Hi everyone, welcome back to the podcast.
We're looking at the Gospel reading for today's mass, and
this is probably one of my favorite gospel texts across all
four gospels. There's so much richness and
it's so let's start by reading the passage.
And let's see what we can draw from the literal sense.
What was Going on in the author's mind when he was trying
to convey these words. And in particular, in this case,
what was Jesus trying to say, to his disciples?
John chapter 15 verses 1 to 8. Jesus said to his disciples.
I am the True Vine and my father is the vinedresser.
Every branch in me. That bears, no fruit.
He cuts away, and every branch that does bear fruit.
He prunes to make it better even more.
You are pruned already by means of the word that I have spoken
to. You, make your home in me as I
make mine in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit
all by itself but must remain part of the vine.
Neither can you unless you remain in me?
I am the vine. You are the branches.
Whoever remains in me with me in him bears fruit in plenty for
cut off from me, you can do nothing.
Anyone who does not remain in me is like a branch that has been
thrown away. He Withers, these branches are
collected and thrown on the fire and they are burned.
If you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask what
you will and you shall get it. It is to the glory of my father
that you should be a much fruit, then you will be my disciples.
So, a really interesting passage for us to look at today and
there's a lot going on here. Let's jump into it.
So, what's the context? So, the Last Supper has begun in
Chapter 13 and 14 and Jesus has begun the farewell discourse.
If you've been following on, in the last few days, you would
have heard the first few bits of the farewell discourse.
So, the last thing that's happened is Jesus has just
promised to give the apostles. Peace, he says, peace, I leave
with you. Now it appears, although it's
not sir, And that at this point they've gotten up and they're
walking towards the Garden of Gethsemane verse 1.
Jesus said to his disciples. Now the audience is really
important. Let's keep that in mind.
As we go through today. He's speaking to his 12
Apostles. What he says, he does not apply
in the same way to everyone. He's going to speak, to them
about the importance of remaining in communion with him,
rather than doing it in their own strength.
Keep in mind that they're going to be the leaders of the church
and Jesus knows. Is that?
So he wants to make sure they're clear on what they're going to
have to do in the coming years. And he's going to use a
metaphor, that they will be quite familiar with.
So it's kind of like a mini Parable that Jesus does here and
the metaphor that he uses is about a Vine.
So the apostles lived in an agricultural area of the world
and it had a lot of vines, so they would have known how Vines
and fruit worked. But on top of that, the metaphor
of the vineyard is you A lot in the Old Testament.
Jesus doesn't bring up the vine as though.
No one else in the Bible has done it.
A lot of the prophets, talked about God's relationship with
Israel. His people as like the
relationship between a Vine dresser and a Vineyard and a
really good one to read for. This is Isaiah chapter 5.
That's a really, really clear, example of how God himself
describes Israel as his Vineyard and him as the vinedresser.
It's well worth reading Isaiah chapter 5.
Before we go any further with this text.
So if you have the time stop and read Isaiah chapter 5, I would
say Now, let's move on here in this text.
He says, I am the True Vine. So, this is said, Jesus, seventh
font, and final. I am statement in the Gospel of
John seven times in the Gospel of John.
He gives himself and I am title. This is the last one notice.
He says here, I am the True Vine.
So he probably, at this point, the apostles probably have in
their mind. Although certainly would have
been familiar with Isaiah, chapter, 5, and other Old
Testament passages where Is depicted as the vine.
But here Jesus says, I am the True Vine as the as in Jesus is
the realization of Israel as their vocation to be God's
obedient people. He's the final perfect.
Perfect version of that because he's completely United with
God's will. Israel was able to follow God's
will sometimes Jesus as the perfect.
Vine is able to fulfill all of that obedience.
So, in a sense, you Jesus is encouraging his Apostles to find
their new source of life and strength in Jesus himself rather
than the old Covenant. Maybe that's something that
Jesus is intending here. Now since this occurs towards
the end of the last supper or maybe they've just left the Last
Supper, there could be a link here between something else.
