There are multiple characters in the allegory of the vineyard in scripture. There is the vineyard owner, also known as the vinedresser. There are also the vine, the branches, the sap that flows from the vine to the branches and finally the fruit. Let’s consider together the second character in this depiction, the vine.

As we walked with our Sicilian vineyard owner friend among his beloved vines in mid- May, they weren’t much to look at. They were all sprouting light green supple branches, but the vines themselves were gnarled and covered with shaggy brown bark. It was a bit of a surprise to hear our host Ooo and Ahh over their appearance, “Isn’t she beautiful?” Some were upwards of a hundred years old and certainly looked it, bent and curved under the strain of years of growth. But beauty is as they say in the eye of the beholder and this vinedresser appreciated the beauty of each of his vines as they responded to his care and rewarded him with exquisite grapes. 

As Jesus led his confused disciples from the Passover meal to the Garden of Gethsemane, many believed that they walked through a vineyard as they crossed the Kidron Valley. In the midst of the vines, on the night of his betrayal and arrest, he spoke these words,

“I am the true vine and my Father is the keeper of the vineyard… I am the vine and you are the branches.” Jn.15:1,5 I am the vine, I am the true vine. 

Jesus, the true vine, was beautiful in the eyes of His Father. But to the world, he was merely a gnarled, shaggy, unattractive man.

“ For he grew up before him like a young plant,

And like a root out of the dry ground;

He had no form or majesty that we should look at him,

And no beauty that we should desire him.” (Isa.53:2)

And yet it is through this One, who called himself the true vine, that all the riches of God’s grace and mercy, all the privileges of adoption and inheritance, all of the fulfillment of bearing fruit that will remain, emanates. 

The only means for the vinedresser to receive the fruit of the vineyard, the only way for the branches to bear and carry fruit, is through the vine. The vine is the source of nourishment. The vine is the source of support. The vine is the conduit through which all that the branches need is delivered. Apart from the vine, the branches can produce nothing. All the benefits of the vinedresser’s nurturing, watering, fertilizing and tilling are received by the branches through the vine. 

As we walked with our host through his vineyard, watching as he tended and tied up the branches, we noticed that he examined each vine to see the place from which the branches were growing. “All the branches that are to be kept grow from above the pruning line. All those that grow below are suckers and need to be taken off.” On each of his vines was a place where at some point in its growth it had been cut off and all the new fruit-bearing growth emanated from above that line. The pruning line was the point of demarcation to distinguish between true branches and suckers.

The point of demarcation for the first disciples and every disciple of Jesus since then, is the cross of Christ, where the Son of God was cut off so that we, the branches, might have life. All true life emanates from this point. 

“By oppression and judgment he was taken away

and as for his generation, who considered

that he was cut off out of the land of the living,

stricken for the transgression of my people?” (Isa.53:8)

The apostle Paul, repeatedly and emphatically testified and taught that the cross, where our Lord sacrificed his life on our behalf, being cut off out of the land of the living, is the only source for our lives as “true branches of the true vine”.

“But far be it from me to boast except in the cross

of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified 

to me, and I to the world.

For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision,

but a new creation.” (Gal.6:14,15)

The new creation begins where the true vine was cut off. Any other connection point to the vine was deemed invalid by the vineyard owner. No matter how lush those branches appeared, he removed them. “They must be connected to the vine above the pruning line,” he insisted as he cast the verdant suckers off. We too must be connected to the life of God through the death of his one and only Son. This is where the new creation life begins. This is where fruit bearing life is made possible.

Some of the vines in the restored vineyard were upwards of a hundred years old. Year after year new branches came and after a season of fruitfulness, they died back and were removed. But the vine remains as the enduring source of life for all branches past, present and future. 

Jesus is the true and oldest vine, the source of our life, our vigor, our fruitfulness. It all comes through Him. Without the vine, there is no life. 

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were created through him… In him was life, and the life was the light of men. ( Jn1:1,3,4)

And from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. (Jn.1:16)

All that we need for eternal life and fruitful life is supplied through the vine. All we are to do is to receive and live in his supply of grace upon grace.

What about you? What is your relationship like with the true and oldest vine, Jesus?