Vine

This morning we are finishing our series on the seven “I Am” statements of Jesus found in the gospel of John. These statements are important for two reasons. First, in these statements Jesus is telling us who he is and what he is like. In them Jesus says:

I am the bread of life

I am the light of the world

I am the gate

I am the good shepherd

I am the resurrection

I am the way, the truth, and the life, and today’s

I am the true vine

Second, these statements are important because of the connection Jesus makes with himself to God in them. We may not take much notice when Jesus says “I am,” but the Jewish leaders did. In these statements Jesus is equating himself with God and it’s because of that they wanted Jesus killed. They considered these statements to be blasphemous.

Turn with me to the fifteenth chapter of John. If you don’t have a Bible you can use the one in your pew and it’s on page . Last week we looked at John 14:6 where Jesus said he is the way, truth, and life. In John 14 Jesus is still in the upper room with the disciples. In John 15 Jesus has taken the disciples out the Mount of Olives. With every passing moment his crucifixion draws closer. This would be the longest day of his life. One of his disciples would betray him, one would deny him, all would desert him, and his heavenly Father would turn his back on him. But even with that in the back of his mind Jesus continues to teach his disciples and encourage them in their walk with him.

1I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

5I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

9As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. (John 15:1-12)

Grape vines were important in Jewish life. In additional to being one of the leading cash crops, it had become a national symbol of Israel. In Psalm 80 Israel is compared to a vine that God:

. . . transplanted a vine from Egypt; . . . drove out the nations and planted it. (Psalm 80:8)

God prepared the soil and took care of the plant. Other Old Testament writers pick up on this theme as well. We read about Israel being God’s vineyard in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Hosea. Hundreds of years later Jewish leaders picked up on this idea and used the grape vine on their coins. And later, when Herod had work done on the temple and temple mount a gold grape vine was added to the front of the temple. The rich gave money to add grape clusters in their honor on the vine. Today we pay to have someone’s name put on a brick, then it was a cluster of grapes or even a single grape on the side of the temple. So the idea of the vine was rich with meaning and symbolism. Jesus says that he is the vine.

Some call this a parable, some say that more accurately it’s an allegory, but the technical name isn’t important. What is important are the three parts to the picture Jesus gives: the vine, the branches, and the gardener or vine dresser.

First, Jesus says that he is the vine. What’s the purpose of the vine? The vine is what feeds water and nutrients to the branches. If there were no vine there would be no branches. The vine gives life to the branches. It’s what the branches connect to. But Jesus isn’t an ordinary vine. Jesus says that he’s the true vine. If Jesus is the TRUE vine then there must be false vines. What are false vines? False vines are those things we try to connect to for life and hope other than Jesus.

In the Old Testament those false vines included the idols the Israelites kept worshiping because they wanted to be like their neighbors. Even though God promised he would provide everything they needed, the people continued to worship idols thinking they would provide them with abundant crops and healthy animals. They didn’t trust God and turned to idols.

Today we don’t have idols we set up and go bow to, but there is an abundance of false vines we look to. Even though there is nothing that will be able to supply our needs like God can through Jesus we too look to other things. People look to jobs, bank accounts, or a government plan to provide the income they need. People look to insurance plans and retirement accounts to provide the security they want. People look to families, a spouse, or a social club to provide community and acceptance. People look to movies, sports or a hobby to provide entertainment and a distraction from the problems of life. There is no human institution that will be able to provide for us the way that God can. Jesus is the true vine. They will all leave us wanting. So why is it that we have a tendency to seek out those things before we turn to God? Perhaps we don’t trust God as much as we say we do.

Second, there are the branches. Jesus says that we are represented by the branches – those who have placed their faith in Jesus. What’s the role of the branches? The branches produce fruit. That’s our role. We are to produce fruit. There is the expectation that we will produce fruit. How are you doing?

That sounds intimidating, however, there are a couple of points we need to remember. First, the branches don’t work at producing fruit; they do it naturally simply because they are connected to the vine. They don’t produce fruit by themselves, but as a result of the water and nutrients provided by the vine. They must stay connected to the vine.

