I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower.
He takes away every branch in me that does not bear fruit
The Father knows that the purpose of branches is to bear fruit. It is for this reason that the vine supports them and gives them nutrients. To be part of the vine and yet remain unfruitful means to selfishly exhaust resources that ought to be put to better use. It is similar to the situation of the one who received the talents but hid them and made no profit. He was given the talent, not for discretionary spending, but to make a profit for the master (see Matthew 25:14-30). As with the barren fig tree, if it would not bear fruit, why should it be allowed to exhaust the soil? But in that case we see that the vine-dresser himself was concerned to optimize the conditions for growth as much as possible, to give the fig tree every possible chance to be what it was meant to be (see Luke 13:6-9). The implication was that the environment would not be at fault in the case of failure.
Remain in me, as I remain in you.
Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own
unless it remains on the vine,
so neither can you unless you remain in me.
It cannot be the case the branches prove their place on the vine by bearing fruit. Rather, this is the natural course for branches that remain on the vine. The real risk for branches is that they become disconnected from the source. This happens when they begin to dry out and become lifeless. Such a state implies nutrients can no longer flow freely through the branch. It becomes increasingly static and loses the dynamism that defines living things.
In reality, branches have no say, no agency in determining their well-being. But when we consider ourselves as branches we see that the only threat to us, once we are part of the vine, is if we interrupt what God himself initiated. Nutrients will continue to flow, and fruit will be produced. Jesus describes a casual relationship when he says, "Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit". This will be the case, then, unless we begin to reject the flow and stifle the fruit.
We don't typically go immediately from fruit bearers to soil exhausters. Instead it is more typical that we gradually increase our resistance for the flow of life coming from the vine until we are no longer capable of the dynamism of bearing fruit. We become overly invented in our life as isolated branches and forget that we are meant to be part of a wider ecosystem. At first we assume that fruit is something of which we ourselves are capable. But the more we apply a tourniquet to the source of our life the more we discover this is not the case. We may do this to avoid constant change, and the demands on the branch that producing fruit implies. But we will eventually find that if we refuse to let life flow through us, the gardener will eventually prevent it from flowing to us at all.
everyone that does he prunes so that it bears more fruit
In order to ensure that we do not become lifeless parts of the vine we ourselves need to have the parts of us that are threatening to become isolated, dry, or cancerous, to be pruned. The blueprint for what we are meant to be as part of the vine is found in the word of God. Because this word is living and effective (see Hebrews 4:12) it itself is capable of causing the pruning we need in us, therefore we are in part, "already pruned because of the word that I spoke to you". But since we are called to continuous growth we need his word to remain in us. This is fundamental to remaining in union with him. Without his definitive say in what constitutes our relationship with him we tend to make things up, to engage in the self-definition that does not have reference to the vine. The Word of God helps us to treasure our place on the vine, and our union with Christ. It teaches us the importance, indeed the necessity, of bearing fruit. It gives us confidence, because it is not all about our own efforts, which we have seen amount to the precisely nothing we can do apart from Christ. Rather, it is the Father himself who is glorified when we bear fruit. And this means that he, his Son, and the Holy Spirit will do everything possible to see it happen.
John Michael Talbot - I Am The Vine
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