Vineyard insights proclaimed in California wine country
By Parker T. Williamson, The Layman Online, November 2, 2007
FAIR OAKS, Calif.– Speaking to Presbyterians who gathered in California wine country, Gerrit Scott Dawson, co-moderator of the New Wineskins Association of Churches, employed vineyard rhetoric to declare a life-changing truth. Quoting Jesus, he said, “I am the vine. You are the branches. … Apart from me, you can do nothing.”
Dawson described a prominent feature on the great temple that towered over Jerusalem in Jesus’ day. Carved into its stone edifice was a grape vine with gilded foliage and fruit. This was the symbol of Israel, God’s chosen people, he said. This is what they were called to be, a demonstration of abundant life that reflects the goodness of God.
But the image also was a symbol of failure, Dawson said, for Israel did not live up to its Divine appointment. It did not produce the fruit called forth by its Creator.
As He entered Jerusalem on His way toward Golgotha, Jesus employed the symbol in a new way, Dawson said. “Jesus took the place of Israel. ‘I am the vine and you are the branches,’ he said. He stood in for God’s people as the one who is expected to produce the fruit of obedience, worship and faithfulness.”
‘You’re off the hook’
“You are not the vine,” said Dawson, paraphrasing Jesus. “You’re off the hook. I have come to do for you what you failed to do, what only God in the flesh can do. This life of filial love with the Father which you abandoned, I will do. I am the vine. You are the branches, tiny shoots which come forth and in due season bear grapes. So, stay connected to me.”
“Jesus’ image was stunningly obvious,” he said. “Branches don’t try to live apart from the vine. They are just there, effortlessly letting the vine produce its life through them, resulting in a harvest of grapes. No branch leaps off the tree. No branch tries to do anything. Branches just remain, held by the vine, yielding fruit.”
“This is a tremendous relief,” Dawson said. “We are not expected to do what we are unable to do. We are not thrown back on ourselves and left to our own failings. Christ Jesus has lived the life of obedience on our behalf. He will fulfill in us now that life we were meant to live and could not live without Him.”
But the news is mixed, Dawson said, “for, on the other hand, this is a dire blow, a kind of death. It is the end of our pride and independence from God. This is a counter-cultural experience, for we live in an age of self-preoccupation. Christ’s call to living reliance and utter dependence goes against every message from our environment.”
Dawson said abiding in Jesus requires a continually renewed decision. “It is not about our clinging to the vine, but allowing ourselves to be held. It is not so much a matter of being for, but being from. I want to be not just for Jesus, but from Jesus.”
The Great ‘I AM’
Turning to John’s description of Jesus’ arrest and trial, Dawson shared a graphic illustration of the vineyard metaphor. He reminded his audience of the words that the Lord employed when revealing Himself to Moses: “I AM.” Whenever the people of Israel hear those words, Dawson said, they fall on their faces, for these words point to the one true God.
Dawson then referenced words that Jesus employed when speaking of Himself and His mission: “‘I am the door. I am the good shepherd. I am the bread of life. I am the living water. I am the way, the truth and the life. …’ Here is the great I AM. Jesus identifies Himself in connection with the Father, a connection that no Jew who heard His words could miss.”
Dawson turned his focus to Jesus’ arrest in the garden of Gethsemane. As Jesus prayed there, soldiers arrived. He asked, “Whom do you seek?” They responded, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Dawson paused for emphasis, then continued: “Do not miss the significance of Jesus’ response: ‘Ego Eimi’ (I AM he)!”
“The soldiers hit the dirt, flat on their faces,” Dawson said. “Suddenly, this man sweating blood in prayer, rose and said Ego Eimi. A flash of uncreated light pierced the Judean night. Suddenly, the soldiers saw a man under agony, sweating blood, broken and weak, yet when he spoke ‘Ego Eimi,’ a surge of deity rushed through Him and the whole army was knocked to the dirt at the sound of the Word made flesh uttering the Word. … We are reminded of Philippians 2: ‘At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow.'”
Peter and the vine
Under orders, the soldiers arrested Jesus and began to take Him away. Note what happened next, Dawson said. Peter unsheathed his sword and struck off a guard’s ear. While that act may have appeared courageous and laudable, Dawson observed, “it was a bad move.” Peter was taking the matter into his own hands. No longer depending on the vine, he was calling on his own strength and resources.
