308 From The Ground Up

   (Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “From The Ground Up” originally shared on April 23, 2024. It was the 308^th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.) 

   When Sally and I go to an American supermarket and I look at the produce section, I often think, “This is what brought down the Soviet Union.” Today, we’re going to see how our bearing much fruit is the expression of lives that have been transformed forever.

   It’s Spring-ish in Southern California.

   Armstrong Nursery stopped selling pansies here because the hot weather is coming.

   Yet, we’re supposed to be getting high temperatures in only the mid-60’s and a heavy mist-like morning rain for the next three or four days.

   “April showers bring May flowers”, but we’re not quite in May.

   Summer is coming, and we can see things growing and flowering and making allergy sufferers suffer, but in a way that tells us that we’re not quite there yet.

   Summer is being built, like vines, from the ground up.

   We have grape vines, and their branches, in our back yard that have been there at least since 1986, and probably since well before. They just sort of twine among our trees and bushes. But they all originate from a massive base. If they’re cut off from the base, they die.

   They need a foundation.

   Vines, like all healthy plants, need several things in order to live and to bear fruit: food, light, water, and air.  And they need a process to make those things beneficial to the plant: photosynthesis. And they need care to make the process produce the desired outcome.

   We are much like plants in that way. We need several things to live and to bear fruit, not just for today, but for forever. And we need a process to make them beneficial. And we need care to make it happen.

   Jesus describes what these things are, and how God makes them work together, in the Gospel text that will be read in churches all over the world this coming Sunday, John 15:1-8.

   He starts in verses 1-4,

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. 2 He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. 3 You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. 4 Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.

   Jesus is alive and our lives are totally dependent upon our relationship with Him. Jesus is the means by which we receive life that really is life, new life, eternal life now and forever. God the Father, the first person of the one-God-in-three-Persons Trinity, removes that which is not connected to Jesus in order to keep the dead parts of the vine from attracting the spiritual equivalent of insects and disease that would harm the living vine.

   This life is maintained through Jesus; food: the bread and wine that is the body and blood of Jesus Christ in Holy Communion, light: Jesus the Light of the world, water: the Baptism that cleanses us from sin, death, and the power of the devil, and grants eternal salvation to all who believe it, and air: the power of the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity.

   Vines also need the right space, the right temperature, and the right amount of time to bear fruit.

   Just like us. In our lives, we pray and trust God’s guidance to know God’s calling for us to serve in the right place, in situations where we can be of best service, and for the right amount of time.

   For example, I’ve heard it said that clergy don’t retire, they just get put out to pastor. 😊

   When I retired, I just knew it was the right time, and that the space and the environment for Sally and my future service was going to be different, but that we would still be “pastoring”.

   This is true of every Christian life. The live of we, the branches, comes from and is sustained by the life of the vine: Jesus.

   And Jesus gives our lives everything we need in order to accomplish everything that God gives us to do.

   Jesus continues in verses 5-6,

5 I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. 6 Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.

   What is the fruit of Christian lives? It’s the new life, the transformed life, the born again life, the result of the living relationship with the one, true, living God that is the purpose for our creation from the beginning of time, the life that is given to all who repent and receive it.

   Paul describes that fruit, in Galatians 5:22-23,

²² By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, ²³ gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.

   The consequence of that “fruit” is that we “branches” who abide in “the vine” Jesus in turn bear much fruit. We become the means through which God draws others to a living relationship with him, new life in Jesus!

    Natural Church Development is a church development program that is based on the belief that all healthy living things grow and reproduce. If they are not reproducing, there is something wrong that must be corrected. Bearing the fruit of the Spirit is living the Christian life ourselves and leading others to receive the gift of faith from God.

  What is the purpose of a branch of a vine? It’s to bear fruit, but not primarily to provide food. That’s a secondary benefit. The primary purpose of a branch of a vine is to produce more grapes, whose seeds produce more branches from the vine.

   Programs don’t grow churches, though. People do. People guided by the Holy Spirit, whose lives have been transformed, whose lives demonstrate the fruit that comes as the result of being connected to the vine, Jesus.

   Sin separates us from God, and we can’t save ourselves. Jesus is our Savior. Jesus is life. Hell is separation from Jesus and, as the bumper sticker says, “If you feel far from God, guess who moved?”  😊

   What is the result? Jesus concludes Sunday’s text in verses 7-8,

7 If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.

   Let’s look at that verse 7 again. In the middle of that verse, Jesus says, “ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” That’s the part some people like to hang onto.

   But it begins with a great big “If”. “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you,”

   To “abide” means “to live.”

   Whatever we do is the outcome of abiding in Jesus. If we are living as a new creation, if we are abiding in Jesus, our desire will be only to do His will.  What we “desire” and what we “ask” will only be God’s will, and God’s will will be done.

   God’s will, Jesus says, is that we bear much fruit and become his disciples.

   And what does that produce? God will be glorified.

   That’s what becomes the outcome of everything that we do, of our worship, of the ministry of our churches, of our service to others.

