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Report a TypoJohn ◦ Chapter 15
1As they were walking, Jesus saw a grapevine, and pointing to it, said: "I am the vine from which all truth and life originates, and my Father is the gardener who tends the vine.2You are the branches which have life and grow — as long as you are connected to me. Any branch that does not grow and bring forth the fruit of a transformed character reveals that it is not genuinely connected to me, and therefore my Father will remove it. Any branch bringing forth fruit of a transformed character my Father prunes and disciplines in order to bring forth even more fruit.3Your hearts have already been cleansed from the lies of Satan as a result of the truth I have revealed to you.4Remain connected and in unity with me, and I will remain connected and in unity with you. No branch can live, grow, and bear fruit on its own; it must remain connected to the vine. Likewise, you do not have life and cannot grow and bear fruit unless you remain connected to me.5"I am the vine from which all truth and life originates, and you, who receive truth and life from me, are the branches. If a person remains connected to me and in unity with me, I will never sever the connection, and they will develop a fruitful, Godlike character; but separated from me–they can do nothing good.6If anyone severs their connection to me and refuses to be reunited with me, they are like a branch that is cut off from the vine and thrown away and then withers and dies. Such dead branches are picked up, thrown into the fire, and burned.7If you remain connected and in unity with me, and my character is reproduced in you, ask whatever you wish — in harmony with my methods and principles — and it will be given you.8This healing of damaged hearts and minds, which results in the development of godly character in my followers, brings honor and glory to my Father, as it reveals that his methods are the only methods of life, health, and happiness.9"My love for you is just as free, complete and abundant as the Father's love for me. And just as the Father's love lives in me and flows through me to the world, so you must continue to let my love live in you and flow through you to others.10If you value my methods and practice my principles of selfless love, my love will live in you — just as I have valued my Father's methods and practiced his principles of selfless love, and his love lives in and flows through me.11I have told you this so that you may be completely restored to the Father's original ideal for mankind–to unity with him–and you may then experience the joy I have known in my unity with the Father; and then your joy will be complete also.12My prescription to heal your minds and hearts is this: Love each other as I have loved you.13There is no greater love than this—that a person lay down their life to save their friends. This is the principle of life — the central principle of the kingdom of God. This love is the Remedy for the infection that is destroying mankind, and the infection is this: Satan’s wicked disease of survival-of-the-fittest, which is preferring self so much that a person will kill their friends in order to save themself.14You are my friends if you take my prescription and love one another.15I do not want you to be my servants, because servants only do what they are told but do not understand what the master is doing, nor do they understand the master himself. Their hearts are not in harmony with the master, and what they do they do not do freely. I want you to be my friends — to understand what I am doing — and to freely choose to be in unity with me. That is why I have told you about everything the Father and I are working to accomplish, so your hearts and minds will be in harmony with us.16You did not come seeking me, but I came seeking to heal and restore you, so that you will develop character in harmony with mine–character that will not be shaken. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask as you work in harmony with us to finish our mission.17This is my prescription: Love one another.18"If the selfish, survival-of-the-fittest world hates you, remember that selfishness hates love; and the world hated me first.19If you also were selfish and valued the methods of the world, then the world would love you as part of itself. But as it is, you do not value the selfish methods of the world or practice its principles, for I have taken you out of the world and restored my methods within you. That is why the world hates you.20Don't forget what I have told you: 'No servant is greater than their master.' If they have tried to destroy me to prevent me from revealing the truth about the Father's methods of love, they will also try to destroy and prevent you from spreading the message about the Remedy. If they have partaken of the Remedy and helped me promote it, they will help you also.21They will oppose you because they hate my character of love revealed in you, for they are completely wrong in their understanding about the One who sent me.22If I had not come as the Remedy for their infected hearts and brought the truth about my Father and his methods and principles, their terminal condition would be no fault of their own. Now, however, they have no excuse for their terminal state or the fact that selfishness in their hearts has not gone into remission, for they have rejected the Remedy.23Those who hate me hate my Father as well, as I am an exact representation of my Father.24If I had not revealed, in their very presence, the Remedy for human sinfulness–a life operating perfectly on my Father's principles of selfless love–their fatal condition would not be their fault. But now they have seen the miracles of healing that have occurred as goodness has flowed from the Father through me to the world — so that all may see that life is designed to operate on my Father's methods of selfless giving — and still they hate both me and my Father and thus reject me, the only Remedy.25But this is in harmony with what was written in their Scriptures: 'They hated me without cause or reason.26"When the Helper comes, whom I will send as my representative to you from the Father — the Spirit of Truth — he will work to reveal me.27And you must also work to reveal me, because you have been with me from the beginning of my ministry and now understand my purpose and mission"