The fundemental things apply, abide


I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. John 15:5 ESV
                As the song says, “…The fundamental things apply, as time goes by.”  I suppose it is cliché to say that a particular verse changed your life, especially for a minister of the gospel; nevertheless this verse did change my life, especially as a minister of the gospel. Now allow me to depart from my typical tone and pull back the curtain a bit. In the midst of this pandemic I have been troubled. As an individual I have been made to compromise, it is necessary, but to me very uncomfortable. As a minister I have often been at a loss as to how best to serve the church and its people. Some things had to change very quickly, and because of that a lot things had to be, “good enough”, or, “the best we can do right now” instead of the very best. Yes, it had to be that way. It was necessary, and at the time of this writing it still is. Good intentions, even love can press us to try more than we are able to do, even more than we ought to attempt.
                It is so easy to get caught-up in what cannot be done, and what could have been done better, and what else might be done. We can easily become restless with good reasons. Because we look at the shifting sands around us, at the things that do change as time goes by. We forget to look straight down and find the solid rock is still as solid as it was yesterday. The unholy trinity of world, flesh, and devil would like us to forget. They would like us to act as though our feet were in the sand, are roots not planted in the good soil nourished by the living waters, our souls not abiding in the life of the True Vine, and His life abiding in us.
                We must remember this alone we are helpless, abide still means abide. These fundamental things apply, as time goes by.  Notice, “I am”, it does not say He was, or is, or will be, He just am. Unchanging, and unchangeable, the certainty leads to a certain pronouncement that as we abide in Him and He in us we will bear much fruit. His life will be on display, all the fruits of the spirit clearly visible. I remind you that among these are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentles, and self-control.  Joy and peace may seem to be in short supply these days, but they are still abundantly available in Christ.
                What then shall we do in this time of turmoil? In ourselves, we cannot do anything. As a minister of the gospel I cannot do anything on my own. For all of us the fundamental things apply in this time we must abide in Him so that He can abide in us. The command has not changed. There never was a command here to bear fruit, and there is not such a command here now. The command is to abide, the result is that fruit will come forth. The Holy Trinity will see to that.
                Abiding sounds simple, but it is not easy. However, even as we take hold of the Vine, the Vine takes held of us in the Spirit, and the Father cares for the branches so they will grow and flourish in the life of the True Vine. Even if your strength should fail, you will not be lost if you are indeed in Christ as it is written in John 10:28-30. The life of the Vine is eternal life.  Let us remind each other of these fundamental things which apply as time goes by. Thankfully by God’s grace we have the means to do assist each other in abiding even though physically separate via technology of varying kinds. All of my writing it is my intention to aid you in abiding.
                All I can do is hold onto the Vine. All any of us can do is to hold onto the Vine. Christ the True Vine can do all things, has accomplished the subjected of all things to Himself. With us nothing is possible, but with God all things are possible. Abide.
Prayer
                Father you are holy the perfection of goodness from which comes every good thing. You have given the very best of all in Jesus Christ our Lord. In Him we have life abundant and free. We have the promise of fruitfulness by a simple command. We thank you that even as our strength fails and our hearts falter You hold us fast who belong as branches connected to the True Vine.  May we bear fruit in season to Your glory. May we weather well the storms as time goes by. Forgive us our trespasses. Let Your will be done in all things. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Songs
                There are many good songs which connect to this text and these themes. I see no reason to limit myself to just one and so give you five.
Abide with me
All I have is Christ
On Christ the solid rock I stand
Christ the sure and steady anchor
He will hold me fast

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Against work addiction

  It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep. Psalm 127:2 ESV             When work becomes anxious toil, something has gone wrong. Something has gone wrong in our society when it comes to work. Several decades ago, Wayne Oats coined a new word, “Workaholic” to describe addiction to work.   The description Oats came up resonates with the psalmist describes. Anxious toiling, long hours, and little if any enjoyment of the work itself or the fruits of the toil. Addiction is another word for slavery, and it is easy to be enslaved by the anxiety over our work for it drives to work more, and that increases our anxiety while also burning through psychological energies.             Not only is workaholism addiction/slavery, it is idolatry for if we stop to think about it the workaholic has placed his hope in his own work. Beloved what is truly tragic is that we live in society that admires the workaholi
Read more

Up and ahead

              Sometimes we are blindsided by a sudden shift in life. We thought we were on stable ground, and then someone starts shouting at us in a routine meeting, or tells us we don’t have a job anymore on a Monday morning, or a loved one leaves on Friday evening with no plans to return. We are left with broken piece of something that once made a kind of sense to us. We knew, and now we do not know.             Where is God? We can’t see Him anymore. We cannot understand where He went to, or what he was thinking. We trusted Him, didn’t we? Now look where we are… It is the better part of wisdom to be quiet when these calamities come to visit and to wait. It is the one wise thing Job’s friend did, when first they saw the plight of the miserable man, they only wept with him.             When later they decided to try and explain things, it did not help Job at all. What could they tell him? They didn’t have answers. And a lot of times we do not have answers either. We are too sca
Read more

The folly of, "what if?"

              As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. John 9:1 ESV             Here we find a man born blind, sitting beside the way, with nothing much to do. And we are given to understand this had been the occupation of his life, sitting and begging. We can imagine he had a lot of time to think. And what do we suppose he was thinking about? What do we find ourselves thinking about when life leaves us sitting beside the way with time to think? Do we ponder how we got there? Do we perhaps wonder if there might have been some other way we could’ve gone? Do we wonder, perhaps where else we might have ended up? Do we not find ourselves moving from practical questions, into those alluring questions of what if? There are few questions which hold the captivating power of, “what if?” The question immediately removes the constraints of what is which often seem to hold us in less favorable positions. We are free to believe that which is not evident, not apparent; but desperately w
Read more