Christ Episcopal Church
May 3, 2015
5 Easter B
The first house Don and I purchased had a lovely back yard that reminded me of an English garden. There were some flowers and flowering bushes, and a lot of fruit trees. A cherry tree lived toward the back of the yard. A pear tree had residence in the front of the yard. An apple tree over produced fruit in the middle of the yard. There was another fruit tree that we cut down pretty quickly, and I don't remember what that one was. And right smack in the middle of the yard there was a grape arbor. The grape arbor and the tree I don't remember came down immediately as we could either take them down or they could be assaulted by the forces of little boys throwing footballs, frisbees, and each other. But we kept the other trees and they produced fruit as long as we lived in that house.
The previous owners had harvested the fruit and done a lot of canning. My strength is baking, not canning, and involves chocolate, not apples or pears. Our neighbor asked for the pears to make jam and we were happy to oblige. Any pears she picked were pears we didn't have to pick up. The trees required little care to produce fruit, although since we did little to care for the trees, the fruit was generally enjoyed by the birds either before or after it fell off the tree. Our stewardship of the trees was not optimal, to say the least, but the trees were undaunted and continued to bear much fruit, because that is what fruit trees do.
I always think about that yard when I hear Jesus tell us that he is the vine we are the branches, and that we are to bear fruit. Just as our trees were rooted in good soil and the branches produced abundant fruit, Jesus calls us to abide in him so that we can bear fruit, fruit that will last. This is a lovely metaphor for the Christian life, calling us to be attached to Jesus so that we can be Jesus' disciples and do Jesus' work in the world. Jesus is clear that apart him, we will not be nourished to bear that fruit.
However, I find this all rather vague. At an intuitive level, I understand the need to abide in Jesus. But what does that look like in action?
The reading from 1 John tells us that God is love, and those who abide in love, abide in God. Then 1 John tells us a bit about God's love, so we know what kind of love we are to abide in. First, God's love is life giving. "God's love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him." The point of sending God's only Son was so that we might have life. Secondly, God's love is self-sacrificing. God sent God's only Son-the heart of God's heart-to give us life. Thirdly, God's love is a free gift. There are no strings attached. There is nothing in 1 John that tells us what we must do to earn that gift. We love because we are loved, not in order to be loved. We are called to respond to the life giving love of God by loving our brothers and sisters with that same life-giving, self-sacrificing, no strings attached love. If we say we have love, and hate our brothers and sisters, or as last week's reading said, ignore those in need when we ourselves have plenty, we are lying. How can we love God, who we have not seen, if we do not love our brothers and sisters who we have seen? 1 John paints a pretty clear picture of what it means to live in God's love and as people who are attached to the vine.
The story from Acts takes us even deeper into understanding how we are to abide in God's love and bear fruit that will last. In the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, we see an example of life-giving, self-sacrificing, no strings attached love for a total stranger. Philip is given directions by an angel of the Lord that will take him to an Ethiopian eunuch who had come to Jerusalem to worship. As an Ethiopian and a eunuch, the man was something of a double outsider, even if he was in charge of the entire royal treasury. The Ethiopian invites Philip to sit in the chariot with him, an act of hospitality, and Philip interprets the scriptures for him, proclaiming the good news of God in Jesus and ultimately baptizing the Ethiopian before being snatched away. Philip's love for God was demonstrated in his openness to the angel of the Lord who told him to travel a wilderness road for no apparent reason, his care and acceptance of the Ethiopian, and his sudden departure after baptizing the Ethiopian that left no room for any praise or credit for Philip. The Ethiopian's love for God was demonstrated in his openness to hearing God speak through the scriptures, his openness to Philip and hearing God speak through Philip, and his openness to the Spirit in his desire to be baptized. The love Philip and the Ethiopian had for God spilled over into life-giving, self-sacrificing, no strings attached acts of love for a complete stranger.
The trees in our backyard bore fruit because that is what fruit trees do. The apples, pears, and cherries were produced, not for the tree to use, but to either to be used as food for others or to produce more fruit. Jesus tells us this morning that the natural result of abiding in God's love and being nourished by that love is that fruit will be produced. We want a program we can attend or a church growth package we can buy that will tell us how to better reach people with the Good News of God in Christ. Jesus tells us that if we abide in him, if our branches are firmly attached to the vine, we will live with live-giving, self-sacrificing, no strings attached love that will naturally bear fruit. The fruit may or may not be the fruit we want to produce or that we think we need to produce. But the fruit that comes from abiding in God's love will be the fruit God wants us to bear. And like Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, that love will take us places we never imagined we might go, to encounter people we never thought of meeting via roads we never dreamed of traveling.
Amen.
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