   The outcome of our lives is not that people glorify us. In fact, if everyone speaks well of us, that is cause for concern.

   The outcome of lives in which we abide in Jesus and Jesus abides in us is an outcome that comes only by the grace of God. When we bear spiritual fruit and become the disciples of Christ, it is God who is glorified.  

   There are many vineyards in Southern California. We don’t have to go far to see one in action: Joseph Filippi Winery & Vineyards and Pierre Biane Winery in Rancho Cucamonga and Galleano Winery in Jurupa Valley, and San Antonio Vineyard in Ontario, to name a few.

   But we need travel no distance at all to see “The” Vine, Jesus. He lives within us, and we are his branches.

   In the Old Testament, that is, the Law and the Prophets, the vine is a metaphor for Israel. When Jesus says that He is the vine, he is telling us that he is the fulfillment of the history of salvation among his people, he is the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets for all people. We live now in the living relationship with God for which God created us. It was accomplished for us on the cross.

   Jesus gave his life, was buried, and then took his life back again. He rose, from the ground, up.

   We have been made and are nourished from the ground up. Like the branches from a vine.

   Salvation has come through the gift of faith, the restoration of that relationship in Jesus Christ. We have already died with Christ in our baptism and so we will rise with him to eternal life now and in the life to come.

   As Jesus says, in John 12:24,

24 Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

   It’s Spring-ish in Southern California.

   But among God’s faithful people, it’s time to bear fruit.

307 To Other Sheep

   (Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “To Other Sheep” originally shared on April 17, 2024. It was the 307^th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.) 

   How do we share Jesus without a culture? Is that even possible? Or desirable? Today, we’re going to find out.

   Not too many of us have any firsthand experience of caring for sheep. And few of us want to.

   Little lambs are cute, but little lambs grow up into big oafish sheep that need everything.

   So, what do we make of it when Jesus refers to himself as “the good shepherd”?

   Being a shepherd was somewhat romanticized at the time of Jesus because few people then did it anymore. Like some of us romanticize the days when we or our families were farmers. We only remember the good things. We forget about the hard, almost endless, work it takes, the isolation, and the almost total dependance upon things beyond our control.

   Even in Jesus’ day, being a shepherd was not necessarily desirable work. Sheperds were nomadic; they moved their flocks to wherever they could find food and water, so they had no fixed address most of the time.

   They were strangers. They were viewed with suspicion.

   When you heard that shepherds were coming, you hid your daughters and locked up anything valuable. They were not allowed within city limits. Their testimony was not acceptable in a court of law. They smelled bad.

   The word pastor comes from the word “shepherd” in many languages. 😊

   Pastors guide their “flocks”, though we don’t use the term “flocks” for “congregations” much anymore. It seems kind of old-fashioned, and almost none of us take being called “sheep” as a compliment.

   Most people think of sheep as being passive, as needing someone to take care of them, and as only doing what they are told, none of which are thought of as admirable qualities in our culture.

   So is our message, “Come and be a sheep”? No.

   And the message in the text from the Gospel reading that will be read all over the world this coming Sunday tells us why in its first verse, John 10:11,

11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

   The message is that we need a Savior and that we have one in Jesus Christ. That’s good news.

   Jesus is God, and God loves us. Jesus gave His life for us. No one took it away from Him. Jesus gave His life and then He took it back again, He rose from the dead! He died as a one-time sacrifice to restore the living relationship with God for which we were created at the beginning of time. And he is Risen from the dead! He is who he said he was. He is our Savior, the good shepherd.

   I once heard a story about a tourist who was riding a tour bus in Israel, looking at the geography. Suddenly, he saw a flock of sheep and a shepherd behind it. The shepherd was shouting at the sheep and hitting them with his staff to keep them moving forward.

   The tourist went to the guide and said, “I’ve always pictured shepherds   walking in front of their sheep and the sheep following the shepherd. “Why is that shepherd pushing and driving them from behind?”

   The guide replied, “That’s not the shepherd. That’s the butcher.”

   The message in this text is to follow the good shepherd to everlasting life and receive His love and care starting right now.

   The text concludes with John 10:12-18,

12 The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13 The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. 17 For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.”

   Jesus says, in verse 16,

16 I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.

   The “this fold” that Jesus referred to is the Jewish people. The “other sheep who do not belong to this fold” that Jesus brings in are the gentiles, everybody else. Us.

   Jesus says that he must reach us with the good news of repentance and the forgiveness of sins. New life, eternal life, is won on the cross by Jesus for all people who receive it.

   Almost all of my ancestors came from the country of Norway. My family there can trace our relatives back to the Viking Era in the 1,100’s. Some of our ancestors were farmers who worshiped many gods. Some may have been marauders. Some may have been slaves.

   But they came to Christ. They were saved by Jesus. They repented and received new life by the grace of God through the ministry of missionaries, Christians who shared their faith, just like us, as Christians have done for 2,000 years.

