Sunday,
May 26, 2013
“I
Am the True Vine”
John
15:1-17
Shallow
and Uprooted
I
would like us to start out today by picturing a huge grape vine that is growing
right outside the church building; a big huge grape vine. Now imagine that
through some weird geological event all the soil under the grape disappears
until there is only a shallow bit of soil left. What happens to the vine?
Much
like our imaginary vine, something has happened to our faith. And like the vine,
there is a threat that we might become uprooted from spiritual shallowness.
Perhaps it is because we have become too ingrown to see the depth in our faith
symbol for today that we miss the depth of what God is calling us to. This is
to say that instead of growing into the vine, our rampant need to be in
control, and our idols of self-rights have planted our roots in the shallow
soil of self. When we are ingrown our imagination withers from lack of
nutrients. When we are ingrown the blustery gusts of the whirlwinds of life
uproot us and leave us languishing on the ground; shriveling in the heat.
In
this ingrown state, we grow accustom to hearing the same stories again and
again from the same tired point of view. Perhaps we are comfortable with what
we know. It’s a nice Sunday school tale, Jesus the vine. It’s a nice clip art
image that we can throw a few inspirational words on and feel good. But maybe
we need something deeper. Maybe we need to pull ourselves out of the ingrown
briar patch of self made tangles and let our heart, mind and soul to grow into
the depth of the true vine. Maybe all this shallowness is threatening to
deconstruct or take apart the church, the people of God.
The
True Vine
Jesus
begins our passage with an emphatic declaration: I Am the True Vine. So smack
dab in the heart of this farewell discourse to his disciples Jesus does
something quite curious, he uses an image that the disciples would have
associated with Israel and turns it on its head. Israel was the vine and God
the gardener, as Ps. 80:8 poetical points out, yet as the prophets, Isaiah and
Jeremiah, suggest Israel had grown wild so God was going to purge Israel. But
now Jesus declares, at the end of the journey, that he is (not just the vine)
the True Vine. Admits all the competing “vines” that seek to attract our
attention, Jesus is the true vine. He is the fulfillment of the hope that
Israel was supposed to point towards.
And
as I turned this image in my mind, I began to see the power in this symbol.
Have you ever stopped and just looked at a vine. Although it is rooted in one
spot, the vine stretches, twists, and contorts itself through the underbrush or
up any structure it find itself next to. In other words, it spreads out and
consumes the things around it. When I think about this image, I can’t help but
think about how this is a beautiful image of what kingdom life is about. While
we might be rooted in one place, we are not stuck in that place, like the vine
we must spread out in the place that we find ourselves in. This is reminds me
of the prophet Jeremiah who calls the Babylonian exiles to seek the shalom of
the place they were exiled to. We too must spread out into our community and
seek the wholeness of the community. Our faith life cannot be confined will
just wither and die to one spot because if we try to trap the vine it withers
away. Therefore, our faith life must creep into every crevasse of our community
giving life to all we encounter (epistle to Diognetus).
But
there is something else that is amazing about a vine. If you look closely you
might notice that the vine is a twisted labyrinth all mixed together. I think
that this highlights the beautiful chaos of God. One of the greatest obstacles
to growth is when we try to take the place of God and pick of the pruning
shears for the vine. Over the years as the church has shifted from people to
institution, we have created structures patterned mainly off of different
business models, which then in turn create us and confine us in our thinking
and in our faith. When we were praying last week together in the Pentecost
serves, I looked out the back window and I saw the wind blowing in the branches
and I was reminded of Jesus’ words...In the same way, life in the vine has a
beautiful chaos that we cannot control, where things are interlinked and
twisted together to bring life that is unexpected; life that cannot be tamed.
Grace Community Church in Bryan, OH takes this approach, where they allow the
Spirit to move and hang on, their former pastor, who helped plant the
congregation, said that if someone had a vision to do something for the Lord
they found a way to say yes to it, because they realize that they are the branches
are not the gardener.
Indwelling
as Key
But let’s take this symbol a step deeper. Jesus proclaims that
he is the true vine and then follows that by saying something that cuts to the
core of the passage. He calls us to abide or dwell or live in him. Live in the
vine. In other words we as individuals melt into the vine, which reminds me of
John the Baptist’s prayer that he must decrease and Jesus must increase; to
live in the vine means that we surrender every fiber of our being; every corner
of our hearts. And, in turn we are recreated into something bigger and beyond
ourselves, which has deep meaning both personally and communally.
Personally,
when we find ourselves abiding or dwelling in Jesus, our fragmented self is
consumed and we in turn find wholeness, which transforms the way we see and interact
with the world around us. As Richard Rohr observes, “Whole people see wholeness
wherever they go,” which contrasts with the more fragmented life outside the
vine where we live in a split existence. Rohr, states, “Split people see and
create splits in everything and everybody.” If we insist on taking apart
everything and everybody then we are felt with piles of pieces of people and
it’s pretty hard to love only pieces of people.
So
we seek to become whole people, but how? Well, for me, I know that in the past
I have tried to move closer to God through avoidance. Now that seems a bit
ridiculous and it is. It’s what the late Dallas Willard called the gospel of
sin management, where we try to grow closer to God by managing our sin. We lay
out all the do’s and don’ts and think if we just stay away from the don’ts then
we will really grow in our faith. Yet, this sterile list of rules often leaves
us more split than whole. Perhaps instead of spending all our energy on
avoidance, we can spend more time on falling; that is falling into the good,
the true, and the beautiful. We can fall in love with God (which if we notice
in the passage the vine switches to love).
