My Epic Journey

I have been working through the book, The Ministry of Nurture, by Duffy Robbins.  It is an older book but a classic for anyone in a discipleship setting.

As a result from my read today I found myself in John 15.  This passage begins with a Vine imagery.

1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

This imagery has stuck in my mind all day.  What does it mean that I am the branch and Jesus is the vine?  I pulled up a picture and this helped with my understanding:

I had always pictured the vine as the small, swirly part of the plant/tree.  This is not the case.  The vine is the TRUNK–life-giving support of the tree.  Without the vine we have no branches–no fruit!!

So it is true of us spiritually.  Without the Vine-trunk of Jesus we are absolutely nothing and of NO USE for God.

5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

So how do I make sure that I am not only “part” of the vine but that I am using it’s life-giving source to produce life myself?

Christ gives us the answer in the next few verses.

9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit–fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. 17 This is my command: Love each other.

So what is the solution?

1. Remain in the LOVE of Christ.  Too many times I try to find love in other places.  Maybe it’s my family, my job, my hobbies, etc.  My hope is to find acceptance and a place in this world and yet Christ says that HE is that source.  HE must be the One where I find love.
2. Obey Christ.  Sounds simple, right?  It is, and yet it is so hard for us to actually follow. Christ says that in order for us to fear much fruit we must listen to what He says and follow them.  Christmas is quickly approaching which means I will have to thumb through countless instruction sheets in order to get my childrens’ toys put together properly or even make them work.  I hate instruction sheets but I have to read them.  Without them my kids stare at the strange contraption in the living room that is suppose to be a bike but instead resembles a metallic pretzel!!!  God gives us instructions as well and we must KNOW them and FOLLOW them.
3. LOVE others.  That is the command/instruction of Christ–LOVE each other.  Once again, it is a simple concept but a hard one to practice, especially when other people aren’t lovely.  It is easy to love people we like but not the people who we don’t and yet God says we are to love everyone.  I think He wants us to go beyond SAYING it to actually LIVING and PRACTICING it!!

So what about you?  Are you producing fruit?  If so, what kind?  If not, what do you need to “RE-ATTACH” yourself to the Vine?

For more study, read Isaiah 5.1-7

Mark D. Regnerus argues in his book, Forbidden Fruit: Sex and Religion in the Lives of American Teenagers, that churches are not much more than “social control units.”  What he means by that is, the church is designed to bend adolescent (for that matter any age group) behavior away from the norm and “helps prevent them” from sinning.  He states that this done by “enmeshing [adolescents] in a religious personal network and community.”

My thought is this, Is this really our goal?  Are we just trying to curb teenage behavior by putting them in a setting that is socially religious?  Or should our goal be more personal and deep?

I would argue that our goal should be that our teenagers’ behavior is a direct reflection on their view of God not of the church.  Perhaps this is why so many students leave the church after high school because their view of church has changed.  If they had a proper view of God I think the stats would be different.

As a youth pastor I am then challenged to create, not a social control unit, but a place where students meet, wrestle, and commune with a real, knowable God.