Writings: Branches of the True Vine

By: Dr. Gregory S. Neal

While in graduate school at Duke I served as the pastor of a four-point charge in the North Carolina Conference: the Pinetops, Temperance Hall, McKendree, and Marvin United Methodist Churches. It was a great, but challenging appointment, one of the greatest challenges being that I preached four times each Sunday morning, at 8, 9, 10, and 11 am! By the end of each Sunday morning’s trek, I either loved or hated my sermon, and rarely did the message survive to the last preaching without undergoing major changes. I would begin the morning at Marvin with announcements, a prayer, a hymn, a scripture reading, and my sermon. I would then depart while the church’s Lay Leader conducted the rest of the service and drive down the road about a dozen miles to Temperance Hall, where their 9 am service would already be underway. I entered the sanctuary, joined in the singing of a hymn, offered a prayer, read a passage of scripture, and preached my sermon. Then, while the Lay Leader there continued with the service, I would depart and drive ten more miles down the road to McKendree, where I would arrive a few minutes after they had begun their 10 am service. After singing a couple more hymns, praying, and preaching, I would scoot out the door and into my car for the fifteen-mile drive to Pinetops and their 11 am service. Yes, Sunday mornings were long, and heaven help me if I needed a potty break.

Of the churches on that charge, Temperance Hall UMC was the most interesting. It was founded during the Temperance movement back in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, making it even more ironic that the church’s Lay Leader ran a small vineyard and bottled his own wine! I remember walking through his vineyard with him, watching as he dress and tended the vine, pruning the ends of the branches that were not growing and helping the rest of the vine to flourish. It was a stellar example of this story from John’s Gospel:

"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." (John 10:4-6)

With this passage, we usually focus on our abiding in Christ. The metaphor is that we are the branches of the vine, whom we know to be Christ, and hence we are entirely dependent upon him for our spiritual existence: “Apart from me, you can do nothing.”

We must be part of Christ’s body, the Church; we must abide in Christ to grow, mature, and bear much fruit. The metaphor cannot be downplayed, nor should it ever be minimized. There are no “Lone Ranger” Christians; there are no “do-it-by-yourself” Christians. Being a Christian means belonging to the Body of Christ; we only ever thrive and grow as Christians when we are rooted in the larger community of the faithful, when we abide in Christ … and, when Christ abides in us.
Which brings us to two questions: firstly, how does Christ abide in us? And secondly, when we meet strangers will they know that Christ is abiding in us?

Being Wesleyan in our understanding of the nature and function of grace, we believe that Christ abides in us through the many means of grace. The means of grace are those amazing instruments through which God conveys love and favor to us. The means of grace include, but are not limited to, the reading and study of scripture, preaching, worship, fellowship, praying, serving, giving, and the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion. When we partake of these means of grace we are nourished by God’s love and empowered to live as Christ calls us to live. They are the principle ways that Christ abides in us, and the means by which we abide in Christ. They are the methods by which God dresses, prunes, and improves the entire vine, and each branch of the vine, so that we can continue to grow and bear much fruit. They form us, improve us, and make us better Christians. When we partake of the means of grace, they become the foci of faith through which Christ abides in us and we abide in Christ. They call forth from us a willingness to accept God’s call and are the ways that we then to act upon that call. At first, we must passively receive God’s grace, but then we must actively say “yes” to God’s “yes” toward us. The means of grace aren’t just received, they must be acted upon; they must be lived within, and through, in order for us to grow in Christ’s love.

And this brings us to the second question: if someone you’ve never before met – some stranger at Walmart, or at a shop downtown, or at a gas station along the Interstate – were to get to know you for any significant length of time, would they see and experience Christ in you? Would they be able to recognize the life and love of God, living in you? In other words, does Christ abiding in you make a difference … not only in your life, but in the lives of others?

The religious life is all fine and dandy when it touches us with the love of God, but if it doesn’t also change us so that others can experience God’s love for them through us, then it has fallen short of God’s will for us. So, ask yourself this question: when a stranger looks at us, when a stranger interacts with us, would they be able to experience the presence of Christ in our lives? When the community around us looks at this congregation, do they have an opportunity to experience Christ’s love for them through us?

Not too long after I arrived here as your pastor, I was shopping in the grocery store and someone asked who I was. It was a Sunday after church, and I was still dressed in clerics, so they knew that I was a pastor and they had never seen me before. When I said who I was and where I served as pastor, they immediately said: “That’s the church that cares about people.” How wonderful was that! And, yes, that’s what I’m talking about. She didn’t worship here, but she knew that this was the church in town that really cared about people.

I was again in the grocery store a few weeks ago on a Sunday afternoon to pick up a few items for dinner that night. And yes, I was wearing clerics. And yes, another person stopped me to ask where I was pastor. I told them, and they smiled and said: “I thought that was you. Thank you for caring so much about people’s health and safety that you closed your doors during the pandemic and broadcast your services on the internet for us.” As it turns out, they had contracted COVID-19 in some other church’s worship service and, even though they have been fully vaccinated, they still don’t go to in-person church anywhere; instead, they worship with us online.

My sisters and brothers, let us continue to so live our lives as a church in which others can see the love and presence of Christ Jesus, our Lord. That is our calling as branches of the true vine.

© 2021 Dr. Gregory S. Neal
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