think maybe it was even Sunday afternoon, uh, I had seen a couple bushes in our backyard or were overgrown and they're they're up against the house, you know, and you gotta cut them back.
SPEAKER_00: And so I knew I was gonna do that, and so uh Christy had had gone off and I had the two bigger girls.
SPEAKER_00: And so um, after rest time, uh I have them kind of like nice shorts and a nice shirt, but I'm thinking it's just two bushes, you know.
SPEAKER_00: And so I go out there, my sandals, and I get my my big clippers, and I get over there and I clip them down, and then I look to my left, and there's all these like overgrown Nandinas, which is a shrub, just to let you know.
SPEAKER_00: Uh overgrown Nandinas and I start cutting them, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's like kicking an anthill, and I start cutting them, and then I cut, and then and then I keep hitting this these uh branches with thorns, it's just nasty, like it didn't belong.
SPEAKER_00: It's a group of Nandinas, and it's a thorny, and I'm cutting it, and as I'm cutting, I'm beginning to see kind of like this.
SPEAKER_00: That's actually a pretty big bush, like within the other bushes.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm like, I mean, I'm I'm I'm taking that guy out.
SPEAKER_00: Like we're it's it's go time, and so I cut my way a path to get back in there, and I get back in there and I'm cutting, I'm pulling, and I go get my gloves, and I'm still having my nice clothes on because I'm an idiot.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm back in there and I'm pulling, I get sweatier, I'm getting dirtier, and then finally I'm back in there with a pickaxe, a hatchet, I've dug a hole.
SPEAKER_00: And and why why am I doing this?
SPEAKER_00: What am I doing?
SPEAKER_00: I I'm I'm going after the root, right?
SPEAKER_00: We know this.
SPEAKER_00: If I just if I just if I just trim that branch, he's gonna keep coming back, he's gonna keep coming back.
SPEAKER_00: And why is this?
SPEAKER_00: Because life always comes from the root.
SPEAKER_00: This whole passage is this wonderful lesson.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: What a what a root and a tree trunk is to a tree, Jesus is to human life.
SPEAKER_00: What a root and a tree trunk is to a shrub to a to a tree.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is to human life.
SPEAKER_00: So don't forget Jesus on your way to being a productive Christian.
SPEAKER_00: Because we can do that.
SPEAKER_00: And if you've done it before, you know what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: So that's the problems.
SPEAKER_00: The problems in the past that scare you.
SPEAKER_00: The problems are just saying, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: If you leave Jesus, he's not trying to scare you, he's just trying to jolt you.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus' language is trying to not scare you, but jolt you, like, hey, wake up.
SPEAKER_00: Don't live out of your own strength.
SPEAKER_00: If you live out of your own strength, you're like, because two hours later, after I did all the Nandinas, I did all the bushes, there's all these limbs on the ground.
SPEAKER_00: And what did I do?
SPEAKER_00: I went by and I picked them all up and I put them in a pile.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't burn them as I'd probably be arrested by City Marietta, but I put them in a pile out by because that's what the gardener does.
SPEAKER_00: He gets rid of the stuff that just doesn't produce life.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is not trying to scare you, just trying to jolt you to say, hey, if if you live out of your own strength, it's just, it's, it's just, you're dying.
SPEAKER_00: You're withering.
SPEAKER_00: The overarching promise here is about God's love for us, his promise to us.
SPEAKER_00: Uh when I was in tenth grade, I got involved, sort of like my first Christian community, like Christian group.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was FCA at my school.
SPEAKER_00: I'd become a Christian about a year or so before.
SPEAKER_00: And this was my first experience.
SPEAKER_00: And there was this older, he's a senior, his name was David.
SPEAKER_00: He later became a good friend.
SPEAKER_00: I realized he wasn't as perfect, still close to perfect, Christy would agree.
SPEAKER_00: Pretty perfect guy.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but he wasn't as perfect as I thought he was.
