Husbandman, Vine, & Branches

John
{15:1} I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.


Amazing. Jesus wasn't claiming to be the husbandman Himself, He was pointing to God, the Father as the Husbandman. God is the farmer- God is the one in control of the garden. God is the one planting, cultivating. God decide which plant is healthy, which isn't. God pulls the weeds out of the garden. God is in control and that's something we tend to forget because we are brought up to believe that we are in control of our own lives. For the longest time we know we are under the control of our parents- and even then we start to fight for our independence- we are OLD enough to do for ourselves. We are encouraged to take over control of ourselves because it's only proper, right? We learn to dress and feed ourselves, we learn to meet our basic needs, bathing, using the bathroom, we are being taught to take care of ourselves. Along with the being taught to tend for ourselves as is only proper we are encouraged to believe that we know what is best for ourselves-- what? We are encouraged to believe we know what is best for ourselves, but is that true? Don't some parents fight to keep that control over their kids? Don't some parents believe that even when their child is full grown that they still don't know what's best for themselves. Some clingy parents, some obsessive parents, some overbearing parents actually claim to know better than their children forever. When life knocks their child down over something the child dared to undertake on their own they claim that if only they'd listened then they wouldn't be in the situation they are in. The parent knew best. But most children don't like that do they? Most children even adult children don't like it when their parent is right and they're wrong, when their parent knew better than they did and can gloat about it. Not all parents are like this though and not all children are like this.


The bottom line is we are taught and compelled by something in our sinful nature to want to do for ourselves, to be our own 'man', to handle things our way.


To have to believe that we aren't in control, that we're not in full control of ourselves, that we need to depend upon any one is something we rebel against and it's the very thing we need to accept, to believe.


Jesus was the true vine-- His Father the husbandman.


And if Jesus was a vine, what does that make us?


{15:2} Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit


We are branches of the vine.


We are offshoots of our Lord and Savior and that makes God our husbandman as well.
Our life is dependent upon God and Jesus, the Father and the Son, the Husbandman and the Vine.
We can't forget that without the Husbandman the garden withers and becomes wild and often dies. Without the Vine, there is no life for the branches, none.


Every branch in Jesus that bears no fruit God takes away.
Every branch in Jesus that bears fruit God purges it, so it brings more fruit.


The fruit of the Spirit.


We are promised the fruit of the Spirit and we will have the fruit there is no getting away from it if we are truly in Jesus, truly in God.


Instead of setting out to do this on our own, working to produce our own fruit- you can just imagine how well that would work- we have to stay as close as we possibly can to the Vine, to the Husbandman. We have to relinquish control to the Vine and Husbandman. We have to believe truly that we are the creatures created and not the creatures who create. Try as we are in this world, we are not and never will be the Creator.


Masters of our own destiny?


Masters.


Total control over ourselves.


So why are we shown time and time again how little control we really have over ourselves?


We do not control our life and death do we?
We have no say so over that.


Sure we can consent to have an operation to save our lives, but we don't control the accident that takes the life of one who was just recently saved themselves by that operation. Ultimately we don't have control, but we fight for it constantly and we get defiant against the fates, against God, against life itself for being what it is that leaves us without full control.


We were never meant to be our own gods. We were always meant to know our Father, our Creator.


May God help us relinquish control over our lives to Him and help us to bear the fruit He would have us bear. May He help us as we are purged by Him to bear more fruit, trusting always in Him for all things. By His will, by the grace and mercy of our Lord and our Savior may we be found in Him always!


Amen.