s that
He had told them these things beforehand, so that when the predicted
events came to pass the apostles would be confirmed in their faith in
Him, the Christ. He had time to say but little more, for the next hour
would witness the beginning of the supreme struggle; "the prince of this
world cometh," He said, and with triumphal joy added, "and hath nothing
in me."[1216]

In superb allegory the Lord thus proceeded to illustrate the vital
relationship between the apostles and Himself, and between Himself and
the Father, by the figure of a vine-grower, a vine, and its
branches:[1217] "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.
Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every
branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it,[1218] that it may bring forth
more fruit." A grander analogy is not to be found in the world's
literature. Those ordained servants of the Lord were as helpless and
useless without Him as is a bough severed from the tree. As the branch
is made fruitful only by virtue of the nourishing sap it receives from
the rooted trunk, and if cut away or broken off withers, dries, and
becomes utterly worthless except as fuel for the burning, so those men,
though ordained to the Holy Apostleship, would find themselves strong
and fruitful in good works, only as they remained in steadfast communion
with the Lord. Without Christ what were they, but unschooled Galileans,
some of them fishermen, one a publican, the rest of undistinguished
attainments, and all of them weak mortals? As branches of the Vine they
were at that hour clean and healthful, through the instructions and
authoritative ordinances with which they had been blessed, and by the
reverent obedience they had manifested.

"Abide in me," was the Lord's forceful admonition, else they would
become but withered boughs. "I am the vine," He added in explication of
the allegory "ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him,
the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. 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.
If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will,
and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye
bear much fruit: so shall ye be my disciples." Their love for one
another was again specified as an essential to their continued love for
Christ.[1219] In tha