Abiding in the True Vine

I have been involved in BSF (Bible Study Fellowship) for almost 4 years now and I love it. This year they introduced a new study, one of Isaiah. Last week we covered Isaiah 5 and there are a few thoughts that keep coming to mind that have really challenged me to examine my heart.

Isaiah 5:1-2

I will sing for the one I love a song about his vineyard: My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines. He built a watchtower in it and cut out a winepress as well. Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit.

This vineyard was given everything it needed to bear GOOD fruit, and yet it bore fruit that was BAD. This vineyard had the best soil, a place where it would get sun and rain. The best vines were used. There was even a watchtower built in expectation of a good crop that someone would need to keep watch over in case of intruders. Yet, the vines yielded bad fruit... This doesn't make sense! Why would it yield bad fruit when it was given everything it needed to flourish and potentially bring forth some of the BEST fruit?

Then it hit home. I have been given God's perfect word. I have been given the ability to come before the Throne of Grace and bring anything before the very God of the universe. I have been given forgiveness through the Lord Jesus Christ. I have been given the Holy Spirit who lives in me. I have been given so much! I should bring forth GOOD fruit...

Yet, when I examine my heart, my motives are so often selfish, my attitude is so often wrong, my heart is often prideful...BAD fruit.

I produce bad fruit when I rely on myself instead of relying and abiding in Christ alone.

John 15:1-5 says,

“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing."

He desires and expects us to bear GOOD fruit based on what He has given to us. This is my prayer, that I would abide in the True Vine that through Him and through His pruning I would bear GOOD fruit that will last for eternity.