SPEAKER_00: But when I was in 10th grade and he was a senior, he's like the he was like the class president, he's the head FCA, and he's good looking, um, and he was just good at everything.
SPEAKER_00: He was so kind to everybody.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he was like the Christian guy, and I'm I was like this little low, and he had he had like big muscles, and this like little skinny, scrawny guy.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I can do skinny, I can't do that.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm I'm looking at him, how kind and nice he is, and and I'm just going, man, I could I could never, like, I could never be like that.
SPEAKER_00: I could never be like him.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he's he's just he's such a leader, I mean, he's so good at the Christian life, I mean, he's so disciplined, he's so devoted, and it's like these, just these, like, like I have these wounds and I have these lies I believe, and this lust and this insecurity.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I could never be like that.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all know what I'm talking about, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like you view somebody like that, and they're not really like that, but you view them that way.
SPEAKER_00: And you're like, man, look where look where I come from.
SPEAKER_00: Look what look what I've done.
SPEAKER_00: Look what people have told me.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you've tried and you've come up short.
SPEAKER_00: And this is this is where this passage is just so promising and good for us, who have looked at like a Christian or the Christian life, and either you've tried it and you went at it in your own strength or trying to like perfect it, and and you got uh more and more tired and exhausted, and you're just like, forget it.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you just said forget it from the very beginning.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I can't do that.
SPEAKER_00: That's not me.
SPEAKER_00: And this is where this promise is so great.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 3 if you're in faith, faith in Christ, verse 3, Jesus says, You're already clean.
SPEAKER_00: Because of the word I have spoken to you.
SPEAKER_00: Not the word you're speaking, not what you're manifesting and producing, but what I am giving to you.
SPEAKER_00: You're already clean.
SPEAKER_00: You're made righteous by me.
SPEAKER_00: You're secure forever because I made you clean.
SPEAKER_00: You're all you're already clean.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the cross is.
SPEAKER_00: The cross is all of our dirtiness and damage and guilt and burden and shame and just all of it, the sin put on him and all of his goodness and his righteousness and his wholeness is put on us.
SPEAKER_00: So we are deemed by position, even though we're not maybe even close to practically being a by position.
SPEAKER_00: We are deemed because of him that we are righteous, and we are whole, and we are complete, and we are noble.
SPEAKER_00: Verses four and five.
SPEAKER_00: Remain in me.
SPEAKER_00: As I also remain in you.
SPEAKER_00: Some versions, maybe if you look in your Bible, it'll say, and I will remain in you.
SPEAKER_00: I don't really I think this is a little bit closer to the truth here.
SPEAKER_00: Remain in me as I also remain in you.
SPEAKER_00: The idea of remain in me and I will remain in you sort of sounds like, well, if you do this, then I'll do this.
SPEAKER_00: And that's not that's not the story.
SPEAKER_00: No branch can bear fruit by itself, it must remain in the vine.
SPEAKER_00: Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm the vine.
SPEAKER_00: You are the branches.
SPEAKER_00: Understand who you are.
SPEAKER_00: You're not the vine, you're not the root, you're the branches.
SPEAKER_00: If you remain in me, and I in you, you will bear much fruit apart from me, you can do nothing.
SPEAKER_00: So verse 4, you're to, but you are to do something.
SPEAKER_00: Just the something is not really all that much because the something is totally within the bounds and the covering of his being everything for you.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus says, Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Make your home in me.
SPEAKER_00: Settle in, unpack the bags, bring the sofa, bring the curio, bring the washer and dryer, unpack everything.
SPEAKER_00: Get it settled in in me, that I'm enough for you, and you don't have to add anything to it.
SPEAKER_00: Settle into that.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, remain, abide rest.
SPEAKER_00: It's sort of how do we put this into words?
SPEAKER_00: Sort of like restful engagement.
SPEAKER_00: So we're engaged, but it's within the context of being at rest and within the context of being relieved that we're already something that we're becoming.
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, we're we're in the word, man.
