Jesus the Vine: The Vital Connection

Pastor Phillips’ Sermon

Lent Sermon, Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Heavenly Father, as we continue on this journey through the season of Lent, we pray that you will strengthen our connection to you. We pray that you bless us as we meditate on your word and, as we hear it proclaimed, it will take root in our hearts and bear fruit in our lives. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Jesus says, “I am the true vine.” Into the Jewish audience he was speaking to, this was a familiar symbol. You see, in the Old Testament, the nation of Israel, God’s people were often referred to by the prophets as a vine but, in many of those instances, it was not in a flattering manner. It was more of a rebuke to the nation of Israel. It was a rebuke to those who were simply proud to be Israelites and proud that they are part of God’s people but not really having faith in their Lord and Master. It was a rebuke to those who, even though genetically, ethically, they were Israel, spiritually, they were chasing after the idols of the land wherever they lived. Idolatry.

And in some ways, I believe that rebuke fits us today. Sometimes when we’re born into the church or born into Christianity, our parents are Christians, our ancestors are Christians, sometimes we fail to take ownership also. Luther said, “Your Father’s faith can’t save you.” In other words, each person must have that connection. Each person must have a relationship with Jesus Himself.

So today, that rebuke could be for someone who was simply born into the church and considers themselves a Christian but really there is no connection. Or somebody who joins a church maybe because their spouse wanted them to or they were just part of a family that joined or something like that or maybe it seemed to make good business sense, but there is really no connection.

Jesus says to those who maybe thought of the Old Testament people as the vine or to those who think maybe of the church as the vine to be connected to, He says to those people, “I am the true vine.” The true vine, not just an ethnic thing, not just a genetic thing, not just a membership thing. Jesus says, “I am the true vine.”

What He’s talking about is something that every believer is a part of. Every believer, everyone who has a relationship with Jesus Christ and trusts in Him for their salvation is part of that vine. They’re connected to Jesus. But in addition to that connection, every believer is called to be fruitful. Very carefully, Jesus says, “I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch that bears no fruit.” We have to take Jesus’ word seriously. Fruitful. That seems pretty important to Jesus.

He says, “Every believer is a part of the vine and everyone who’s a believer is called to be fruitful.” But also He says that His heavenly Father, our heavenly Father is the gardener and everyone who is connected to that vine gets pruned for a purpose. Just like a gardener trims things so they’ll grow better, God prunes us through the ups and downs, the highs and the lows, the struggles and the good times. He prunes us so we can be more fruitful, so we can bear more fruit.

But the main thing here is we have to be connected. It’s vital for us to be connected. We can’t assume there’s a connection because our parents are believers. We can’t assume there’s a connection because of the family we grew up in or something like that. We have to have that connection ourselves. We have to be certain of it. We have to believe and know who Jesus is.

One of my very good friends, actually sitting here tonight, has been helping me with a project. Man cave. He’s been helping me because he’s knowledgeable and understands how these things work and how to put stuff together, how to plan it, how to make sure it all comes out the way it’s supposed to. And one of the elements of the projects was wiring and we were working on that wiring, the electrical for this man cave, plugs, lights, all of that. Got everything together, put up some of the wall board covering up the wiring, ceiling and stuff. “Hey, we better try this out to make sure everything works.” Hum. It didn’t. There were a few things that didn’t come on when they were supposed to and things like that. We figured it out and we fixed it and everything’s great now but our connection with Jesus is just as important as having that electrical circuit completed. If you don’t have the electrical circuit completed, if you have a loose connection or no connection, you have no lights. You have no heat. You can’t run tools. You can’t run your entertainment system or your computer or whatever else you want to plug in. You can’t run it because you have no connection.

