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1 People of the Vine Reverend Dr. Benton J. Trawick Grace Presbyterian Church May 6, 2018 John 15: 1-12 It’s hard to say just what I expected to see when I first visited a vineyard. I guess I expected to see tall arbors with vines racing up trellises to form a great green canopy, arching everywhere and heavy with fruit. In comparison to my expectations, the vines in the vineyard looked—well, a little bit stunted or stumpy.

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Page 1: People of the Vine - gracepresby.org · 1 People of the Vine Reverend Dr. Benton J. Trawick Grace Presbyterian Church May 6, 2018 John 15: 1-12 It’s hard to say just what I expected

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People of the Vine

Reverend Dr. Benton J. Trawick Grace Presbyterian Church

May 6, 2018

John 15: 1-12

It’s hard to say just what I expected to see when I first

visited a vineyard. I guess I expected to see tall arbors

with vines racing up trellises to form a great green canopy,

arching everywhere and heavy with fruit. In comparison to

my expectations, the vines in the vineyard looked—well, a

little bit stunted or stumpy.

Page 2: People of the Vine - gracepresby.org · 1 People of the Vine Reverend Dr. Benton J. Trawick Grace Presbyterian Church May 6, 2018 John 15: 1-12 It’s hard to say just what I expected

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Just some stout trunks with closely trimmed branches so

that each individual vine looked a bit like a miniature tree.

I suppose my imagination of what a vineyard might look

like had been fueled by the gnarled tangles of woodland

vines I’d encountered in my long-ago backpacking days,

but the vines in the vineyard were a lot less unruly—and a

lot more fruitful. A brief bit of research into the growing of

grapes reveals why.

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It turns out that only certain wood within the vine is suited

for bearing fruit. Grapevines produce fruit exclusively on

one-year old wood, not younger and not older.

When a bud sprouts in springtime and grows into a new

shoot within the larger vine, the shoot turns from green to

brown by the end of the growing season. It is now

considered one-year old wood. The next spring, some of

the buds on that one-year-old wood will grow flowers

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(which develop into fruit). Buds on older wood, meanwhile,

produce only leaves or shoots—which are necessary for

photosynthesis, but not fruitful.

The goal of pruning is to keep as much one-year old wood

as possible without encouraging the plant to produce so

many grape clusters that it lacks the energy and nutrients

to fully ripen them. It’s a balancing act that requires

constant care and cultivation.

Unpruned and left to its own devices, a grapevine grows to

a dense mass of mostly older wood with relatively little

“fruiting wood” each year. More and more energy goes to

vine growth and less and less goes to fruit production. The

dense growth leads to poor air circulation, which

encourages fungal diseases. Effective pruning removes 70

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to 90 percent of the previous year’s growth each winter,

keeping the vine healthy, vibrant, and abundant.1

Now that may be more than you ever wanted to know

about how grapes are grown, but the basics of what I just

described would have been widely known in Jesus’ day—

namely that in order to bear healthy fruit, a grapevine must

be continually monitored and trimmed and tended, so that

its energy is directed toward bearing fruit instead of just

growing for growth’s sake.

As he often did, Jesus takes an idea or image that is

common knowledge and uses it to teach his disciples an

1 This information is quoted/paraphrased from a 2016 article by Brian Barth in Modern Farmer: https://modernfarmer.com/2016/02/pruning-grapevines/

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object lesson about their proper relationship with God and

with each other.

But the occasion of this teaching makes it all the more

worthy of our attention, as it takes place during what is

referred to as the farewell discourse, Jesus’ final

instruction to his disciples in chapters 14-17 of John’s

gospel, on the night before his crucifixion. It is among the

last words of instruction Jesus offers to his closest

followers, and last words are important words.

I am the vine, Jesus says—I am the source of your life,

your energy, I am the very source of your ability to bear

fruit. And my Father, Jesus continues, is the vine grower.

He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every

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branch that bears fruit, he prunes to make it bear more

fruit.

