Easter Week 5 Wednesday

Readings: Acts 15:1-6; Psalm 122; John 15:1-8

Visiting family in Australia some years ago gave me the opportunity also to visit - and in some cases to re-visit - some famous vineyards. The Australians, with good reason, are very proud of their wines. It was a chance not just to enjoy the fruits of the vineyards but to learn more about the care of the vines, the preparation of the ground, the blending and storing of the wines, about the whole art of viniculture which is a very interesting world in itself,

One thing that struck me on this visit was the length of time it sometimes takes for some vines to produce good fruit. We read in the gospels about a farmer who decides to give his crops another year, and if they fail again they will be cut down and thrown away. But a vinedresser cannot be as impatient or short-sighted as that. They must sometimes wait five, ten, twenty years before some vines begin to produce fruit that can be used.

It is easy - and encouraging - to bring that aspect to bear on what Jesus says about vines in today's gospel. All vines will be cut, either to be thrown away or to be pruned, and perhaps it will not be immediately obvious to us which kind of cut we are receiving. We trust that it is with the intention of pruning so that at some future date we will be fruitful. It is a way of understanding the suffering that comes to us: it is a discipline, a kind of schooling, which if properly received can lead to great things in the future.

Likewise encouraging is the patience of the vinedresser. If Jesus chooses to compare us to branches of the vine we can assume not only that he knew something about the craft but that this patience is part of what he wants to teach us. 'Remain in me' is his message to us. Do not lose trust or confidence that all will be well. And even if for now we do not see any great fruitfulness in ourselves, trust in the vinedresser, for it is to the glory of the Father, who is himself the vinedresser, that he, the Son, is working. So he will be more anxious than we that we bear much fruit.

And here is another, perhaps the most, encouraging aspect of it. For it is Christ himself who is the vine of which we are the branches. It is his life that is flowing in us. Of course we can place obstacles to its flourishing but any fruit we do come to bear will be on account of him. Without him we can do nothing. Cut off from him we can do nothing. Which is why we must remain in him, and be patient.

Paul and Barnabas have been bearing fruit in the Lord's vineyard through their preaching mission. Now another kind of attention is required, another kind of work, to care for the vineyard in a way that probably seemed less exciting than their itinerant preaching. Today we hear about what is sometimes called the 'council of Jerusalem', a meeting to consider issues that continued to rumble on in the church. They were faced with questions of viniculture, we can say. How to blend Jew and Gentile to make a new community? How is it to happen? How graft these new branches onto the ancient vine of Israel?

The Church needed patience and wisdom and the other gifts of the Holy Spirit in order to care well for the vineyard at that moment. Its task was to encourage the new growth and to facilitate the spread of the word in new territories. This meeting or council of the apostles served to prepare the way for the fruitfulness which the Word inevitably brings about. Many of the participants did not live to see that fruitfulness but so it is with vines - those who sow and plant do not necessarily see the fruit to which they have, nevertheless, made an essential contribution.