Every Branch in Me That Beareth Not Fruit — Keith Daniel

The Transformative Word of God

A great privilege, and I do bless God for all of you with a lovely singing, a lovely word to the children, a lovely message and a song that we all love so much and burned into our hearts. It's a great joy for me to be with a very godly man, and a tremendous privilege to see how God can honor a family and be with a family as this family.

So I am so grateful to be in your home, brother, to meet your children, your godly wife, and the lovely ministers that serve alongside of you. And it's a tremendous joy to be here with you this morning, just to send God with you, to hear the men praying as they did before this service.

That was a privilege in itself. And the way you sing, everything, even this lovely message and song by these godly young people and family, I do bless the Lord to be here. And I thank God for the privilege of bringing my wife.

For seventeen years, eighteen years, she never left our home. She was always there when I left her. And she never left the children. This is the first time she's come to your land, and it took quite something to make her to come.

But I'm glad she came. I'm glad she came particularly the first time to your land, to this church, and to you very lovely people. So thank you that I can be here. I've been looking forward to coming. I thank God for the man you've spoken of, Herod de Troy.

And I've worked with him in Canada quite a lot, gone across that lovely land. And I'm so glad now that through his friendship I've met you dear people. Can we all have a short prayer? Can we bow before God for a short prayer, please?

Our Father, we praise Thee for the Word of God. The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life. And we look to the Holy Spirit to make this Word that God has given to man alive. Come Thou Spirit of God, and speak through the Word of God by illuminating it into our hearts.

Keep us under the blood of Jesus Christ, safe from the powers of darkness. And in mercy come visit us this day, this hour, with Thy presence and with Thy voice speaking to the depth of our hearts. Come Lord, in mercy stand beside me in this pulpit and speak through me.

We all ask these things in the name of Jesus Christ, God, Saviour, and our dearest friend. Amen. In the Holy Bible there are many passages which we come to love above other passages, if that's possible.

The True Vine and the Fruitless Branch

And one passage, all of God's people will begin to walk with God and go through with God and get understanding of what it is to walk with God in truth. One passage that all of us slow down at and all of us come to love is John 15, where the dear Lord Jesus speaks these words, I am the true vine.

He calls himself a vine. I am the true vine. My Father is the husbandman, the keeper of the vineyard, the one who tends and works in the vineyard. I am the true vine. My Father, my Father is the husbandman.

Every branch in me. Now suddenly he looks at you and I. Suddenly he points to us, to you and me, and he calls us branches. He calls us branches. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, that beareth not fruit.

Is that you, young man? Is that you, lady, that Christ suddenly looks at? And I believe with a broken heart would say this about anyone sitting here today. No fruit. Oh, I can't think of anything more tragic that God could ever say about my life.

I can't think of anything I would hate more that God would ever say this of me, that he says of you, as he looks at you, every branch in me that beareth not fruit. What tragic words. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away.

He taketh away. I don't know what that means. I'm a preacher. I've preached in ministers' conferences where there are hundreds and hundreds of ministers who preach from the Word of God, and I have said to them, I don't know what that means.

I don't know what that means. So all I'm going to do today is leave it between you and God. I won't preach on it. Forgive me, I can't. But I leave it between you and your God. Who said these words. Just you, you work it out what God means, please.

If this is what God says of your life, every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away. And every branch that beareth fruit, now suddenly he looks at you and I who are vitally real with God.

You and I who, he can write across our lives the words of 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17, without any shadow of a doubt. If any man be in Christ, he says, any one of you sitting in this building, he's a new creature.

All things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new. Look, God says, to the whole world. All things have become new. There's fruit. You're real. You're vital with God. He can say to your enemy, look, all things have become new in this man's life.

And your enemy won't have one word to argue as God speaks to him louder than any preacher ever spoke from a pulpit to one life. No man can argue. All things became new. Oh, every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away.

He taketh away. And every branch that beareth fruit is reality, is life. He can say to the whole world, to your wife, to your children, to your father and mother, there's fruit. No one can mistake it.

