Abiding: The Foundation for Discipleship

My burden this morning is to help continue to move our church towards having a culture of disciple-makers. 

If something is part of our culture, that implies that it will be the majority of us, right?

In many churches, they experience what business calls the Pareto principle, which means 20% of the people bring forth 80% of the production. This is often true in churches too: 20% do 80% of the ministry. 

I’ve shared this with you at the very beginning of our church that my goal has always been for us to become a reverse Pareto church, where 80% make disciples. 

How many churches do you know are like that? 

Almost none! 

I can’t tell you how often I have asked people, how would you like someone odler in the faith to walk with you hand in hand, teach you how to connect with God through word and prayer, and help you follow Jesus?
And most look up with a sense of longing and often pain as they have never experienced that. 

How is it possible that our very mission that Christ gave us, our primary mission, to make disciples, is something that most Christians have not experienced directly but have had to piece it together primarily through books, podcasts, classes, and schools. All valuable, but should be supplementary. 

As I say that, let me ask you to honestly assess: Where do you think APC is at right now? 

I think we have made a ton of progress but obviously we are doing this series because we believe we can grow more . 

And not to add shame but for you to be honest with yourself, which is most loving to you, where are you in this equation?
Are you actively making disciples

So, what keeps people from becoming disciple-makers? I

• Lack of understanding and training 

• Lack of getting discipled themselves

• Fear of rejection

• Our love of comfort and a watered down gospel that is savior without lord. Forgiveness without mission

• Know that it may expose their own pet sins or idols because they would imitate you

• Lack of love 

But I want to go to the most important foundation, the one that if we don’t have it, no matter what we do, we won’t ever see a culture of disciple-making. We are going to get a lot more practicals and how-tos, but if we don’t have this, it won’t last and it won’t change lives. 

The Trellis and the Vine: A Core Framework for Discipleship

To understand how we make this shift, I want us to grab onto a helpful metaphor from the book Trellis and the Vine. It’s a powerful way to see the two parts of our church life.

First, imagine a trellis. It's the wooden frame, the wires, the irrigation pipes. It's strong, organized, and man-made. In our church, the trellis is everything we build and organize: 

our Sunday gatherings, our MC groups, our ministry budgets, our website, even the announcement slides. This trellis is absolutely essential. A vine without a trellis collapses into a tangled mess on the ground, vulnerable and unproductive. The trellis provides the necessary structure and support for the real ministry to happen.

But then you have the vine. The vine is the living, breathing, growing organism itself. This is not something we can build; it can only be cultivated. The vine represents the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of people. It’s the quiet, unseen miracle of a heart being transformed, a sin being conquered, a faith being deepened through one-on-one relationships and shared life. It's the actual life of Christ flowing through His people, producing spiritual fruit. No program can manufacture this. No budget can buy it. The growth of the vine is God’s work.

Here is the critical insight, the danger we constantly face as leaders and as a church: we fall in love with building the trellis because we can control it. We can schedule the meeting, write the curriculum, and check it off our to-do list. 

But we cannot control the vine. We cannot force spiritual growth. 

And so, we pour our energy into perfecting our structures—our trellis—while often neglecting the patient, prayerful, relational work of cultivating the vine. 

We confuse our activity for God with the supernatural activity of God. 

Our goal is to re-orient everything we do, to ensure our trellis exists for one reason and one reason only: to support the supernatural, fruit-bearing life of the vine.

How do we make this crucial transition? 

The answer isn't a new program. It's a return to the foundational pattern Jesus gave us. It's found in the soil, the very lifeblood of the vine, described for us in John 15. This passage gives us God's blueprint for a fruitful, multiplying, joy-filled community.

I. The Source of All Growth: The Command to Abide

Before we can even talk about the "how-to" of making disciples, we must address the power source. Many of you may hear this call and immediately think, 

“There’s no way I can help disciple someone. I don’t have the energy. I don’t have the strength. I can barely care for my own soul.”

