C, Post-Pentecost 10, Proper 15 - Hebrews 12:1-2 "The Fruitful Faithful Vine"

Hebrews 12:1–2 (ESV) Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

God the Holy Spirit works faith within the hearing hearts of believers, so we might do the things God wants us to do, to please him.  Doing what God wants is doing the will of God.  God gives faith so we receive what he does for us, and so we listen to him and do what he wants.  It’s God’s will to make you holy, so he can live with us, and so we want to live with him in peace. 

In Hebrews eleven, we hear “By faith” God’s people did this, and “by faith”  they did that.  By the will of God, the people of God were led by the Holy Spirit.  Therefore, despite being human and sinful, they did what pleased God and waited on him with faith.  By his will, God’s  people allowed the Holy Spirit to lead them to trust him, despite deprivation, degradation and death.

The writer of Hebrews calls us to take this word to heart and also follow the will of God, just as those who have gone beforehand have done.  But the encouragement goes further than just the witness of what they did in faith.  You and I are called to see that we are surrounded by this great cloud of witnesses. 

They are alive in Christ in the great resurrection of the dead, that has transported them from this deathly existence within time, into life in the eternal now with God.  They have been perfected by faith.  They have allowed the Holy Spirit to give them the desire to wait for a Saviour, who didn’t come during their time, but has now come and redeemed all those who faithfully wait on the will of God.

These are the folk of faith recalled in the book of Hebrews: Abel, considered useless by his parents, but who faithfully offered a pleasing offering to God, then Noah, Abraham, Moses, the nation of Israel who was faithfully led out of Egypt and into the Red Sea, and Rahab the prostitute who faithfully honoured God, over against her trade, by helping Caleb and his crew spy on Canaan.  Plus, others who while struggling in their weakness, faithfully died by the sword, and were considered unworthy and useless, just like Abel was at the beginning.  Together they are witnesses — literally martyrs — pointing to Jesus Christ, who is their foundation and their perfection from sin. 

But these witnesses are alive, they’re not just memories written down, they’re martyrs resurrected with Jesus, willing you through the living written word by God the Holy Spirit.  Together with the whole company of heaven, they’re not dead, they’re living!

Hear it again, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:1–2 ESV)

In the Old Testament reading and the Psalm we hear how sin clung closely to his chosen people of Israel.  Israel was the vine and vineyard of God. 

In Psalm 80 the psalmist calls God — the Shepherd of Israel — similar to that of the 23^rd Psalm.  A warm and comforting image!  But three times in the Psalm there’s a powerful lament, where Israel faithfully honours God by crying out to him, “Restore us, O God; let your face shine, that we may be saved!” (Psalm 80:3 ESV)

Israel was the vine that God transplanted from Egypt into Canaan.  God was completely faithful to them, despite periods of faithlessness from them.  Through his faithful servants God’s face shone upon Israel, and remembering this, Israel laments to God, “You brought a vine out of Egypt; you drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it; it took deep root and filled the land.  Turn again, O God of hosts! Look down from heaven, and see; have regard for this vine, the stock that your right hand planted, and for the son whom you made strong for yourself.” (Psalm 80: 8–9, 14–15 ESV)

In a time of great rebellion, Isaiah sings a love song for God, his beloved, about his vineyard, “My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; …but it yielded wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry! (Isaiah 5:1–2a, 3-4, 7 ESV)

This too is a great witness to us.  Prophets like Isaiah suffered to reveal the sin of God’s people.  King David and his entourage of Psalm writers lament, calling God to return, and his people to repent, to stop being wild grapes, sour grapes of God’s vineyard, the poisonous stench that was growing on the vine God rescued from Egypt. 

Let this powerful witness work!  So, you die daily to self, allowing the Holy Spirit to return you and restore you in faith.  To once again see the shining face of God.  To bring you again and again back to the true source of salvation.

Also hidden amongst Israel’s lament at their failures in Psalm Eighty is a powerful promise. We hear, “But let your hand be on the man of your right hand, the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself!  Then we shall not turn back from you; give us life, and we will call upon your name!”  (Psalm 80:17–18 ESV)

This Son of Man, made strong for God, is God’s own Son, Jesus Christ.  He is the fulfilment of Israel, the one who many waited for in faith, while much was going wrong in Israel.  Jesus is the new Israel, that those who endured by faith, were waiting.

Jesus has now come, he has died, and he is risen from the dead.  In faith Israel looked forward to the coming of Christ, and in the same way we too look forward, but to Christ’s second coming!

As we struggle, we are called to cast off “every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.”  (Hebrews 12:1b–2a ESV)

Jesus continues to send us the Holy Spirit, so we too, live with faith, and die in faith.  But also, we do so with hope, because Jesus is the new Israel, the perfect Israel, and we are grafted into this Holy Vine of Israel and God the Father is the vinedresser. 

This is the promise:  “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.  Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.” (John 15:1, 3-5, 7–9 ESV)

Jesus is our true vine, and we are his branches.  We bear the will of God because we are grafted into the resurrected Israel of God.  We are fruitful and faithful because the Holy Spirit wills us to look to Jesus, our founder and perfecter of faith!  Amen.

B, Easter 5 - John 15:1–5, 1 John 4:11–17 "Branches of God's Love"

John 15:1–5 (ESV) “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.  Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.  Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.  Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.  I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. 

1 John 4:11–17 (ESV) Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.  By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.  And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Saviour of the world.  Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.  So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.  By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world.

*****

Getting liquid into cells with thick membranes can be near impossible if the membranes are too tough.  Even if one finds a way to get the liquid in, if the membrane is not pliable enough to grow, the membrane can break, and the life-liquid within is lost.

