Church as Vineyard

Introduction

If you take a deep dive into Biblical study you can see that there are many Biblical images and concepts that describe the church. The one guy that really helps us understand this is a professor named John McVay from Walla Walla College in Washington State. McVay filters all these images down to 5 main metaphors.

Last year we spent a tonne of time exploring Church as Whanau or Family. At the beginning of the year, I spent some time unpacking the Church as the Body. We have 3 that we will investigate more these next 3 weeks. Agricultural, Martial and Architectural.

Agricultural Metaphor

We have had many vegetables growing in our backyard. I have met some neighbours that have grown grapes and let me tell you, they are a mess! If you then drive thru Picton and Nelson area you start to see how grapes should look for a maximum yield.

Makes me think of the disciple and this text.

We can interpret this text quite easily as an individual reader. We can extend this out corporately to understand these branches that stretch out from the main vine would be larger church context.

From these grapes would produce a sweet wine that would later be put into casks or wineskins and we have taught and heard prophetically about the need for new wineskins!

This metaphor doesn't just find its space in the New Testament! Even in the OT we see Israel connected to the image of vineyard.

Isaiah 5:1–7 “Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and briers and thorns shall grow up; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for…”

Hosea 10:1 “Israel is a luxuriant vine that yields its fruit. The more his fruit increased, the more altars he built; as his country improved, he improved his pillars.”

Interesting fact that in the OT, the vineyard is always described in a degenerative track or being wild. When the “chosen nation”, these Jews tried to establish themselves on their own they became rogue and started to wither and fade. Apart from Yahweh they were nothing, but when they were in right relationship with God they were heathy and strong.

Main Text

John 15:1–7 ESV

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

Exegesis

Content

Jesus even says that he is the true vine!

Lexham Theological Wordbook ἀληθινός

ἀληθινός (alēthinós). adj. true, sincere. Indicates truth, correctness, or sincerity.

Context

The Vine is the plant. The root, stem and all the branches. We abide in Him and he in us. We are One.

The vine, the purpose of the the vineyard, the church is to bring forth. It is NOT ornamental.

When I was in Romania where the orthodox church is heavily enmeshed with the culture and country, many of the churches would be decadent and 360 degree covered with icons and ornate beauty. Almost too much as people could really congregate anymore as their wasn't any room or any space that was appropriate to sit.

During the time of Jesus ministry, grapes and vineyards were grown over terraces and trellises.

It grows and needs to be directed and pruned constantly.

The vine would grow 2 types of branches: ones that would bear fruit and ones that didn't.

the good for nothing branches needed to be cut aggressively as they would suck out the much needed nutrients to the branches that were growing fruit.

William Barclay unpacks the 3 ways branches become useless

We refuse to listen to God. We know better.

We listen to Jesus but only give back the “lip” service and we don’t back it up with deed or action.

James 2:14–20 ESV

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder! Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?

3. We accept Jesus as Master but as soon as we face trials and hardship, we abandon him.

Pruning

Useless branches

These were absolutely useless to anyone and everything!

Back in the times of Jesus, vinedressers would gather these spiral like, greasy smooth branches and tie them into bundles and throw them into a bonfire as they wouldn’t be of any good use at the temple or the home for heat or to consume with fire.

If the Vinedresser/gardener can’t make any good use of the branch, there is no need to keep it.

Sucker Shoots

Ray Stedman unpacks this eloquently here:

“I struggled for a while with this word prunes because in the Greek it is really "cleanses." It seemed to me a far cry from cleansing away debris to pruning back the branches -- until I learned that, in the usual practice of viticulture (i.e., the care of vines), the branches are pruned back each year in order to cleanse them. That is, a vine produces certain shoots (called "sucker" shoots) which start to grow where the branch joins the stem. If allowed to continue to grow, they would dissipate the life of the vine through so many branches that the vine would produce little or no fruit but would produce leaves instead. So every vinedresser knows it is important to prune away these little sucker shoots in order that the vine may produce more fruit. And since they grow right where the branch joins the stem, creating a tight cluster where dirt, leaves, and other debris collect, the pruning is therefore a cleansing process. This is what our Lord has in view.”

If pruning is a process of “cleansing” then vs3 now makes sense! The Word, the truth set us free from the dirt, debris of the enemy so that we can fully grow fruit that will last.

Fruit

We see that the Father gardener is wanting us to grow off from Jesus the Vine and produce a vine and as a church - fruit that will build the Kingdom of God on Earth, fully represent and mirror the Image of God to all that can see.

What are these fruits of living attached to the Vine? What are the “sucker shoots”?

Galatians 5:16–24 ESV

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Of course we see the “sucker shoots” first as a reminder of what we all struggle with!

sexual immorality

impurity of any kind

idolatry or things that we replace the centre of our lives with

enmity: being hostile towards another person

strife: bitterness and conflict with others

jealousy of others

anger and rage and rants

envy and rivalry

dissension: getting separation from another person

division

drukeness and orgies

Our Applications

1. Fruit that the Vinedresser wants for us individually and as a church

In the ESV we read them out like: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control

Here’s what The Message Translation renders it:

“But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely.

Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified.”

2. How do we do this? Abide in HIM!

Abiding in Christ means a constant receiving of His Spirit, a life of unreserved surrender to His service.

Ellen Gould White

Storyline - My testimony

Me my branch was marred with sucker shoots. I had so much dirt, grime and parasites that were plaguing my branch. I wasn’t connected to the vine.

Abiding to me is that you live in the space and the space lives in you. Like a house. Jesus was knocking on the door as he wants to square away the horde and clear the house for living again.

For me, it was Mike and Lorri Hinger & Ron Woods.

These 3 people allowed me to come into their space and I too wanted to surrender to their pruning. I believed that God showed them the areas that they needed to mentor and love me in so that first of all I would realise that I needed to receive God’s love and merciful gift of salvation.

As I remained connected (abide) to them, and they to me, I started to grow all these new fruits of the spirit.

Was it hard? Yes!

I tried to pull away too early and start living on my own prematurely and I started to wither and the sucker shoots started to grow and deplete me.

I came back to them, asked forgiveness and moved forward.

Wait! What? I have to be in a abiding relationship with others so that I can produce fruit?

Short answer is no & yes

Do you need to, so that you can grow? no. The earthly relationship is the template of something much much better we have with the Father, Son and Spirit!

Should we have people in our lives that we can spiritually abide with that will help us see the sucker shoots and pray/counsel us to make right decisions so that we can produce the best fruit? - YES!, it’s called your church!

This is why when these earthly spiritual abiding people, when they were instrumental in your life then commit moral failures and disgrace themselves and the Gospel… this is gutting and devastating as you saw these people as ordained gardeners on your branch!

These people, as all of us are imperfect and potentially able to let you down, abandon you and in some cases abuse you. All the more reason for us to abide 100% in our relationship first with God.

3. Apart from me - Nothing

There is a reality that you can so some things, you could be a “good” person and grow some stunted, weird worldly looking fruit and they become the modified bland tasting fruit that most people could see but they are fake.

God is the Gardener.

He is the Vine.

The church, you, are the branch attached to it.

Apart from Him, we will sooner or later become the very useless branch that will be thrown into the fire.

Surrender a fresh to God church

Come to the table for communion

Seek Mike & Lori Hingers or Ron Woods like people to help you grow and produce fruit.