15:1  "Symbolically I represent the true vine, and My Father represents the vinedresser.

15:2  "Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.

15:3  "You have become cleansed already because of the word which I have spoken to you.

15:4  "Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.

15:5  "I represent the vine, you represent the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

15:6  "If anyone does not abide in Me, he becomes thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they burn.

15:7  "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and My Father will do it for you.

15:8  "My Father receives glorification by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to serve as My disciples.

15:9  "Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.

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.

15:11  "These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may reside in you, and that your joy may become full.

15:12  "This I command you, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.

15:13  "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.

15:14  "You prove My friends if you do what I command you.

15:15  "No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master does; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.

15:16  "You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.

15:17  "This I command you, that you love one another.

15:18  "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.

15:19  "If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.

15:20  "Remember the word that I said to you, 'A slave does not have greater worth than his master.' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also.

15:21  "But all these things they will do to you for My name's sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me.

15:22  "If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin.

15:23  "He who hates Me hates My Father also.

15:24  "If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.

15:25  "But they have done this to fulfill the word that the scriptures state in their Law, 'THEY HATED ME WITHOUT A CAUSE.'

15:26  "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, namely the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me,

15:27  and you will testify also, because you have remained with Me from the beginning.