ANCHOR DEVOTIONS (APRIL 12, 2012)

Plants Don't Choose

John 15:9-16


"You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit-fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name."
(JOHN 15:16)

Nurserymen often talk about how a plant "likes" being planted in sun or shade. But you never hear them talk about where a plant chooses to be planted. That's because plants don't choose. They grow where they are planted. That's what makes them a "plant."

But Jesus chooses those who will become His followers. "I have chosen you out of the world" (John 15:19), Jesus says. The entire process of salvation is due to Him choosing us, not because of anything we have done. This is a great mystery. We don't know how it works, but we see that it works in our changed hearts. I know that if God had waited for me to choose Him, He would still be waiting.

How reassuring this is when we follow His command to bear fruit (that's His way of telling us to do as He did and how our lives then reflect His goodness). We need not feel the weight of responsibility so heavily if we remember that He chose us and appointed us to do it. As we study and respond to His good and perfect Word, He will give us what we ask in His name.

INSIGHT
"SO NEITHER HE WHO PLANTS NOR HE WHO WATERS IS ANYTHING, BUT ONLY GOD, WHO MAKES THINGS GROW."
(1 CORINTHIANS 3:7)

READ THROUGH THE BIBLE IN A YEAR
2 Samuel 1-2
Psalm 136
Ephesians 3-4
John 15:9-16
New International Version (NIV)
9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit —fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.

THREE THINGS TO BOAST ABOUT

Boasting comes naturally to us, but rarely is it a good thing. The Bible tells us it's okay to boast about some things. Do you know what they are?