   Jesus’s last words to his followers in the Gospel of Matthew were instructions to carry the Gospel to the whole world. It is the Great Commission, in Matthew 28:18-20,

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

  The good news of Jesus Christ is not for one nation. It’s for all nations.

   It’s not for the Western World. It’s for the World.

   That’s why we can speak of the Jesus of faith and the Jesus of history. The Jesus of history was an olive-skinned Middle Eastern Jew. The Jesus of faith looks like me. He knows me. He understands me.

   That’s why Jesus looks African in African Christian art, why He looks European in European Christian art, and why he looks Chinese in Chinese Christian art. That’s the Jesus of faith.

   Some people have been bridges between cultures toward this end, like the distinguished, and internationally respected artist James He Qi, who combines Chinese folk art and technique with the structure of Western religious art of the Middle Ages. (https://www.heqiart.com)

   Missionaries have been used by every nation to be their instruments, to impose their culture, and to enforce their economics, and their politics. Sometimes we have failed to resist these efforts or have contributed to them without knowing it.

   But most missionaries have sought only to Name the Name. To proclaim Jesus by finding how to best communicate the good news of Jesus Christ in ways that reflect the cultures they serve in ways that are clear and appropriate. They have sought to serve cultures by contributing schools, hospitals, social services and institutions. Some have brought a written language to the people for the first time. Often with great sacrifices.

   One of my professors in college was born in Hankou, China, in 1914, the son of Norwegian-American missionary parents. His family was scheduled to leave on one of the last sailing ships to leave China after foreign missionaries had been expelled from China, accused of being a foreign influence, during the Anti-Imperialist Movement.

   But, one of his brothers broke a leg just before the ship sailed, and it left without his family.

   He said that he remembered riding his bicycle with his other siblings to see the demonstrations against Westerners, seeing the anti-Western signs and banners, and seeing many people who he knew who were marching in the demonstrations. But, when they saw him, they were not angry or threatening to him or to his family. They were concerned for them. They asked how his brother was doing and how long it would be before his family was able to travel.

   Isn’t it true that people are sometimes angry with each other as groups, but loving toward each other as individuals?

   One of my nieces was a teacher in the United Arab Emirates. She said that one day, when she was holding Parent-Teacher conferences, a couple of parents came in and, as they sat down, the husband said to her, “I hate America. But I’ve never met an American I didn’t like.”

   I think that that holds a clue to sharing our faith with all nations.

   When we share the gospel, we share Jesus, not our culture. It takes effort to separate what we say from what our culture is, but if we listen to God alone and act with humility, it can be done.

   And we are helped by the fact that Christianity is able to adapt to cultures, not like some other religions that are locked into one culture at one time in their history.

   We believe that what defines us is at the core of our faith, revealed to us through the Bible, and expressed primarily in two ancient creeds: The Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. They represent the faith that was handed down from Jesus to the apostles, and now to us. And, as Church reformer Martin Luther said, as long as the Gospel is rightly preached and the Sacraments are rightly administered, everything else is secondary. It may be important, but it is not something that cannot be adapted.

   Christianity came from the Middle East and it spread throughout the world. Today, missionaries come from countries all over the world and go to countries all over the world, including to the United States.

   Finding reliable numbers is difficult but, among the top 10 missionary-sending countries in the world are the United States, Brazil, South Korea, and China!

   The Church in China, by many accounts, is booming! But the numbers of Christians who are members of independent underground churches are hard to estimate, unlike those of the country’s official 3 Self Movement churches that submit to the control of the government.

   Nations and cultures rise and fall while Jesus, the Good Shepherd, will be present forever.

   How do people find Jesus? Jesus finds them, often through missionaries, through people who teach people how to recognize what is already inside of them by knowing how to hear the shepherd’s voice. Jesus is already present in every culture, and calls people of every nation to follow Him. Lives that have been changed are lived in love for God and in the service of others, with our whole selves.

   And we bring our whole selves to God in worship.

   Worship is for those in Jesus’ flock. Worship is for those who have been brought into the fold by Jesus to live among God’s faithful people, whatever their nation or culture.

   We respond to his voice by worshiping Him in a way that is not directed toward ourselves, but toward the one true living God.

   That’s why, when worship is finished, the question we ask is not, “What did I get out of that?” but, “How did I do?”

   There are many church groups in the world, but there is only one Church.

   It is composed of all the baptized believing Christians who know the voice of the Good Shepherd, Jesus, and follow Him in daily life. And worship Him with the other members of the Body of Christ.

   The Church is now and it will be brought to perfection only in the life to come, as Jesus said in the second half of verse 16:

16b So there will be one flock, one shepherd.

   That one flock is the Body of Christ, the Church, and it is composed of people. People of every race and place and language and culture. People of every nation. Even of people of every time! A community of people who love God, love others, and hear the voice of Jesus.

   That voice is calling all people to follow Him. The Good Shepherd.

   Because Christianity doesn’t come from the West.

   It comes from above.