The Gospel we just heard is from Jesus’ “Farewell Discourse.”  It seems to me that the Church, here in the Easter season, has us revisit Jesus’ last conversations before His passion, much like if a close friend or family member died, we might think back to the last conversations we had with them before their passing.

 

So this particular conversation happened at the Last Supper, Jesus gives this image of the Vine and the Branches.  One thing to recognize up front is everyone in Israel at this time would have been very familiar with a grape vine, grapes were a staple of a Jewish diet.

 

But also, this image of a grape vine was a prominent image of the Temple.  According to the Jewish historian Josephus who saw it himself firsthand before it was destroyed, over the entryway to the temple was a golden vine and giant clusters of grapes “as tall as a man” made out of gold (The Jewish War, book five, paragraph 207-211), so to those listening to Jesus, the grape vine image would have also called to mind the Temple, which is where God was. 

 

So that’s the 1st point of this Gospel, Jesus, by saying, “I am the true vine” is showing that He is God, He is greater than the Temple. Then Jesus goes into this analogy of pruning, which is a farming technique, which is important to the life and the health of the vine.  

 

Really randomly, about two weeks ago, when I was getting ready to leave my dad’s house, he said “come out here and look at my fruit trees.” And he showed me the different ones and how they were blooming and he was pretty excited about them all, but he admitted he hadn’t done a good job pruning in the fall.

 

He pointed out a branch that was clearly bad, rather than being smooth and brown, it was gnarled and black, and he said, “see that, I should have pruned that off.”  Pruning, although painful initially to the tree, gets rid of the bad, which allows what is good to flourish. The 2nd point of this Gospel is this, “You are already pruned because of the word that I spoke to you.” 

 

When Jesus was speaking to His disciples, He was, in essence, pruning them.  Think of His earlier discourses - the Good Shepherd Discourse, the Bread of Life Discourse, the Sermon on the Mount, the Mission Discourse, the Discourse on the Church, the Discourse on End Times - these discourses were helping His disciples to get rid of that which was bad in their own lives, to make room for the good.

 

In a similar sort of way, if we are willing to read the Bible, to truly listen to God’s word and take it in, the Word of God will prune us too.  We must read the Bible!  If you don’t have a Bible, talk to me after Mass, okay?  The Bible is the Word of God still speaking to us today, if we let it, it naturally convicts us of those rough spots in our lives, it will prune us at our own pace.

 

Then the 3rd point, Jesus says, “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.” So the natural question is “how do we ‘remain’?” 

 

Well, something that really struck me in preparing for this homily was the realization that this statement was made at the Last Supper.  So, at the same supper where Jesus says, “This is my Body” (Matthew 26:26) and “This is my Blood,” (Matthew 26:28) He also says, “Remain in me, as I remain in you.”  Seems like a pretty clear connection to me! 

 

We believe in the True Presence of Jesus so we truly receive Him and He remains in us, while we remain in Him.  He says, “I am the vine, you are the branches.” The vine feeds the branches; Jesus the vine, feeds us the branches with Himself. 

 

Jesus goes on to the 4th point, “Anyone who does not remain in me will be thrown out like a branch and wither; people will gather them and throw them into a fire.” Whenever Jesus talks about fire, He is talking about hell.  Clearly this is an analogy for people that go to hell, this might seem harsh, but, this is a choice.  Those that go to Mass and receive the Eucharist choose to do so each week.  God just gives us what we choose.  In the Sacraments, He truly gives us Himself, we choose Him here at Mass.

 

Jesus goes on to say, “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask for whatever you want and it will be done for you.” He is essentially saying, if you receive me in the Sacraments and you keep reading the Bible, I will answer your prayers.

 

The confusing thing is that we know quite often our prayers are not answered.  The issue is, often, we don’t ask for the right thing in prayer.  But when we are truly in tune with God, when we are leading a strong sacramental life and reading scripture regularly, our desires, our will begins to align more perfectly with God’s.  And when that happens, then our prayers get answered, because we pray for the things that God wants too.

 

Finally, this last verse, the 5th point is about the fruit, that’s how a grape vine is judged, by how much fruit it produces, so Jesus says, “By this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.” The fruit is how we know the branches are healthy, but personally I questioned what the fruit was in our lives, so this is what the Catechism says about the fruit:

 

“Jesus says: “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that 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, 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.”(paragraph 2074)

 

So the fruit is, first and foremost, personal growth in holiness.  This was the topic of my homily last week, at the end, when I gave those six tips for the shortest path to growth in holiness, this must happen first. We can’t give what we don’t have, so our growth in holiness is first.

 

The second aspect of bearing fruit is to help others to know of God’s love for them. The Catechism says when we have faith, partake of the Sacraments, and keep His commandments, it is then that we are truly united to Him, and that is when we can truly bear fruit in the world, since it is God working through us, then we help others to know the love of God as well.

 

And then third and finally, just the statement here that when we do all these things, Jesus Christ himself becomes “the living and interior rule of our activity.” That’s a radical thing to realize, because whether we realize it or not,  whether we are conscious of it, we all live by an interior rule of some sort. 

 

What the Catechism is basically saying there is that when we believe in Jesus, remain in the Sacramental Life of the Church, and stay obedient, whenever we do bear fruit, it’s not actually us acting, it’s Jesus acting in us, it’s Him bearing fruit in us, it’s Jesus becoming “the living and interior rule of our activity.” 

 

It’s basically St. John’s way of expressing what Paul says, “It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20) And if we really begin to believe that and to live it, it will totally change our lives, to realize that everything good that we do, whatever good that we do is actually Christ living and working in us.

 

When we prayerfully read the Bible, when we faithfully receive the sacraments, when we obediently follow the commandments, we will grow in holiness day by day, and we can be confident that we are remaining in God, and God remains in us.