while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

from me you can do nothing.6If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and
withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.7 If you remain in me and my words
remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.8 This is to my Father's glory, that you
bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

Isn\u2019t it great to be back into the Spring season again. Finally the
temperatures are warming up \u2013 the sun is starting to shine\u2026maybe
not today\u2026but lots of days \u2013 and we\u2019re starting to see signs of life
all around us.

Flowers and herbs and vegetables \u2013 seeds and shoots. It\u2019s time to
get back into the garden \u2013 to weed and to prepare the ground \u2013 and
to reconnect with the land. And our farmers are planting too.
Putting crops into the ground to prepare for another growing
season.

Now as we think about crops and industry and we pray for them
this morning \u2013 it\u2019s useful for us to notice how farming and our
food supply have changed over the last little while.

It\u2019s definitely changed \u2013 certainly there\u2019s always been a market
element to farming \u2013 but these days the business side of it has
become more prominent.

Efficiency, profitability, marketing, costing \u2013 in today\u2019s economy it\u2019s not enough to have some land and to grow something with it \u2013 you have to be precise and prepared \u2013 all the elements from

Now I begin with this not to get into a discussion about the
problems with our agricultural system \u2013 that\u2019s not what we\u2019re here
for \u2013 but to realize that the way we think about agriculture has
changed \u2013 and with it our understanding of its imagery has
changed as well\u2026

And that has a profound impact on our reading of Scripture \u2013 we\u2019re going to see that this morning as we open up the Word of God here in John chapter 15 \u2013 where:

Now when we hear Jesus saying this \u2013 what is your gut reaction? \u2013
what is this image saying to you about what it means to be in
Christ?

Did you think about evangelism? About sharing your faith? About
reaching out to people around you and getting them to come to
come here with you? To come to church?

The image of bearing fruit to the contemporary Christian reader is about people and numbers\u2026and we connect it all the way back to the book of Genesis where it says be fruitful and multiply\u2026

I have books and articles and CDs on my shelves all with the same
theme as this conference. How to be fruitful and build your
numbers.

A lot of them are good and useful things \u2013 don\u2019t get me wrong \u2013
anything that we can use to help share the love of Jesus Christ that
we know \u2013 in a way that reaches peoples\u2019 hearts and touches
peoples\u2019 lives \u2013 that\u2019s a good thing.

But there is a downside to this way of thinking about being
fruitful\u2026when you start hearing the language that all of these
sources are using \u2013 then church and Christianity starts to sound a
lot like\u2026what we\u2019ve just noticed in contemporary farming...

Efficiency, profitability, marketing, costing\u2026how can we as a
church plant and fertilize and harvest in a way that yields a
maximum return on our spiritual investment. How can we bear the
most fruit at the lowest cost\u2026