There is always something amazing about the world around us. We love to watch kittens and deer. We enjoy flowers and trees. The warm sandy beaches are as wonderful as the
snow covered mountains. Our eyes and ears are open to the world around us and we are stimulated by what we see. It is intentional. God did not create any part of anything we know of without purpose. His desire is to be your desire. Adam and Eve are the example of each of us. We too would have and do turn away from our creator when enticed by that which is around us. The Bible calls this “worshiping the creature more than the Creator”. His plan is to draw you back to Himself. His purpose is that we appreciate all He has made and worship the Maker of it all.
Each of us has been given gifts and talents. We are naturally endued with unique abilities mostly based upon our genetic filtering over the centuries. The results of planting apple trees is that you get the fruit of the tree, apples. So without giving a long list of examples the same is true of all plants, animals and people, Careful attention to pollination and breeding can accentuate particular qualities in each. Let us consider fruit. It is important to have crisp apples for some things and softer for another. Likewise there are green grapes or purple, large juicy ones or smaller meatier grapes each to be used for their proper purpose. Wild grape vines produce an enjoyable fruit for some while cultured or grafted grapes please others.
Yet, there is one constant which cannot be ignored. Each apple, grape or other fruit is tied to the stalk, tree or vine which produces it. There are ways of assessing the product of a plant and we say the fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree. What we mean is that when you find a fruit on the ground, you can look around and find fruit of a very similar kind hanging from the tree it fell from. People are like that. We tend to have the attributes and mannerisms of our nearest relatives. Many times this is true even if we did not grow up around them. A young child separated from his father at two years old will retain many of his fathers skills, traits and even ways of doing things or thinking at age twenty two and even sixty two.
But there is another truth which applies. When a fruit branch is taken from one plant and grafted into another it adapts to some of the qualities of the other fruit of the plant. It produces very interesting results when putting different types of plants together. Is a grapple a grape apple or an apple grape? Certainly it is not what it would have been but it is the result of purposeful manipulation. The Bible speaks of wild grapes being grafted back into the original grapevine. Metaphorically it speaks of us. People who have strayed from what the Lord created us to be, are drawn back to be placed under the nurture and influence of the Lord. Jesus said “I am the vine and you are the branches”. When we are grafted into the original plant our wild side is subdued and the nutrients and qualities of the vine change us. We produce different fruit than we would have as a part of the wild vine.
Some grapes are sweet, some sour and some even inedible. When the wild branches are grafted into the sweet vine they are fed by the vine and produce a unique flavor for the enjoyment of the keeper of the vineyard. In fact the results can be so enjoyable that others are drawn to imitate those results. People are like that. We can be taken from the rebellious, self-centered life we thought was good and restored to the life God desired for us to enjoy. Then when others see His glory in us, they too desire to be like that. It is not just that the grape branch is grafted into the good vine and grows well. It also is important that the fruit which is produced is able to light up the eyes of the taster when that plump juicy fruit is crushed between their teeth showering their taste buds with a rainbow of joy.
The immediate response is “Oh, Wow!” Then follows relishing the flavor of that which was once inedible, being realized as fantastic. The experience is followed by a desire to replicate it. When you became a believer in the sacrifice of Jesus as your only means to receive forgiveness for sin and became acceptable to God, you were grafted back into the vine. When you began to be fed by your new roots, you grew in ways you did not know were possible. The flavor of the juices in your fruit were as unique as you. Others have watched as you grew and produced fruit. They see in you the beauty of your King and love you for being His. This draws them to examine their own fruitfulness and their connection to the vine. Maybe they even see things in their own branch which negatively affects the flavor of their fruit. Maybe they will allow that to be pruned from their lives for their good.
Fruit are an example. Grapes are a metaphor. So be the grape. Be the best grape you can be. Your life, your circumstances, even your ill-chosen past is all part of the flavors your particular fruit carries. It should be unique, but it should be replenished from the good vine you are grafted into. Those branches which continued to produce bad fruit are pruned and cast into the fire. Even whole branches, even entire lives which reject the Savior.
Picture in your mind a silver platter piled high and hanging over the edges with plump juicy colorful grapes glistening in the radiant sunlight. It is a picture of the desire of the master gardener who labored to bring forth the best fruit. Contrast that with a pile of withered scraggly twisted lifeless vines which produced no good fruit. They are ready to be cast into the fire for there is no good thing within them. Then wonder. Which will be the picture of my life when I am finished? Will I have allowed the Lord to give me the desires of my heart or will my own selfish desires have made me good for nothing?
Be the richest, juiciest most desirable grape you can be. Choose to be grafted back into the good vine and filled with the nutrition of continual contact with its life giving juices. Follow after the flourishing fruit-producing branches you see around you. Know that each in their time will be pruned for greater results. Know that one day, the bounty of their lives will be held up as a monument to the joy of their King. Know that you shall likewise be pruned and that one day your fruit too shall be lifted high as an honor to the Maker of all things. Be the grape. The best, juiciest, most well fed, happily growing grape it is possible for you to be. So that when your body is withered and worn out by the seasons and trials of life, you can hear the Master say “Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of thy Lord.” Be the Grape!