5th Sunday of Easter, Year B

Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
~1 John 4:8
 
Christ Jesus is the true vine…and we are the branches. We are the branches. How easy it is to get this backwards! We spend our days being busy and productive, occupying ourselves with good works, putting ourselves back into the center of the story. We are the branches. And there are other branches.
 
Truthfully, we are later grafts, to the vine. We have more in common with the Eunuch of Acts 8 than Philip the deacon, one of the first to proclaim the Good News outside of Jerusalem. But for the love of God, our lives would be fruitless. But for the life-giving Spirit abiding with us, we would be without hope.
 
Though vine nor fig tree neither
 their longed-for fruit should bear,
 though all the fields should wither,
 nor flocks nor herds be there,
 yet God the same abiding,
 his praise shall tune my voice;
 for while in him confiding,
 I cannot but rejoice.
 
Enter into worship.
 
Readings: Acts 8:26-40 † Psalm 22:25-31 † 1 John 4:7-21 † John 15:1-8
 
 
About the Art: Koenig, Peter. Christ the Vine, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=58500 [retrieved April 15, 2024]. Original source: Peter Winfried (Canisius) Koenig, https://www.pwkoenig.co.uk/.

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