Sermon25-18 Jn15 Guide

John 15:1-19 theme verse John 15:16

The praise and honor and glory be to our heavenly Father who seeks true worshipers who worship Him with the Spirit and truth.

In this twelfth Sunday of 2025, I pray that His grace of the application of all the benefits which Jesus earned for our salvation and also the glorious ministry of the proclamation of His kingdom by the power of the Holy Spirit may be full in our life. Last week, we have seen that human beings, after eating the forbidden fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, were fallen and became the corrupted beings with original guilt and original pollution, yet God chose us before the foundation of the world in love to have mercy on us who are full of sinfulness and made us bear the fruits through Christ whom He sent so this week, so we would like to look at this divine election together.

1)    First, to review the context of today’s text, as we already have looked at the story of creation and fall of humanity in Gen chapter 1 & 2, man and woman who were created in God’s image to be good, righteous, and holy ate the forbidden fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so that they were expelled from Eden after having the punishment of pain, suffering and death. The more serious problem was that because of this sin, mankind had to fall into a state of original sin, I mean, original guilt and pollution of total depravity and total inability. Regarding this total inability, Jesus said in John 15:5 that “apart from Me, you can do nothing” and in order to bear fruit, saying “abide in me, if my words abide in us, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you”, and also “abide in me" then “my joy may be in you and your joy may be full.” Yet, in verse 16, in order to bear fruit like this, He said we have to be chosen.

2)    To exegete on these theologically, we, human beings, because of original sin, bore original guilt, but due to total depravity and total inability, we could not bear good fruit by our own. In other words, we, human beings, could neither know God’s will exactly, nor judge good and evil, because of original pollution, so that we could not act in a way that is good before God and in God’s eyes. Therefore, in the end, we, human beings, need help from outside. That is, as all things were made through the Word, that is, Jesus Christ as John 1:3 says, we, human beings, cannot bear fruit, unless we abide in Jesus Christ, who is the way, the truth and the life. But, since we could not abide in Christ on our own, so we must be chosen by God and united with Christ by the Holy Spirit and the Word. In other words, we who were dead in sin and transgression, were chosen by God and were generated by the Holy Spirit sent in due time, being united with Christ through faith in the Holy Spirit, and being forgiven and justified, and while being sanctified through His grace, we could live the life to bear fruit while living according to God’s will. So, in today’s text, abiding in Christ means the union with Christ that occurred in the early stage of faith and the fellowship with Christ in faith which continues during the process of sanctification. And abiding in the word of Christ means putting Christ’s word into practice, while asking, in other words, the fact that we have to pray means that all good ultimately flows down from God, and also good fruit and fruit of love from God, so we have to ask for in prayer. When doing so, we can live in love through the love that. flows from God, who is love, and also can live a life filled with the joy of Christs.

3)    Regarding this divine election, Belgic confession article 16 confesses that “We believe that all Adam's descendants having thus fallen into perdition and ruin by the sin of Adam - God showed himself to be as he is: merciful and just. God is merciful in withdrawing and saving from this perdition those who in the eternal and unchangeable divine counsel, have been elected and chosen in Jesus Christ our Lord by his pure goodness, without any consideration of their works. God is just in leaving the others in their ruin and fall into which they plunged themselves.”

4)    Here we see the most difficult and important doctrine of our Reformed church, I mean, the doctrine of pre-destination for the election and the reprobation. What this means is that human beings were originally created in the image of God as good, righteous and holy and were a being capable of producing the fruit of inner character, outward good deeds and love, but they were tempted by the serpent and ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which God had told them not to eat, and were not only punished with pain, suffering, and death, to be expelled from the Garden of Eden, but also, fell into the state of original sin, that is, guilt and pollution which is total depravity and total inability, and were unable to bear fruit on their own and were unable to escape from this state of destruction. In short, human beings became dead in trespasses and sins, as Eph 2:1 says. Therefore, God who is merciful and just, chose some among them according to His good will to be recipients of eternal salvation and special grace, which is called God’s divine election, and others were probated in their sins, and God ultimately will punish in the end, thereby revealing His justice, which is called God’s just reprobation.

