St. Johns Ev. Lutheran Church, Mahoning, Lehighton, PA

The True Vine
I grew up in the South, and one thing you see a lot of around there: kudzu. By this time of year, the thick and fast-growing kudzu vines are leafing out, and the branches are invading, far and wide. As a kid, kudzu seemed scary. It seemed to spring up so fast, and grow up and over everything in its path: telephone poles, fences, sheds, houses, even parked cars. I used to imagine, that if I lay down in the field next to a kudzu vine for even just a few hours, it would soon cover me up so completely, I could never get up and never break free.

Yes, scary stuff, for a young imagination. But what about our reality? Do we ever feel like things in our lives are also growing out of control? Maybe it�s our bills � too much month at the end of the money. Maybe it�s anger or fear. Maybe it�s an obligation, a responsibility, weighing us down. Maybe it�s just too much to do, and too few hours to get it all done.

All these things can seem to be overpowering, overgrowing, all around us. Wrapping around our feet and our shoulders, up over our heads, pulling us down. Wrapping us up in dark moods, sealing us off, and separating us from good friends and good work and good things that matter.

Does your life feel overgrown with anxiety? Are you tripped up in the undergrowth of your worries? Are you stuck in the thickets of grief and frustration and regret?

When you come to church on Sunday, May 6, you will hear these words of Jesus:
�I am the true vine�and you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them will bear much fruit.� (John 15)

What a promise from Christ! All these other overgrowing vines in our lives � they are not true vines. Jesus, who died, who was buried in the ground, and who sprung to new life in the resurrection � he promises to pull you out of the weeds, out of the overgrown undergrowth, out of the dead ground itself � and graft you to himself. Transplant you into a new and better life � not just after you die, but RIGHT NOW. Right in the midst of all those choking weeds and thorn-covered thickets.

Even now, God invites you to rest your overburdened limbs, to place into his powerful arms, all that dead wood that�s weighing you down. Let God do the heavy lifting. Let him bear you up. Let him prune away the clutter, and free you to reach up to the sky, reach out to others in loving service, and bloom forever, with new life and new hope that can only come from the True Vine, Jesus Christ.

In God�s Love,
Pastor Chris