John 15:1-2 (NET) “I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. 2 He takes away every branch that does not bear fruit in me. He prunes every branch that bears fruit so that it will bear more fruit
When Jesus spared the adulterous woman who was to be stoned to death, He did it on the premise that everyone there was guilty (see John 8:3-10). There was no point killing a woman who did what everyone was already doing.
The reason why God sanctioned capital punishment in the Old Testament was so that it would prevent the virus of iniquity from spreading among His people. God’s design was that if anyone grew under the system of His Law, it would be very strange for that person to commit certain acts of rebellion like adultery and sorcery, etc. If anyone was found doing such, it proved that the person really hated God, not that the person was pressured into such acts, because the law was to create an environment that would make it strange and abnormal to perpetrate such acts. So in order to stop the virus of iniquity from spreading among God’s people, the offenders were to be killed.
Yesterday, we saw that there is sin that can lead to the Lord allowing believers’ lives to be cut short (see 1 John 5:16-17).
In today’s Bible text, Jesus tells us that God takes away any branch in Him that is not fruitful. This doctrine is repeated by the Lord in other places (see Mat 7:19-20, Luke 13:6-9). A Disease can make a branch that is still connected to the vine to be unfruitful. In order to prevent such diseases (of iniquity) from spreading to other branches, the gardener cuts off the unfruitful branch.
Go into today examining your life to see if you have been fruitful in God’s vineyard. Are you spending your time serving God, or are you spending it serving mammon?
Prayer: Heavenly Father, please have mercy on me and purge me from everything that hinders my fruitfulness. Amen.
—Abraham Damilola Arigi
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Bible In 1 Year: II Thessalonians (In today’s audio)
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