05-03-15 Sunday Sermon

First Congregational Church
May 3, 2015
Fifth Sunday after Easter
John 15:1-8 
“Abiding”
Rev. Dinah Haag, preaching

A farmer purchased an old, run-down, abandoned farm with plans to turn it into a thriving enterprise. The fields were grown over with weeds, the farmhouse was falling apart, and the fences were broken down.  During his first day of work, the town preacher stops by to bless the man's work, saying, "May you and God work together to make this the farm of your dreams!"   A few months later, the preacher stops by again to call on the farmer.  Lo and behold, it's a completely different place.  The farm house is completely rebuilt and in excellent condition, there is plenty of cattle and other livestock happily munching on feed in well-fenced pens, and the fields are filled with crops planted in neat rows.  "Amazing!" the preacher says. "Look what God and you have accomplished together!"  "Yes, reverend," says the farmer, "but remember what the farm was like when God was working it alone!”

In the book of John, our passage for this morning comes during the table discussion/sermon that happened on Jesus’ last night. Unless one spends a bit of time looking at the overview of chapters in John, one might not appreciate all that happened between grace and Jesus’ arrest.  One would be apt to miss that it was more of a worship service, complete with sacramental communion, a foot washing, prayers for the disciples and all believers, and words of inspiration and hope to face the coming days. In the middle of all that, Jesus gives the disciples - and us - these words.

John 15:1-8 NIV
15 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 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. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

Thank you, Mary Ann.  For all for whom this passage is a favorite, I apologize right up front. From the very first reading of this passage, I began rehearsing all the reasons why I so dislike this passage. There is so much in here that rubs my fur the wrong way, that in earlier days, I may have passed right over it, opting for the lectionary passage from the epistles or even, yes, even, a passage from the Old Testament or Psalms or something I picked out of the air.

God cutting off anything - even if it dead - doesn’t seem to represent the loving kind of God that I - and maybe you - love and worship. God pruning seems like saying that God makes bad things happen to people, which doesn’t sit right.  (Although I have to admit, that the passage talks about pruning that which is already dead, so I guess I have to cut Jesus a little slack there.)

Apart from Jesus, no one can do anything? There are plenty of atheists and members of religions of all kinds that do good things. When we’re worn out and grieving to the max and seeming to lie still, even feeling far away from God, by all rights looking dead, does that mean that we ought to be gathered up and burned? If that’s discipleship, don’t sign me up. At least he said we are already clean, so we don’t have to go through all the purification processes of yester-year. Thank you for listening. I now feel better. 

I’m guessing that many of you farmers or hobby horticulturalists have taken up the pruning shears to make a plant “better.” I’ve done it myself more times that I can remember, and I know that makes what I just said nigh unto antithetical.  In reality, it’s not that the plant is bad, but we’re making way for more better - so to speak. So it makes sense to prune, bushes and plants and our own lives. My heart still doesn’t like the idea of God’s pruning, but my head says not to burn that bridge. To the English people, I apologize for mixing metaphors, but sometimes a preacher’s got to say what a preachers got to say. So they say.

Pruning takes evaluation, and while we are often times excellent at evaluating other plants, that is, other people, we aren’t so good at doing it in our own lives. Okay, my own life. I know you all are good.

I’m hanging good with God, life is good, mostly, and truthfully, if I do any self-evaluating, it means it may - will probably - need to get a little messy before it gets “better”.  And I know you’re all wise enough to realize that when I say “I”, it’s really “we,” but I’m trying to to guilt anyone, if that makes any sense. 

The title of this morning’s message, “Abiding,” strangely doesn’t not appear in the passage.  It is used in the New Revised Standard Version and the King James Version and probably others, but not our pew New International Version.  But it comes from verse 4, where we have it as “Remain.” “Remain in me, as I also remain in you.” “Abide in me, and I in you.”

Meda Stamper from WorkingPreacher.org was the one who raised the focus on abiding.  She pointed out that the writer of John uses “abide” a lot to mean “mutual indwelling.” She also pointed out that other famous passage from John, that the many mansions Jesus goes to prepare for us are actually abiding places. Then she made the bridge that the vine image is another way of of talking about abiding places (places where one is deeply at home), and both the vine and the abiding places are ways of talking about love.