“We cannot do this by ourselves, and when we try, our efforts will always fail” he said. “Our efforts end in compromise.”
Soon, Peter, now relying on his own strength, would be tested, Dawson said. A servant girl approached him. “Aren’t you one of his disciples?” The question was clear: “Do you belong to him? Are you his?”
“Ouk Eimi,” (Not I AM) was Peter’s reply. “In that moment,” Dawson observed, “Peter denied the vine. He snapped the branch and separated himself from the source of his life. ‘Ouk Eimi‘ put him on the opposite side of standing with I AM. The Lord said, ‘Ego Eimi, I AM he.’ Peter said, ‘I am myself. I am self-generated. I have a life of my own.’ Peter cut himself off from the vine, and apart from the vine we can do nothing. He was going it alone, and he would not have the strength to carry on.
“Think of what Peter threw away with his ‘Ouk Eimi:‘ I have poured the living water into the sewer. I have spat the bread of life from my mouth. I have gone out from the door of life to the valley of the shadow of death. I have lost the way. I have not life. I am cut off, withered and rotting. Oui Eimi! Peter threw it all away: the bread, the water, the way, the truth, the life. … ‘Ego Eimi – Ouk Eimi.’ We are fair warned. Peter has committed spiritual suicide.”
Trading truth for tone
The high priest, Dawson said, asked Jesus to explain Himself, and He replied by referring to His accusers. “Ask them,” He said. “They are the ones who heard me.”
Immediately, one of the officers slapped Jesus. “Is that how you answer the high priest?” he asked.
Jesus responded to the rebuke: “If I have spoken wrongly, bear witness to the wrong; but if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me?”
Dawson unpacked the incident: “In the face of accusations against Him, Jesus asked ‘where is the evidence? Tell me what I have said that is wrong. Argue on the basis of fact and documented testimony. What has tone to do with anything?'”
“Tone is the language of the institution that cannot argue from fact, but must appeal to its own purported authority,” Dawson said. “When confronted by the truth, religious leaders say, ‘We don’t like your tone … you won’t give us your property … the response of authority figures who have no truth to claim is always about tone.”
They took Jesus to Pilate, who asked the Jews what evidence they had of their prisoner’s wrongdoing. Again, the request is for truth, evidence, facts, a fair hearing. And how did the religious authorities respond? Dawson asked. They pointed to their own purported authority: “If this man were not an evildoer, we would not have handed him over.”
“In other words,” Dawson observed, “he is guilty because we say so! This is all about authority. No charge is specified outside of tone. Because we are established, we will accuse.
“Pilate was disgusted and said the Jews should try Jesus themselves, according to their own law. Even the pagan world calls for evidence and fair process,” Dawson noted.
What is truth?
Pilate then asked Jesus the question that culture always asks: “What is truth?'” Dawson said. “The culture wants to know, for culture assumes that no one has the truth.”
Commenting on this exchange, Dawson paraphrased Pilate: “‘Come on, Jesus, truth cannot be known.’ Culture’s answer is proper modesty. Agnosticism is preferred. But that is actually not modesty, but arrogance. The truth is Christ. We are called to proclaim that reality even if it seems immodest in a culturally pluralistic world.”
“In the face of this world, where force must be brought to steal the light, where we are questioned more about tone than reality, where we are evil just because someone says so out of an inflated sense of position, where truth is a question, not a certainty, we hear the voice of Jesus, who says, ‘Ego Eimi.'” Dawson said.
“The voice of the Son of God still sounds: I AM. I am the bread of life. I am the light of the world. I am the door. I am the good shepherd. I am the resurrection and the life. I am the way, the truth and the life. I am the true vine: the source, the remaking of Israel, the remaking of the human race, the new Adam, the end, the goal. …”
“Do not be afraid of the stormy sea and the strong wind against you. Draw your life from me, abide in me. Remain in me. Receive restored, ransomed, healed humanity from me.,” Dawson said, adding:
“Before Abraham was, I AM.”
The Rev. Parker T. Williamson is editor emeritus of The Layman and The Layman Online..