Week 14: Judges 1-21, John 15-19

Monday: John 15—The Vine 

In John 15, Jesus portrays our organic union with Him by using the metaphor of a vine. Verse 5 says, “I am the vine. You are the branches. Whoever abides in Me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.” Our relationship with Christ is not mechanical, such as a piston to an engine. We are living branches attached to Christ through life. An inorganic machine can do work; only life can produce fruit. Jesus tells us that as a branch, we simply need to abide in Him. Christ is already the vine and we are already the branches. We are not asked to become branches or to manufacture fruit. We are the branches and when we abide in this fact, we bear fruit. We spend too much effort trying to do good things apart from Christ and too much time worrying about the expression of fruit in our life. We tend to fret about our faults and plan steps for self-improvement. But, all attempts are futile. Apart from Christ, “we can do nothing.” Instead, we need to rest in Christ. We need to trust in His life and allow this divine life to flow through us, to nourish us, to strengthen us, to uplift us, and to supply us with all the riches of the person of Christ. This organic union will spontaneously produce the fruit of the Spirit. Jesus promised that as we abide in Him, He will abide in us. He will do the work from within. How blessed we are to be a branch. No worries. No trying. No pressure. We just rest in the work of Christ.

Tuesday: Judges 8—Gideon’s 300 

Roving bandits from the Midianite nation had terrorized Israel for years. They had mercilessly pillaged cattle, produce, and personal possessions from the rich and poor. God called Gideon to defend His people. So, Gideon led the 300 soldiers God gave him to the edge of the camp of their enemies. In their left hand, they each carried a torch hidden within a jar and in their right hand a trumpet. On Gideon’s command, the soldiers broke the jars, blew their trumpets, and shouted, “A sword for the Lord and for Gideon.” God had already filed the hearts of the Midianites with fear through dreams, so, the sudden noise and light brought confusion into the camp. The enemies turned on each other and ran for their lives, crying out for help as they fled. Gideon’s 300 soldiers were no match, physically, for the thousands of the soldiers that fled. God made sure of that by sending home 21,700 of the soldiers that Gideon had gathered to fight. Only 300 were left. But, as the Apostle Paul said in Romans 8:31, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” It doesn’t matter how fierce our personal enemies of self and sin are, or how strong we feel. We just need to hold up our torch and our trumpet and proclaim victory. God is on our side. Romans 8 continues, “…We are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Wednesday: John 17—The Highest Prayer 

After Jesus gave a final encouragement to His disciples in John 14-16, He prayed to the Father (chapter 17). This is the fourth time the gospels recorded a prayer of Jesus. This prayer was His longest and arguably most significant prayer. Four times within the prayer, Jesus asked the Father concerning the oneness of the believers (vv. 11, 21, 22, 23). He asked that the believers could experience the same oneness that He had with the Father, described as an intermingling of the two into one. This oneness defies human logic and Newtonian Physics, that each could be in one another. Yet, in the spiritual realm, it makes perfect sense. The Father abides in Christ and Christ lives in the Father. The two are one! What cannot be explained with human words is easily recognized in our hearts. It is this divine oneness that Jesus prayed would also be among the believers. He prayed that the believers would experience a oneness that would cause the world to believe. Human history, without God, is stained with racial prejudice, discrimination, hatred, power struggles, rebellions, and brutal wars. On the contrary, the believers, have a divine oneness that breaks down human divisiveness and infuses love and peace into the human race. The expression of this oneness is, in itself, a convicting power that brings a sinner to their knees. The divine oneness is not a manufactured oneness through human organization and effort. It is a reality unique to those that believe. We just need to “keep the oneness of the spirit” (Ephesians 4:3) and to continue our Lord’s prayer that all contentious and denominational divisiveness among Christians would be eradicated with divine oneness.

Thursday: John 18—“I AM” 

In John 18, Judas brought a band of armed soldiers and religious leaders to arrest Jesus. When they asked for Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus replied, “I am.” Although many translations add the word, “he,” so that it reads, “I am He,” Jesus explicitly said, “I am.” The armed band, hearing this title drew back and fell to the ground. This title was first used in Exodus 3, where God spoke to Moses from a burning bush and commissioned him to lead His people out of Egypt. When Moses asked what God’s name was, God replied, “I am who I am” and tell the people that “I am” sent you. This description meant that 1) God exists in the past, present, and future; He is ever-existing and 2) God is everything and anything that Moses and the people needed to be freed from Egypt’s tyranny. When Jesus told the betrayer and his armed band that He was the “I am,” He was telling them that He was the ever-existing God, the same God that led the people of old across the Red Sea. In fear, the band fell to the ground. John’s gospel highlights what the other gospels did not even mention once—that Jesus is the “I am.” The Apostle John recorded how Jesus used this phrase at least 15 times in His ministry to express how He is everything and anything we need. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life” (6:35, 41, 48, 51), “I am the light of the world” (8:12, 9:5), “I am” (8:56), “I am the door” (10:7,9), “I am the good shepherd” (10:11, 14), “I am the Son of God” (10:36), “I am the resurrection and the life” (11:25), “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (14:6), and “I am the vine” (15:5). Jesus is everything and anything that we need.

Friday: Judges 16, 21—"Right in His Own Eyes” 

Judges concludes with the phrase, “Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (21:25). This phrase explains why the people repeated the same cycle of failure at least 7 times: 1) seeking other gods, 2) God’s curse—oppression from their enemies, 3) God’s blessing—deliverance through a judge, 4) undervaluing God’s blessing, seeking other gods. Lesson learned: avoid living according to what we think is right and focus on what God thinks, recognizing His blessing in our life.