The holy vine

Today’s Gospel is well known to regular church goers and seekers alike.

One of the first images that came to my mind, while thinking about it was The beautiful song we sing “You are the vine we are the branches”

So, what do we see when we look at today’s Gospel?

Well, the first thing that stands out is when we compare it to Mark 12:1-11, Matthew 20:1-16 and Luke 20:9-19: Those parables have a degree of conflict, tension and ego embedded in them: John paints a much more pure picture that presents love and grace. We are introduced to the idea of God as a gardener who loves and attends to to the vine; us his children.

It’s interesting think about the idea of branches removed: What I was think about with that was, the idea that as we grow we change right?

So, ideas or beliefs that we thought were really important die off, which makes room for new ideas and experiences.

As with last week, the Gospel for today repeats a lot of John’s main themes:

For example, the I am statements, the idea of abundant life and the idea of an unbreakable oneness with God, Even the image of the vine and the branches, shows us the idea of an unbreakable connection right?

There are a lot of references to abiding or as my version says remaining If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; that refers to a mutual in dwelling God is with us and we are with God. So it’s not just about the heavenly experience when we die, it’s about abundance now, connection right now, meaning now and love right now.

So that what we do with our time or the fruit we bear has some kind of holy value to it, to close, one of the things I like about the verse is, although there are some ideas about responsibility, God and his son are painted more as our companions on this journey; rather the divine judges.

They are offering to walk with us, live with us and comfort us so that our very essence can reflected the glory of God