And for you, my heart breaks. But I also have good news. If you feel like you can’t, you’re correct. You can’t.

Jesus makes this crystal clear in our foundational text. 

John 15:4 ESV

4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.

He gives the reason—both a promise and a warning:

John 15:5 ESV

5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

"Nothing." Not "you'll do less,"  or not be able to do hard things, but "you'll do nothing, 

which I take as you cannot produce any fruit apart from abiding. 

This is why my primary concern is that the biggest reason we don't make disciples is that we are not abiding in the vine. All true, Holy Spirit-driven ministry must flow from this connection. 

Vine Illustration 

The days I am not abiding, I care very little about the needs of others. They feel like a burden. But when I am connected to the vine, His life flows through me, and ministry becomes a natural outflow.

 A church full of people who are not personally abiding in Christ will produce a lot of trellis activity but will see no fruit. It will be a collection of dry, lifeless branches.

II. How to Abide

So, if abiding is the source, what does it actually look like? Is it just a mystical feeling or a vague spiritual mood?

If we want to learn how to abide, we must learn to practice these things.

1. We Must Abide in His Love

John 15:9 ESV

9 As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.

Essential to abiding in Christ, is abiding in his love. 

Another word is to remain in his love. 

Stay.
Which means we can leave. 

He doesn’t leave us. 

But we often leave his love. 

Look at those words carefully. 

Let the weight of that word, "As," sink in. The perfect, infinite, joyful, eternal love that God the Father has for God the Son is the same kind of love Jesus has for you right now. It is not a lesser, second-tier love. For many of us, the hardest part of the Christian life is not doing things for God, but actually believing God loves you!

Oh yes, but that’s Jesus, the loving one. 

John 17:23 NIV

23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

The Father loves you like He loves the Son. 

Do you believe this? 

Or maybe, feel this? 

Most Christians don’t and that breaks God’s heart. 

Imagine if I heard one of my kids confide in one of you this week at camp, saying, “I know my dad loves me, but I don't really feel it.” That would break my heart! And that’s how your heavenly Father feels about you not truly believing his love and feeling his love. This demonstrates a deep level of dysfunction. 

No wonder we struggle so much….

When we understand God’s love for us through the gospel, our identity is secure in Christ and we can love others and be loved. 

It also is essential to kill performance-driven ministry. Some of the most well-known disciple-makers are not rooted in the love of God. They are trying to earn their worth by their evangelism or their mentorship. God may even use their mixed motives. 

But God’s love is the answer for all of us.
Its for those who feel condemnation and those are seeking self-justifications. 

From that place of deep security, we can help each other grow.

• Do you truly believe, deep in your soul, the truth of John 15:9—that the Father loves you as He loves the Son? Not a lesser, second-hand love, but the same kind of perfect, infinite, joyful love.

• When you are honest, what is the loudest voice in your head? Is it the Father’s booming voice of approval because of Jesus, or is it the whisper of condemnation from your past, your failures, and the enemy?

2. We Abide by Loving others like Christ

This is the pinnacle. This is where all the inward reality of abiding becomes an outward, tangible blessing to the world. Jesus boils down all His commands to this one, glorious, all-encompassing action:

John 15:12 ESV

12 “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.

Love others, specifically Christians. 

We are to love all kinds of people, but the way we love our fellow brothers and sisters says something huge about us. 

But what does that love look like tangibly? 

John 15:13 ESV

13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

Are we actually loving like this? 

The standard isn't our culture’s definition of love. The standard is Jesus. "As I have loved you." This forces us to honestly examine our love against the love of Christ:

• Is Our Love Sacrificial or Convenient? 

• Is Our Love Patient or Irritable? 

• Is Our Love Purposeful or Passive? 

When we look at that standard, we all fall short. It’s impossible. And that is the point. You cannot produce this love on your own. It must be the supernatural fruit of the Vine flowing through you. 

