We are strongly impacted by images; no surprise here. Early in the Bush administration when Vice President Cheney left the hospital after treatment for chest pain, it was obviously extremely important, from the standpoint of image, that he walk out confidently under his own power. Imagine the fallout if, by contrast, he had been pushed out in a wheelchair and helped into his waiting automobile. Whenever possible, we want to project the best image we can.
The images we have of ourselves are also powerful, both with regard to how we behave and how our behavior affects other people. There is a world of difference between a husband who sees himself as a loving helpmate to a wife who is his co-equal, and a husband who sees himself as the lord and master of his home and, by implication, his wife as a subordinate. A manager who moves by fiat and intimidation is a very different cat from a manager who builds consensus and is secure in her authority. A teacher who sees her classroom as a garden is very different from a teacher who views his classroom as an assembly line. To whom do you warm: a minister who is always in your face, or one who helps you save face? A supervisor who acts like Attila the Hun, or one who resembles your favorite aunt or uncle, and while supportive, also holds you to a reasonable standard?
And what of our image of God? Some view God as a capricious, vindictive, and erratic presence whose delight is our miserableness. The souls of those who so believe are going to exhibit a climate quite at variance with the souls of those who understand God to be one whose love for us is profound, and whose judgment is for our growth, not destruction.
In the imagery of John, God is the vine grower. Chances are there are vines very near where you live. Typically they grow along the ground and up walls. What's more, they are tenacious. God is the planter of the vine. I believe God is planting seeds all the time. We call them by different names of course -- hunches, ideas, senses, inklings, and the like. Nevertheless, when those seeds issue in fruit that is indeed kingdom fruit, we know full well who has been doing the planting. What's more, God often plants seeds in us so that we can carry those seeds of hope, insight, strength, and perseverance to others. Paul puts it rather neatly in his first Corinthian epistle. Writing of his work with that congregation, Paul says: "I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth" (1 Corinthians 3:6).
A simple example of seed planting is something that parents do (or should be doing) with a small child. Perhaps the child has a difficulty with a classmate and comes home upset. Mom and/or Dad listens, comforts, and then comes up with a suggestion to make matters better with this classmate. That's planting a seed.
Every congregation was begun by a person or group, who planted a seed. There was a perceived need, that need was articulated and presented, and in that way a seed was planted. The result was the church of which you are presently a member.
God, John tells us, is the vine grower. And Jesus is "the true vine." It is this connectional theology that provides us with an understanding of who we are and how we live. We define what for the Christian community is this special relationship to God all the time. We do that through what becomes our glib use of a five-word phrase: "through Jesus Christ our Lord." The phrase points to the particular lens through which God comes for us more fully into focus. Looking through the lens that is Jesus, God's compassion, grace, overtures, hope, and mandates become visible to us. Every time we use that five word phrase we are reminding ourselves, and others, how it is that we can see most clearly. This is the vine that nourishes us and enables us to grow.
God the vine grower. Jesus the true vine. And now we, the branches, nourished by God in Christ, so that we can be fruitful. To be nourished -- that's why you came this morning, that's why we read the Bible, that's why we trouble ourselves to be involved in programs of adult education, that's why we read theological literature, and that's why we spend time with others who are on the same journey. Doing all this is what is meant by "abiding in Christ." But it's not absorption for absorption's sake; it's absorption for exertion, fueling for propulsion, ingestion for action.
There is a significant portion of the Christian family that believes God is the grand collector, a collector of human souls. Jesus is the bait God uses to capture and collect those souls, and the ultimate purpose of God is to gather as many souls as God in Christ can. What's important is to be part of the gathered; and once one has been gathered, one waits with others who have been gathered until all die and live in heaven with God forevermore. The gathered are the redeemed and happy in Christ, and what fuels this portion of the Christian family is the ongoing repetition of invitation and ingathering.
The image of Christian believers as branches off the vine does not square with this understanding of God as the great gatherer. God is not so much the gatherer as God is the sender. Declares Jesus: "I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them will bear much fruit ..." (v. 5). Said differently, we are not the shelved heirs of salvation; we are the heirs of salvation charged with bearing fruit, and read "bearing fruit" to mean getting out there on the highways and avenues and making a beneficent difference for God by working for what is fair, graceful, beautiful, lovely, and wholesome.
Pruning, too, is a part of this imagery. Pruning involves cutting off what is dead, and sometimes what is living, too -- all with a view to increasing fruitfulness. Churches are quite reluctant to put members on inactive lists, and even less inclined to take measures whereby one is dropped from membership. Ministers spend a fair share of time over the years chasing after inactive church members. But sometimes there comes a point where it is better to allow people to drift way, because not to do so can mean we are neglecting those already here, and on the way in.
Then, too, pruning what is living means realizing we have too many balls in the air; and trying to keep them all in the air means in effect that we will soon be able to keep none of them in the air. So we prune in order to increase effectiveness and fruitfulness.
God the vine grower; Christ the true vine; and God's people as Christ's branch managers, who manage themselves in such ways as to produce fruit. Together the elements establish the picture of a vibrant organism that is continually replenished and productive.
Now, one more observation. When Jesus talks about "those who abide in me and I in them," he is talking about togetherness, but a togetherness that serves a common good -- and that's the reign of God.
There are two kinds of togetherness, a good one and a bad one. Family systems theorists term bad togetherness fusion or enmeshment. A family that is enmeshed looks like a can of worms, or like a string of Christmas lights that has become hopelessly entangled. There is constant reactivity and unspoken rules govern family life, rules like you can't be angry, or men in the family can't be scared, but the women can. This kind of togetherness does not well serve the kingdom.
But that is not the only kind of togetherness. God is well served by allowed and encouraged variety. No one in a congregation has a corner on the total truth. Therefore through vigorous debate and the sharing of various ideas, a collective wisdom emerges that is better than anything less. A congregation is richer because of variety. What's more, in congregational life it isn't required that everyone be interested in the same aspect of faith.
There was wide press coverage of the female doctor who developed breast cancer while serving with others in a geological survey of the South Pole. Part of the coverage included the housing arrangements. You may recall that there was a rather large external structure, but within that structure there were several smaller modules, each with its own purpose. Any mature grouping of people looks like that. The outside structure might be the family, but within the family there are individuals. The outer structure -- the family -- is really richer and healthier when adequate attention is paid to the development of its constitutive parts. The same holds true for the family that is the church. We are a congregational family, and our outer structure is healthier and happier when our constitutive parts flourish.
Take a church choir. Can you imagine the sounds that would emanate if we asked the sopranos to sing like basses, the basses like altos, the altos like tenors, and the tenors like sopranos? That would be idiocy. The choir sounds like a choir because its singers are true to their voices.
Together, but not enmeshed. When that happens, we are infinitely happier; but more to the point, God is better served.