Jesus said about wine and the vine during the Last Supper.
Remember he talked about when he institute's the Eucharist?
He says the fruit of the vine. So that's a phrase that he uses
there. So maybe that would still be
fresh in their memory. And maybe they're supposed to be
a link between that, what he says here and the Eucharist.
And that's that phrase, the fruit of the Vine.
Is discussed more explicitly in the synoptic gospels, version of
The Last Supper. He then says, after I am the
True Vine and my father is the vinedresser.
So notice, this Jesus is giving us information about how to
interpret this many Parable. Jesus is not in charge of the
vine. Interestingly, it's actually the
father that's in charge of the vine and the one that does the
cutting and the pruning. So the father plants, the vine
and looks after it. And the son, Jesus is the main
part of the vine, the life-giving part of the Vine So
he could say Jesus is the foundation of the church, he's
the source of life for the rest of the church.
The branches, as will see refer to individual Christians.
So, the vineyard is a whole with the church and individual
branches are individual Christians.
It's quite an amazing metaphor. Actually, the more you think
about it and you think about how there's life actually throwing
flowing through individual branches.
That comes from the core of the vine itself, but let's keep this
in mind. The Father, is the one who's
establishing the kingdom and the vine.
He is establishing the people for himself and he's the one
who's kind of overseeing it, but Jesus as the son is the one who
makes the Kingdom Possible and supplies this special
Supernatural life to the kingdom.
Now on top of that, it doesn't say this in the passage but the
church throughout the ages has seen the sap that flows from
Jesus to the individual branches.
That sap could be considered to be the Holy Spirit and you'll
see that in the catechism. Although that's not specifically
said In this passage, Jesus has been talking about the Holy
Spirit prior to this. So it's a logical inference to
say that the sap if there is sap, here would be the Holy
Spirit verse 2. 2, every branch in me that bears, no fruit.
So Jesus here is thinking of people who have been brought
into God's Kingdom. So notice this, they people who
are in him, they are part of the vine but they're bearing no
fruit. So they're not cooperating with
the spirit and therefore, they're not producing the good
works. The good fruit that God requires
of them if they're going to be part of his Vine.
So those branches that are in him, but they bear no fruit.
Now, notice that there's a, you know, there's so much we could
draw from this but It's possible to be in the Kingdom but not to
be bearing fruit. Some Christians would say that
if you're a Christian and you're saved, it's obvious because
you're producing good fruit. That's not the way the New
Testament portrays. It, it's certainly true, that
true Christians will produce good fruit, but the New
Testament also adds in this other group of people who are
part of the Kingdom. But they're sort of reducing in
status of the king. And when they gradually moving
further and further away, From the father even though they were
once part of the Kingdom. So the New Testament does talk
about people who lose their salvation and that's what's in
mind. Here, he says, Jesus says that
for those people, God Cuts them away.
So this is a clear reference. It's not a nice thought, but it
is a clear reference to how God puts people out of his kingdom,
because they're not bearing fruit.
So, only those, which remain in God's grace and produce good
fruit. Remain a part of the kingdom and
in a few verses time, Jesus is going to give us more
information about what happens to these branches after they are
cut off. In context, this is a warning to
the apostles. Jesus is telling the apostles
that, if they want to stay in the Kingdom, they need to keep
producing fruit, which means they need to stay in communion
with Jesus. That's the main point.
He wants the apostles to hear this.
They have to stay in communion with him.
Then Jesus talks about a different group of people in the
Kingdom. He says, every branch that does
bear fruit. He prunes to make it better even
more fruit. Now this is a fascinating
principal think about how Vines work in real life and the
apostles knew this to get vines, if you've got a Vine at home we
have a Vine at home. So this is why it's one of my
favorite parts of the gospels to get them to Bear more fruit.