The science of cells receiving liquid is known as osmosis.  A cell with a thick solution within, naturally attracts a thinner solution through its outer membrane to dilute the thicker within.  The results of this dissolution, the breaking up of the thicker solution, is the hydration of the cell.  Plant and animal cells work this way by containing a thicker salty solution, and water is the solvent that breaks down the salt and hydrates the cells in the object.

If the source of the hydration is hindered, the life of the branches suffers.  If the membranes of the cells become thick and clogged, the cells choke themselves.   If the source stops providing, everything downstream dies.  If the nutrient supply is changed at the source, then the cells can be poisoned.  And if an external action physically separates a branch from the source, then understandably what is cut cannot live.

Jesus calls himself the vine, and our Father as the vinedresser.  God is our gardener, and we are the branches of Jesus Christ.  Elsewhere in God’s word we’re told we have been grafted into God through Jesus Christ. 

“For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, (the Israelites) be grafted back into their own olive tree.” (Romans 11:24 ESV)

Jesus Christ is now the vine shoot from the stump into which God’s branches are grafted.  Both us and the Israelites get spiritual growth from the new Israel, our Saviour Jesus Christ.  Apart from Jesus Christ we can do nothing; we cannot grow or bear any fruit! 

Remaining in Christ, abiding in him, we produce fruit!  What is this fruit?  What does your fruit look like?  Does it look like Jesus Christ?  Does it point to him or to something else?  How do I remain in Christ, so that his solvent can work its dissolution of sin within every cell of my being? 

Ask yourself, “If God can cut out the cultivated olive branch, what can he do to me, a wild olive branch that’s been grafted into him?”

So, what is it that allows a person to remain grafted into him?    In what do I trust?  Does it allow God to abide in me, so I can receive the holiness and cleanliness of God?   Despite the dirtiness of my deeds and desires that hardens my being to his cleanliness and holiness!

Ponder how this looks to God!   If you were God, how would you deal with one who hardens itself to the faithful softening nutrients of forgiveness?

Well, this is how God deals with it!  God places an electrolyte within our being, to draw in the nutrients from his word and his sacraments.  Without this electrolyte the cells of our spirituality would become so hardened, from the salinity of the self’s desires, that we would lose the energy we need to exist and eventually self-destruct.  We would spiritually collapse and die.  

This electrolyte is the activity of the Holy Spirit!  It comes from nutrients in God’s word and sacraments, and it draws God’s word and sacraments through the branches of the vine, into every living cell of our being.

This activity, of the Holy Spirit within us, gives us spiritual growth.  This electrolyte seasons us with the salt of salvation, and it creates a new desire within us.  This is the desire to be loved by God. 

However, the electrolyte of the Holy Spirit working within us, is already God’s love working.  We desire the love of God because God has been loving us with his word and sacraments.  The spiritual growth occurring here does a number of things.

First, the Holy Spirit reveals to us the hardness of our being and our resistance to God’s electrolytes of love.  We’re shown how our desires of love to love, negates our need to be loved by God, in the way that he needs to love us.

We hear the great love text of the bible, such as the first John text today and Jesus’ summary of the Old Testament, on how to inherit eternal life, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself.” (Luke 10:27 ESV)

We learn very quickly the way God so loved the world, is so different to the way, we so love the world.  Jesus says, “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” (John 12:25 ESV)

Secondly, the Spirit having revealed this leads us to cry out, “How do I love the Lord my God with all my heart and with all my strength and with all my mind, and my neighbour as myself?”  

Thirdly, one of three scenarios then occurs!  Only one grows us with the electrolytes of God’s love in the Holy Spirit.  The other two continue to shut out the love of God with the hardness of the human spirit of love.

In these other two scenarios, one cries out “How do I love?” and then decides to climb up to God and love him with one’s good works and obedience.  Unfortunately, these works are filthy rags in the sight of God, because they disobey God and his word. 

The other of these two scenarios, one sees the hopelessness of their spiritual health, knowing that no amount of their works will fix their failure to love God, and they walk away from God, usually hating God, or hating themselves, or both!

In both of these ways, climbing up to God or walking away from him, the effects of humanity’s negative spiritual electrolytes are working within, hardening us to the will of God. 

But the third scenario is God’s way.  In crying out, “How does one love God?” One learns in God’s word, it’s God’s love that has carried them so far!  Therefore, it will be God’s love that continues to energise them with all his gifts of love for salvation and eternal life!

It may not be immediately obvious, but God’s word and sacraments have been flowing from the vine into the branches to give life and vitality.  Our love for God and others is revealed in events we would usually deem ordinary rather than extraordinary!  

These are in desires like: Being still and letting God be God in our circumstances.  Waiting on God with patience.  Opening one’s heart to God’s word to reveal sin, to willingly repent and believe our forgiveness.  One is also shown in their enemies a need for God’s grafting gift, so there’s a willing desire to forgive as one has been forgiven. 

So, in summary, first the Holy Spirit shows us our shortfall.  Second, the Holy Spirit elicits the desire to cry out to God for help.  And third, we are quietened with a revelation of God’s work in and through his word and sacraments, where we continue to abide in these works of love, to confess sin, and live in peace with God and those with whom God has placed us.

Knowing that God’s love flows to us through the vine that is Jesus Christ, and our life now comes from the work of the Holy Spirit within, we know we ought to love one another.  With this debt to love, our faith returns us to the cycle of life where we continue to receive nutrient from Jesus Christ, our vine,  in the electrolytic empowering work of the Holy Spirit, given in and through God’s word and sacraments.

God the Father is the vinedresser, Jesus Christ is the vine, and the Holy Spirit seeks to hydrate the health of every spiritual cell in the vine’s branches, which is God’s church! 

Let God abide and remain within, so his love can be perfected in us and keep us healthy in Jesus Christ.  Amen.