No one will argue with God. No one will not recognize it. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away. And every branch that beareth fruit, what does he do with us? He purges it. Not one month after you come to God.

The moment there's life. The moment he sees you're real. He purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit, God says. That it may bring forth more fruit. The moment you're really saved. The moment there's vital reality in your life, God says he purges it.

God says. Now, that's not a popular message. That's something you won't hear much in the pulpit of God anywhere in the world today, because people will run. He purges it. That word, some of the new translations that they bring out say the word means cleanses it.

The moment there's life, he cleanses. But that's not true. There's only one true translation of any of the originals that will bring out any true meaning to what Christ said. It's a cutting word. There's something that hurts.

Can God be saying that to you and me? Does God say that in the Bible? The moment I'm real, the moment I turn in truth, the world can see I'm real. Say! Is something going to hurt? He cuts. Is something of a pain, a wound about to come?

Is this God that would do this to man, who gives his life to him? Oh, yes. Oh, yes. He purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit. It's not a popular message. Today, you hear people crying out, prosperity preaching.

Trials, Persecution, and the Purging of Fruitful Branches

Loud and clear. Come to Christ and you'll prosper, sir. No wonder they come to Christ. Who wouldn't want to prosper? Come to Christ, you'll have no difficulties financially, they cry out. You'll never suffer.

You won't have persecutions. You won't ever suffer physically. You won't have any sorrows or wounds as well as physical. Come to Christ. We pray for you. If you're sick, they say, you'll be healed. If you're not healed, it's sin in your life or unbelief, they say.

Come to Christ. It's heaven on earth, but beloved, that's not the truth. That's a lie. When these poor people come to Christ in their difficulties and find they're not prospering, then they become bitter in their millions against God and Christianity.

And they find they're not healed. They're bitter. And things go wrong. We need to cry it out loud and long, loud and clear. There's no such a thing as heaven on earth. Heaven is coming. But in this world, you shall have tribulation.

All who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. There is so much crying out of that which will be hard. It is about to come on us when there's vital reality in our lives, that God allows that it may bring forth more fruit.

Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, He taketh away. And every branch that beareth fruit, He purges it immediately. He purges it in His perfect wisdom, in His perfect love, in His perfect longing for the best.

The best. No wasting of time here. There's no time to waste. He purges it that it may bring forth more fruit. You go to the vineyard. And you and I who are perhaps ignorant of vineyards, you watch the keeper of the vineyard, the worker, and what he does to the branches on the vines.

There's a ruthlessness that you and I would stand back, stunned, literally stunned. He will not spare anything that shouldn't be there. Cutting, cutting, anything that shouldn't be there. There's no wasting time as He can work.

Cutting, cutting. You and I look and think, will this thing ever survive? There's nothing left in the end. It's a stump. Will it ever survive this ruthlessness? But He has wisdom and love that doesn't spare.

He has wisdom. Perfect wisdom in His understanding that as He stands there being so ruthless, He knows that you and I don't know. This will bring forth fruit that this would never have seen had it not been treated thus.

And you and I need to trust God when things go wrong. You and I need to trust the wisdom of God when everything isn't heaven on earth. When everything isn't just prosperity and perfect health and perfect love from everybody, even your enemies.

No, we need to trust God when God says to us, the moment I see fruit in your life of any reality, don't be stunned. Then upon you comes trials. Think of not the strange thing when trials come upon you.

God says, these things must come upon you. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, He taketh away. And every branch that beareth fruit, He purges it that it may bring forth more fruit. Now, when God purges you and I, and especially me, it's not easy.

It's not easy. I wish I could say, I shouted hallelujah every step of the way in the thirty years I walked with God, but I would be a liar. I wish I could stand here today and say of an honest heart from the pulpit, I praise God all the way through every trial, everything that ever came upon me.

I just worshipped, I praised, and I shouted hallelujah, but I would be a liar in the pulpit of God. And beloved, the day you lie in the pulpit of God, you lose the right to stay in the pulpit of God. Get out of the pulpit if you're going to lie.

