June 13, 2004

Rev. Marietta T. Smith

Scripture: John 15:1-8, 16,17

The text today is from the John 15:1-8 and verses 16 and 17.

As I travel over to North Wilkesboro to the District Office, for various and sundry things, or for shopping, or going out to eat with friends or whatever, I pass by — just before you get to the Wilkes county line — the Cermanaro Vineyard. It is owned and operated by Joe and Debra Cermanaro. There is also a sign on Interstate 40, somewhere between here and Winston Salem, that indicates that there is a vineyard somewhere close by there and I always think about this text when I see those signs, and all the work that goes into keeping a vineyard like that in good operating order.

As I was preparing this sermon, I researched grape growing and vineyard operating on the internet and found out some interesting facts:

One source said that a vine grower could have pretty leaves or good fruit, but not both. Another source said that vines need to have 70 to 90% of the branches pruned away. Yet another source I read said that new vines are pruned rather severely so that they don’t bear much fruit the first three years, in order to give the roots and the vine time to build strength.

Pruning is the annual removal of nonproductive and excess vegetative growth. Its purpose is to facilitate regular cropping by encouraging growth of new wood. Regular pruning also leads to maximum production of high quality fruit. Pruning is a necessary part of the process for anyone who expects to grow productive vines.

Jesus used the vine-vinedresser metaphor to describe how the Christian life is to be developed and stay connected to the source of energy of that life. Now, we know that Jesus wasn’t really saying He was a vine, but He used the idea of the vine because He knew that His disciples would understand what He was talking about. The disciples knew how grapevines looked and how they needed to be cared for and what happened when they weren’t cared for very well. They understood how, sometimes, because of disease or poor weather or bad varieties or stock, there would be fruitless grapevines. So, in His last days with His disciples, Jesus wanted to get across to them that they needed to stay close to Him if they were to carry on His work after He left.

Jesus describes Himself as the vine and His listeners as the branches. The vine is the source of nourishment for the branches. If they stay connected to the vine, they receive the nutrients that cause the buds to form and change into grapes. Jesus said, in the beginning of our text: I am the vine. The very next sentence tells us that the vines that don’t bear fruit are taken away and every branch that does bear fruit is pruned that it may bear more fruit.

Pruning is the cleansing process that takes away those little things that deflect the energy and weaken the branches — those little suckers in tomato vines that you have to pinch off to keep them from taking the energy away, out there where the blooms are growing. You can tell that I am not much of a gardener, but Herman Anderson knows what I am talking about. Anybody else in here who grows tomato vines knows you have to pinch those little suckers out to make the rest of the vine be strong.

Or sometimes there are unproductive little branches that have a mind of their own and they want to go their own way. Abide in Me, Jesus said. The emphasis on that phrase in me describes the deep abiding fellowship we have in Christ. Just as the branches must be connected to the vine, so we must be connected with Christ — “to abide in Him.”

In verse 4 Jesus says: As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.

So the question comes: How do we abide in Christ? How is it that we stay connected to Him? Well, we become connected — the first connection — when we trust in Christ for the forgiveness of our sins. We become part of the vine through the waters of Baptism when we are grafted into that vine through those waters of Baptism.

To abide means to dwell, to stay, to settle in, to sink deeper. The way to abide in Christ is along the path of obedience. We abide in Christ as we learn to obey, by developing that close relationship with Him through prayer and Bible reading and fellowshipping with other Christians, and regular times of worship and Bible Study — publicly and in private times of Bible study and worship. For, my friends, Dr. Tony Evans says that we cannot adequately worship God on Sunday morning publicly, if we have not worshipped Him privately during the week. We should come on Sunday morning and bring all of our private worship of Him to fruition in our public worship. We are giving God His worth, and we need to do it seven days a week, not just at 8:45 or 11:00 on Sunday morning.

Through these acts of piety, as John Wesley called them, we nourish our souls with living bread — that manna that is spoken of in the hymn, “Pray and Holy Manna will be showered all around.” We nourish our souls with living bread and quench our thirst with the living water of life. The bubbling joy of being a child of God by faith in Christ Jesus erupts into a fountain of joy as we worship Him, whether it’s in private of in public.

I believe it was St. Augustine who said that there is a God-shaped void in every human soul that cannot be filled by anything but a relationship with God through Christ. The problem with us is that we try to fill that God-shaped void with world-shaped figures that just do not fit. Like the vine, we need to be pruned of those things that hinder our relationship with Christ.

We don’t just get baptized and that’s it. The vineyard keeper doesn’t just stick the seedlings in the ground and ignore them. They have to be worked and nourished, just like our souls have to be worked and nourished in order for us to produce fruit. Just as our physical bodies need food and water to nourish them and keep them in good health, so our souls need that spiritual sustenance, that spiritual food and spiritual water to keep the soul in good spiritual health.