The vine is under the constant examination and cultivation

of the vine grower. And every single branch in the vine

receives attention—they are either removed or they are

trimmed to facilitate health and growth.

You have already been cleansed by the word I have

spoken to you, Jesus goes on to say, and the same Greek

root word refers to cleansing and to pruning, so what

Jesus means is that his disciples have already been

pruned to bear fruit through what he has taught them. You

already know what you are called to do, he is saying to

them. You are already rooted in me and prepared to bear

much fruit.

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Abide in me, live in me, remain in me, Jesus goes on to

say. I am the vine and you are the branches. Apart from

me you cannot bear fruit.

If you want to discover the central theme this passage it is

captured in the word abide. The word is repeated eleven

times in the first twelve verses of the chapter.

You must remain, you must stay connected, you must stay

focused, you must root yourself in me, in my teachings

and in my love. If you do not do so, you will be unable to

bear fruit.

Lindsay Armstrong writes, “On this final night, Jesus is

preparing his disciples for the time when he will no longer

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be physically with them. Abide, he counsels. Remain with

me, as I remain with you. Continue with me as I continue

with you. Dwell with me as I dwell with you. Endure with

me as I endure with you. Be present with me as I am

present with you.”2

If you keep my commandments you will abide in MY love,

just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide

in His love. This is my commandment: that you love one

another as I have loved you. The fruit that Jesus’

followers are to bear, in other words, is love.

So, to take that whole message and boil it down, Jesus is

saying as his final instruction to his disciples: I have

2 Cynthia Jarvis and E. Elizabeth Johnson, eds., Feasting on the Gospels, John Volume 2. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2015, p 172 (Pastoral Perspective).

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rooted myself in God’s love, and you, my disciples, are

engrafted into my love. Your calling, your single purpose,

is to bear the fruit of love—the vine grower, God, will

cultivate you for that purpose. Remain in me, abide in me,

and God will continually do the work of trimming away

those parts of your life that do not bear the fruit of love.

Now the fruit of love—that’s a sort of a general, vague,

slightly mushy description. What does the fruit of love look

like? Well, elsewhere in the New Testament we get a few

hints or hallmarks to tell us how the fruit of love is

identified.

In first Corinthians chapter 13 Paul writes, “Love is patient.

Love is kind. Love is not envious, or boastful, or arrogant,

or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable

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or resentful. It does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices

in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things

hopes all things endures all things. Love never ends.” In

other words, love abides.

Elsewhere, in Galatians 5, Paul speaks of the fruit of the

Spirit: love, and then these other fruits that sound like

synonyms or manifestations of love: joy, peace,

forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,

gentleness, and self-control.

Those passages give us a sense of what the fruit of love

might look like.

Now I’ve heard an old joke and you’ve heard it too, I

imagine, that someone once asked a sculptor how he

created a magnificent sculpture of an elephant. And the

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sculptor replied, “Well, you start with a great big stone and

you chip away everything that doesn’t look like an

elephant.”

Similarly, I suppose, if we root ourselves in Christ and we

permit God’s cultivating work in our lives, God is

continually at work to prune away every branch that does

not bear fruit, or every branch that does not look like love

or joy or peace or forbearance or kindness or gentleness

or self-control.

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The key, it turns out, is in the abiding—abiding in Christ is

a full-time job. Abiding is not done casually, or

accidentally, or once-in-a-while, or when it’s convenient. It

isn’t done twice a month, it isn’t use-as-necessary. We

cultivate our connection to the vine—and God cultivates

us to bear fruit.

Think of the sacrament of communion as being a part of

the vine tender’s constant, gracious care. As we partake,

we are reminded that we are forgiven, we are invited to lay

aside attitudes, concerns, or behaviors that don’t glorify

God, we are nourished and empowered for the work of

discipleship, we remember, we recommit, we rededicate,

we remain—we abide.

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As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Abide in

my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in

my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments

and abide in his love. I have said these things that my joy

may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. This is

my commandment—that you love one another as I have

loved you. I am the vine. And you—are the people of the

vine. Amen.