You're useless to God and man if you're going to lie. Tell the truth for God's sake, while you have a chance. I didn't shout hallelujah. If you did, you're a better man than I am. I groan. I've known what it is to groan as a Christian.

I've known what it is to weep. Let a man stand up in 1997 in this world, in the evangelical church, and dare to say that I wept as a Christian. I've groaned, I've groaned and longed, the whole creation that groans for God to take me to heaven, away from all this.

I wish I could say I shouted hallelujah, but I've groaned, beloved. And I have to leave the pulpit if I don't tell you, loud and clear, no matter what you think of me. I wept at times and groaned. Then the trials come, when sorrows like seed billows roll.

Oh, it's not easy. It's not easy when this comes upon you. I remember the deepest trial of my faith I ever faced in life was about five years ago. Had you told me 30 years ago when I first came to Christ that these things would come upon my life, I would have been so stunned.

I think I would have lost heart. But at some point, God brought upon me such fires, such trials, that I would never have believed God would bring upon someone who named the name of Jesus. When sorrows just came like seed billows, you know the old hymn, one wave comes, you can't believe such a thing is happening.

You're down in the dust. You try and get up, and then you suddenly, well, here comes the next wave, the next storm, the next tragedy. And you're down, and you get up again, and there's the next smashing, you're down, the next.

You're scared to get up in the end. You're scared to get up in the end. I remember that terrible, terrible time, five, almost six years ago. And I hardly could get up. I was so down, so smashed. It was like there was nothing left for God to take.

It was like there was nothing left for God to touch. I was so confused. My mind was in a whirl, and I was so stunned that God could do this to me, that I was scared to stand up again. And I remember one day in this stunned, confused, groaning before God, why God?

Suffering, Death, and the Refining Fire

The telephone rang, and I heard my whole family had been in an accident in the car, that they were taken to the hospital. And when I put that phone down, still numb from all the other fires, all the other trials, all the tragedies, all the sufferings that I'd been enduring, going on, as I put the phone down, I went down on my face in my office.

And I cried a prayer I never knew I could cry. God, let me die. And I meant it. Let me die. Job was not the only one that ever prayed that, godly people. He was the godliest man on earth. In case you don't think me godly, well, cry that from the heart.

Let me die. Let me die. And you and I will know moments like that. You and I will know moments like that when we're vitally real with God. But now, in case you're all sitting there thinking this man is going to bring nothing but negativeness to us, here comes the positive.

So grab it with both hands, okay? There's always the end of a storm. There's no such a thing as a fire never ceasing when God allows it to come on your life. There's no such a thing as God allowing the storms and the tragedies and the trials of your faith to so smash you that you'll never rise.

You may think you'll never rise, but God knows when to stop. There's always the end of a storm. Trust Him. Whatever you're going through, I don't care what it is, I guarantee you this. God is so perfect in His dealings with us, there will be a moment this God, this holy God, the definer with the gold, and He lets the fire come on the gold, and He sees the dross, the rubbish, rising.

That's all it was that God was dealing. It's terrible for a priesthood to admit, after all those years, there's still things in my life that God has to take out that are hindering Him. And the rubbish, the dross, and the gold, the only way it will come out is the fire.

Job cried out, when He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold from the fire. He knew deep in his heart there's something to trust. Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him. There's no such a thing as God being unjust to you, God being cruel to you.

God is perfect in His dealings to you. You must believe that. There's always the end of the fire. There was a moment when God suddenly said, stop, enough for now. The fire is heating the gold, coming upon this precious, precious metal.

Oh, the trial of your faith is more precious than gold that perishes, though it be tried with fire. The trial of your faith, beloved, trust God when He says it is more precious than gold that perishes, though it be tried with fire.

This is precious in God's eyes. What He sees is about to happen, the rubbish being dealt with. But there's a moment He says, stop, stop, enough, enough for now. And Satan and all the evil people on this earth cannot touch you.

Whatever he stood back and allowed up to that moment, from the moment God says, enough. Not all the powers of hell and darkness, not every evil man on earth, no matter who it is, will be able to touch you again until God allows them.

