The Season of Flowers: Easter
[Ask:] Jesus says, "I am the vine, you are the branches." What is the spiritual condition that Jesus is addressing when he says this? What is the spiritual need that he is addressing?
When Jesus said, "I am the vine, you are the branches," he is addressing our condition of loneliness. A few years ago, at UCLA, there was a national conference on loneliness -- the first of its kind. One speaker defined loneliness as "knowing the TV schedules by heart."
There is an Irish proverb: "Better to be quarreling than lonesome."
But I think a theologian has said it best: "Loneliness is not being known." Other people know us but their knowledge of us is superficial. Very few people know what is in our hearts.
This conference on loneliness reported that, contrary to popular belief, it is not old people who are most lonely, but teenagers. Pause for a minute, and let's think about the teenagers in our lives. Think of them as being lonely.
A "Peanuts" cartoon shows Charlie going up to Lucy, who is in a little box labeled "Psychiatric Help, 5 cents." Charlie says: "Can you cure loneliness?" Lucy says, "For a nickel I can cure anything." Charlie says, "Can you cure deep-down bottom-of-the-well loneliness? No-hope end-of-the-world what's-the-use loneliness?" Mouth wide open and in a loud voice Lucy replies: "For the same nickel!?"
Perhaps some of you have seen a book called ALONE, by Admiral Richard Byrd about his exploration of the South Pole. The year was 1934. Because of complications, Admiral Byrd went alone to an advance weather base south of the main base. A specially built shack, 11 by 15 feet, was sunk into the snow. The famous explorer settled in for months of solitude with food, fuel, weather equipment, and a radio. For several weeks his weather experiments went well. He had time to read and listen to a record player ("Victrola"). Then tragedy struck. The exhaust pipe to the gas engine froze. Whenever he generated electricity with this engine, poisonous fumes came into the little shack, making him deathly ill. Sure that he was going to die, Admiral Byrd wrote farewell letters to his wife and children. Outside it was totally dark and the temperature fell to 50 degrees below zero. The crew sent out a rescue party, even though the 125 mile journey through the cold arctic night was filled with danger. They tried several times and failed. Finally they got through -- 2 and a half months later! Other human beings saved his life but in his book he tells how he got through the ordeal when he was alone: he writes, "There was an abiding presence when I was alone." This is how he explains his survival: "There was an abiding presence" -- something beyond and greater than himself that gave him the strength to endure.
God was with him. In such desperate circumstances, Byrd felt the presence of God! In Jesus' words, Admiral Byrd never lost his sense of connectedness to the Vine. God does not ever leave us alone, and Byrd was one of the fortunate persons who actually experienced it.
"Abide" means "to dwell in." We abide in God. God supports us in our loneliness. We are never alone, and we can call upon this presence through prayer.
The composer Johannes Brahms testified to this human capacity to call upon the presence of God when he said: "I always contemplate my oneness with the Creator before commencing to compose."
Do you write poems or paint pictures? Take Brahms' advice: "I always contemplate my oneness with the Creator before commencing to compose."
Let us live with the faith that, far from being alone in this awesome universe, we are supported continuously by the presence of God, the Vine. We are the branches which abide in the Vine.
In 1827 there was a Scottish Presbyterian preacher in a church called "The Wee Church of St Andrews." After 40 years, suddenly his health broke. His doctor sent him off to the warm sunshine of the French Riviera. After his last service, he walked through the churchyard down to a small boat. They all waved handkerchiefs, hoping to see each other soon again. Transferred to a larger ship, it stopped one night in northern France, where the passengers went ashore and spent the night in a country inn. The next morning, the Minister, Henry Francis Lyte, was found dead in his bed, and in his hand was a piece of paper on which he has written a poem.