You actually have to prune the vine, you have to make the vines
suffer. Are in order to make it produce
the best fruit possible. So God's goal in creating this
Vine or to bring people into the kingdom is so that they will
produce fruit or good works. God is not making the kingdom
just for fun for something to do.
The god. The father's goal is so that
people in the Kingdom will produce.
Good works and glorify him. He wants to transform the world
through. Good works.
That's what his kingdom is. For the word here.
For pruned is Cafe Row in Greek. And that can mean pruned or
cleansed. It's the same same word.
This is a different Greek word that's used for cutting off,
which was mentioned a bit earlier.
So there's a distinction between being cut away the father,
cutting people off from the vine and the father pruning people,
it's two different concepts So here Jesus says that there's a
group of God's people who are doing God's will in his kingdom
and they are producing fruit. But God the father is going to
prune them, which means the father, it brings difficulties
and sufferings into a True Believers life.
So this goes against the Prosperity Gospel a bit, doesn't
it? Here are Jesus teaches that
there are some in the Kingdom who are producing fruit, who are
True Believers, but God makes them suffer in a way.
He prunes them, so that they might become more pure And
produce more fruit. So you could call this the
process of fatherly discipline, the father of the kingdom of God
disciplines his sons. And we see that, if you want
some references, Hebrews 12:5 to 11, James chapter 1 verse 2 to 4
and 1 Peter 1 verses 6 to 7. So this principle of God,
disciplining God, pruning Christians.
So that they will produce more fruit and progress further in
the Kingdom. It's a clear teaching of the New
Testament but we don't talk about it.
Verse 3, he then says to the apostles something interesting,
he says you are pruned already by means of the word that I have
spoken to you. So here he's talking to the
apostles. They have a special privilege
were there already, pruned, basically, and other
translations. Put this as you are already made
clean. So they're already purified and
ready to produce fruit. They don't have to do this
background work, that maybe new Believers would have to.
Because of the fact that they have already heard Jesus
speaking for the last three and a half years, they already know
a substantial amount about God's will, it's just up to them to
put it into action and to produce fruit.
So, basically, Jesus is saying to the apostles from here on
out, you should be able to produce much fruit.
There's nothing that's stopping you from producing fruit because
you're already purified but only if you remain in me.
So it's appears to be that for the apostles in particular, God
doesn't need to prune the much more there, that's already
happened to them through the ministry of Jesus, but they do
need to stay in connection with him.
Whereas, for us today we have to do both.
We have to be pruned and we have to voluntarily remain in.
Communion with Jesus verse 4, Jesus says, make your home in
me. Or as you know, most
translations that we are aware of that we have familiar with
would say abide in me. The idea here, let's try and
keep in mind the metaphor that Jesus is using is the vineyard
metaphor. So the idea is the branches need
to stay connected to the main Vine and not try to plant
themselves elsewhere. It's not going to work.
And then Jesus qualifies it he says make your home in me as I
make mine in you. So Jesus says, he's already
pouring his own Grace and life into the apostles.
So whatever abiding in him means it's something.
Jesus is in a sense already, doing to the apostles.
He says as a branch cannot bear fruit all by itself but must
remain part of the vine. Neither can you unless you
remain in me? So, if the apostles are to
produce fruit for the vine, which is the kingdom of God,
they have to remain in connection abiding with Jesus.
So, here's the question. What does it mean to remain or
to abide in Jesus often, you'll hear commentaries or sermons?
Where I'll try and come up with a fancy idea of what it means to
abide in Jesus, as in it, Means to do a special prayer or
something. Well actually Jesus goes on to
explain it and whenever Jesus gives his own explanation of his
words that's the one we want to go with.
He hasn't explained it yet but he will and if you versus time
and it turns out that the basic meaning of remaining or abiding
in Jesus has a similar meaning to what he's just described in
verse in, chapter 14, where Jesus said that he will make his
home in Christian. Believers to remember that
passage, I will come and make my home in him in chapter 14.
If you remember, in chapter 14, the Mission for Jesus.
