I am: The True Vine

John 15:1-8

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, as I also 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.

5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are 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 done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

What is the Earth without the Sun? What is a branch without the tree? What are we without God? In this passage, Jesus calls himself the “true vine.’; He also goes on saying in Verse 5 that, “apart from me you can do nothing.” In today’s time, someone saying this would be considered to be arrogant, and rude; however as Christians, we know it to be true.

When a branch falls off a tree or is removed from it, it naturally withers and then either it dies or is used as firewood. Similarly, if we dive deeper into the passage, Jesus is saying here that he is and should be the main source of our wellbeing and nourishment. Jesus is saying that He alone provides, and all that we truly need in life comes from Him. 

So, what does this actually look like? The mistake I’ve always made while reading this passage was to think that now that I know his commands, I need to go and do the work so that I can produce more fruits. I confused the word ‘bear’ with ‘produce’, until I realised that when Jesus is asking us to bear fruits, He is asking us to carry them. To carry them within ourselves wherever we go and whosoever we are with such that we, through our behaviour and especially through what we are carrying inside us, we may showcase ourselves to be disciples of Jesus, and through this, God the Father gets the glory. In the first half of Verse 5 Jesus says,

“If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit.”

This beautifully portrays the relationship between the tree and its branches. It is the tree that is responsible for producing the fruits and not the branches. It is the tree that provides the structure, nutrients, and resources necessary for the production of fruit. It is God that is responsible for producing the fruits and not us, the disciples. It is God that provides the structure, nutrients, and resources necessary for the production of the fruit. 

Jesus provides us with all the things we need to bear fruits and be more fruitful, by remaining in him. He provides love, joy, peace, forgiveness, and grace. So as his disciples we are to simply carry these things in our hearts whilst also putting them into work so that we may become more fruitful and glorify God. 

Moreover, by understanding this difference between ‘bearing’ and ‘producing’ we also understand that as his disciples we don’t have to ‘work’ for the fruits but rather they have been freely given to us, which I think as a disciple takes away the burden off our shoulders. The burden that some of us carry, which I do too, the burden that ‘we have to earn’ we have to now go out there in the field and exhaust ourselves to produce more fruits or else God will cut us off from his inheritance. 

So, what are these fruits and how are we to bear them? Well to answer it, these are the Fruits of the Spirit which He blesses us with. Therefore, by living a peaceful life, loving one another, by being kind and gentle towards each other, having patience, and self-control, whilst persevering faithfully with the joy of the Lord in our hearts, we show that we are his true disciples. 

Last week, I went to fill up my car with petrol. We drove in behind another car, but as we pulled up the car ahead stopped at the first pump; meaning that we would have to drive all the way around him. My girlfriend was driving, and in that moment she beeped the horn, asking him to move forward. He didn’t. Therefore, when she parked up and got out of the car to refuel, the other driver got quite aggressive with hand gestures and loud remarks. My girlfriend had asked me to stay in the car, but I was finding it very difficult to not get aggressive in return. But I felt convicted to pray. And as I prayed, all I could hear was God telling me to have patience, to forgive the driver and let it go. This was difficult to do, because that rudeness was shown to someone I love and care about and in front of a lot of people but ultimately God gave me the patience and self-control and to my surprise, I did stay in the car. 

To give you context, I haven’t always been a Christian. Back in India, a time when I wasn’t a Christian, I remember such instances occurring. But back then, I reacted in ways in which I didn’t hold back, I was aggressive and I responded with anger. I reacted in a way that was set apart from Jesus, that wasn’t rooted in Him because I did not know Him. But during the petrol indicent, God reminded me of the fruits of the spirit that I get to bear as a Christian and He reminded me of how to act accordingly and how to act so that I remained rooted in Him.

So my only encouragement to all of us would be to stop trying to produce and start bearing these fruits that we have received from Jesus. To let go of this burden and lie that we need to earn our keep in our Father’s kingdom but rather receive these fruits with humility and carry them within ourselves, allowing the Light of Christ to shine through us such that our Father gets the glory.

Smarak Subudhiray