Nothing can come past God's command, stop. In His perfect wisdom, this refiner with the gold, knowing now is enough, now is enough, stop. And He is perfect when He stops the fires. There's a perfect timing, trust Him, trust Him in it.

I'll never forget when God, at the end of that terrible, terrible time, He allowed me to endure when I didn't think I could ever rise again, but God knew I would rise again. I look back and I look at that moment when suddenly God lifted me up out of the dust.

Oh, I got up slowly. Before, through all the years, whatever the devil did, I got up and I charged back. I remember, I remember charging back into the battle, no matter what the devil did. But now, I got up so slowly, I'd never got up like that before.

And I prayed from my heart of prayer, I'd never prayed before, God, if I'm to take another step, it will be by thy grace alone. All confidence is God Himself. Even that God won't tolerate in you, child.

He's got to take it away that you know without Him, you can't take another step. And I pray from my heart, oh God, if I'm going to take another step, it's by thy grace. Otherwise, I'm not going to be able to step on in this life.

And suddenly, as God lifted me up out of that dust, and I stood up so slowly with all the self-confidence I'd had in life gone, God began to honor me. He opened doors and filters that He could never, ever allow me in before.

Do you know why? Because I would have touched the glory, but now I couldn't, and now God could bring forth more fruit, because I knew I was nothing now. And He was everything, even my next step had to be through God and His grace.

And the whole world looks and lifts you out of the dust, and sees a person broken of self, relying on God for grace, but sees something they never saw before, God, trusting that person, because He knows, now this man won't touch the glory.

Not even a side would glance at it, will he be capable of, Spurgeon says, when God's dealt with you. Not even a look at the glory anymore, let alone touching it, pondering it, God, not even a side would glance at the glory.

I remember turning to my wife, who was in this meeting. My darling wife, I don't know if you'll forgive me for saying that, and I hope she forgives me because I've never, ever preached this in front of her.

She doesn't know what's coming here, but I say it under the blood of our Lord. My darling wife, I turn to my darling wife, whom I respect more than any other human I know on earth, because of her life.

I do hope you can say that of your wives, that end. I say it of my wife. I never deserved her, and I mean that, but God gave her to me. I turn to my darling wife, and I said to the person I respect more than anyone else on earth, but I know.

I said to her, Jenny, why? Why would God have allowed this to happen to me? I have served God with every breath in my body. You know that, Jenny. The children know it. The world knows it. I have served God with every breath in my body.

Why would God turn me like this into all this, Jenny? And I shall never forget what my wife said to me. I shall never forget for all eternity. What my wife said to me, tears came down her face as she looked at me, and she said, Keith, I don't have all the answers, but this I know.

God was perfect in his dealings with you, Keith. Keith, I see in you now something I've never seen before. I see Jesus. I see Jesus, and I know, Keith, that God was perfect in what he's done for you and to you, that I now see what I see in you.

God was perfect in what he's done, Keith. Perfect. You know what I said when Jenny said those words? She doesn't know it. I looked at her, and I prayed a prayer. I said, God, I would be willing to go through everything again starting right now to hear my wife say those words to me.

No one knows you like your wife, sir. For the person who knows you better than anyone else on earth to look at you and say, I see Jesus. I said to God from my heart, I would go through it all again starting now, God, just to hear my wife say those words to me.

Oh, every branch that bears fruit, he purges it that it may bring forth more fruit. Trust him. He knows what the world will see, what your wife will see, what your children will see, what your enemy will see that they would never see, never say, if he doesn't have his way.

If you don't trust him through the fire, trust him. Spurgeon, Spurgeon was the only man they ever called the prince of preachers. No other preacher on earth was ever called the prince of all preachers.

Spurgeon on Suffering and Ministry

From the time of Paul to this day, one man the world dared to call the prince of preachers, Charles Spurgeon. Now, I don't like giving labels to a man. I fear labels handed out to men who God uses. As I read Spurgeon's writings, my heart sank as I realized why the world called this man the prince of preachers.