A missionary in Africa lived in his central mission which had a generator to supply power for his small house. Some natives from an outlying mission came to visit the pastor. They noticed the electric light hanging from the ceiling of his living room. They watched wide-eyed as he turned the little switch and the light went on. One of the visitors asked if he could have one of the bulbs. The missionary, thinking he wanted it for a sort of trinket, gave him one of the extra bulbs. On his next visit to the outlying mission the priest stopped at the hut of the man who had asked for the bulb. Imagine his surprise when he saw the bulb hanging from the ceiling by a string. He explained that one needed to have electricity and a wire to make the bulb work. We may share an understanding smile at the innocence of someone who had never seen an electric bulb. He didn’t understand how it worked. The bulb only works when connected to the power. Likewise, the branches only produce fruit when connected to the vine. And we only produce fruit when we are connected to Jesus.

What kind of fruit are we to produce? Paul gives us a short list in Galatians 5.

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23)

Notice that we’re not told about the fruits of the Spirit, but the fruit – singular – of the Spirit. There are not many fruits, but a fruit. We read many characteristics, but they’re all connected. It’s not like you work on an area that you’re weak in. “I haven’t been very patient this week so I better work on my patience.” Or, “I wasn’t very self-controlled yesterday so I should pray for more self-control.” Each of these characteristics of the Spirit’s fruit is related. If you are weak in one characteristic you are probably weak in them all. If you aren’t very loving then you probably aren’t experiencing much joy either. They all go hand in hand.

How do we produce this fruit? We don’t. The Spirit produces this fruit in us as we remain connected to the vine – as we remain connected to Jesus. As we grow in Jesus, as we love and obey him, the Spirit will produce fruit in our lives. That fruit includes the characteristics listed in Galatians 5, but the Bible lists other fruits as well. They include:

Winning lost souls

Holiness

Helping others, and

Giving praise to God

The Bible even lists financial giving as a fruit

All of these will come naturally as we remain connected to Jesus. And that’s really what Jesus is focusing on in this passage. We are to remain connected to him.

Have you ever seen a branch lying on the ground? How much life is in the branch? It depends on how recently it fell and the circumstances behind the fall, but one thing is sure, even if the branch is currently alive with green leaves it won’t be alive much longer. Soon those leaves will turn brown and fall off the branch. The branch cannot give life to the leaves. The branch can only pass on life that it has received from the vine.

We too must remain connected to the vine. How do we remain connected to Jesus? We stay connected when we read his word, when we pray, and when we worship. We do those at home during the week and we practice them corporately – together – on Sundays. We need to practice them both privately and publicly. Just one is not enough. If we rely on staying connected to Jesus only through public services on Sundays we won’t stay very strong. Perhaps you’ve seen the old church message board that reads:

Seven days without prayer makes one weak.

It’s referring to the fact that we can’t just pray on Sundays, we must pray every day of the week. We must also read the Bible and give praise to God each day of the week and not just wait till Sunday. At the same time there are those who think they don’t need to come together with other believers because they can pray and praise God at home each day. But the Bible encourages us to:

. . . not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. (Hebrews 10:25)

We need each other and the encouragement we can give each other. We also need both the private and public meeting with God to remain connected to him.

So Jesus is the vine and we are the branches. The third element of this picture is the gardener.

I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. (John 15:1)

If the role of the vine is to give life to the branches and the role of the branches is to stay connected to the vine that they may produce fruit, what is the role of the gardener? The gardener is there to assist the branches is producing fruit. The gardener makes it easier for the branches to produce fruit.

Every winter, when all the fruit is long gone and the leaves have fallen from the branches, the gardener goes to vineyard and prunes the branches. Fruit only grows on new growth. The branches put off new growth and that’s where the gardener will find fruit the following summer. But there will be no growth from what produced fruit last summer. The old growth is then cut back to make room for the new growth. Too, if the gardener left the old growth it would take energy away from producing fruit and the primary goal is not to produce leaves but fruit. During the summer the gardener will continue to prune and cut off new growth that is going to wrong way or that isn’t going to produce fruit. It’s a continual process that requires the constant attention of the gardener.

