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John 15:1-8

Have you ever been present at a historic moment? I have. I was a member of the session of my home church the day we voted to kill the church. Of course we didn't think of it that way at the time. We actually thought we were doing the church a favor. But it was a favor build on fear and lack of vision - a fear that had dangerous and potentially deadly consequences.

You see, our church sent two elders to an evangelism conference to learn about ways to attract new members. When they came back, they were on fire with enthusiasm. They were absolutely brimming over with ideas that they couldn't wait to try. But first, they had to get session approval.

And so they made a lengthy presentation to the session, hoping that we might catch at least a glimpse of the vision that seemed so clear to them. It involved a series of detailed steps we could take to make our congregation more open to visitors and make us more visible within the community.

It was a plan that was breath-taking in both its sweep and its boldness. And it might have worked. Except for two things - it would have required a great deal of work and it would have required a radical change in who we were.

I really believe that if we had truly caught sight of their vision, the large amount of work wouldn't have mattered. However, what the vast majority of us saw - and, unfortunately, that included a much-younger me, I'm sorry to say - was that the comfortable, family church we all knew and loved would become bigger and less personal. We would no longer know everyone, nor they us. And for that reason, we voted not to pursue that evangelism plan.

We wanted to keep things just the way they were. But the reality is that life is a process of constant change - things never stay the way they are. And that moment - when we cast that historic vote - was the very instant that church began to die. We didn't know it at that time. But that's what happened. It took some time, but the congregation began to noticeably shrink and was only half its size in a handful of years.

Fred Craddock is a world-famous preacher, who tells a similar story about the small church he served as a student pastor. The church was in a community in eastern Tennessee about 20 miles from Oak Ridge. This was in the early days of the nuclear industry and both Oak Ridge and the atomic energy industry were booming.

Craddock says, people "...were coming from everywhere, hard hat types, in tents and trailers...and all kinds of lean-to's, and they covered those beautiful little hills with temporary quarters, [with their] wash hanging out...and little kids crying...and my...[beautiful] aristocratic little church with white frame building...was nearby."

Craddock saw that influx of workers as a wonderful opportunity for outreach, so he called a meeting of the church board and said, "We need to reach out to those folk...they've just come in from everywhere, and they're fairly close, [so they could be] our mission." But the chairman of the board, "No, I don't think so."

When Craddock asked him why, the chairman said, "They won't fit in. After all, they're just here temporarily, living in those trailers and all." Craddock tried his best to persuade him to change his mind by saying, "Well, they're here temporarily, but they need the Gospel. They need a church now..." To which the chairman replied, "Naw, I don't think so."

The end result of this discussion was a motion that was made by one of the chairman's relatives. The motion stated, "Members will be admitted to this church from families that own property in the county." The vote was unanimous because, as a student pastor, Craddock didn't have a vote. Craddock still looks back to that meeting as being his first real failure in the ministry.

Years later, he returned to that area for a vacation. He discovered that that little church no longer had a congregation. The building had been sold and was being used as a barbecue restaurant. So Craddock and his wife went into the restaurant to look around.

The pews were all pushed back against the wall and music was playing. A bunch of motorcycles were parked outside and a rough-looking crowd was inside, laughing and eating. looking at this, Craddock said wistfully, "It's a good thing this isn't a church anymore, because if it were [...] these people couldn't be here."

In our gospel lesson this morning, Jesus says, "I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing." When we hear Jesus say that, we have somehow come to believe that it's an invitation to a personal relationship with Jesus. It's as if it were a "stick with me, kid, and I guarantee we'll go places," "Me & Jesus" kind of theology.

But that's not what Jesus had in mind. It's not a individualistic statement at all. Instead, it's an invitation to come into - and remain in - community. When we're connected to the vine, we're automatically connected to all the other branches as well - with far larger consequences than just that of our personal issues and needs.

We Americans are so individually-oriented that we often miss the point of biblical stories like this one. But Jesus is trying to tell us that, through him, we are interconnected with all of humanity - that is, all of the children of God - in an organic web of interdependency. And through it all flows the life-giving power of Christ.

In our culture, we're raised with a philosophy of rugged individualism and dog-eat-dog survival of the fittest. But the funny thing is that it turns that even Darwin may not have meant what we thought he meant by the phrase. "survival of the fittest."

According to David Guard, a recent issue of Fast Company magazine ran an article entitled "Only the Pronoid Survive," which was a profile of Helena Cronin, co-director of the Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science at the London School of Economics.

Although most of us have never heard it before, the word "pronoid" is the opposite of the word "paranoid." As you know, to be paranoid is to be fearful of others, while being pronoid means to be trusting of others, and to see that the basis of life is cooperation rather than competition.

In the article, Cronin claims that Darwin has been misunderstood. She says that the survival of the fittest doesn't mean the survival of the meanest and strongest and best competitor. Instead, she argues that the real "fittest" are those who are most the generous, and that survival actually hinges on a willingness to do things for others and trusting them to do things for you. She points out that Darwin's own fieldwork is full of examples of animals giving up time, food, their mates, and even their lives for the sake of others.

She argues, "It turns out that you can actually prosper more by entering into relationships of reciprocation, so that you're both getting more than either of you would have gotten separately... Doing what is immediately good for oneself has been understood by Darwinists for a long time. But what hasn't been understood until recently is that you can actually do better for yourself by being cooperative and altruistic than you can by selfishly refusing to cooperate with others. It's not that you do as well. You actually do better - and all of you do better than if you had gone off on your own and refused to help others... The more you give away, the more you have."

At the end of the article, Cronin concludes, "Altruism has been hardwired into us; it's right there in the genes... We have a propensity for altruism, for wanting to give... for forgiving... [Even] Simple things like neighborliness... create a sense of safety."

That's essentially what Jesus is talking about when he says that he is the vine and we are the branches. He's saying that we are designed for interconnectedness and interdependence. And that, when we attempt to go it alone, we give up something absolutely vital to our existence.

As one author says, "We bear fruit by loving one another, by trusting and being trustworthy, by being generous and giving and forgiving. Such love casts out fear, and strangers become friends and enemies become guests."

And isn't that in essence where our recent successes as a congregation have come from? In most cases, when someone is in the hospital, you are there for them in person or by phone or with your cards or with your prayers?

When there are needs around the world, you are there with your generous financial support and with your interest when we bring a missionary here to talk about their work.

The church I grew up in thought of itself as a friendly church and it was, in fact, friendly if they knew you. But you had to make your own way in first. But in this church, when someone new walks in the door, you are there to greet them and make them feel welcome with a type of friendliness that churches like my home church only thought they had. It's a genuine friendliness that you quietly exhibit.

It's a true example of biblical hospitality - of interconnections through Christ who is the vine which nourishes us all. There are no limit to the love that flows from Christ. Is there a limit to our love? Amen.