Oh, I don't know if a man could ever be found that took the word of God and broke it so simply that a child could be gripped and the man of God that walked with God for 50 years would be equally gripped and broken in the same sermon as this man's ability to take the word of God and break it open.

He was the prince of all preachers. There's no doubt of it. No doubt of it. But do you know what he said in his old age? What Spurgeon, the man that is acknowledged by all preachers as the greatest preacher that ever lived, in his old age Spurgeon stood up and he just said once to the world why God used him.

And I think we need to listen carefully again to something we don't hear today. We're too scared to preach it and too scared to believe it. Spurgeon said these words, if it wasn't for the fire, if it wasn't for the tragedies, if it wasn't for the sufferings, if it wasn't for the trials of my faith, I would be poor as a preacher.

I would be poverty-stricken in the pulpit of God. I would be poor as a preacher. I would be poverty-stricken to man if it wasn't for these things. Spurgeon says you cannot weep with those that weep unless you've wept yourself.

You will judge the man who falls. You will judge the man who groans. But if you've groaned yourself, you'll weep. You cannot weep with them that weep unless you've wept yourself. You cannot comfort people with any comfort unless you comfort them with a comfort where with you were comforted.

When you were in the fires, Spurgeon says what burned into your heart in the deepest trials will burn from your lips as a preacher. What burns from your lips as a preacher will burn into the hearts of all who hear you.

What doesn't burn into your heart will not burn from your lips, will never burn into the hearts of anyone you preach to. Only what burns into your heart. Spurgeon said 80 of this book, I don't know how he worked it out, but I don't doubt him.

80 of this book was not given in Old Testament. This was historical records of the treatment of God towards his people, the Jews. 80 of this book, Old Testament and new, was given primarily by the heart of God for one reason, to take his people through dark passages, through fires, through trials, when there's no hope, to give them hope.

When there's fear, to give them faith. To give light and darkness to heal when they're wounded. 80 of the book is dead to you as a preacher, and let it burn in your heart when you, oh preacher, if it isn't for the fires, you're going to be poverty-stricken to God and man in the pulpit.

Trust God when he lets you be comforted in your deepest trial, because suddenly you, like Spurgeon, will comfort them that need comfort with a comfort where you were comforted. Oh, trust him. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away.

And every branch that beareth fruit, believe him, he purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit. That it may bring forth more fruit. That it may bring forth more fruit, God says. Verse 3, now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

Cleansing and Transformation Through the Word

Are you? I love these words that Christ said, now ye are clean through the word. Not through the blood. There's that cleansing which you can't get another step toward God unless you've gone through the blood.

Do you know that cleansing through the word sanctifies him? Through thy truth, thy word is truth. Do you know that cleansing, the sanctifying power of the word, that cleanses your life, that changes your priorities, your values, everything in life changes through the word.

Nothing else is going to do that. Don't just say it's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit uses the word to change every single priority you have in life. Have you been so changed and so clean from that which is wrong in God's eyes?

Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken, all the words of Christ, recorded and illuminated and expounded unto the New Testament. Everything cleanses you of God's word. You're clean through it.

And then in the next verse comes the most important word God has ever said to a Christian in the whole Bible. There's no verse in the entire scriptures which is so vital, held out by God to you and I the moment we find vital reality.

For unless this verse is a reality in my life, then the fires won't do anything but bring bitterness. They'll make me the most unchrist-like person on earth if this isn't the case. You see, this is the vital thing now, because without this, even God's deepest fires won't do anything but ruin you and destroy you.

This is the crux to bring forth fruit. Verse four, abide in me. Do you? Do you do the one thing that matters more than anything else in life? Listen carefully. Abide in me, and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in the vine.

No more can ye except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in me, and I in him the same, bringeth forth much fruit. Trust him. He knows. If he promises you that the one thing that will bring forth fruit in the fires, in the deepest trials, in the tragedies, in the suffering that will come upon you, believe me, the one thing will happen if he promises you and I.

He says, if a man, he that abideth in me and I in him the same, bringeth forth much fruit. For without me ye can do nothing. Trust him. Preachers, without God, you can't do anything. You have to abide in him.