5)    By the way, a) the decree of God’s election is an expression of the sovereign will of God, His divine good pleasure so that it exclude anything in human, such as foreseen faith or good works. b) And it is immutable, and therefore renders the salvation of the elect certain since God realizes the decree of election by His own efficiency and by the saving work which He preserves and accomplishes, being guaranteed in the unchangeable purpose of God, not depending on the believers’ uncertain obedience. c) And it is eternal from now and to the eternity, as it comes from eternity. d) And also it is unconditional, since it does not in any way depend on the foreseen faith or good works of human, as the Arminians teach, rather exclusively on the sovereign good pleasure of God. e) And also it is irresistible, since even human can oppose its execution to a certain degree, yet God can and does exert such an influence on the human spirit as to make it willing, not overpowering the human will. f) And finally, it is not chargeable with injustice, because God does not owe the forgiveness of sin and eternal life to all human beings, so even if God saves only a limited number of them, it would not be injustice and also since sinners has absolutely no right or claim on the blessings which flow from divine election, so not only have we no right to call God to account for electing some and passing others by, as we can see in the parable of laborers in the vineyard of Mt 20:1-16, but also we must admit that God would have been perfectly just, if He had not saved any, as Rom 9:14 & 15 say.

6)    By the way, the reason why God chose and saved us was not to make us live happily in this world and also in the heaven, since if that were the only reason, those who were not chosen would not agree and even dishonor God as sometimes they seem more moral and better in their life than Christians. Rather Louis Berkhof says that the purpose of God’s election is a) the salvation of the elect, and b) the ultimate purpose is the glory of God, which means that the chosen receive the amazing grace of salvation and give thanks and glory to God, and social gospel says that we were chosen to serve God, but I believe we need to think more deeply about the purpose of God’s election. Yet, in today’s text, Jesus says in verse 16, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you”, in other words, He said that the purpose of God’s election is fruit, which is the internal fruit of character in Galatians 5:22-23 and also the external fruit of good deeds in Ephesians 2:10, of love in 1 Tim 1:5, of righteousness in Phil 1:11 and of the soul in John 4:34-36 and Romans 1:13; 15:16.

7)    Since we cannot help but confess that all of these things that God chose us before the foundation of the earth, in love to make us holy and blameless (Eph 1:3-4) and achieved the promise by crucifying His only Son, Jesus Christ for us, still we were weak and acting as His enemy (Rom 5:6-9), and made us inherit the inheritance by the protection of God’s power that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, (1 Pt 1:3-7) was soly through God’s grace, election and predestination, not by our own merit at all, in His election only by sheer grace. So that as Jesus said in John 4:34-36, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish His word, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest” seeing the field of Samaria, and “already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together,” I pray that this year, we all may know that the reason for God’s election in grace is for our internal and external fruit for His glory so that we may live in His will and purpose.

Key Questions as Small Group Activity

Q1 According to today’s sermon, we can know that God chose us before the foundation of the world, not by our merits but only by His grace. So after thinking about this doctrine of election, I hope we could share our thought and experience with our team members together to learn from each other.

Q2 And then it is said that this election has the end to make us bear fruit. So after thinking about what and how we may bear fruit, I hope we could share our thought and experience with our team members together to learn from each other.

Love you. Thank you. God bless you.

Prayer Note

Dear ( God’s attribute which you found Today ) God!

Thanks for ( something you received through the sermon or  even during the week )

Praise, gratitude and glory be to You, Lord!

Today, I realized my sin (pains) that ( the sin God reminded through the sermon ),

please forgive (or heal) me and help me not to repeat ( the sins you recognized   ).

I learned that ( something you learned through the sermon                                    )

Please help me to live in that (  learned way of life                                                )

I pray in ( Jesus’ attribute you find ) Jesus’ name. Amen.