Episode Transcript
PRAYER OF CONSECRATION
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Abba, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Abba, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
John 15:1–4 (NIV)
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He 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. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also 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."
CONSIDER THIS
In light of this, note the next word from Jesus to his disciples in verse 3.
"You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you."
It is hard to overestimate the negative impact of the self-help industry on the Christian faith. Self-help inspires a take-charge, if-it-is-to-be-it-is-up-to-me, largely behavior-oriented, self-reliant approach to change. Self can produce the trappings of change, but it just adds to the broken structure of our personhood. Self can produce some results, even some semblance of fruit, but in the end, it is not lasting fruit. Sadly, it is often some subtle form of self-righteousness. Note, that Jesus did not say, "You are already clean because you have worked really, really hard to clean yourselves up." No. He said:
"You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you."
What we need is far more engaging contact with the Word of God and Spirit of God and far less reliance on our own best change strategies, which is most often some combination of The Little Engine That Could, Dr. Phil, and Oprah. Self-help is seductive. It puts us in the driver's seat under the seemingly agreeable guise of taking personal responsibility for our lives.
Self-help creates an endless cycle of optimistic striving for an outcome we never seem to achieve. Self-improvement keeps the pruning shears in our own hands to do with as we see best. The problem is we can't see best. Remember who does the pruning: "He 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."
Now hear Jesus say it again:
"You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you."
We are pruned, which is to say transformed, by the substance of the Word of God, not our own self-willed, take-charge efforts. It simply requires repeatedly showing up in surrendered submission and trusting obedience. Learning to revolve our lives around the Word of God: Reading. Ruminating. Rememberizing. Researching. Rehearsing. (Rinse & Repeat). The Word of God must become the deep substance of our lives. He does not do his work through our working. Pruning is the long, slow, steady path by which we learn the way to do our work through his working.
"You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you."
Transformation is the process whereby the life of Jesus displaces the broken structure of our self-referenced identity and turns our life into an unending source of the fruit of the Spirit, which is love.
THE PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
Lord Jesus—Word of God from before the beginning—our Great Teacher,
Would you show me just how deep the self-referenced, self-centered structure of my life goes? And then would you save me from my deeply habituated mentality to try and change that myself? Grace me to put my self in the hands of the Vine Dresser, who will carefully and gently prune away my self so I can learn to abide in the life of Jesus—so his life can become my life.
It will be for your glory, for others' gain, and for my good.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him above ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen!
