Franchising the true vine

4 May 2015 | V Easter
John 15:1-8 | The True Vine

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. (John 15:1-8)

There is a true vine, and the true vine is invisible. Our relationship to the vine is abiding. You know the vine by its fruits.

1. There is a true vine, and the true vine is invisible.

Remember Ukrop’s?

Until 2010, Richmond had a remarkable chain of grocery stores called “Ukrop’s,” – named for the family which started them and owned them. The stores had a very special quality – excellent food and really remarkable customer service. The Ukrop family was and is a family known for service and leadership in the Richmond community. In 2004 they were major donors to the renovation of this chapel because, Jim Ukrop said, he believed that this continual prayer for the city was very important.

As I said, what was really remarkable to me about Ukrop’s was the spirit of the people working there – the way the stores felt. One thing was, of course, that it was a family owned business and they kept it well staffed – the family got more than enough profit from it as it was, and was extremely generous to community causes. Nationally owned chain stores are constantly being milked by investors in the competitive Wall Street environment, and staffing is one of the first things to go. You can really tell the difference and it is instructive about what is going on in employment all over this country.

I once asked Jim about the spirit I felt in the stores. He talked with me about the training program they had for employees. But then he said, “Our goal is that people should feel better after they have been in our store than when they came. If that is true, no matter how much they have bought, they will be back.”

My conversation with Jim Ukrop got me into thinking again about the whole business of the spirit of an organization – a big organization – and about how you take spiritual qualities to scale in a large organization.

That is the business of the church, that Jesus is talking about in this passage. There is a true spirit, represented by the metaphor of the true vine.

Every church that has ever existed since Jesus has claimed to represent the true vine of God. How can there be so many true vines, especially when so many of them deny the genuineness of the other vines? How would you know the true vine if you saw it?

Well, tonight we’ll look a little more at the true vine. For now we need to say that there is a true vine, but it is not represented by a single institution. It is behind things. Just as when you seek to be present to God in prayer, or ask him to be present to you, the presence is invisible, so the true vine is attached invisibly to the branches.

Even the name of Jesus can be deceptive when identified with the true vine. There are literally millions of churches with the name of Jesus attached to them, and there are billions of minds with thoughts of Jesus in them, and it is impossible to measure how many of those churches and those thoughts have the true spirit of Jesus attached to them.

The true vine is a metaphor which identifies a spiritual relationship. If the name of Jesus as you carry it in your mind is not touching what you know to be true, then seek the truth and re-examine what you thought or were taught about Jesus! You may find that the real Jesus is closer to what you know is true than the character you thought was Jesus.

The search is worth it, because there is a true vine, and the true vine is invisible.

2. Our relationship to the vine is abiding.

Jesus said,” I am the vine, you are the branches. 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.”

Our relationship to the vine is abiding. “Abide” is here used as the word to describe our relationship in the spirit to Jesus. It is another word for the relationship that Jesus elsewhere calls “faith.” To abide in a place is to make your home there. It is to be consistent, to remain in a place or a relationship. It then becomes, for better or worse, the place of nurture, instruction, and information. In a grape vine or any plant, the nurture of the branches flows through the trunk or the vine to the branches. The branches are not self-sufficient. They produce for the vine, but they cannot exist on their own. They are permanently dependent, or related, to the vine. They “abide” in the vine.

As I said earlier, since my conversation with Jim Ukrop about his philosophy of grocery store management some fifteen or more years ago, I have done a lot more thinking and examination about the business of franchising businesses and organizations.

I’ve looked at the Walmarts, who control employees by stern economic measures and dictates. I’ve looked at the Starbucks, who seek to create a humane culture and charge more to create it. I’ve looked at the Marines, with their extensive and calculated training and the spirit of their units. I’ve looked at public education, the importance of spirit, and the failure of the current brutal methodology to bring quality and spirit to scale.

And I’ve looked at churches – denominations, local independent churches, churches that are heavy on doctrines, churches that have different organizational methodologies, churches that have bishops and churches that have apostles, churches with different spirits, churches of different cultures and races. How do you guarantee that the spirit of Christ, as you know Christ, will be present in a church?

I do not know any church, any denomination, where it is guaranteed that the liturgies or the beliefs or the clergy or the ethos will be true to the Spirit of Christ and help attach us to the true vine. But I do know that the Holy Spirit is active, and that Jesus can work through the churches.

Here, around this altar, we encourage one another to abide in him, as we come to know him in the spirit, with whatever words carry us closer and more truly to the spirit of God and life. It is no accident that this is a sacrament of wine – indicating the mystery of this relationship of branches to the vine. Three of our Gospel writers record Jesus’ final words at the Last Supper, the origin of this event, as these: Truly I tell you, I will never again drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.” (Mark 14;25 and pars) The kingdom of God is at hand, he said. Tonight we drink the fruit of the vine anew. We seek in this spiritual and physical action to abide in him – to be related to the eternal, true God through his holy spirit, and therefore to be led more and more to find the shape of Christ in our lives.

Abide is a word for faith. Our relationship to the vine is an abiding one.

3. You know the true vine by its fruits.

Jesus said, “Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.”

The true vine may be invisible. There may be no single franchise or trademark. It may turn up in a lot of places even without the Jesus name attached to it.

Our relationship to the vine is an abiding one. We do not know well, and we do not know the future, and we are always learning, but we have learned to abide.

Our judgement, our truth, our discernment, our invitation, comes from the fruits which the vine bears over and over again, in person after person, situation after situation. You know the true vine by its fruits. When the vine is there and the circulation is pumping, what comes forth is something that looks like Jesus.

St. Paul really did give us a good list in the letter to the Galatians: “The fruit of the spirit,” he said, “is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” (Gal 5: 22-23) Wherever you see this result, wherever this spirit emerges, look for God. These are not mechanical products that can be produced by any set of doctrines or verbal commitments or strategies or training programs. They do not occur automatically anywhere. There are things we can do to grow these fruits. We can learn how to nurture and support them. But we cannot guarantee them in any way, shape, or form, any more than a Superintendent of Schools can guarantee the quality of a classroom or a McDonald’s executive can guarantee the quality of service in his restaurant or a doctrinal confession can guarantee a healthy congregation.

These fruits come from abiding in the vine. They are new fruits, special fruits, fruits of the spirit, lively fruits, the kinds of fruit that encourage further fruit. They are abiding fruit. They overcome death and depression. They bridge great gaps between resources and needs. They cause people to step outside the habit patterns of generations and see possibilities they have never seen before.

There is a true vine, and the true vine is invisible.

Our relationship to the vine is abiding.

You know the true vine by its fruits.

Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, I will never again drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”

This is that day. The kingdom of God is here at hand. Abide in the vine. Drink the wine of the spirit. Open your eyes and let Christ bear fruit in you.

AMEN.

The Rev. B. P. Campbell
Richmond Hill
Richmond, Virginia