John 10:22-30

Originally posted on May 6, 2010

The reading from the church service a couple of Sundays ago really touched me.  So much so, that I feel I have to share my revelation with everyone I know!  I also have to say that I was SO disappointed when the chaplain who preached that morning did not even touch on what I perceived to be THE MOST IMPORTANT PART!  He did talk about miracles and making a daily commitment to walk with God, but I couldn’t help but feel that he missed the whole point of the passage.  And no, for those of you thinking my husband let me down, he was not the one standing in the pulpit that morning. 

Allow me to share this Scripture passage with you.

²²Then came the Feast of Dedication at Jerusalem.  It was winter, and Jesus was in the temple area walking in Solomon’s Colonnade. The Jews gathered around him, saying, “How long will you keep us in suspense?  If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”
²⁵Jesus answered, “I did tell you, but you do not believe.  The miracles I do in my Father’s name speak for me, ²⁶but you do not believe because you are not my sheep.  ²⁷My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.  ²⁸I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.  ²⁹My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. ³⁰I and the Father are one.”

Wow.  “No one can snatch them out of my hand.”  I was almost moved to tears as I followed along as this passage was being read from the pulpit that morning.  I continued to meditate on it most of the day, and another passage in John came to mind.  John 15:1-8 says this:

¹“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. ²He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. ³You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
⁵“I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. ⁷If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. ⁸This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

At first glance, these Scriptures seem to contradict each other.  At least they did in my mind.  How can Christ claim that no one can snatch one of his followers out of his hands in one passage and then assert that believers who do not bear fruit will be cut off and cast into the fire in another?  This almost seems to say that our salvation is not certain.  If we go through a dry spell and do not bear fruit for a while, do we then lose our salvation?  Is there any way of gaining that back once we’ve lost it?  This just did not sit right with me, as I’ve always believed that believers do not lose their salvation once they have placed their faith in Christ.  So I had to do a little digging and praying.

As I nursed my son before bed that evening, I prayed.  Even before I had fully silently voiced my thoughts to God, I felt an answer begin to formulate.  Perhaps Christ was speaking of those who were never true Christians to begin with in John 15?  Those who pay lip service to God and claim to be Christians, and yet never truly die to sin or to their flesh?  We all know people who claim to follow Christ and yet live as though they are not Christians.  Are these the people Christ was referring to?
Once the baby was asleep, I decided to check out some commentaries on the topic.  I looked up both references in several online commentaries and came to the exact conclusion I have outlined above.  One in particular says it better than I ever could.
W. Hall Harris III states on Bible.org that

We conclude, therefore, that the branches who do not bear fruit and are taken away and burned are not genuine believers. They are those who profess some sort of allegiance to Jesus but who in reality do not belong to him. In the Gospel of John, the primary example of this category is Judas. In 1 John 2:18-19 the “antichrists” fall into the same category; they too may be thought of as branches that did not bear fruit. They departed from the ranks of the Christians because they never did really belong, and their departure shows that they did not belong.

I would encourage you to read the full exegesis, which I have linked to above so that you can see how Harris arrived at his conclusions.  He backs all of his statements up with Scripture references from other books of the Bible, including Old Testament references.  Everything checks out for me, and definitely agrees with the answer I was sensing from God as I prayed this evening.  I wish I could post the whole thing on my blog, but it would make this post entirely too long, and I really don’t want to plagiarize Harris’ work.

With that issue resolved, I am able to delight in the reassurance I received from today’s reading at church.  “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.  I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.  My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.”  Wow.  Just wow.

Brothers and sisters, take heart.  Take comfort in the words Jesus Christ speaks in these passages.  You belong to him.  And NO ONE can separate you from God once you have been adopted into his family.  You are his.  If you fail to produce fruit and leave the body, it is because you were never truly a child of God to begin with.  If you are going through a dry spell, as I was a short time ago . . . a dry spell which lasted for over 8 years, no less . . . please know that God has not given up on you.  If you feel that tug or that inkling of guilt every so often that reminds you you are neglecting your Bible study or that you haven’t talked to God in a while, that’s the Holy Spirit prompting you.  And it means you God is still working on you.  Pruning you.  You haven’t been cut off from the vine.  God is propping you up and cutting off the dead spots in the hopes that you will begin to one day resume bearing fruit.  We may rebel for a time, but if we are true believers, we eventually run back to God, without fail.