These words are not spoken as a rebuke, nor even with surprise; Jesus is leading Philip on.

The last One with whom we get intimate is Jesus.

Before Pentecost the disciples knew Jesus as the One Who gave them power to conquer demons and to bring about a revival (see Luke 10:18-20).

It was a wonderful intimacy, but there was a much closer intimacy to come - "I have called you friends." Friendship is rare on earth. It means identity in thought and heart and spirit.

The whole discipline of life is to enable us to enter into this closest relationship with Jesus Christ.

We receive His blessings and know His word, but do we know Him?

Jesus said, "It is expedient for you that I go away" - in that relationship, so that He might lead them on.

It is a joy to Jesus when a disciple takes time to step more intimately with Him.

Fruit bearing is always mentioned as the manifestation of an intimate union with Jesus Christ (John 15:1-4).

When once we get intimate with Jesus we are never lonely, we never need sympathy, we can pour out all the time without being pathetic.

The saint who is intimate with Jesus will never leave impressions of himself, but only the impression that Jesus is having unhindered way, because the last abyss of his nature has been satisfied by Jesus.

The only impression left by such a life is that of the strong calm sanity that Our Lord gives to those who are intimate with Him.

It is a comforting thought that trouble, in whatever form it comes to us, is a heavenly messenger that brings us something from God. Outwardly it may appear painful or even destructive, but inwardly its spiritual work produces blessings.

Many of the richest blessings we have inherited are the fruit of sorrow or pain. We should never forget that redemption, the world’s greatest blessing, is the fruit of the world’s greatest sorrow.

And whenever a time of deep pruning comes and the knife cuts deeply and the pain is severe, what an inexpressible comfort it is to know: “My Father is the gardener.”

John Vincent, a Methodist Episcopal bishop of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries and a leader of the Sunday school movement in America, once told of being in a large greenhouse where clusters of luscious grapes were hanging on each side.

The owner of the greenhouse told him, “When the new gardener came here, he said he would not work with the vines unless he could cut them completely down to the stalk. I allowed him to do so, and we had no grapes for two years, but this is now the result.”

There is rich symbolism in this account of the pruning process when applied to the Christian life. Pruning seems to be destroying the vine, and the gardener appears to be cutting everything away. Yet he sees the future and knows that the final result will be the enrichment of the life of the vine, and a greater abundance of fruit.

There are many blessings we will never receive until we are ready to pay the price of pain, for the path of suffering is the only way to reach them.

I walked a mile with Pleasure, She chattered all the way; But left me none the wiser For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow, And ne’er a word said she; But oh, the things I learned from her When Sorrow walked with me.

My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: and he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, . . . and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.

Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me.

The works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, . . . envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: . . . but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.

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, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide in me, and I in you . . . Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.