Brothers and sisters in Christ, here in the 5th Sunday of Easter, we begin to transition our focus from how the resurrection of Jesus changes our lives, to a focus on his Ascension and promised return. In John chapter 15 we hear the unforgettable illustration of Jesus as the Vine from which we all have life as the branches.
And in chapter 15 we also hear about the world’s hatred of us when we abide in Jesus.
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world , therefore the world hates you.”
The world out there is hostile and spiritually dangerous to us. If we are separated from Jesus, we are far more vulnerable to attack. A branch cut off from the vine is destined to wither. It cannot live on its own, the fallen world we live in is far too desolate to support life on its own.
The picture of Jesus the true vine nurturing and leading us to bear fruit sounds like such a simple path for us to follow. “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.”
This is a scripture verse worth meditating on during times when we feel overwhelmed by the challenges of the world. Reminding ourselves of the order of God’s creation, I am the vine you are the branches. Jesus says it so simply, “I am the vine” Jesus does it all.
Every good fruit we bear, is simply accomplished by staying connected to the Savior who has called us to be His own through the waters of Holy Baptism. Without Jesus we can do nothing. With Jesus we bear much fruit.
What does it look like to bear much fruit? This is where the contrast between life abiding in Jesus and life lived in the world is helpful for us as the church to consider. Jesus is not speaking about bearing the type of fruit that brings popularity and acceptance for us in the world.
If you are of the world you can bear the type of fruit that the world is looking for. Bearing this type of fruit means things like fitting in with the latest cultural winds and doing and saying things that make people whose god is this world feel good about themselves.
But what does Jesus mean by good fruit? Jesus is describing the results of faith in Him. Verse 7: “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” What do you imagine God’s people ask for when the words of Jesus abide in them? Do they ask for riches and fame? Do they ask for humiliation and shame toward their enemies? Do they ask for dishonest gain, wasteful pleasures, and empty entertainment experiences? No, when we abide in Jesus we ask for the things of God’s kingdom to come into our lives.
We bear good fruit in Jesus when we break down the walls we put up and talk to our neighbors about the love of Jesus. We bear good fruit when we patiently pray for the well being of our neighbor. We bear good fruit when we humble ourselves and lift up our neighbor.
If you ask of the Father that you can learn to get more out of your experience of worship and listening to God’s Word- this is a wish that Jesus promises will be done for you. You will grow in your love and appreciation of hearing the Word so that you will want more and more of the gifts of the Lord- in the words of Psalm 119 “How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!”
If you abide in Jesus you will want to ask for wisdom to walk in the way of the Lord and to not be led astray by the world. And this too the Father will answer for you, and grant you to know the way of Life through a journey of repentance. “Every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
We bear more fruit as we allow the master gardener to prune us. To transform by His Word our pride into humility, our envy into contentment, our fear into love. Those areas of our life where we struggle to follow God’s law, we can pray that the Lord would humble us and bring us to repentance, refine our faith, even if it is by means of trial by fire.
Often we go our own direction in life too much, we may begin to think that it is only through this world that we have hope and lose sight that Jesus is returning.
The Father prunes us so that our focus in life does not become too distracted on an offshoot direction.
As we start the worship service with Confession and Absolution, our true and sincere confession for our sins brings a cleansing repentance to our lives. One of the treasures of the Lutheran church is the understanding that every day is an occasion for repentance of our sins and remembrance of our baptism.
Our fallen sinful nature is such where we cannot get by with only one pruning per season as a grape vine would require. We need daily maintenance. We need to have all of the things that weigh us down lifted from us, so that we are free to not just follow Jesus in an intellectual sense where we tell ourselves Jesus is first in our life, but to find all of our strength in Him, to depend on his body and blood to make us whole.
This is what it means to abide in Jesus, to draw near to Jesus and there find the perfect love and unity of the Trinity. The world would tell us that such a devotion to Jesus is foolishness. The world sees our connection to Jesus as a threat and will hate us for how closely we abide in Jesus. The world wants to refute the truth that Jesus is from God.
Jesus is risen from the grave and the hatred of the world cannot touch the joy we have in Christ. Abiding in Jesus, we have much joy, for we are part of the most beautiful design of all of the Father’s creating hand- the true vine of Israel that is the church.
Sometimes we can over focus on the details in the parables and illustrations Jesus uses to teach, and read into them things that are. Those of you who enjoy gardening may notice that branches are much more fragile than the main vine. An animal may come and chew of a branch. A hard frost could put a small branch out of commission. The intent of the illustration of us as branches connected to the vine is not to emphasize how fragile we are, or how arbitrarily we may be trimmed off just for appearing a certain way.
Instead the primary image for us to see is that the Father is the master gardener, and that the beauty with which the vine is tended and shaped is beyond what we can see. Throughout the scripture we see that Our Lord is patient with us, cultivating us into a beautiful design- even when we insist on going our own sinful way.
I am not the center of the world, and neither are you. But what a blessed state it is, to be part of the church, the true Vine with which the Master gardener has planned for us to be IN His presence in eternal dwellings. Amen.