About a week ago, I was visiting a family in the hospital. A little girl is sick and she has spent quite a bit of time there and Mom and Dad are trying to work from the hospital room, so they have their laptops and they have them opened up. They’re trying to go on line with the hospital’s wireless Internet system. Well, you guys know all about Internet, all the wonderful things you can do when you’re connected but how you can’t do anything when you’re not. The mom was trying to do some work and she’d just get a little bit of work done and then the connection would fail. You can’t get any work done if there’s no connection. You can’t communicate all your e-mails and things like that if there’s no connection. You can’t keep up on the news or the weather or any of the other wonderful things you can do over the Internet if there’s no connection.

As important as our Internet connections are to us, it’s even more important to be connected to Jesus. If we are connected by faith to our Lord and Savior, then we receive all the good things He has for us, forgiveness for our sins. We just confessed those earlier tonight, didn’t we? We laid them before Him. Wasn’t it great to get rid of that junk? If we’re not connected, we can’t do that. If we’re not connected, we don’t have salvation. We don’t have peace knowing our eternal destiny is secure. We don’t have eternal life. We don’t have hope for the future. We don’t have encouragement for the day or strength for those hard things that come. If we don’t have the connections, we don’t know about unconditional love. And we don’t have a purpose in life. We have to be connected. It’s not an option. It’s essential for us to be connected to Jesus, the true vine.

Our connection also makes it possible for us to bear fruit. Now you think about somebody who’s maybe just barely connected to Jesus. He might come to church once in a while, he might pray if things are tough, the escape hatch thing, “Lord help me.” He might know a few bible stories but his connection is weak. How much fruit can a weak branch bear? Not much.

More importantly, why is it so important to Jesus that we bear fruit? Why is He making such a big deal over being connected to the true vine? It’s because of what it means to bear fruit. It’s not just to be happy and friendly and kind and loving. It’s salvation. Our connection gives us salvation but our connection also gives us the opportunity to be used by God to bring others to salvation, to help other people be connected, to help other people receive all those blessings that we talked about, forgiveness and salvation, eternal life and hope and encouragement and all those things. God works through us. That’s the fruit when we help other people get connected. That’s the fruit. And that is the single most important purpose that He’s called all of us to fulfill. Be fruitful. Like He told Adam and Eve in the garden, “Be fruitful and multiply.” Like He told us in the Great Commission, “Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations.” That wasn’t just to the disciples way back when. That’s to every believer. Be fruitful. Be fruitful.

Think about the importance it has in your life that you have Jesus. That’s why it’s so important for him that we bear fruit, that we get others connected because in our fruitfulness, God changes the eternal destiny of another person. That’s really difficult to grasp that but just think, when we bear fruit by sharing our faith and helping others get connected to Jesus, they go from suffering to celebration. They go from eternity in a place of punishment and pain to eternity in a place of total and complete joy. I can’t imagine anything more important than eternal destiny, heaven or hell. Being fruitful is important because, through you, God brings people to heaven. It’s that simple.

Think about your spiritual genealogy. It may just be your family tree. It may be that you can look back generation after generation and see that they went to church. They went to confirmation and learned their faith. They taught their children. They prayed at meals. They studied the scriptures. They had devotions. Some of them were pastors and teachers and other things. Look back over your family tree and note those who trusted in Jesus.

Now if you’re like me, I can see an unbroken chain, generation after generation after generation, pastors and teachers and all these different people, all the way back to Germany and beyond, Christians for generations. And that’s been a great blessing to me. Imagine though if that chain was broken, if one or two generations were not connected, fell away, didn’t know Jesus? What would be the likelihood that I would be a Christian today or that I’d be a pastor? That’s how important it is to be fruitful, to be connected and to help others be connected. Through you, the future generation will see Jesus and receive eternal life.

Think about that. It’s a great privilege. It’s a great call. And you may feel a little overwhelmed when you think about sharing that faith, but it’s no different than what your parents did with you and what your Sunday School teachers did with you or what the pastors did for you. It’s simply living as a Christian and saying what you know.

May God bless you to stay connected and to bear much fruit. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2010 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church