Honey From The Rock

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Honey From The Rock
Psalm 81:16

"Sweet Stuff From God's Word"

A daily Bible study with Victor Knowles
Copyright 2007

DEADWOOD!

This entry was posted on 10-14-2008 and is filed under uncategorized.

"Anyone who separates from me is deadwood..." (John 15:6a The Message). These are ominous words! This is the peril of failing to abide in Christ. This warning - that comes from the living Christ Himself - should cause every one of us to do some soul-searching and self-examination (see 2 Cor. 13:5). Look at some other translations. "The man who does not share my life" (The N. T. in Modern English). Jesus is saying, in essence: "Don't want to share my life? You will be sorry!" "If a person does not remain united to Me" (The N.T., An Understandable Version). Unlike a piece of wood, we have a will. A branch does not leave the vine, but a person can certainly choose, bad choice that it is, to leave Christ. That's why The Message says, "Anyone who separates from me is deadwood."

Why would anyone choose to separate himself from Christ? Case in point: Demas. He was a co-laborer with the apostle Paul. Yet Paul had to write (2 Tim. 4:10), "Demas has deserted me" (Weymouth) "because his heart was set on this world" (NEB). Many have chosen to love the world more than to love Christ. John 15:6 in the NKJV begins, "If anyone does not abide in Me..." Half of LIFE is "if." There are a multitude of warnings about leaving Christ in Scripture that begin with "if." Then Jesus says, "anyone." Anyone! "So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!" (1 Cor. 10:12 NIV). Even one such as Paul testified that he made his body (his fleshly desires) his slave, lest he should be come a "castaway" (1 Cor. 9:27).

"The lessons these words teach are very simple and very solemn," writes Andrew Murray. "A man can come to such a connection with Christ, that he counts himself to be in Him, and yet he can be cast forth. There is such a thing as not abiding in Christ, which leads to withering up and burning...What a solemn call to look around and see if there be not withered branches in our churches, to look within and see whether we are indeed abiding and bearing fruit!" Murray goes on to address the cause of this sorry state. "With some it is that they never understood how the Christian calling leads to holy obedience and to loving service. They were content with the thought that they had believed, and were safe from Hell; there was neither motive nor power to abide in Christ...With others it was that the cares of the world, or its prosperity, choked the Word...With still others it was that their religion and their faith was in the wisdom of men, and not in the power of God." Murray concludes, "Let the word abide ring through the Church until every believer has caught it - [there is] no safety but in a true abiding in Christ" (The True Vine). "Easy believism" or "cheap grace" is the number one enemy of the Church today!

Prayer: Holy Father, prevent us from ever becoming a belligerent branch who would separate himself from the true and living Vine!