Expert: Thurman C. Petty, Jr. - 9/5/2008

Question
Hi Thurman, thanks for being available.  John 15:7 seems too good to be true.  Is this to be taken literally?  Jesus also mentioned this a couple times, so what really did He mean?  Thanks & have a blessed day.

Answer
Dear Greg,

Yes, the promises of Christ are for us to receive and to enjoy. There are hundreds of them in the Bible, both Old and New Testament.

But they are not blank checks. I suggest that you read both John 14 and 15 and notice that there are four or five conditions Jesus mentions that we must meet to receive answers to our prayers.

The text you mention has a condition in it. Notice:

John 15:7  If you REMAIN IN ME AND MY WORDS REMAIN IN YOU, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you.

“If you remain in me and my words remain in you,” then . . . .

What does it mean to remain in Christ? What does it mean for His words to remain in us? You see these are very important conditions to answered prayer. Let’s let John clarify this for us:

John 15:10  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.

To remain in Christ then, we must obey His commandments. What are His commandments?

Of course, Jesus gave us many commands while He was with us on earth, and these are recorded in the Gospels. But Paul gives us a clue of something even bigger:

1 Cor 10:1  I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea,
1 Cor 10:2  and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea,
1 Cor 10:3  and all ate the same spiritual food,
1 Cor 10:4  and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and THE ROCK WAS CHRIST.

So, Who was it that led the Children of Israel out of Egypt and through the desert? Christ. How can that be? Wasn’t He born in Bethlehem to Mary? Yes. But notice what the angel said to Mary before she conceived:

Luke 1:35  And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also THAT HOLY THING WHICH SHALL BE BORN OF THEE SHALL BE CALLED THE SON OF GOD.

John 1:1-3, 14 makes it plain that Jesus lived from all eternity past, He created the world.

John 1:1  In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was with God, and the WORD WAS GOD.
John 1:2  HE WAS WITH GOD IN THE BEGINNING.
John 1:3  Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. . . .
John 1:14  The WORD BECAME FLESH and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

So then, who was it that gave the Israelites the 10 commandments? It must have been Christ. So when Jesus tells us to remain in Him (vs. 7) and that means to keep His commandments (vs. 10) we must begin with the 10 commandments. You see, the commandments describe for us the kind of Person that God is, and the kind of character God wants us to have.

We do not become that way by trying to keep the commandments. No. The commandments are a description of the character that we receive from Jesus, not a checklist to use to make ourselves pleasing to God. When we remain in Jesus . . .

Gal 2:20  . . . it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

You see, we must first be crucified with Jesus . . . repent of our sins (Acts 2:38), and confess them to Jesus (1 John 1:9). Then we believe that Jesus saves us and gives us eternal life (John 3:16; 1 John 5:11-13). Then we are in Christ and He in us, and the life we “live in the flesh [we] live by faith in the Son of God . . .” It’s all a work of faith. And as we remain in Christ, all 10 of the commandments will begin to show, and grow, in our lives (including the fourth).

So, John 15:7:  If [we] REMAIN IN [Christ] AND HIS WORDS REMAIN IN [US], [we may] ask whatever [we] wish, and it will be given [us].

It’s just as simple as that.

Always remain in Christ and let Him remain in you, and then you will be always ready for Him to come (Matthew 25:44—Jesus Second Coming: the greatest promise of all!).

Thanks for your question.

Thurman C. Petty, Jr.
Thurman@PettyPress.com
Check out my website www.PettyPress.com where I’ve posted 18 books, 40 Bible study guides and much more.