“Abide is one of the two imperatives of the passage. The branches have to abide because without the vine, they are fruitless; they can do nothing. And if they do abide and Jesus’ words abide in them, then comes the imperative ask. There can be little doubt that what the branches will ask for will be shaped by the one who tends them; they will surely ask for the fruitfulness for which they have been pruned.”

“Abide is one of the two imperatives of the passage. The branches have to abide because without the vine, they are fruitless; they can do nothing. And if they do abide and Jesus’ words abide in them, then comes the imperative ask. There can be little doubt that what the branches will ask for will be shaped by the one who tends them; they will surely ask for the fruitfulness for which they have been pruned.”

The word “fruit” occurs six times in these eight verses. Fruit-bearing is not something that the branches do by force of will. The fruit happens organically because the vine is true and the gardener good. It is perhaps also worth keeping in mind that branches don’t live off their own fruit. The fruit is for someone else.

I’ve been catching articles lately about church membership and “how to get people to come/participate” - not because I’m worried, but I’m intrigued by what is driving people.  This week, I came across a Washington Post article about why or how Millennials - those born between 1980 and 2000 - are coming back to church.  The article, by Rachel Held Evans, suggested that it’s not the fancy tv screens and the overly loud praise teams, or even the stylin’ pastors with the cool hair cuts and worn jeans. It seems that our young people are looking for is real, honest to goodness worship. 

Ms. Evans said, “What finally brought me back, after years of running away, wasn’t lattes or skinny jeans; it was the sacraments. Baptism, confession, Communion, preaching the Word, anointing the sick — you know, those strange rituals and traditions Christians have been practicing for the past 2,000 years. The sacraments are what make the church relevant, no matter the culture or era. They don’t need to be repackaged or rebranded; they just need to be practiced, offered and explained in the context of a loving, authentic and inclusive community.”

Ms. Evan’s friend, Amy Peterson put it this way: “I want a service that is not sensational, flashy, or particularly ‘relevant.’ I can be entertained anywhere. At church, I do not want to be entertained. I do not want to be the target of anyone’s marketing. I want to be asked to participate in the life of an ancient-future community.”

We are connected to the vine of faith, because Christ is the vine. We think our connection to the vine is about ourselves, and granted, there are some great benefits from our own connection - our own abiding.  We may think that our fruit bearing is for our family, for children and grandchildren, and that is also true - to an extent.  Truth be told, our abiding - in Christ and Christ in us - is much more about those we will never know.  

As the first official Sesquicentennial meeting comes up this week, we begin some serious thinking about all those years ago, when some good hearted folks like Warren K and Anna A. Marsha of Randolph, N.Y, Joseph and Elsie A. Ford of Benzonia, and Charles G. and Mary E. Brownell of Detroit and 22 others decided that they would cultivate one of God’s vines right here in Frankfort.  Those individuals, and all those that came after them and before us - official abiders or not - were connected to the vine of Christ and produced a crop that they didn’t get to see: us. 

They didn’t know our faces when they had to take stock of their own hearts and minds, determining what wasn’t bearing fruit. 150 years from now, they will have pictorial directories, but few is any will really know of that with which each of us personally struggles. It is doubtful that any of those that have gone before us or any that will come after us will come to love vine-pruning.  Because of what we have been given, we owe it to the next generations to give our own grapes the best sun, the best protection, and the best space to become the fruit-bearers that God has always seen us to be.  Which sounds like a great place to pray.

Great heart-tender and fruit lover, we thank you that you provide the places where we can abide in you, through your son, Jesus Christ.  We may not passionately love all that happens in our lives, but we are grateful that you do not leave us, abandoned and wild, to grow up as weeds.  Thank you for the abundance you give us, not that we thoroughly understand or fully appreciate vine-tending or soil preparing.  But thank you that we can be an honest work, that you work through us, despite us and with us to produce things that are far beyond our knowing and recognition.  Help us to clearly see your love - not as we like it to be or want it to be, but as you have given it to be, that we will desire more than anything to stay connected to your roots.  For all the blessings you bestow on us, regardless of our human appreciation, all your people say, Amen.