God’s Great, Green, Grape-y Earth

 John 15:1-8

”I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me as I abide in you. Just 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. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.

Last week, Jesus was the Good Shepherd and we were the sheep... and maybe a sheepdog.  This week Jesus is the vine and we are the branches.  Last week it became clear that as sheep and a dog, the idea of questioning and second guessing the Good Shepherd was a pretty silly thing to do… as if some sheep and a dog know better than the Good Shepherd where to go and how best to live.  

This week we’re the branches.  Not the Vinegrower and not the vine with roots.  We’re branches.  This week we have even LESS grey matter than a sheep or a dog!  Last week our job as sheep was not to debate the Good Shepherd as to the correct shade of green for the pasture or the appropriate level of stillness for the waters but to simply follow… trusting that this wasn’t just any old shepherd leading the Way, but the GOOD Shepherd.  

This week our job as the branches to Jesus’ vine, is simply and only to ABIDE in the vine.  We don’t even have to walk to find grass or water this time around!  This week, we just need to be still and know… know that we abide in the True Vine… Jesus.  Think about that image for just a minute.  Jesus is the vine.  He’s the one with the roots.  He’s got the trunk.  He’s got the cordons… the two parts of the vine that form the top of the “T” shape of a grape vine.  That’s all Jesus.  You and I… we’re the branches.  We’re what modern viticulturists call the “Spurs”… the little two inch stub that comes off the cordons.  Then, on the other side of our two inch stubby selves, we’re also not the shoots that grow new each year nor are we the fruit which only grows on new shoots coming out of the branches. 

We’re the branches.  The small, little, stubby two inch bit that just sits there in-between the vine and the fruit.  We don’t have the roots.  We don’t have the leaves.  We don’t have the fruit.  So what in God’s great, green, grape-y earth are we good for then!?  We are good, it turns out… for ABIDING.  We are the connection.  We are the grape version of the interstate highway system connecting… well, everything!  Connecting the vine with the fruit… connecting the Divine with the world.  

Our job is not to MAKE the good stuff our world so desperately needs.  Our job is not to BE the good stuff our world so desperately needs.  Our job is to take all the good stuff that God is gifting to the world without condition… all of God’s love, grace, kindness, compassion, and patience... and then, through Christ, transport ALL of that out into the world around us.  We’re God’s vehicle baby!  Great God in heaven you know I love you!  The Divine Vinegrower has chosen us, you and me, to connect the Divine with the world.

What all that really means, is that for us as a congregation our job is simply to stay deeply connected, both to the vine… to Jesus… and to the world around us.  Here at the church end of our two inch little branch-y selves we’re fed and cared for with the sacraments and by our loving, supportive, and caring community.  Here on this end we take in all the love, compassion, grace, and generosity that God in Christ first brings to us without condition. THEN as a congregation, our job is to take ALL that we have first received and turn right around in the length of our short two inch branchyness and send it all out into the new-this-year shoots where, the sure and certain hope is that those new shoots will make fruit and that fruit will bring a little grape sized packets of God’s sweetness into a world that is all too often bitter.  

That’s what we do.  Take it in and then send it out.  Sending new shoots of kindness into a hurting world.  And when they bear fruit… WOW!!  The AT ministry, Beer and Hymns, Feeding Sheffield, a Bicycle Hospitality Station.  It is SO good to look down those shoots we've sent out and see the fruit growing and see the people come along and be fed by it!  Very cool!    

That feels SO GOOD!  This little story also reminds us however, that no matter how good one particular shoot looks to us (and we've got some awesome shoots growing for sure) but no matter how that shoot looks… it’s not our shoot… it’s not our project… and it’s the Vinegrower, not us, who knows when one particular shoot needs to be pruned away to make room for the next new shoot.  Watching that beloved old shoot get pruned can be hard but remember, we’re just two whole inches of xylem and phloem covered with bark, and as much as we would like to believe we know best, it continues to be true… God knows better than sheep or branches.  

So my fellow branch mates, let us celebrate the truly excellent vintages that have passed through us over these last few years!  Let's mark them, celebrate them and remember their wonderful sweetness!  And then, when the Vinegrower says it’s time, let us simply trust the One who created branches and sheep and everything else, really DOES know what's best and through that pruning, is making way for the next, new, amazing vintage of love, compassion, grace, and generosity to flow through us and out into the world.  I for one simply can’t wait to taste and see the next new vintage that God is even now entrusting us with to pass on to the world!  Amen.