A branch cannot bear good fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, and we cannot bear fruit unless we abide in Christ. And bearing fruit, my friends, brings glory and honor to God. Bearing fruit proves that we are Christ’s disciples. Just saying that we are part of the Church is not enough. Just being at Church on Sunday morning is not sufficient. Just calling out, “Lord, Lord,” is not all there is to do. You know what Jesus said about those people, don’t you?

The path of obedience that I mentioned earlier — the path of obedience is one of the ways that we grow in our connection to Jesus. If we really want to accomplish God’s will and purpose for our lives, we will be serious about this business of producing fruit. We will produce actions and deeds that complement our faith. James spoke about this in Chapter 2, verses 14 and 17.

Just as a grapevine which produces no grapes is worthless, so faith without works, without actions, without anything to show for it, is dead. Matthew, chapter 7 records the words of Jesus:

So what kind of fruit do fruitful disciples produce? Paul wrote in Galatians, chapter 5, that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such there is no law.

. . . (tape change) sounding gong or a tingling cymbal and any musician knows, and you all ought to know, that if you tap on a triangle and the sound is there and gone. You crash a cymbal and it might last a little while, but it’s gone pretty soon. So are those things that we do that are not rooted and grounded in love. And I’ll even go so far as to say, friends, that if we are not rooted and motivated by love, that we are not really going to have the rest of the fruits of the spirit that Paul mentions, because love, as he talks about in 1 Corinthians, chapter 13, produces joy, which produces peace, which produces patience, which produces kindness, which produces goodness, which produces faithfulness, which produces gentleness which produces self control.

Love, my friends, is the motivating force of it all. Don’t forget that.

Now these fruits that Paul mentions are not normally found in great quantities in the world. Nor, when they are found, are they of the quality that Christ’s spirit can produce in us. We can be such a great influence on others when we allow these fruits to grow in our lives — to grow from the love of God for us, and our love for our fellow men and sister women. And these fruits honor God. For Jesus said in the text that by this My father is glorified that you bear much fruit.

In addition to the fruit of the Holy Spirit, there is the fruit of obedience to His word. If we are truly attached to Christ, it should be evident in our obedience to Him. John wrote about this in First John 3:24 when he said:

If we are part of Christ and He of us, how can we not obey Him? How can we claim to know Christ and not obey His will? Can the vine branch tell the trunk and the roots what it wants to do, regardless of what it’s supposed to do or what it is designed to do?

When we obey, when we produce the fruits of the Spirit, we’re showing to others just what it means to be a part of Christ. We’re showing the world just what it means to belong to His body, the Church. We’re pointing the way for men and women of the world to see the Father in us. We let our lights shine and so glorify the Father.

The wonderful thing about all this is that because we are attached to Christ, we can do some awesome things. Not only do we bear fruit, but we can bear much fruit because we have been nourished and cleared of all that hampers our witness so that we can have an even brighter light and more effective witness.

I can tell you from personal experience that spiritual pruning is not an easy thing to experience. We cry “ouch.” God uses His Word to cut away those thing that hinder us — His Word that is sharper than a two-edged sword. It cuts away sin that corrupts us. His Word lops off undesirable habits and characteristics. It molds us and reshapes us to be better producers of fruit. His Word guides us so that we don’t get so busy and spread ourselves out so thin that we can’t do a good job of anything.

If we’ll pray that God will use us to His honor; if we’ll pray that God will make us strong and effective and fruitful, to bring Him praise, He will do exactly what we ask Him to do. He wants to accomplish extraordinary things through us.

When we are fully plugged in to God; when we are totally reliant on His strength and His might; when we are securely attached to the vine, pruned up and ready, we as Christians and as a Church will venture out into the world in new boldness to carry the Gospel — one cup of cold water at a time.

There is a grapevine in Hampton Court near London, I found out when I was looking on the internet. This grapevine is nearly a thousand years old! It grows from a root that is nearly two feet wide. Some of its branches grow as much as 200 feet away from the root and they still produce fruit. This vine and its branches produce several tons of fruit each year. It’s obvious that the vine has been well pruned and nourished to keep it in existence all these years.

Well, it was about two thousand years ago that Jesus spoke the words of our text:

How well connected to Christ are we? How well nourished are we? Do you hear what I’m asking you. Do you understand? I hope so, because, without Him, I could not stand up here and preach. I asked for prayers at 8:45 and at 11:00 and I’ve gotten them, because God, through the power of the Holy Spirit gave me the strength to stand up here and preach. To Him be all honor and praise. Hallelujah, thank you Jesus. Amen.