Coming to make his home in a Christian believer, was they
have to keep his Commandments. Jesus is going to make the same
point here, in verse nine intent, which is in tomorrow's
reading. Jesus says that if you want to
remain in Jesus and if you want Jesus to continue to abide in
you he says to the apostles you need to keep following my
Commandments. That's what it means to abide in
him to follow his Commandments. If they do that they'll be able
to produce a lot of fruit. Verse 5, Jesus summarizes it by
saying, I am the vine, you are the branches, whoever remains in
me with me in him bears, fruit in plenty.
So Jesus is repeating himself. He knows he's about to go away
and he wants to make sure the apostles absolutely understand.
This principle because they are going to lead the church.
And then he says, this cut off from me, you can do nothing.
Now, remember the audience here, he's talking to the apostles, he
says to the apostles that if they separate themselves from
Jesus and his Commandments, they reject his Commandments and his
grace will, then his Divine Life, will stop flowing through
them and they will not be able to produce good works.
They can do nothing. Now notice this refers to a
voluntary leaving of the vine. Otherwise, there's no point
telling this so the apostles he's telling them, don't
deliberately leave the vine don't leave the kingdom and
that's going to be developed more in the next verse.
What does it mean to say they can do nothing?
Now, it doesn't mean literally nothing in the way that we might
think about in English today, a common Jewish expression would
be there, would say, all or everything.
And the context tells you what all or everything means in.
This context can do. Nothing basically means you will
not be able to produce any fruit or maybe something like you will
not be able to please the the father.
It doesn't mean you won't be able to walk or talk.
It just means that if you separate yourself from the the
vine, you won't be able to do work said of pleasing to the
father and that applies to us today as well.
We can't do good works in our own strength and that's a
Catholic teaching. Actually, any good works.
We do ultimately empowered by Jesus.
Verse 6. Jesus now tells us what happens
if you don't remain in him, anyone who does not remain in
me. So that's those who know, Jesus
Commandments, but refused to follow them.
So they cut themselves off from Jesus.
Life is like a branch that has been thrown away more literally.
It's actually says he is cast forth, so God actively casts
them away. God cast them out of the
kingdom. It says he Withers.
So, that probably means that in this life, the person One who's
been Cast Away, loses all Grace and divine life.
So he Withers. And then on top of that, Jesus
says, these branches are collected and thrown on the fire
and they are burned. And that's what happened to
vines in that culture. If a Vine was not producing
fruit, then it was considered useless by the farmer and the
farmer collected it and threw it onto the fire.
So is this a reference to? He'll probably it probably is
Jesus. Here is probably teaching that
for those who remain outside of Jesus Kingdom when they die.
They get Eternal punishment because they did not produce
good fruit. That God expected them to
produce. Another metaphor to this, which
is really similar is in Matthew 3:12.
John, the Baptist says about Jesus.
His winnowing Fork is in his hand, he will bring the wheat
into his barn, but the chaff will be thrown into unquenchable
fire. It's the same basic agricultural
metaphor, good fruit or good weed is used and brought into
heaven, bad, wheat, or bad fruit, which doesn't produce
what God expects is thrown into unquenchable fire.
And that probably means how Verse seven.
If you remain in me and my words remain in you.
So again, notice what he qualifies it with, if you remain
in me and my words remain in you.
So, the key indicator of whether Jesus is remaining in someone
appears to be whether they following his word, his
Commandments. That's what it means to remain
in Jesus. It doesn't mean thinking nice
thoughts about Jesus. It doesn't mean saying nice
prayers. Necessarily Jesus says, to
remain in him means to follow his Commandments.
If you remain in me and my words remain in you, he then says
this, you may ask what You will and you shall get it or it shall
be done for you as other translations, put it.
Now, this is not a magical thing, this is a promise given
to the apostles, particularly about the early years of
preaching, the kingdom of God, that they're going to have to do
after Jesus goes away. And you can see this because
Jesus is already, discussed it in 14:13-14.