It forces us right back to the beginning: to the desperate, daily need to abide in His love to get love that you don’t have!

• Look at the key relationships in your life—in your family, in your MC group, at work. Is your love for them sacrificial, or is it merely convenient?

• In what specific relationship is God calling you to stop loving on your own terms and start loving the way Jesus has sacrificially loved you?

3. We Must Abide in His Word 

John 15:7 ESV

7 If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

This isn't just about reading a chapter to check a box. This is about marinating in the Gospels until the voice of Jesus is more familiar to us than the voices of news anchors, social media influencers, or our own inner critic. It’s letting His stories, His promises, and His commands soak into our thoughts, shape our desires, and correct our course. The Word of God is the channel for everything else that follows.

• How is your engagement with God's Word right now? Are you truly letting the word of Christ "dwell in you richly," shaping your heart and mind? Or has it become a neglected duty?

4. Abide by Obeying

John 15:10 ESV

10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.

This is the opposite of legalism. Legalism is trying to obey in order to earn God’s love. The gospel is that we obey because we are already secure in God’s love. It's the response of a child who deeply loves and trusts their father. Keeping His commands is how we stay in the "current" of His love, experiencing its joy and benefits. It’s about aligning our lives with His good and perfect will. 

Often times, when people confessed to me that they struggle feeling God‘s love, and if they would be honest with me, usually there is some area of their life of disobedience that has not been dealt with. It may have been a few years, an area of Hinson or bitterness and unforgiveness, that has completely hindered their ability to abide in Christ. 

Remember this, when you stop obeying, you stop abiding. 

• Are you joyfully aligning your life with His commands as a grateful response to His love? Or is there an area of your life where you are actively resisting His good and loving will for you?

III. The Posture for Growth: The Humble Commitment to be Pruned

John 15:2 ESV

2 Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.

It's incredible to see new believers on fire and growing like crazy, often because they instinctively know they're immature and humble themselves to grow in leaps and bounds. That's been a joy to see in many here! 

I can’t tell you how happy I was about a year ago when I heard that William Manning was going through the purple book with Chris Hakencamp. This joy was multiplied 100 times when I was at a coffee shop the other week and bumped into Chris going through the purple book with Aron now!

Discipleship cycles! This is what it's all about! This is pruned branches bearing more fruit!

I want this to be the norm in our church. However, it is common to see Christians who've been in church for years, yet haven't made significant progress in their discipleship to Jesus. This is a dangerous place to be. Many are deceived, thinking they're mature because they know how to appear mature, playing the part, but at their core, they're self-deceived and immature.

And for those who do realize their immaturity, they often find it extremely difficult to reach out and humble themselves asking for help, feeling shame, thinking they should be further along. 

The enemy wants to keep you in this infancy, shaming you to stay quiet and not reach out.

But we must have the humility to say, "I need help." "I can't grow alone. I need the body of Christ!"

Whether you're a new believer and immature (which is normal), or you've been a believer for a while and are immature, or maybe you used to be mature but have regressed – we want to help you! All of us need help! But the first step is humbly admitting where you are at, and only then can you start to mature.

• A branch that is loved by the Gardener gets pruned. In this season, what is the one area the Holy Spirit is putting His finger on? The attitude, the habit, the idol He wants to lovingly cut away so you can be more fruitful?

• Are you willing to be honest about it? Who is one person in this church family you could be humble enough to go to this week and say, “I need help here”?

What is the purpose God has for us in abiding? 

John 15:11 ESV

11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

OH GOD WANTS THIS FOR YOU! 

Discipleship isn't meant to be a grim duty. When it flows from abiding, empowered by His grace, the result is complete joy.

John 15:16 ESV

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.

Let's Cultivate the Vine

Imagine what it would be like if everyone in our church was committed to this. To abiding in the vine, to loving from a place of grace, and to humbly being pruned for greater fruitfulness. God helping us, we can be this!