Fifth Sunday of Easter
May 10, 2009
Sermon by Pastor John Marboe
The Holy Gospel according to
[Jesus said:] “I am the true vine, and my Father is the
vinegrower. He removes every branch in
me that bears no fruit. Every branch
that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word
that I have spoken to you. Abide in me
as I abide in you. Just 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. Those who abide in
me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away
like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire,
and burned. If you abide in me, and my
words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for
you. My Father is glorified by this,
that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
We talk about love all the time. We live in a culture that is saturated with
love, or at least something we call love.
“Love will find a way.” “Love
makes the world go around.” “Love is the
answer.” “Love is very, very
extraordinary.” Our popular culture is
saturated with songs about love, song after song. And love has become commercialized. “I love my Cub.” “I love my Cub!” McDonald’s: “I’m lovin’ it.” Or do you remember that commercial where, I
think it was Barry White, in the background, with that deep, sensual baritone,
talking about “falling in love.” “I’m in
love.” And on the T.V. screen, turning
slowly, round and round, is an Arby’s roast beef sandwich. Now, that’s love. Love has become cliché and cheap, as cheap as
a dollar menu item.
But people who know love, people who are mature in love,
know that love is life itself, and that to be open to love deeply is to be open
to being cut. To be without love is
death, our text says. To be apart from
God’s love is death; it’s to wither and to be tossed aside. Love is life itself. But there is also great pain in love. There’s no way around that. There is no way
out of that.
Jesus speaks to his disciples here in the Gospel of John
on the eve of his death. It is his last
meal with his disciples, and so what he wants to say to them, of course, is
going to be something that he wants them to remember after he’s gone. He says to them, “I am the vine, you are the
branches.” “Abide in me.” It’s a beautiful image of a vine and
branches, a lovely image; a plant, a growing thing, a living thing.
It’s also an image with a bite. Yes, it’s a beautiful image; an image of our
oneness with God and with one another, and the life flowing through and fruit
being born, good fruit being born; about belonging to one another; about having
life together; that life itself comes to us through being connected to God and
to one another. But it’s also an image about cutting. It says that every branch that bears fruit
will be cut back so that it bears more fruit.
Love, being open to love, is to be open to being cut. Love is unsafe. Sometimes I wish that were different, but
that’s the way it is. Love makes us
vulnerable. Love makes us open to being
hurt. Love that redeems, love that is
redemptive in this world, will experience pain.
The love of God in Christ is the juice, is the sap, is
the life force that flows through this vine.
That love is unconditional, and it is for you. But that life is not just
to be for us but to flow through us and to bear fruit in the world. This is not conventional love. This is not respectable love. This is unconventional love, and Jesus showed
us what it’s like.
Someone approached Jesus one time and said, “Good
teacher, what is the great commandment?”
And Jesus says, “You will love the Lord your God with all your heart,
soul, mind, and strength. And the second
is like it. You shall love your neighbor
as yourself.” That person, wishing to
justify himself, said, “And who is my neighbor?”—which is a question I
think we all ask—“Who is my neighbor?”
Jesus goes on to tell a story in response. He says a man was walking down the road and
fell among robbers and was beaten and robbed and left to die. One person passes by on the other side;
another person passes by on the side.
But a Samaritan, a Samaritan comes.
And who is a Samaritan? In Jesus’
day, a Samaritan was an enemy.
Samaritans shared a border with
Jesus explodes the boundary nearly everyone in his
culture would recognize between a neighbor and a non-neighbor. A Samaritan was
definitely not a neighbor. A Samaritan was unclean. But Jesus goes beyond the
point that your enemy is your neighbor too, which would have been startling
enough. He declares the question wrong.
“Don’t ask who is my neighbor, but, rather, HOW AM I TO BE A NEIGHBOR?” This is
the kind of love that makes us vulnerable.
Jesus taught elsewhere, “Everybody loves those who loved
them back. What good is it to you if you
love those who love you? I tell you,
love your enemies; pray for those who persecute you; do good to those who hate
you.” This kind of love is the
redemptive love of Christ that connects us to the vine and makes us fruitful in
the world. But this kind of love comes
with pain built in. Loving enemies is no walk in the park.
Let me here add an important point. This is not
encouragement to stay in an abusive or oppressive situation! Love, even for
enemies, can also say NO, and NO MORE.
Mothers, I think, have a special knowledge of the pain
that comes quite naturally with real love.
There is death in love. There is
no growth without severing—from gestation to birth, to the cutting of the cord, to
the weaning, to the toddling off, to the “I can do it by myself, mom” stage, to
off to school with a backpack, to graduating from school and moving away.
To love is to be truly alive. Jesus said, “Abide in me, abide in my
love.” But do not be naïve, because
God’s love is costly. Love and pain are
part of the same vine. And for that
reason Jesus said, on the eve of his death, to his disciples who were about to
see the measure of his love for them, Jesus said “Abide, stay in this love.
Amen.