This idea that if you remain in, God's will he's talking to the
apostles, then God will grant their request.
Tests and that makes sense because if the apostles are
following Jesus commandments, so their remaining in Jesus, that
means their remaining in God's Will and therefore their Wills
are aligned with God's will. So he's going to Grant whatever
requests they have because the apostles and God want the same
thing which is to build up his kingdom.
The reality is this principle probably doesn't apply to the
same extent to Christians today, although in a general way, if we
align our Wills with God's will, God will grant us the desires of
our heart. He then says this it is to the
glory of my father that you should bear much fruit.
Notice that that's the whole point of the vineyard the whole
point of it is and in fact of God's kingdom is to produce good
works. Which glorify the father
Christians who were called into the kingdom are expected to
produce good fruit for the father.
And then you will be my disciples.
And remember disciple means follower Jesus says, if the
apostles can continue doing good works in a similar way to what
Jesus did, then they will be his followers.
His disciples, they will remain in him, and they will continue
to build the kingdom. So there are a bit of a longer
exegesis there today but hopefully you learn something
new, I think, often this, I am the vine thing is treated as
some deep mystical thing that we can't fully grasp.
And there is a mystical element to it because he's talking about
Divine life, but he does make it Concrete in terms of to remain
in me means to follow my commandments.
So it's something that all Christians have access to.
It doesn't have to be a complicated thing, follow Jesus
Commandments, and you will have Jesus divine life in you It's
the basic teaching of this section.
Now, this farewell discourse continues in the lectionary, in
the coming days. This gets a lot of attention in
the catechism, this particular chapter and these verses in
particular. So I want to spend a bit of time
talking about some really powerful verses from the
catechism. So today will be a bit of a
longer podcast, but hopefully you can see why?
Because it's such an important passage in helping us understand
the holy spirit in helping us understand, God's work and the
apostles work. So there's a, there's more
catechism references than I can do in this podcast but I'll
include them all in the show notes.
Notes. I want to read out a few really
powerful ones. A paragraph 1108 is about the
Holy Spirit. It says, in every liturgical
action, the holy spirit is sent in order to bring us into
communion with Christ. And so to form his body, the
holy spirit is like the sap of the father's Vine which bears
fruit on its branches. The most intimate cooperation of
the Holy Spirit and the church is achieved in the Liturgy.
The spirit, who is the spirit of communion Ian abides, in
defectively, in the church for this reason, the church is the
great sacrament of divine communion, which gathers God
scattered children. Together communion with the Holy
Trinity, and fraternal communion are inseparably, the fruit of
the spirit in the liturgy. Paragraph, 75 5 talks about the
church. As the vine says the church is a
cultivated field, the tillage of God on that land, the ancient
Olive Tree Grows, whose holy Roots were the prophets and in
which the reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles has been brought
about and will be brought about again that land.
Like a choice Vineyard has been planted by the Heavenly
cultivator yet. The True Vine is Christ who
gives life and fruitfulness to Branches, that is to us who
through the church remaining Christ without whom we can do
nothing. Paragraph 1988 talks about the
individual Christian and the power of the Holy Spirit which
can flow through us. It says, through the power of
the Holy Spirit, we partake in Christ's Passion by dying to
sin. And in his resurrection by being
born to a new life, we are members of his body which is the
church branches grafted onto the vine which is himself.
God gave himself to us through his Spirit by the participation
of the spirit. We become communicants in the
divine nature. For this reason, those in whom
the spirit, dwells are divinized.
Now, that's an amazing paragraph.
It says that Christians, if they remain in Jesus actually
developed Divine Life and get pulled into the communion of the
Trinity and that's amazing. A lot that could be said about
that, but we'll move on paragraph 787 Jesus.
Spoke of a still more intimate communion between him and those.
Who would follow him abide in me and I in you, I am.