And
as we fall together in love with God, we are drawn together in love as a
community of faith. This unity is not just a phase of the faith journey but it
is the goal of the gospel narrative. However, our culture is dominated by the
narrative of self. The rampant blight of unchecked individualism often
fractures true community. As Christine Pohl states, “While we might want
community, it is often community on our terms, with easy entrances and exits,
lots of choice and support, and minimal responsibilities. Mixed together, this
is not a promising recipe for strong communities.” So there might be a certain
level of self that we let go of when we live in the vine.
Fruit
and Pruning
Yet, while being a branch in the vine is all well and good, the
branch does not exist just so that others can look at it. The branches of the
vine are not just decorative features. No, they exist to bear fruit. Now
bearing fruit is sometimes used as churchy code language for some sort of
business model success where we have a strategic plan for success that gets
millions (or at least thousands or maybe we’ll settle for hundreds) of people
in our pews because we have the best religious entertainment in town, and these
people will give us lots of money, so that we can have the best buildings and
programs, which dwarf the other congregations in town, who are our business
rivals, causing them to shrivel up (picture). That is rotten concept of fruit.
The concept of fruitfulness here is not built on power or strength but on
vulnerability and weakness. As Henri Nouwen suggests, “Community is the fruit
born through shared brokenness, and intimacy is the fruit that grows through
touching on another’s wounds. Let’s remind one another that what brings us true
joy is not successfulness but fruitfulness.”
But
before we get to fruit bearing we have to be pruned. The Gardener cuts us back
in order to bear fruit. And I wonder are we will to be that vulnerable in
submission to God to allow God to trim us? For the sharp edge of God’s trimming
word sometimes cuts deep into us, and every strand of our being lies open and
exposed before the One who cuts away the lifelessness in our souls. So pruning
hurts. But, then again not pruning at all leads to waste, which might just hurt
more in the long run. And one of the biggest things that we need pruned out of
our lives, which serves as an obstacle to fruit bearing, is the self-love of
self-promotion, which seeks to hide the brokenness lurking beneath the surface.
But the gift of pruning allows us to let go of the brokenness and stop hiding
in the shadow. We can finally be who we are created to be without disguise or
fear!
So
we are pruned (which is a word play in the Greek for cleansed) so we can bear
fruit, but what is that fruit? If the fruit isn’t about material success what
is it? Perhaps the fruit is tied to Jesus’ commandment; tied to that which
makes us his friends: Love! But what does the fruit of love look like? Does it
look like Abraham hand trembling above his son on the altar? Does it look like
David crying out to God in brokenness? Does it look like Jesus carrying his
cross? For Jesus says that there is not greater love than to lay down our
lives. This fruit of self-sacrificial love draws in those around us who are
hungering for love, some so much so that they are willing to take their own
life because they are starving for love.
I
Am...
Perhaps
in the end we need to take the long view when it comes to all of these symbols
that Jesus gives us, because when we take the long view we begin to realize
that the kingdom Jesus is pointing towards is truly beyond our efforts; beyond
our ability to grasp it. And, if we dare to step back and begin to take the
long view, and allow ourselves to reflect for a moment on each of these images;
each of these I Am symbols, then perhaps we might begin to see a thread being
woven throughout, for in every “I Am” this God who is eternally powerful hits
at the longing of the soul again and again and again. In every “I Am” Jesus’
words reach into the void of our being and tear open our longings for
connection to something that will take away the pain of isolation and delusions
of the world around us. And by doing this Jesus gives us connection, beauty,
and sustenance.
Yet,
if we are only content with a shallow existence that seeks to escape reality,
or be chained to the ingrown image of self, then we will find that we are no
longer a community of the vine. Rather we are an ingrown club; a mere religious
reflection of our culture. When we find that we are in this position we have
nothing to bring to this world; we don’t engage we only reflect and get lost in
the reflection.
So
in all these symbols, we allow our gnawing hungers to be satisfied, our dim
shadowed lives to be illuminated, our hopeless wandering to find a direction,
our hopeless despair to be given life, and our shallow existence to be consumed
in a new community. In all of this we can no longer hold on to ourselves, for
as Jesus proclaims in Luke 17:33 “Whoever tries to keep their life will lose
it, and whoever loses their life will preserve it.” It is time to lose
ourselves in God. It is time to fall into God; fall into love...
O God of such truth as sweeps away all lies,
of such grace as shrivels all excuses,
come now to find us
for we have lost our selves
in a shuffle of disguises
and the rattle of empty words.
of such grace as shrivels all excuses,
come now to find us
for we have lost our selves
in a shuffle of disguises
and the rattle of empty words.
Let your Spirit move mercifully
to recreate us from
the chaos of our lives.
to recreate us from
the chaos of our lives.
We have been careless
of our days,
our loves,
our gifts,
our chances....
of our days,
our loves,
our gifts,
our chances....
Our prayer is to change, O God,
not out of despair of self
but for love of you,
and for the selves we long to become
before we simply waste away.
not out of despair of self
but for love of you,
and for the selves we long to become
before we simply waste away.
Let your mercy move in and through us now....
Amen
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