Reflection for 28th April 2024
The Fifth Sunday of Easter
Genesis 22.1-18. Acts 8.26-40. John 15.1-8.
In the reading from the Gospel of John, Jesus describes himself as the vine and refers to God as the Gardener. Jesus’ disciples would have known about vines and grapes as they were commonly grown all over Israel. For all we know, they may even have worked in vineyards as teenagers to earn a bit of pocket money! As a result, the disciples would have been very familiar with vines regularly requiring pruning for the plants energy to be focused on producing high-quality grapes. Jesus once again draws from common experience to paint a picture of how we are to relate to Him and how God works within us, which is by ‘cutting off every branch that bears no fruit while pruning every branch that does bear fruit’.
As we consider what it means to stay in Jesus, being ‘cut off’ feels terrifying. John suggests we relate the vine's 'pruning' to the disciples' 'clean' state. Jesus told the disciples to take up their cross and follow him. They had to sacrifice their personal aims and ambitions. After bearing fruit, they need more pruning to bear more. However, the disciples can only bear fruit if they remain, (or in some bible versions, abide) in Jesus. In other words, as disciples of Christ, without Jesus’ guidance, we can do nothing and our actions are done in vain.
You may realise this passage speaks of a very intimate relationship with Jesus that we are to enjoy and to cultivate. We are the branches growing out from the vine, the love of Jesus. Branches that decide to ‘go it alone’, whom try to live without the life of the vine, soon discover their mistake. They wither and die and are good for nothing but the fire. But branches that remain in the vine and submit to the pruners knife when necessary, live and bear abundant fruit. That is the prospect that Jesus holds out to his followers, to all of us.
How do we remain in Jesus? Or rather, the more urgent question is, how do we know we are remaining, abiding, in Him? What does it look like in practice? We remain in Jesus from hearing his words through reading the bible and making time to pray in our own personal lives. We must take responsibility to know Jesus and open ourselves to being known by him.
We must remain in a community of believers, the body of Christ, whom celebrate, know and love him. There is no such thing as a solitary Christian. We cannot "go it alone" because, in the absence of the caring support and encouragement of other Christians, a person is more likely to fail as a disciple and make a Jesus into our own, tamed, image. In fact, Jesus gives the starkest of warnings on this “If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.”
The most extraordinary promises about prayer are made in verse seven and eight that if we “remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples”. Abundant fruit, or in other words answered prayer, happens when we make pray requests that are guided by God’s will, and informed by scripture, not from our own desires.
The work of the Father’s pruning knife may indeed be painful at times but ultimately is for God’s glory. The process is an intimate one as the vine gardener is never closer to the vine, taking more thought over its long-term health and productivity, than when he has the knife in his hand. The result, however, is amazing because God is glorified, and so will we be, by bearing good quality fruit, and lots of it!
Blessings and prayers,
Emma