Digging Deeper Days
Finding the original intent of Scripture and making good application to our everyday lives as we become equipped to correctly handle the Word of Truth!
Yesterday’s Journey Study connects with today’s!
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The Questions
1) What does joy mean?
2) What does it mean to love as He has loved us?
3) How do we produce fruit?
John 15:9-17
9 “As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you. Remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.
11 “I have told you these things so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.
12 “This is my command: Love one another as I have loved you. 13 No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 I do not call you servants anymore, because a servant doesn’t know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my Father. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce fruit and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.
17 “This is what I command you: Love one another.
Original Intent
1) What does joy mean?
Before looking further into this text, readers must understand John is recording a teaching of Jesus to His disciples. The Greek word John used here is ‘chara’ which translates to joy or gladness. Often times when we think of the word joy we think of happiness. According to dictionary.com, joy literally means “the emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying”. Jesus tells His audience that the joy in them is complete and the same joy Jesus Himself has. However, it is not a feeling of happiness that comes and goes based on circumstances. It is a joy or delight that is constant because the joy of the Lord never ends.
2) What does it mean to love as He has loved us?
The word love can mean a variety of different things in Scripture depending on the context. In these verses, specifically verse 12, Jesus used the Greek word ‘agape’ which we would equate with unconditional love. He is commanding His readers to love just as He loved, which, by the way, is absolutely impossible unless His love is alive inside of us. His love is a self-sacrificing love, demanding nothing in return for Him to give it, that was ultimately displayed when Christ gave up His life on the Cross to rescue humanity from Sin. This isn’t a surface level love. This deep love is the same love Jesus is calling His readers to sacrificially and unconditionally live out to others. Jesus is not necessarily telling His readers they must physically die for someone else, but He is telling them they must love in a way that crucifies their own selfishness.
3) How do we produce fruit?
The idea of producing fruit refers back to what Jesus taught in John 15:1-8. These verses draw on an analogy of a vine growing in a vineyard. Jesus teaches that without being connected to the vine a branch cannot grow and produce fruit. Jesus is that vine and Christ-following believers are the branches. Jesus then tells His disciples they have been chosen and appointed to produce fruit. By ‘chosen’, God means ‘purposefully intended’. His designed purposeful intention for His children is for us to ‘bear fruit’. A believer’s relationship with Jesus allows this fruit to grow. Fruit only comes as the disciple draws near to Jesus, asking Him to grow us. (verse 16)
Everyday Application
1) What does joy mean?
We know the joy John is referring to is not a fleeting feeling because this joy is from the Lord. As believers, we have access to this same joy through the Holy Spirit who shares Jesus with us. This joy is unfailing and unending. Regardless of the storm we may be walking through, we can find joy in our lives as believers because the Spirit of God dwells within us. This joy flows from an ongoing relationship with Jesus. As we remain in fellowship with Him, His joy continues to be our joy.
2) What does it mean to love as He has loved us?
Just as the original readers were called to love with an unconditional, self-sacrificing love so are we. The meaning hasn’t changed since Jesus originally spoke the words. We are called to love others by willingly setting ourselves and our comforts aside. We are to live out a humble and sacrificial love by serving others before ourselves. Jesus didn’t limit this love to people we like or who are similar to us. He simply commands us to love one another as He loved us. We are called to love everyone in the same manner. As believers, we are called to set aside differences and to see people as Jesus Himself sees them and be willing to step out and love them wherever and whoever they are. In each situation God puts in our path, this love may be fleshed out differently each time, however, the one constant will be us setting aside ourselves and giving of ourselves regardless of the situation, expecting nothing in return.
3) How do we produce fruit?
Once we enter into relationship with Jesus by acknowledging that He is Lord and Savior (and we are not!) and inviting Him into our lives as Lord, we are then connected to Him as the vine, the Source for growth. We become His branches to produce fruit that glorifies Him. As believers, this fruit will not look the same as another believer’s. We are to draw near to Him and ask Him to grow us as He sees fit. As we do, fruit is produced. This fruit comes through answered prayers, through loving as He calls us to love, and living a life connected to the Father through Jesus by daily disciplines like Scripture reading and prayer. Fruit is simply the overflow of our relationship with the Father. We cannot expect to produce fruit and grow deep with Him if we are not investing in our relationship with Him on a regular and consistent basis.
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Digging Deeper is for Everyone!
1) Take this passage (or any other passage).
2) Read it, and the verses around it,
several times
3) Write down your questions
as you think of them.
4) Ask specific culture related questions and be ready to dig around for your answers. Google them, use www.studylight.org, or look them up in a study Bible and read the footnotes (click on the little letters next to a word and it will show you
other related verses!). (www.esvbible.org)
5) Check your applications with other trusted Christians that you are in community with and embrace the fullness of God
in your everyday!
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Why Dig Deeper?
Finding the original meaning is a huge deal when we study Scripture and can make all the difference in our understanding as we apply God’s truths to our everyday lives.
In our modern-day relationships, we want people to understand our original intention as we communicate; how much more so between God and humanity?!
Here’s a little bit more on why we take Digging Deeper so seriously.
Study Tools
We love getting help while we study and www.studylight.org is one of many excellent resources, providing the original Hebrew (Old Testament) or Greek (New Testament) with an English translation.
Want to know more about a specific word in a verse? Click on “Strong’s Interlinear Bible” then click the word you’d like to study. Discover “origin”, “definition” and hear the original pronunciation – That Is Awesome!
Want more background? Click “Study Tools”, then pick a few commentaries to read their scholarly approach, keeping in mind that just because a commentary says it, doesn’t mean it’s true. (just like the internet :-))
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Under the second #3, “How do we produce fruit?” I think you have the wrong verses linked. You have, “The idea of producing fruit refers back to what Jesus taught in John 5:1-8.” I think you meant John 15:1-8. 🙂
Lila, you are correct. That was an error on my part. I did mean John 15:1-8. I apologize for the error.
And mine for not catching it! Thanks, Lila!!