SPEAKER_00: We need to be in the word because we need to be learning, we need to be praying, we need to, we need to do that, we do that relationship.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's taking walks with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's it's uh if you like art, it's painting.
SPEAKER_00: But you know what it is?
SPEAKER_00: It's when you're doing the dishes.
SPEAKER_00: And you're just going, man, I'm just like under it.
SPEAKER_00: Man, I can never get ahead.
SPEAKER_00: And you're like, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: I'm good.
SPEAKER_00: I'm loved, I'm accepted, my housework does not define me, or you're at work and you haven't achieved what you wanted to, and you're like, you know what, this is not going to define me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm already I'm already clean, I'm already righteous, I'm already validated.
SPEAKER_00: I don't have to use any of this to feel clean or accepted before God because I live in a different home.
SPEAKER_00: And there's all these lies that come against us, right?
SPEAKER_00: And the lies like you'll always be a failure.
SPEAKER_00: You're never gonna live up to it.
SPEAKER_00: That thing your dad told you is true.
SPEAKER_00: You're really a coward.
SPEAKER_00: You're not really as pretty as your friend or your neighbor.
SPEAKER_00: Like you're not really loved until you but you're not listening to that.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what remaining in me is about you're not listening to that.
SPEAKER_00: Because you've unpacked your bags in a different house, and and this is a house of love and acceptance that he already made you clean.
SPEAKER_00: That's the word spoken to you.
SPEAKER_00: And that the Father loves you because you're his.
SPEAKER_00: And you're just rooting into that deeper and deeper and deeper, and you're receiving life from that root up through that branch out to your brand, to the fruit coming out.
SPEAKER_00: So your question that you're asking yourself is not kind of sort of this question like, um, okay, grace of God, I'm forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: Now what do I what do I need to do?
SPEAKER_00: Like, what are the five things?
SPEAKER_00: If I get the five things right, then then now I'm really, like I'm really, now I'm now I'm a mature Christian.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not just like a Christian who's entered.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that that's not your way of thinking.
SPEAKER_00: The way of thinking is I need to remain more, I need to abide more.
SPEAKER_00: So the question is, how do I abide deeper in him?
SPEAKER_00: Into him who already made me completely righteous.
SPEAKER_00: We were this week at the Blue Skies at the camp we were at, uh, preached in the morning psalms, and after the preaching, we we'd have these counseling groups.
SPEAKER_00: And so that this was for all the parents of the children with cancer.
SPEAKER_00: So there's nine couples in this condo, and then me and a couple people who were mediating and running it, and I just sat and listened, and and they just just story by story by story.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, one family that lost their oldest daughter to cancer.
SPEAKER_00: You know what you think, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like, we took our shot, like we're good now, and now their youngest son has cancer.
SPEAKER_00: You know, some families are just going, man, we've been in this for six years, we've been in this for three years, it has just been surgery and feeding tube, and my child withering away, and we're not getting out of it.
SPEAKER_00: And we think we're okay, and then we're not, and then something happens, and it comes comes back again, and it comes back again.
SPEAKER_00: And this one guy spoke, it was it was the first day, and he said, uh, he said, I I I really believe I I cannot add a day to my life.
SPEAKER_00: He said, The scriptures say that, and I just believe it.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think I can take a day away, and I don't think I can add a day.
SPEAKER_00: And he's like, and I I believe that for my child too.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't that that makes him okay with everything.
SPEAKER_00: But it was like he'd settled into a home that some of the people didn't know about of God's care for him and for his children, his life, and even if we lose her, we haven't really lost her.
SPEAKER_00: And it I don't think there's a few couples that it felt like that, listening to talk, that they'd settled into that home of God's care and provision and sovereignty for their life, for their family, for their children.
SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't that they had like more compassion than the others.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think I think this group got compassion.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you want to put a group of people together who are compassionate, you this is the group.
SPEAKER_00: They're all compassionate.
SPEAKER_00: But they did seem to have a greater joy and peace in the midst of uh suffering while being sad.
