The Vinedresser

John 15 I AM the true vine and My Father is the vinedresser.

Last year I cleaned off the fence line in our back yard. I was surprised at what I found there. Several small trees had died. They had been murdered, actually, by ivy and other vines. Choked to death. Once the vines were pulled away the trees could literally be pushed over. There were standing, looking green and healthy, but dead. The vines had grown around the tree roots, wound their way like a serpent through the branches, green, beautiful and deadly. Some of the vines put on leaves and even bloomed flowers. They had bound the roots and branches of the trees so tightly and had been left that way for so long that the trees themselves died even as the vines flourished. From the windows in the house the tress looked green and healthy.

The symbolism is strikingly familiar. Life, even the life of a Christian, can be a lot like this. From a distance we look okay. We seem to be healthy. Thriving in our career, in our marriage, in our church. But something is silently and relentlessly smothering us, and upon closer inspection others find that though we are standing with all the other trees we are, in fact, lifeless. There is no real joy, no real power in our spirit, no real bloom of our own making. Sin is clinging so closely to us, forming such tight root systems and from a distance is indistinguishable from the true plant. We are bound by our sin, held captive and struggling even for life. And if sin is allowed to continue it will choke the life from us. We show the world a false bloom, a stolen leaf, a deceptive flower. A liars growth.

Some of our trees were able to be saved. The looked a little worse for the wear after they were stripped of their parasitic vines. The vines had actually made them look fuller and happier. They bore scars along their trunks and limbs where their tag alongs had dug into their flesh. Over the last year they have begun to put on new leaves and seem to be recovering nicely. Other trees were not so fortunate. They were lost. Too far gone. Not salvageable. I gathered them up and placed them on the street to be picked up and disposed of by the city. There is a noticeable empty spot where they should be standing, providing shade or a home for my birds. Maybe they became mulch and just changed form but are still beneficial in another garden. Maybe they were burned in a fire and destroyed. Anyway, they are no longer.

As I sit at my desk looking at my back yard I can see the vines beginning to creep back in through the fence. They grow quietly hoping I will not notice them. Sometimes it is easier just to let them steadily come. They fight back with thorns and some of them are an ivy which carry poison in their leaves and I must put on armor to fight them back. But this is, at least temporarily, my yard. I hold a deed to this property. These trees are my responsibility. They look to me for protection for they cannot defend themselves without my help. I am their vinedresser. The depend on me to save them.

Gardening is hard work. You have to love it. It has to MEAN something to you.

You matter to the vinedresser. He watches over you. You owe Him your life. He takes pleasure in looking at you. He fights for you. Prunes you even when it hurts. And there is an empty space in the garden if you aren't there to fill your spot.

Psalm 100 We are HIS people and the sheep of HIS pasture.

Hebrews 12 let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely.

Song of Solomon 6 My beloved has gone down to his garden to the bed of spices to graze in the gardens and to gather lillie's

Genesis 3 Cursed is the ground because of YOU...thorns and thistles it shall bring forth

Psalm 41 The Lord protects him and keeps him alive....you do not give him up to the will of his enemies.