Verse six, if a man abide not in me, there comes a tragedy. There comes a tragedy. No matter what God does or longs to be done, he trusts you with hardships and difficulties. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch and is withered.

And men gather them and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. Now, I don't know what that means. I've heard preachers preaching on these verses, and I had to get up and walk out weeping at what they were trying to tell men God was saying there.

I can't preach on these verses. Forgive me. I just leave this between you and God also. That's all I'm capable of doing. I haven't got the ability to preach what God means here. Forgive me. And no preacher ever challenged me for saying this.

No preacher on earth. And I say to you, I don't know what it means, but I leave it between you and God. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch. You can be sure of it. You can be sure of it.

It is withered. Men gather them, cast them into the fire, and they are burned. If he abide in me, my words abide in you. You shall ask what ye will, it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit.

This is what glorifies God, the fruit that comes in your life. It is the result of abiding in him. Now, I want you to turn to the same writer who recorded in John the gospel according to John. Now, he expounds on what Christ said about abiding in him.

Abiding in Christ According to First John

In one John, the first epistle of John, the first letter of John, he takes what he recorded word for word that we've been reading what Christ says, and now he expounds. And he tells us what Christ meant by abiding in him.

And why Christ told us this is the most vital thing for anything, of any reality to come in your life. No matter what God does, the one thing you've got to do is abide in him. Otherwise, there's no fruit.

The one thing he expects of you, the one thing he can't force you to do, the one thing you must do, and why? Let's listen to what God says through John as he expounds on what Christ meant. Let's start in one John, chapter 2, verse 3.

Hereby we do know that we know him. Hereby we do know that we know him. If we keep his commandment, if we keep his commandment, he that sayeth, I know him, and keepeth not his commandment, is a liar. That's not me saying it, sir.

That's God. You're a liar. Tragedy is you're lying to yourself. And that's a tragedy. But if God says this is the truth, don't argue with him. Hereby we do know that we know him. If we keep his commandment, he that sayeth, I know him.

Do you say you know him? He that sayeth, I know him, and keepeth not his commandment, is a liar. The truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his word in him, verily, is the love of God protected. Hereby know ye that we are in him.

He that sayeth, he abideth in him. Here comes this verse, this word that Christ said is the one thing that matters for you to survive, for you to bear fruit, for this terrible thing not to happen upon your life that I don't even understand if you don't abide him.

He that sayeth, he does the one thing that matters. Do you say you do that, sir? Do you say you abide in him? He that sayeth, he abideth in him, art himself also so to walk even as he walked. He that sayeth in this building that I do the one thing that matters in God's eyes from my side, the one thing that matters in Christianity once I'm born again, you could say there's ten things, I say there's one thing.

If you do the one thing, he that sayeth, he abideth in him. I'm doing it. Art himself also so to walk even as he walked. Do you in your home? Do you in your church? Do you at your work? Do you towards your enemy?

Do you walk even as he walked? Do you walk as Christ? He that sayeth, he abideth in him, art himself also so to walk even as he walked. And we turn in the same chapter to the last two verses. Now, little children, verse 28.

Little children, abide in him. Here it comes again. Abide in him. Why? He always tells us why. That when he shall appear, we may have confidence and not be ashamed. Before him it is coming. Beloved, if you're not abiding in him, you will be ashamed.

Before him it is coming. Otherwise, the word of God is not true. If you don't think that's possible, what is God speaking about? If you're not doing this, you will be ashamed. God says. Otherwise, you're calling God a liar.

Little children, abide in him. Do this one thing that matters. This great priority for all God's people. That when he shall appear, we may have confidence and not be ashamed. Before him it is coming. Chapter 3, verse 6.

Whosoever abideth in him, sinneth not. Whosoever abideth in him, sinneth not. There's no victory in Jesus Christ outside of this one thing. There's no such a thing. You can come out a thousand times through your life and weep at the front of a building, but until you do the great discipline of abiding in Christ, you will never know victory over the things that are calling, causing you to fail and taking the wind out of your testimony.