SPEAKER_00: And was it because they were doing something?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, wasn't it because they were doing something?
SPEAKER_00: It's just because they had a home.
SPEAKER_00: They were they were living out of a different place.
SPEAKER_00: So fruit was coming, even in suffering.
SPEAKER_00: You could see some fruit, and you're like, wow, that's incredible.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're here, it's still in the back of your mind, you're gonna preach, all right, preacher, good emotional story.
SPEAKER_00: Wait till I kind of pull us in, but you don't know me.
SPEAKER_00: You don't really know me.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know what I hear in my head.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know what I've done.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know my addiction.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know my habits.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know that I just can't do it.
SPEAKER_00: I just can't.
SPEAKER_00: Do you hear the promise in verse 4?
SPEAKER_00: He's making a home in you.
SPEAKER_00: Like in you.
SPEAKER_00: He's not a passive inviter.
SPEAKER_00: He's making a home.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he is saying to you, I'm unpacking my bags into your fear.
SPEAKER_00: I'm unpacking my love into your apathy.
SPEAKER_00: I'm unpacking my patience into your selfishness.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm going into the den, I'm going to the bedroom.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to be in the laundry room.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to be in the basement.
SPEAKER_00: Into your dingy, insecure heart and mind.
SPEAKER_00: Holy God.
SPEAKER_00: I'm coming in there.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to make a home.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm saying, hey, you make a home in me while I'm making a home in you.
SPEAKER_00: That promise, so what the promise is saying is, yeah, I know about that.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, I know about that.
SPEAKER_00: I know about that fear.
SPEAKER_00: I know about that wound.
SPEAKER_00: I know about that lie.
SPEAKER_00: I know about it.
SPEAKER_00: But I'm making a home in you.
SPEAKER_00: And what we see once again is that Jesus' grace precedes our faith.
SPEAKER_00: His love prompts ours.
SPEAKER_00: So relieving.
SPEAKER_00: So in his love, he loves us, and then we love him, and then great fruit will come from it.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the brilliant, beautiful thing about you won't even know.
SPEAKER_00: You won't even know.
SPEAKER_00: You won't even know how much fruit because part of the fruit is humility.
SPEAKER_00: So you're being free from counting all the apples and all the oranges and all the pears and sort of validate yourself because part of the fruit when you're remaining in him is that you're being humble and you're being free from having to count all the fruit to present it back to him or to show everybody else and look at how I'm performing, how good I am.
SPEAKER_00: You're being free of all that because you're just remaining in him.
SPEAKER_00: And what he's showing you is he's showing you another room and another room of your insecurity and your fear and your worry.
SPEAKER_00: And at the same time, you're discovering room after room after room after room after room of his love and acceptance for you.
SPEAKER_00: And you'll think there just can't be another room.
SPEAKER_00: There can't be another room.
SPEAKER_00: There can't be another room for him to love me.
SPEAKER_00: There can't be.
SPEAKER_00: And then he shows you another room.
SPEAKER_00: And he's in that room unpacking his bags, settling in, loving and accepting us.
SPEAKER_00: So we make our home in him as he's making his home in us.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we confess this morning that we often sort of walk out the front door and go and take a suitcase to another home.
SPEAKER_00: And it just doesn't work.
SPEAKER_00: You are the root.
SPEAKER_00: You are the vine.
SPEAKER_00: You're the tree trunk.
SPEAKER_00: You are the source of life.
SPEAKER_00: Help us to root into you, to remain in you, to abide in you.
SPEAKER_00: For there's no other place for life.
SPEAKER_00: There's no other place to receive the love and acceptance we need to break us of trying to find love and acceptance everywhere else.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we pray, please show us another room of our own fear, of our own pride, of our own insecurity.
SPEAKER_00: Help us to see another room of your love and of your acceptance.
SPEAKER_00: And your joy in us that we might have joy in you.
SPEAKER_00: We pray this in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.