Vine, you are the branches and he proclaimed a mysterious and
real communion between his own body and hours, he who eats my
flesh and drinks. My blood abides in me, and I in
him, So there's a link there to what Jesus said in John chapter
6 in the bread of life discourse.
Paragraph 3 or 8. And this talks about primary,
sorry, Providence and secondary causes.
So it talks about how God works in the world, the truth that God
is at work. In all the actions of his
creatures is inseparable from faith, in God, the Creator.
God is the first cause who operates in and through
secondary causes for God, is at work, in you both to Will and to
work for his good pleasure. Far from diminishing, the
creatures. Dignity.
This truth enhances it drawn from nothingness, by God's
power, wisdom and goodness. It can do nothing.
If it is cut off from its origin for without a Creator, the
creature vanishes still less a creature can attain its ultimate
end without the help of God's grace.
So, that's a really interesting one about the Theology of how
God works through us to bring about his plans.
Paragraph 8, 6 4 is about how God, works through the apostles.
And the Bishops, it says Christ sent by the father is the source
of the hot. The church's whole apostolate,
thus the fruitfulness of the apostolate for a danger
ministers, as well as for Lay people, clearly depends on their
vital Union with Christ. So that's a really important
teaching because often we can look at Bishops or priests or
individual Christians and realize they're not living a
holy life. This paragraph teaches us.
One of the main reasons, why? People can fall away is because
they no longer have a vital Union with Christ.
Which probably means they don't follow his Commandments.
That's one of the teachings of the church even people who are
blessed by God as Bishops and Priests who have holy orders.
Not necessarily is their mission going to be successful if
they're not remaining in Union with Christ.
Paragraph 1694 is about individual Christians, that
says, incorporated into Christ by baptism.
Christians are dead to sin. And alive to God in Jesus
Christ. And so participate in the life
of the Risen Lord, following Christ and United with him,
Christian's can strive to be imitators of God as beloved
children and walk in Love by conforming.
Their thoughts words and actions to the mind which is yours in
Christ Jesus. And by following his example,
Paragraph want 2074 this is an interesting place.
It's in the introduction to the discussion about the Ten
Commandments and here it talks about what is the relationship
between the Ten Commandments and the natural law.
It says this Jesus says, I am the vine, you are the branches,
he who abides in me and I in him he it is.
The Bears much fruit for apart from me, you can do nothing.
The fruit referred to in this saying, is the Holiness of a
life made fruitful by Union with Christ when we believe in Jesus
Christ, partake of his Mysteries and keep his Commandments.
The Savior himself Comes to Love US in US, his father and his
Brethren, our father, and our Brethren.
His person becomes through the spirit, the living and interior,
rule of our activity. This is my commandment that you
love one. Another, as I have loved you, So
that's a really interesting application and here, the
catechism actually tells us what the fruit is in this particular
Passage. Lastly, we'll make this the last
one for today. Of course, there's so much more.
You could say about John chapter, 15 paragraph, 27 32 is
about prayer and this is a really powerful paragraph and
it's well worth meditating on because we all struggle with
distraction in prayer. The most common yet most hidden
temptation is our lack of faith. It expresses itself less by
declared in credulity than by our actual preferences when we
begin to pray. And laborers or cares thought to
be urgent via for priority. Once again, it is the Moment of
Truth For The Heart. What is its Real Love?
Sometimes we turn to the Lord as a last resort.
But do we really believe he is? sometimes we enlist the Lord as
an ally, but our heart remains presumptuous In each case, our
lack of faith reveals that we do, not yet, share in the
disposition of a humble heart. Apart from me, you can do
nothing. So that's fascinating that
quote, apart from me. You can do nothing from John
chapter 15, The catechism uses that as the principal for
really, we can only do proper prayer.
When we grounded in Jesus, when we abide in him.
So all of that will be in the show notes for you to take a
look at, thank you for listening to this slightly longer podcast.
Today, it's such an important passage and one, which is well
worth dwelling on, thank you. And please tune in again
tomorrow as we continue in the farewell discourse.