Welcome to Pastor Jack Buckley's weekly blog and podcast.
You have three ways to hear his weekly message:
- Read Pastor Jack's GODblog.
- Listen now to an audio of the scripture reading and Pastor Jack's sermon.
- Listen anytime. You choose the time and place. Download Pastor Jack's GODcast to your MP3 player.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Fruitful Faith
Psalm 22:25-31; John 15:1-8
In Jesus' day, the facade of the great Temple in Jerusalem, I hear, was decorated with a golden bas relief sculpture of a grape vine. It symbolized Israel's calling as God's Chosen People among all the nations of the world -- to bear righteous fruit for God's glory and for people's good. The image came from at least four of Israel's prophets.
If you had enough money, you could pay for a new cluster of grapes to enhance the sculpture. Even a single new grape would be a great honor to you and your family. For you were investing in God's plan for the ages.
Only one problem: each of those prophets brought up the vine idea to lament and lambaste Israel's failure to live up to their calling. Nobody, it seemed, from one generation to another, got it right. But what were they to do? Try again, and again, and... You get the point. If you're called, you're called.
And then there's Jesus. Talk about being called.
He had a crystal clear sense of God's call upon his life. He was the Messiah, the one and only member of the Chosen People who could finally get the calling thing right. His closeness to God would open the way for anyone to get close to God; his spiritual perfection would counteract everyone else's imperfections, once and for all.
John's Gospel has Jesus saying seven times over, "I am..." one or another familiar metaphor for God's plan for the world through the Chosen People. So, for example, he was the Light of the World, the Bread of Life, the Good Shepherd, and now in chapter 15 he was the True Vine. Nobody else so far in all of history had lived up to God's great calling, but now he was doing exactly that. In spades.
And his disciples (then and today), he says, are the True Branches. Called by him to stay as closely connected to him as a branch that cleaves to its vine, not for warm feelings of spiritual contentment but in order to bear spiritually vital fruit.
While I'm no horticulturist or vintner, I think I get the picture pretty well. And that's where my message takes us in this week's podcast.
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
10:52 AM
<< Home
|
|
 |
|
|