Likewise, God works in our lives to help us to produce fruit for him. As you read these verses some of the work the gardener does seems pretty brutal. He’s cutting off branches that don’t produce fruit and burning them in the fire. That sounds a lot like punishment. It certainly doesn’t sound like fun. But what is the goal of the gardener? The goal is to assist the branches in growing fruit. The gardener isn’t trying to harm the branches, he wants to help them and he knows what they need to produce the best fruit.

Likewise, God wants to help us produce fruit. He wants what’s best for and he always does what’s best for us. We know that we can trust him.

At the Men’s Fellowship Tuesday Todd Wolf told a story about going to visit his grandparents for Christmas when he was child. He says he was lying down in the back of the station wagon and remembers the car feeling a little funny. When he looked up he saw his mother was driving and they were going sideways down the highway in the snow. His father grabbed the wheel and turned into the slide while his mother was applying the brakes. Ahead of them traffic had come to a stop. Just before they hit anyone they too stopped. Todd said he enjoyed the ride and that never once was he concerned that something bad might happen. Why? He trusted his parents.

Even as children trust their parents, we can trust God to do what is best in our lives.

So why don’t we remain connected to Jesus?

One problem is we’re so easily distracted. It doesn’t take much to get our minds off of Jesus. We sit down to read the Bible or pray and our minds quickly run off to all the things we need to get done that day. We make plans to do better, but we’ll start tomorrow – today is just too busy. We have good intentions, or as we saw Jesus telling Peter last week – the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Even when we really want to stay connected we have a hard time doing it.

Sometimes it’s distractions. And it’s not always bad distractions, but they’re distractions none the less. There’s nothing wrong with reading a good Christian book that encourages your walk with God. But if I hadn’t read the Bible in a week which would be better for me: a book about God’s word or God’s word? There’s nothing wrong with a book about God unless it’s keeping me from reading what God has to say. We get easily distracted.

Another reason we have a hard time staying connected to Jesus is we don’t see the immediate results.

When was the last day you went without eating? Did everyone eat yesterday? Perhaps a few of you missed a meal, but I don’t doubt anyone missed two meals and I’m pretty sure no one missed every meal. How do we find time to eat three meals every single day without fail? Think about the time it takes. It takes time to prepare the meal and then to sit down and eat the food. Yet somehow we manage to find the time. How do we do it? We do it because we’re hungry. Our stomachs are empty and if we don’t eat they start growling. Plus, we enjoy it. We like the taste of the food. So we don’t mind giving up an hour or so a day to eat.

But it’s different when it comes to our spiritual nourishment. First, we don’t take as much pleasure is reading the Bible as we do in eating a hamburger, a T-bone steak, or a slice of pie. We don’t see the benefits of reading the Bible like we do when we eat nutritious food. Yet the psalmist compares God’s word to honey and to fine gold. When we eat we are immediately satisfied. We feel better, unless we eat too much. But we don’t immediately notice what reading the Bible and praying do for us spiritually. As a result we may not think they are very important, but they are. You usually can’t immediately feel the strength your food gives you, but it does. Similarly, reading the Bible and praying gives you spiritual strength you may not immediately recognize but is still working in you.

However, I think the major cause of our disconnection is our sin. When we sin we feel guilt, maybe shame, and we avoid God. We know he’s disappointed, so we don’t pray or read his word. We may even skip church. I understand. But what should we do? Let me go back to Peter as example of the steps we should take to reconnect to God.

In the upper room Jesus told the disciples that they would all fall away. One of them would betray him, but all of them would fall away. Peter insisted that he wouldn’t. Even if the others abandoned Jesus, he would be willing to die with Jesus. That’s when Jesus told Peter that he would deny him three times before the rooster crowed. And how long did it take Peter to go back on his resolution? Only a matter of hours later Peter was doing just as Jesus had said. Peter was denying he even knew Jesus.

We know that Jesus went to the cross and died, but three days later he rose from the dead. Several days later Peter and John and some of the other disciples went to Galilee and were fishing when Jesus appeared to them on the shore. When they realized it was Jesus who couldn’t wait for the boat to make it to shore? Who was the first one out of the boat swimming to Jesus? It was Peter the denier. He ran to Jesus and in Jesus he found forgiveness and redemption. And we will find the same.