Year B

John 15:1-8

The Rev. Denise Vaughn

Plugged In For Life

If I were to ask each of you, what makes life worth living for you? I would expect to hear very similar answers to mine, things like family, home, church, work, and those fun times when we can get away. The gospel text today on this fifth Sunday in the Easter season gives us Jesus’ answer to this question that speaks to how staying connected to God, helps us have a life worth living, a fruitful life. Today’s text is part of a final conversation Jesus had with his disciples the night before he died at the last supper that begins back in chapter 13. These parting words, which are loaded with a variety of powerful images, are meant to give strength to his followers for the days after his death. He begins this portion of his conversation today using the image of a vine and its branches.

This image has great theological meaning and was very familiar to his disciples like the other “I am” images of bread, light, door, shepherd, life, way, and truth, and now the vine. Using the metaphor of a vineyard, Jesus describes the life of discipleship and having a right relationship with God and with each other by comparing the relationship of the branches to the trunk of the vine. We hear Jesus tell us that he is the true vine, God is the grower, and we are the branches. The branches are all those who have been baptized into Christ. We heard the story in Acts today of the Ethiopian eunuch who committed his life to Christ and was baptized into the vine. Legend has it that he was the first person who brought Christ to the Ethiopian people. This morning, Gretta will be baptized and another new branch will be grafted into the true vine. Just as we cannot exist apart from the trunk of the vine we cannot live apart from Christ. His disciples are to abide in him, as he abides in them so they will bear much fruit; if his disciples do not abide in him, they will be cut off from their life source and bear no fruit.

Recently, I saw a church sign that read: “Unplugged? Plug in here and get current with God!” It’s a different metaphor than the vine and the branches. But, in our day when so much depends on electricity to be “up and running,” it makes sense. The appliance needs to be plugged in to operate. It needs to “abide” in the electrical field to receive the energy waiting to be channeled its way, so it can operate in the way it was designed. In a similar way, the branches need to be plugged into its life source so they produce good fruit and those that are not plugged in will not bear fruit and have to be removed by the vine grower, and even those that do abide in the vine and bear much fruit will still need to be pruned so they can accomplish and bear even more.

Pruning a tree isn’t easy. It’s an acquired skill. Cut off too little, and nothing happens: too much and you risk killing the tree. Vines, thick trailing plants, if left alone will attach themselves to other things and grow uncontrollably, resulting in one big tangled mess. A vine grower is needed to keep the vines in order. The paradox is that the vine grower must cut away lifeless, unproductive branches and also prune those branches that are productive. Because, as you gardeners know, it is only a carefully pruned plant or tree that delivers the maximum yield and allows the plant to become its true self.

This image of the vine and the vineyard would have been very familiar to the disciples because it is rooted in their experience and spreads across the Old Testament, and now the New Testament. They knew literally how necessary it was for branches and vine to be one if there was going to be fruit for the harvest and also, they knew how that relationship of vine and branches symbolized the interdependence of God and the people of Israel. They knew Israel could do nothing without God. So, to help them weather the days to come, Jesus prays for them and invite’s them to stay close to him by placing their trust in him and he warns them that they cannot go it alone trusting in their own strength. On their own, they would be cut off from their life source, produce no fruit and die.

A tree does not have to strive to be fruitful. If it is healthy and connected to a source of water and nutrients, it will bear fruit, it can do no other. As long as the branches remain connected to the vine, they live and produce full leaves and abundant fruit. In the same way, if we “remain plugged in” to Jesus our values, priorities, desires, and dreams will all line up with God’s purposes. We become lovers of God and of people. We become concerned for the well-being of others and of our planet. We find compassion flowing freely because that is the heart of Christ that is “in” us. We are not born mastering the impossible standard of loving neighbor as ourselves, or loving enemies, or honoring the stranger in our midst and laying down our life for our friends.

These lessons often come through “long, slow growth and costly training”, much pruning, practice and prayer. This is why it is so important for us to stay connected to the vine. John, in the Epistle 1 John today, presents us with the mandate to “love one another, because love is from God.”  That seems pretty straightforward. He says, “Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.” John makes it abundantly clear that our actions are the sign of God’s presence within us. By this fruit, “we know that we abide in him and He in us.” And we already bear good fruit, all of us, in the ways we do reveal God’s love in our lives. Our fruit is visible in loving Jesus and each other through the power of the Holy Spirit, who makes a home with all disciples. “Remaining in” Jesus is about daily working on our relationship with him so that his love continues to grow in every part of our lives. Yet, there are branches that fail to live in love for God and others, therefore they need to be “pruned or shaped to make them more effective lovers.

Julian of Norwich, in her Revelations of Divine Love, written around 1395, is the first book in the English language known to have been written by a woman. Julian was known as a spiritual authority within her community, where she also served as a counselor and advisor. She believed that “love” was the only word that could be used to describe God. But God she said cannot love apart from us. Love, by its very definition, needs an object. It is a verb. If God is love, which began when God created us in God’s image, then God must have someone to love. Love begins with God and is perfected through our actions of love toward others. This kind of loving can only happen if the branches stay plugged into the true vine, Jesus.

On this the Fifth Sunday in the Easter season, we are still celebrating the empty tomb and the resurrected Christ. Which might have us asking why this passage which took place before Jesus died was chosen for this Sunday of the Easter season? It was chosen because we need to be reminded that Jesus is an eternal Vine, the living Vine for all ages. Because of Easter, he lives today and our branches get their life and strength from him.  If the vine were dead, then there would be no hope of eternal life for the branches, and we would still be in our sins. The Cross would only be a sign of martyrdom rather than of salvation. But because the Vine lives, the branches that are plugged in produce fruits to the glory of God. As long as we “remain in” the living vine our fruit will not only reveal who we belong to, but our love will flow freely, giving glory to God the master gardener and we find life worth living.