28 Apr SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2024
How many of you enjoy raising houseplants? If not anymore, how about at least sometime in the past? I enjoy raising houseplants in spurts. I can go years content to own many types and varieties: flowering, variegated, succulent, trailing, of the begonia, fig, philodendron, or coleus families.
You know how it goes, you buy a few, trade a few, and collect them. Over time, you accumulate or propagate more. Soon, you have twenty, possibly thirty, or more. Then one day, you, or at least I, couldn’t give a fig about the lot of them.
Every pot looks like a hungry mouth to feed, another burden to try and keep healthy and alive. That’s the day the pots go outside to fend for themselves or become available for rehoming. I mean, some of them won’t stop making babies or trailing to great lengths growing out of control. Having a green thumb isn’t always a blessing, though it is kind of nice.
One thing I’ve always noticed but continue to be surprised about is that in certain kinds of plants that drop vines, there can be healthy looking leaves far down below from what looks like nothing more than a length of dead stem. I can’t tell you how often I pulled out a dead section of a hanging plant only to realize that I’ve removed healthy leaves that were somehow surviving by a mere connection with what looked like a shriveled brown stick.
I wonder if those green leaves prove exactly what Jesus was talking about in today’s gospel lesson. “Abide in me as I abide in you,” he said. An old definition of abide means to live with. But more precisely, abide means to accept or act in accordance with, to comply, observe, follow, keep to or uphold, go along with, tolerate, put up with or endure.
The term abide makes more and more sense with regard to how some hanging house plants survive. If we forget to water them, parts nearest to the soil begin to brown and shrivel while leaves farther away from being parched survive on a well established system. One that conserves moisture by drawing it down various lengths of stem. Even though the plant is cared for inconsistently and getting either over or underwatered, the system manages.
That’s what Jesus is talking about. There is a system in place for our benefit that aims to balance out the inconsistencies of our faith and lifestyles, where care and input vary, where we go through periods where we are either overzealous or downright neglectful.
Jesus accepts and acts in accordance with our efforts to comply, observe, and follow him. As we keep to and go along with him, Jesus abides in us, he will tolerate, put up with, or endure our failings. As Christians, we are like trailing vines.
We may look lovely and healthy at first sight as we bend upward toward sources of light, but if someone were to see where we meet the dirt or are rooted in the pot, we may look thin and straggly. Sometimes healthy greenish-purple leaves are deceiving and yet, they are still a sign of belonging and attachment.
When I get tired of a plant’s dangling parts, the mix of drying brown leaves and lengths of spindly hanging bits, I’m liable to break them off, yank them apart, even uproot things I deem ugly. I won’t abide with them even though I know they survive by being rooted to parts requiring soil.
Jesus is the deliverer of all things necessary and good. Through Him plants and people thrive and propagate knowing that nothing survives without being a part of what’s rooted in Christ even if parts look hard, brown, dry and shriveled up. When an entire branch withers, hope for that branch is lost, but the vine remains intact to send out new offshoots. That’s the story of the Christian faith in all its many iterations.
Jesus is the vine who tolerates, puts up with and endures our inconsistencies, who supplies what we need in spite of the distance we put between ourselves and Him. Whose word teaches us to act in accordance with His commandments, to comply, observe, and follow Him. It is he who keeps to us, who upholds us, who goes along and tolerates us, putting up with us, enduring us. Like a true wandering Jew, Jesus is awesome at staying alive and remaining in a relationship with people who don’t necessarily appreciate Him or are barely willing to contribute anything.
When Jesus threatens to remove every branch that bears no fruit, or prune it, I consider my own frustration with my plants. If I break off pieces, cut or yank on them, I rarely toss them on the compost pile. More often than not, I put them in water to root and eventually plant them in soil, sometimes in the very pot they once came from. The goal is for God’s children to remain healthy and thrive, to grow and multiply, to hang around flourishing in the light as a result of tlc, to travel to parts beyond the confines of a pot.
The beloved apostle John writes: If we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. In this case, abide includes everything: living with, accepting and acting in accordance with. Our ability to comply, observe, follow, keep to or uphold God’s commandments is directly related to God giving us the Holy Spirit.
John continues, “And we have seen and do testify that the Father has sent his Son as the Savior of the world. God abides in those who confess that Jesus is the Son of God, and they abide in God. So we have known and believe the love that God has for us. The Savior of the world goes along with, tolerates, puts up with and endures us out of love.
Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because he first loved us.
On a recent visit with someone predicted to have little time left on this earth, I pulled up a hymn entitled, “Abide with Me.” The lyrics perfectly suited the day’s passing time and nearing closure.
Abide with me, fast falls the eventide
The darkness deepens Lord, with me abide
When other helpers fail and comforts flee
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me
Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day
Earth’s joys grow dim, its glories pass away
Change and decay in all around I see
O Thou who changest not, abide with me
I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness
Where is death’s sting?
Where, grave, thy victory?
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me
Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies
Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee
In life, in death, o Lord, abide with me
Abide with me, abide with me.
Loneliness is on the rise among Americans who become isolated or prioritize individualism over community, who cannot or do not value remaining connected to a leaf node, who can only admire what looks healthy and attractive from afar. Loneliness is exacerbated by those who want a cutting, but fail to care for the parent plant, who are willing to spill the dirt, trample leaf clusters found far from their roots, or toss others aside when growing tired of dealing with their demands and/or needs.
The number of elderly being abandoned by family members grows. Courts can’t keep up with demand to oversee custodial care for incapacitated individuals. Truly, we live and move and have our being in Him. Let us never forget who lives among us and within us, the One who has chosen to accept our wayward ways and helps us act in accordance with His word, who is willing to teach us how to comply, observe, and follow His commandment to love.
We all represent different shapes, sizes and colors of variegated leaves that are kept alive and upheld, allowed to grow and wander. Jesus is the rooted one who goes along with us, delivering what we need, tolerating, putting up with and enduring our inconsistent treatment so that overall, there is beauty to behold, love to be had and love to give. Let us pray.
Lord, thank you for the opportunity to grow things, to witness the relationship between light and soil, leaves and stems, what appears dead but in truth, is not and is still deserving of further consideration. Give us patience and skill, love for the process and awareness of your intentions. Your word, your Spirit, our connections to you and to each other represent everything that is beautiful, healthy and good. In your holy name we pray, Amen.