Last Night: At the Corner of Branch and Vine

“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.  You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

   John 15:1-5

I'm not a farmer or even a gardener. I was raised in the city, except for a few forgettable years in small towns, and never gave much thought to the source of my food beyond the grocery store.

I have a number of friends for whom the idea of a house on a piece of land way out in the middle of nowhere sounds like the perfect life. The long miles over gravel roads pose no problem for them - they don't really want to go to town that often anyway. Their goal is to be as self-sufficient as possible.

Good for them. But I like being where I can hear the big rigs barrel past on the highway. I like being close enough to a bus stop to catch a ride to or from work or to the mall.

I married a country girl, so we've never lived where I'd really like to be. I've always imagined living downtown, right on Broadway, the main drag. I'd live in one of those loft apartments above a local business. Who needs a back yard when you've got city sidewalks and the constant presence of city life just outside your door?

The other reason I don't live downtown is that the price of apartments has gone through the roof. I tell myself it just proves how great it must be to live there, since people are willing to pay exorbitant rents for the privilege.

You can't have a garden in an asphalt neighborhood, but you can't step out of your front door in the boonies and find yourself instantly immersed in the life of the city.

Jesus used a seemingly endless supply of farming and gardening metaphors in his parables and sermons. It makes sense, given He was talking to a mostly agrarian society.

I can do the research and understood the meanings behind His illustrations, but even after all the in depth study, they still don't resonate with my city-boy mind like they do for my wife's extended family, all products of the farm.

I get the point that I'm a branch off the vine. I get that the key to life in Christ is to stay attached to the vine, to depend on the vine as my source for everything I need.

But I relate a little more to the idea that I'm "abiding" at the corner of Branch & Vine.

Picture Vine as the main arterial boulevard in a bustling city. The main arteries are the broad streets designed to feed traffic from the highways to the residential streets. There's plenty happening on the side streets, like Branch Avenue. Daily life, in all its mundane variety, happens along those neighborhood roads, But everyone and everything gets to the side streets by way of the main streets. The mail carrier, the police officer, the friends who come to visit - all of them use the arterial streets to get to the neighborhood streets.

As a disciple of Christ, I live at the intersection of my life and the life of Jesus.

My life, in all its mundane faithfulness, will become like a spiritual ghost town if I remain isolated, content to pursue my own version of the Christian life. Only by abiding on the vine will I stay connected to the source of nourishment and vitality I need.

Choose to live at the intersection of Branch and Vine. The alternative is to be a homeless spiritual beggar.