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"The Vine"
Easter V May 10, 2009 John 15:1-8 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! When I first moved to northern California, twenty-some years ago, the Sacramento area was known primarily for two agricultural products: rice and tomatoes. There were almond groves in the area along with various orchards, and the occasional vineyard. Most of the vineyards, the most well-known at any rate, were to the west, in the Napa Valley area. As I spent the first eight months of last year commuting to a church in the Sierra Nevadas, I was struck by the change. Oh, there are still orchards, but as I would drive east and south of Sacramento, I would pass miles and miles of vineyards. And driving past during the winter months, I thought it was incredibly boring scenery – just vines, looking like they had been thrown over wires hung across fields. No greenery, no branches, just brown stubs coming off these brown vines growing in what looked like a big plate of dust. Now I realize that the vintners were not concerned about appealing to my delicate aesthetic sensibilities, that it was not their concern to provide me with a pretty sight as I would drive past. Their concern was, and is, fruit, grapes to be precise. They kept their vines trimmed, pruned way back because they were interested in growing large bunches of grapes. To the vintner, a pretty sight is lots of grapes that can be used to make wine. And by the time I left, those vines, those vineyards, had become a thing of beauty, producing much fruit. Quite the contrast to the vine that overtook part of my backyard! It had started in my neighbors front yard, taking over, overgrowing a large bush of some sort, trying to throttle my holly bushes, going over, under, and through the wooden fence that separated our back yard from the front yard, killing, choking everything Cindy tried to plant, even growing up in and through my rose bushes. This vine, I don’t know what it was, even tried to move up my beloved palm tree. It was prolific, it was green, there were leaves and braches all over the place, and I think over the years, I consigned a mile or two of it to the recycling bin. If ever a vine needed some serious pruning, that was the vine. And this morning, we heard about yet another vine. It is a vine named Jesus, he is the vine, he makes one of those “I am” statements as in “I am the bread of life,” “I am the light of the world,” or “I am the way and the truth and the life.” And he tells us that his Father is the vinegrower, removing branches that bear no fruit, pruning those that do produce fruit so that they will produce even more. It sounds severe. No fruit, get cut away, produce fruit and get pruned so you produce even more. But is it severe? At first glance, at first hearing, many think in terms of their own life, as they should, but they think in terms of death, illness, losing a job. They think in terms that equate producing fruit with hardship, because they have gotten caught up in the idea of looking pretty. They decide they don’t want the fruit that our gracious God wants them to produce, they want to live it up, get ahead, stay ahead – die with the most and you win! However, the more I think about, pray about it, study it, the more I am convinced that the pruning God does in your life doesn’t have to be painful. As we abide more and more in Christ Jesus, and he in us, the more we give up our childish ways, the more we give up the our “mine, mine, mine,” the more we are being “pruned,” “cut back,” the more God produces fruit in us. I know a pastor, a second-career pastor, who had been in northern California. Too young to retire, he quit his job to attend seminary. He and his wife are grandparents, they owned a home, a couple cars, lots of furniture, lots of stuff. You might say they lived what the world considers to be an abundant life. He was called to a church a couple thousand miles away. After prayer and deliberation, he and his wife accepted that call. She quit her job, they sold the house (this was last year so it was more like they got out from under it), they sold their cars, they gave away much of their furniture, their “stuff.” They said goodbye, “see ya later,” to friends and family and went. Before they left however, I heard someone say to them something along the lines of “leaving home, family, friends, this is a pretty severe pruning, isn’t it?” And it was a pruning, but not a severe pruning, instead it was an exhilarating, freeing pruning, joyfully entered into, a life that continues to grow in and through our Lord Jesus, a life of true abundance centered in trying to do what God wants, not what they want. Call it a pruning if you want, they call it “saved by grace through faith and rejoicing in it!” AMEN
Rev. Bruce Hannem, Associate Pastor Lutheran Church of the Cross, Nisswa, Minnesota |
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